Page 88 of Assassin's Game
Levi flinched but didn’t back down. “I already do that. I decide who I take out. I decide who is innocent and who is not. You think I’d trust you to make those decisions? The man who threatened my family?”
“Threats are nothing.” The words were emotionless, like X’s eyes. “You’ll be called on to make decisions without guidance, to be responsible for each action, each thought. To bring justice. And yes, I will rely on you for that final judgment. The only way to be certain you were the right choice—and make no mistake, you are the right choice—was to push you to the absolute brink.” His eyes flicked to Mikaela. “And you passed, all of you, with flying colors. One team, one decision.”
He clasped his hand in front of him this time, the gold Rolex on his wrist gleaming in the artificial light.. “That is my proposal. That is your choice. And you must make it now.”
“And if we don’t?” Mikaela asked, voice low and mean.
“Then you’ll see, Ms. Nixon”—X grinned, a flash of shark’s teeth that chilled my gut—“I always keep my promises.”
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Chapter Thirty-Nine
Nix —
“You want us, together”—Levi waved his finger between his chest and mine—“to work for you, as one team, killing on your order.”
“Yes,” X replied blandly.
“No.” It was my turn to deny X. Not because I refused to work with Levi, but because we were not someone else’s trigger. “No one controls us but us.”
“You’ve been around military your whole life, Ms. Nixon. You know we are all controlled by something or someone.”
“Are we?” Levi asked.
“Of course.” X moved closer, less a king and more a benevolent leader. “Societal rules. Social constructs. Laws, whether those are made by a governing body or one’s own conscience. Merely because I control you does not mean we cannot do good together.”
Levi glanced at me, and in his eyes I saw the same knowledge I knew was in mine: did we have a choice? We could run. We could kill X right here and pray getting out of this compound wasn’t harder than getting in had been. Or we could say yes, either because we were truly agreeing, or to bide our time.
All doable choices, but which one was best?
“Who else knows what you’ve dug up about us?” I asked.
“Enough people that killing me won’t free you. But over time I believe you won’t need intel to hold you here; the work will speak for itself.”
Because our targets would be just? “And if we disagree with the chosen target?”
“You won’t.” X did that minuscule head tilt I’d seen him do a couple of times before, the only indicator of reaction, maybe even emotion that I had witnessed so far. “I can guarantee it. I know you, each one of you, thoroughly. Coaxing you into working with me is hard enough.” He ignored Levi’s snort at the wordcoaxing. “Why take killers with zero conscience and try to give them one? Why not take killers obsessed with justice, perhaps because of the injustices done to them and those they loved in the past, and grant them the highest opportunity to fulfill their calling?”
Jesus, with that salt-and-pepper hair and the benign look in his eyes, I could almost believe he was as trustworthy as someone’s grandpa. But I hadn’t been that naive for decades.
“Without any guarantee as to the protection of our families, the keeping of our secrets, we could never agree.”
Those words told me Levi was weakening. Unfortunately I was following him down that same road of futility. What choice did we have, at least for now?
“I doubt my word in writing would mean much,” X pointed out. “Nor would handing over the hundreds of files and papers I’ve collected on you. Nothing will convince you until you actually come work with me.”
“No,” Levi said again. “Not unless we have the same amount of dirt on you.”
X spread his hands wide. “Then find it. Create your own file. But work with me in the meantime. If it’s your families you worry for,” he said, “I will guarantee their safety.”
“A guarantee from you means nothing,” I said. The circular argument added bite to my words. I wanted out, wanted all this to end.
But it didn’t look like I was going to get what I wanted.
“My guarantee means nothing yet, at least,” X agreed, frustrating me even more. “In time…”
Levi stepped closer, and I couldn’t help but admire the fact that X didn’t flinch, didn’t back away or call for guards. He stood his ground and stared at Levi as if they were simple colleagues, as if Levi couldn’t gut him before the soldiers beginning to wake up around the room would stand a chance of intervening. Even I might be sweating bullets at that proximity, but not X.
