Page 26 of Assassin Anonymous

It’s truth by default. A year and a few days ago I would have considered the possibility. Remainders complicate equations. I hate myself for thinking that. Old programming. But the way her body relaxes, she seems to accept it as sincere.

She stares at the screen on the seat back in front of her, playing an advertisement for the airline. “So what’s the plan?”

“Once we land, I should have instructions on where to meet my old handler, which I will ignore, and then I’ll go find him,” I tell her. “We post you and the kitty up at a hotel. I’ll hit an ATM and get some cash. I’ll see what I can figure out. Then I come back to you and we decide on the next right action.”

I’ve got one more errand to run, but I don’t want to tell her about that one. I’m still trying to convince myself that now isn’t the right time. But I’m flying across the world—when else might I get the chance?

“Dump me in a hotel,” she says. “Like a glass figurine you don’t want to break.”

“Astrid, the people I’m dealing with are serious.”

“Here’s the thing about the people you deal with,” she says. “They all end up coming to me to fix them, because at the end of the day they’re just scared little boys who want their mommy.”

“The hotel is safer.”

She sits back and folds her arms. “The hotel better have a nice spa.”

“I’m gonna hit the head.”

She digs in her purse and passes me a small zipped case. “Clean it up, apply a fresh bandage. Simple enough, right? You don’t need help?”

I wave the case at her. “Thanks.”

As I move toward the front of the cabin my body cracks back to life. I pick an empty bathroom, which is spacious enough to move around in. One of the few perks of international flights. I splash some water on my face, try to wash away the fuzziness. I take a piss and wash my hands and pull my shirt up.

The stitches have held. It still looks pretty gnarly, but no redness or bruising. I give it a poke around the edges. Hurts, but normal parameters of pain. I open the case and clean the wound and put a fresh bandage over it, and when I’m done and everything is put away I turn to the mirror and stare at myself.

I’m still not sure if bringing Astrid along was the right call. Maybe I should have gotten my hands on some cash and sent her off to points unknown before I left for the airport. Now she wants to help? I don’t begrudge her the impulse, but the last thing I want to do is put her in the line of fire.

I scratch at the two days’ growth of stubble on my face and wonder what it’ll be like to see Ravi again. I never had much of a family. The Agency became something adjacent to that. Ravi being the dad who sometimes sent you to knock down a hornet’s nest with a stick while he drank beers in the living room.

By the end of my reign, just invoking the name Pale Horse was enough to make people drop their weapons and run. I walked on water. I was a god. Hell followed with me. Now the one thing I was good at, the one thing I was better at than nearly anyone, is something I can’t do anymore.

What if this is his game plan? Flush me out, drop the hammer.

The Agency could be behind this. There’s a reason their employment plan doesn’t come with a 401(k). You die, or you survive long enough to run and hide. Could be there’s something buried in my head that the Agency needs, or doesn’t want someone else to know.

But I still can’t shake the feeling that this is personal. The Russian took the notebook. The list of everyone I need to make amends to. He took it like he was looking for it.

I’ve got a lot of questions right now, and not a lot of answers, but that doesn’t bother me. The thing that bothers me—that downright scares me—is whether Ravi is going to see it in my eyes when we sit across from each other. That I’m no longer willing to kill. That I can no longer protect myself.

I’ve got to sit down with the lions and hope they’re not hungry.

Which is the problem with guys like Ravi.

They’re always hungry.

I need something to give an edge. Just a little bit of assurance. The idea comes to me quick, because it’s a bit cliché, but sometimes the clichés are that for a reason—they work. I exit the bathroom and head back toward my seat, get close to Astrid, and tell her, “Maybe there is a way you can help.”

She smiles and says, “I’m listening.”

—

I had hoped that, since it’s winter, it wouldn’t be as hot as the last time I was here. But no, as soon as we stepped outside the airport, the humidity hugged me like that weird uncle you try to avoid: way too tight and in all the wrong places.

It’s a little cooler inside the Maxwell Food Centre, free from the sun’s judgmental gaze, with an army of ceiling fans pushing the air around, swaying the garland and tinsel strung from the rafters that thinly acknowledge the holiday.

It’s near lunchtime, so the place is packed with people lined up at the various food stalls. The sound of pots banging and woks scraping, along with the smell of sizzling meat. Not many white faces, so again, I stand out.

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