Page 1 of Lesson In Forgiveness

Chapter One

Tabitha

Sandwiched between a mortally obese woman and a man who smelled like a skunk’s ass, Tabitha Fairfax was not a happy assassin. After a hellish time in Ireland, thanks to the Gardaí sniffing six paces behind her, all she’d wanted to do was kick back in her first class seat, have a glass of champagne to celebrate the rather spectacular kill she’d left behind in a room at The Merrion, and relax for a few hours.

Her cover—the identity she’d needed for that first class seat—had somehow been compromised, which meant she’d had to take a few extra days dodging the fucking police while securing a fresh passport and identification.

It wasn’t hard to figure out who was responsible for putting her in such an untenable position; her phone had blown up only a handful of hours after she snatched up a lucrative contract from a member of the Irish mafia.

Anarchy and Olivia.

Her brother’s wife and the woman she’d taken on as a pet project, so to speak.

Fairfaxes weren’t allowed pets. Anything small and furry was considered a waste of time, soft and frivolous, and a tool to be used as a training device.

Serial killers all started with murdering the cute stuff first, right?

That was one test she’d passed with flying colors. By the time Tabitha was six years old, she’d been beaten—physically and mentally—to the point where her emotions were already dead and buried.

The next test… well, she’d failed that one miserably.

Resisting the urge to slam her fist into her neighbor’s flowery midriff for taking up so much of her personal space, Tabitha drew in a calming breath—through her teeth so she didn’t have to inhale the sick scent of body odor—and tried not to imagine massacring the entire plane.

Sometimes, if she thought about doing something and zoned out enough, that something became horribly real.

Instead, she recalled the brief directive she’d seen posted on the dark web site she most often used to find her next hit. Nothing fancy, nothing particularly exciting, but taking it meant she could go home for a while.

Mitchell. E. Denver, CO. Two-fifty.

Two hundred and fifty thousand was a hefty sum for a simple hit, which roused her suspicions. The brief search she’d done on one Elias Mitchell didn’t come back with much; no social media presence, no overtly active social life. The guy was the right-hand man to some construction magnate, kept his head down and out of trouble, and was apparently just a nice, British citizen making a decent life for himself in the US.

She smelled a rat.

Sliding her eyes to the right, she glared at the odorous prick beside her, wondering if her thoughts were being influenced by the smell coming off him. Dead rat, she decided, rotting in his colon. She’d smelled corpses which were less offensive.

When he actually lifted his hip and farted, it was all she could do not to yank the ribbon from the ponytail she’d fashioned her stupid brown wig into, and wrap it around his neck. It would be most satisfying to pull it tight, listening to the choking sounds he made, watching his eyes bulge until the tiny blood vessels popped, seeing his face turn from red to purple to ashen gray.

Tabitha felt the itch begin beneath her skin, a warning sign she was becoming overwhelmed and overstimulated. She didn’t cope well with people touching her, breathing her air, invading her sense of self.

Dominic had done all that and more.

Fisting her hands, she forced herself to step away from reality, shutting down all but the most basic functions she required to keep breathing. Stepping away from the situation so the urge to kill every single living thing on the damn plane didn’t escalate.

It was going to be a long fucking flight from Dublin to Philadelphia.

She just hoped the bounce from Philly to Phoenix didn’t suck as hard.

*

Grit

“You want me to go to Denver.”

“Yes.”

“It’s fucking cold in Denver, Atticus.”

His boss smirked. “Think you’ve got a few more months before the snow hits, Grit. If you’re worried about maintaining your tan, I don’t think that’ll be an issue for a while.” He tapped his fingers on the desk. “I need my best guy on this.”

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