The Accidental Assassin (9 page)

My eyes drifted shut as I contemplated my murderous knight in shining armor. Even in my dreams I couldn’t escape my reality. Rachel at the coffee shop made a gun with the foam on my café mocha before chasing me down the block with a knife, but the worst were the ones about Mr. Song. He was walking through the building where I used to answer phones and the lights were flickering. I chased him past airplanes that were half-built, begging him for forgiveness, but he never stopped, never looked back. Instead he stopped at the door to the engineering wing, his shoes drenched in blood, and knocked.

“Please forgive me!” My fists clenched. There was blood on my hands, caked under my nails.

“Ava.”

“I didn’t mean to kill you.”

“Ava.”

“Please!” I reached out to touch Song.

A hand closed on my shoulder and I woke screaming. Owen looked down at me with sad eyes.

“Shh. You’re okay. It was just a dream.”

I took in a lungful of cool air and choked. Bile rose in my throat and I covered my mouth. Pushing past Owen I ran to the bathroom and got rid of last night’s soup. I clung to the cool porcelain and wept as quietly as I could. I tried to choke back my sobs but there was no stopping them. My eyes burned and every muscle in my body felt as if I had just completed a marathon by the time I was finished. Pushing away from the toilet I leaned back against the bathtub and rubbed the back of my hand across my nose.

Owen knelt down next to me and held out a wet wash cloth. “Finished?”

“Think so.” I took the wet rag from him and pressed it to my face. “Sorry ‘bout that.”

“No need to apologize.” He sat down on the floor and leaned against the tub next to me. “I thought it would happen yesterday.”

“You thought I would break down and toss my guts yesterday?” I leaned my head back and looked at him from the corner of my eye.

“Killing isn’t easy. The first time is always the worst.”

“Did you throw up after your first… kill?” Hit? Mark? Murder? I didn’t know the lingo.

He let his head fall back and closed his eyes. I watched as he swallowed and wondered if he was reliving it in his head.

“Two days later.” For all the emotion he expressed he could have been an android. Which meant it was probably more important in some way than he would let on.

“A real tough guy, huh? Two days.” I shrugged. “I guess I shouldn’t be ashamed that I lasted a whole day. That’s almost as good as you.” Which was probably only because I had been too busy running for my life to stop and really think about it all. Or maybe my moral compass was off. I’d been too worried about my life to think of the one I had accidentally taken.

His lips curved upward just a hair.

“Was he really a bad guy?” I turned my face to watch him carefully.

“Yes.” His deep voice was firm. I didn’t have to say who I meant.

“He killed women and girls?”

“Most prostitutes don’t retire, Ava. They live a life where they trade part of themselves for money; sex and companionship are commodities. It’s a high stakes world and Song was brutal.”

“How do you know for sure it was him?” I tried to brush some of my tear dampened hair out of my face.

“A local madam lost some of her girls to Song. They ended up dead not long after.”

“And what, she cared about the turncoats?” I frowned. “If it’s such a brutal world, you’d think she’d have chalked it up to what they deserved. Not spend money to avenge their deaths.”

“Too right.” His chin jerked decisively. “From what I found, she was more angry that some of her high rollers followed the girls to Song’s business and never came back, even after their favorite girls were gone. That’s bad for profits so she decided to make a spectacle and remove him from the scene. He encroached on her territory and then spat in her face.”

I thought it over. “Why not just lure his girls away from him?”

“Money. If those girls come to her looking for a job she has the upper hand and can pay less. She’d have to dangle a large carrot to get them to come to her otherwise.”

“It’s a prostitute turf war.” I shook my head. “Like in a movie.”

“Fiction is usually grounded in some sort of reality.” He stood up and offered me his hand. “Would you like to get some breakfast?”

“I’d really like to brush my teeth.” I let him pull me to my feet.

“Extra toothbrushes in the medicine cabinet. Then we eat.” He closed the door behind him and I stared at my reflection. I had hopped on the carousel of death and had no idea which way it was going to take me.

DECIDING WHICH VEHICLE to take to town gave me pause. We could use the stolen car because I’d changed the tag while Ava was sleeping. Or we could take the old farm truck from the garage. Then again, people might recognize the truck and it would be better to keep a low profile here. Most of the people I ran with long ago were gone or locked up, but it paid to be safe.

Ava might object to using the stolen car, though. Watching her cry in my mother’s bathroom had been like a knife to the gut. How was I supposed to comfort her over killing someone? Patting her on the back would have been patronizing. Any sort of comment I made would sound empty. I would have made tea, but we were out. So I’d gotten her a rag and sat on the floor instead.

The gentlemanly thing would be to take the truck so I didn’t upset her any more, but my pragmatic side pointed out that it would be better to keep her alive than to soothe her feelings. She was just going to have to suck it up.

The bathroom door knob turned and I stopped pacing. I’d felt heat before, but having someone else by my side as I dealt with dangerous people was a new experience. It made me uneasy to feel responsible for another person’s safety, and it was wearing on my nerves. With slow, deliberate moves I picked up my laptop and placed it back in the safe. No reason to telegraph my unease.

I closed the safe and froze when I saw Ava. All traces of the makeup she had worn the day before were gone, letting a vulnerability shine through her eyes that was at odds with the defiant way she held her chin. When her gaze met mine it was like being kicked in the gut. I’d just watched her get rid of everything I’d fed her the night before. There were circles under her eyes and she was pale, her hands twisting the hem of the over-sized sweater she was wearing, leaving the material disfigured. But something in her eyes remained fierce.

I’d never seen anyone so beautiful in my life.

I couldn’t tell you what it was that drew me. She would never be a model and she wasn’t sultry or glamorous, but just a look at her made me want to bundle her up somewhere safe so that I could enjoy her smiles forever.

“Ready?” I cleared my throat.

“Where are we going?” Her voice was low, hoarse from her earlier sickness.

“Breakfast.” I slid my guns into my shoulder harness and slipped my blazer over them. I hadn’t taken the time to change since we’d gotten to Oxford.

“And then where?” She looked around the room and then shook her head. She had nothing to bring with us.

“We need more supplies.” I opened the front door and waited for her to go through.

“Duct tape, tarps?” Her lips quirked into a smile.

“Har, har. Look who woke up with a funny bone.” I rolled my eyes. “I meant more food, maybe some soap.”

She didn’t respond, just shook her head.

“Besides, I have plenty of the other stuff in my super-secret kill room.”

She stumbled a bit and shot a glare in my direction. “Not funny.”

“You started joke hour.” I quickened my pace so I could get to the car and open the door.

“I’m officially shutting it down.” She tried to look annoyed but couldn’t hide the amusement in her eyes.

“Kill joy.” I closed her door and moved around to the driver’s side.

“Nope, that’s your job.”

Ouch. That one stung.

“Way to beat a dead horse, Ava.” I set the car in drive and headed for town.

She snickered loudly. “What, that doesn’t fall under your job description, too?”

“I leave the animal slaughtering to my apprentice.”

“You have an apprentice?” Her tone lost some of its laughter.

“No, Ava. I don’t have an apprentice. There is no assassins’ guild. No journeymen trying to work their way up the ranks. No apprentices mucking bloody rooms.” I sighed. “And I don’t beat animals.”

“Sorry.” I could see her suck her bottom lip into her mouth. “I’m in unfamiliar territory.”

“No problem.” I kept my voice calm. “You’re going to have to trust me and if that means answering random questions then I will do my best to supply the correct response.”

“Look, I’m not used to depending on other people. I take care of myself.” She frowned out the window. “So this is new for me.”

“And you don’t like it.” If the roles were reversed I wouldn’t like it either.

“Of course I don’t like it. And it’s not exactly like you’re upstanding citizen material.” She waved her hands in front of her. “I mean you’re not a police officer or secretly a knight in the Queen’s Royal Guard.”

“Why are you so sure I’m not a secret knight in the Queen’s Guard?” I raised an eyebrow but kept my eyes on the road.

Silence filled the car.

When I finally looked over at my companion her mouth was ajar. I couldn’t help the smile that split my face.

“You asshole. I knew you weren’t some secret agent.” She crossed her arms.

“You thought about it.”

Her eyebrows narrowed and she squinted at me. “You’re awfully chipper today. Aren’t you breaking some kind of assassin rule?”

“Nowhere in the indoctrination did it say I had to frown while killing people.”

“I bet you had classes on how to annoy people, too.” She looked out the window but I could see a small smile in her reflection. “For your exam you would just stare at the instructor with that smug grin plastered across your face.”

“Top of the class.”

“I can imagine.” She shook her head. “Did you wear bullet proof vests to class? Or were you expected to protect yourself with bare hands from ninjas that jumped out from nowhere?”

“You have a very active imagination.” I turned onto the road that would take us to town.

“Maybe, but I never imagined I would kill someone in a parking garage or run away with an assassin.” She cracked the window and lifted her head as if trying to get a good breath. “Or that I would be riding along a back road in a stolen car.”

“Well, killing Song was an accident. An accident that he caused.” I shrugged and turned on the windshield wipers. The misty rain was making it difficult to see the road. “No one imagines they’re going to run over a pimp in a car garage.”

A soft chuckle escaped her soft lips that blossomed into a throaty laugh. “Oh God. I killed a pimp in a London car garage. A pimp. A well dressed, non-fur wearing pimp.”

“Yes, you did.” Worry crept up my throat. “Are you about to lose it again?”

“No.” She laughed again. “Maybe. Actually, I think I’ve already lost it.”

I swerved for the edge of the road.

“Not lose it as in my lunch. I mean my mind. I’m pretty sure I’ve lost my mind.” Her laugh took on a shrill note. “Look at me. I’m wearing a stranger’s clothes, riding in a stolen car, a murderer, and running around with a hot hitman. I wanted to shake up my life a little, but this is a bit much.”

“You think I’m hot?” I slowed the car to turn into a parking lot.

“Is that all you heard? Yes. You’re hot. Okay? It’s not like you don’t know that. Your targets probably throw themselves at your feet with a smile. That’s not my point.” She waved her hands in the air and her cheeks turned a pretty red. It amused me to no end. “My damn point is that my life is a fucking mess right now! I’m a freaking mess right now. And we’re…shopping? Where are we? Is this a meat market?”

She turned her large blue eyes in my direction while flinging a hand in the direction of a sign that was shaped like chicken riding a pig.

“Yes, this is a meat market. No, me being hot was not the only thing I heard you say.” Though it had been a bright point in her rambling. I opened the door and walked around to her side of the car. She was still pointing at the sign.

“That pig doesn’t look very happy.” Her eyes met mine as I opened her door.