Chance Assassin: A Story of Love, Luck, and Murder Read online

  “Huh?”

  “I can talk.”

  I smiled, then sat up so I could watch him. He stayed close to the door for a few seconds before moving into the room, circling the bed as if he was trying to keep the same distance between us. I turned off the TV, giving him the level of undivided attention I’d never bestowed upon anyone. “I only asked questions because you’re interesting,” I said, feeling the need to justify myself now that we were alone, so he wouldn’t get Charlie’s biased opinion on my curiosity. His face didn’t change. “Charlie doesn’t like talking about you. He got mad at me, actually. Then he stopped coming around, and it’s not like I could leave so I had to behave myself or I wouldn’t get any food, except what he brings really is shit and you were right to decline the offer, even though you look like you could use a big, greasy cheeseburger.”

  Frank finally smiled. “Now, you can talk.”

  “Are you sick or something?” I asked bluntly.

  He raised one eyebrow inquiringly.

  “You don’t look so good. I mean, you do, in that dangerous way they write romance novels about, oh beautiful stranger steal me from my husband spank me I’ve been—” I winced, wishing that Russian gangsters would cut out my tongue. “But not healthy. You look…tired. Not fine.”

  He watched me in blank disbelief for a few seconds, as if trying to figure out how one person could ramble on so much. I’d gotten that look before. Many times.

  “We don’t know each other that well, but you’ve seen me naked so I figure we’re close enough to have this discussion.”

  Frank laughed, shaking his head in disbelief at my mouth. “You are something else,” he said, then he sighed deeply and it was like he’d never been humored at all. How quickly the room seemed to darken. To get colder.

  He sat in the same chair and put a cigarette between his lips, then gazed up at me. “You don’t mind, do you?”

  God, he looked like a little kid when he did that. Even with the cigarette in his mouth. There was something so endearing about his face. Maybe it was because he had such a sad expression that I felt like he needed to be taken care of.

  I shook my head, moving to the edge of the bed to be closer to him. “I didn’t know you smoked,” I said. He didn’t smell like cigarettes. Not the way Charlie did. And he’d made Charlie go all the way out to his car when he had a full pack in his coat. That made me like him even more.

  He shrugged as he took a hard drag, holding it in for a second before blowing it away from me. “I don’t do it often,” he said. “Not like Charlie.”

  Nothing he did was like Charlie. “I wasn’t sure if you’d come back.”

  “I said I would.”

  “In a manner of not speaking.”

  “Don’t get lippy,” he warned, and he wiped off my key and set it on the nightstand.

  I could see how his tone could easily become threatening, but I just smiled. I felt really relaxed around him, and it was a nice change of pace from how uneasy Charlie had been making me the past few days.

  “How old are you?” Frank asked, blowing smoke away from me again as he spoke.

  “Sixteen,” I said. I usually lied, purely out of habit. Still, I could tell from his expression that he didn’t buy it. “If I was gonna lie I’d have gone older,” I added. I was used to the looks of disbelief, and I knew what he’d say next.

  “You look really young.”

  “I have an innocent face.” That was the truth. I looked more like fourteen. It didn’t help that I was small for my age.

  “Can I ask you a question?”

  I nodded. It was beginning to seem like Frank had a list of questions for me the same as I did for him. But I bet my list was longer, even without asking whether he’d prefer to come on my face or in my mouth, or if he’d rather just fuck me without further delay.

  “What did he offer you?”

  “You mean Charlie?” I asked. I would’ve thought he’d get the entire story from his friend.

  Frank took another drag on his cigarette, tilting his head just a little instead of responding verbally. And he wondered why I’d thought he was mute.

  “He asked me to steal a painting from that guy’s house. He said he’d give me fifty bucks for it. And he paid for my dinner.”

  “Is that all?” he said, sounding completely unimpressed.

  I looked away. The last thing I wanted was to cry in front of him, but just thinking about it brought a lump to my throat. What was I doing breaking into someone’s home for money? Much less the other things I’d been doing to survive since Mark had decided to go back to his wife.

  The way I’d gotten by so far had been just short of prostitution; stealing wallets from lowered pants or finding an older man willing to let me live with him in exchange for the occasional blowjob and some light housekeeping. But the last living situation had gone bad, and I’d been left without a jacket in January on the streets of Chicago.

  I’d never been able to handle the cold. Every time I spent too long outdoors in the winter I seemed to end up getting sick, and having a runny nose makes giving good head extremely difficult.

  Seeing Charlie waving to me from inside that diner, cozy and warm, was like a beacon of hope. Even if I knew about him then what I did now, I still would’ve gone to him, because the chances of getting another roof over my head before I froze to death were growing slimmer with every sniffle.

  “Well, I was fucking desperate, and I didn’t have any other offers,” I said heatedly.

  “I didn’t mean it that way,” Frank said. “I’m just always amazed at his…generosity.”

  He had actually made a joke. I didn’t think he had it in him.

  “I bet he never paid you,” he added.

  I shrugged. “I didn’t exactly complete the task.”

  “I’m sure there was no task to complete, Vincent,” Frank said.

  Even though I’d only known him to have a voice for a couple of hours, I would’ve thought I’d notice an accent. But it was only apparent in my name. The way he said it was different than any way I’d ever heard. It was more like van son, instead of the standard, almost hard sounded vin rhyming appropriately with sin with a T on the end. But even as interested as I was in his pronunciation, what he’d said had kept my attention.

  “What do you mean, no task?”

  “The man who stabbed you, did he look like the type of person who’d own a painting?”

  I thought back to the house; the mismatched furniture that screamed bachelor and the flat screen high-definition TV covering almost an entire wall. Nothing on the bookshelf, save for the thick instruction guides to his over-priced electronics and a couple of magazines about making money. “No,” I muttered, feeling a bit foolish for looking as hard as I had.

  Then I thought of the man’s face, not just his shocked expression but his features as well. “He was familiar,” I said. I knew I hadn’t blown him. He wasn’t my type; guys with earrings were a bigger turn-off than the ones with wedding rings. But I couldn’t place him. “Who was he?”

  Frank watched me in silence for several minutes, waiting for me to figure it out. Then he started to try and help jog my memory. “When you first saw Charlie, what were you doing?”

  “I was walking past the diner. He signaled for me to come inside.”

  “How were you walking?”

  “You mean what direction?”

  “No, not the direction. Something about you must have caught Charlie’s eye. Were you limping? Were you hurt?”

  “I was cold,” I said, remembering how the wind had practically blown the goose bumps off my arms. “I didn’t have a coat―”

  “Fifty bucks,” Frank said with an air of understanding. “You could get a warm coat for that.”

  I frowned. He must’ve seen my desperation a mile away. If I hadn’t looked cold, would he have still offered me the job? Would he have paid me even less if they were having a sale?

  “Charlie’s good at reading people,” Fra
nk said reassuringly, as if he knew exactly what I was thinking. He had obviously picked up the skill from his friend.

  “What a dick,” I sighed, feeling completely transparent. Then I remembered the parking lot of the diner. I’d said the exact same thing. There was a brand new Corvette parked right in front, in the closest spot that wasn’t marked Handicapped. I wasn’t as impressed with the car so much as appalled by how badly it was parked. The guy was just looking for trouble parking that way in a new car like that. “Oh, my God,” I whispered in shock as the realization hit. “That car! That was his car. I saw it in his driveway when I left the house. He was at the diner!”

  Frank smiled again, though this time he looked less than pleased with my recollection of the events. But that was all I had. He knew Charlie better than I did, he’d have to take the story from here. I watched him, waiting for him to fill in the blanks.

  “If I had to guess,” he started, sounding even less pleased than he looked, “either the man got the last blue plate special or he took Charlie’s intended parking spot.”

  “He had a really good spot,” I said. “Would Charlie do that? Over something so…”

  “Petty? All it takes is a little motive and an address. Don’t ever leave your mail in your car where someone can see it.”

  “I don’t have a car,” I said with a smirk. I also didn’t have an address, but that was beside the point. It was silly, but working with Frank to figure this out made me feel important. And intelligent for once, considering all the dumb things I’d done recently.

  “Here,” he said, and pulled out a fifty dollar bill. “You’ve earned it.”

  I tried to decline the money, but he forced it into my hand before I could. “Thanks,” I said, and shoved it in my pocket. I was glad that Frank was the one paying me. If it had been coming from Charlie, I wouldn’t have taken it. How could he have someone’s life ended over an area of asphalt? Even if Frank hadn’t finished him off, which I assumed was what happened, did he deserve to be robbed because Charlie had to walk an extra five feet?

  “What happened to your coat?” Frank asked, unconcerned by Charlie’s disturbing motivations.

  “I got in a fight with my boyfriend,” I said. It was easier to call him that than explain how I was really just sucking him off to have somewhere to stay. “He hit me and I left without it.”

  “That’s where the black eye came from,” he said, another one of his questions answered. I instinctively touched my face. It had seemed like such a big deal at the time, but in light of being stabbed I’d forgotten all about it. “It’s gone now,” Frank said. “Will you go back to him?”

  “No! He punched me in the face!”

  He smiled like he was proud of me. “Good kid.”

  I’d never considered being called kid to be a compliment, especially from someone I wanted to sleep with, but I hadn’t gotten that look in ages and it felt really nice. Still, I didn’t think I was deserving. Sure it was good to leave an abusive relationship, but it wasn’t good to get right back into another one.

  Even without the court’s help, I had a tendency to find the worst possible living situations. The most brutal of my appointed guardians hadn’t been as bad as some of the men I’d willingly gone home with. And being roughed up did have its merits. It usually got me sympathy from the next guy, and if it wasn’t for the fear of them killing me, or worse, ruining my pretty face, the momentary pain would be worth the adrenaline kick that came after.

  It was like a runner’s high, muscles burning and lungs scorched, and then suddenly, elation. Only what came from getting hit was a thousand times better, my whole body going into defensive mode, instinct taking over for just a second before it faded and I went back to being scared and defenseless. But nothing compared to the rush I’d gotten after being stabbed. Or more precisely, after stabbing someone in return. I’d acted on that instinct, and I’d defended myself. And the rush had never really left. All I had to do was think about fighting back, and I could taste that elation again.

  “I can go get your things for you, if you’d like,” Frank said.

  I stared at him. Frank barely knew me. As far as I was aware, he still hated me. Not even Mark, in the height of our relationship, had offered to do something like that. He hadn’t even believed me when I told him that my new foster dad shoved me into a wall hard enough to crack the plaster. “You would?”

  “Give me his address. I’ll go over there right now.”

  I had to give Frank credit. Putting me at a loss for words wasn’t easy. I could just imagine the look on Jay’s face when Frank came knocking at his door to collect my stuff. He wouldn’t be such a tough guy when there wasn’t an underweight teenager to knock around. But then I remembered that I didn’t actually have anything worth retrieving, and I realized with great despair that I’d have to turn down his offer. “It’s two in the morning,” I said instead, amazed to see just how late it had gotten.

  Frank glanced at his watch as if the clock on the nightstand couldn’t be trusted.

  “He’s probably thrown it all out anyway,” I added, rather than admitting that the only belongings I had apart from that old coat was a pink shirt, my worn sneakers and the pair of stained jeans I was wearing. At least I had nice socks.

  “That’s probably true,” he said.

  “Thanks for offering, though. It’s really sweet of you.”

  His face colored. I’d forgotten how bashful he was. It took my stomach growling for him to look back at me. “Are you hungry?”

  I was always hungry. “Are you?” I asked reproachfully. Our discussion hadn’t made me forget how thin he looked.

  “I haven’t had much of an appetite lately,” he admitted.

  “I noticed,” I said. The only time I’d ever been upset enough to lose my appetite was after my parents died. Luckily, a fun-sized Snicker’s bar in the candy dish on my case worker’s desk lured me back from the edge. “You’re not okay,” I said again, hoping this time he wouldn’t turn the questioning back on me. “What’s going on?”

  He lit another cigarette. I thought I saw his hand shaking. “A friend of mine got hurt.”

  “Are they gonna be all right?” I asked. Of course they weren’t. Not if he stopped eating and sleeping over it.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Is that where you keep going? To be with them?”

  “No, I was working,” he said, his tone cold and resentful.

  I wasn’t exactly sure what his occupation was, apart from keeping me out of jail, but it was worth a try. “Maybe I can help. I can do your work and you can go be with your friend.”

  He looked toward the fresh scar on my side, not needing to say a word about what a capable employee I was.

  “What are the chances of that happening again?”

  “Pretty good, actually,” he said, though he didn’t sound condescending in the least. “I have a few just like it.”

  “You do?” I asked. That certainly helped me not to feel like such a failure. Maybe Charlie would hire me again after all. “He did a pretty good job cleaning me up, huh? For not being a real doctor…”

  “How do you know he’s not a real doctor?” Frank laughed, though the lack of surprise in his voice was a definite confirmation of my suspicions.

  “I guessed,” I said proudly.

  “Well,” he started, “that’s irrelevant. Charlie wasn’t the one who cleaned you up.”

  I gaped at him. “What?”

  “Vincent,” he said, as if he’d expected me to have figured this out already. The accent was definitely still there. I hadn’t imagined it.

  “You did?” I asked. The pleasure of the thought was greatly overshadowed by the fact that I had no idea why Charlie wouldn’t have.

  “Don’t take it personally,” Frank said. It took me a second to realize he was referring to Charlie again and wasn’t shaming me for getting a kick out of him playing doctor. He probably didn’t even realize my mind would go that direction. I di
dn’t take him for the type of man who was aware of how good looking he was. “Charlie’s very old fashioned…”

  “Oh,” I sighed when I grasped what he was trying to say. The feeling was like being stabbed again. Old fashioned. Closed-minded. Gay = AIDS. That was why he had me change my own bandages. It had nothing to do with his arthritis. “I thought he was my friend!” I pouted, though even as the words came out, I knew that I didn’t really believe that. It was just one more lie I’d needed to hear; that someone in the world, even someone like him, gave a shit whether I lived or died.

  “He’s not your friend. He’s my friend,” Frank said, the coldness returning to his voice.

  That was a revealing statement if I ever heard one. Frank knew it, too. I could see on his face that he hadn’t meant to say it. “Is that why you hate me?”

  “I don’t hate you,” he said, as if he’d only now realized the fact. Then he turned away from me in a sort of stunned silence, his eyebrows knotted together like the lack of loathing deeply troubled him.

  It may have bothered him to be that much closer to loving me, but I was overjoyed. And as irrational as it was, I felt like everything was going to be okay now. “Charlie does though, right? He hates me.”

  “Has he been rude to you?” Frank asked, sounding like he’d definitely do something about it if my answer was yes.

  I looked down. “He’s just…it’s been a bit uncomfortable lately. I mean, it’s like I’ve done something to upset him. I think he might kick me out soon.”

  “He’s not allowed to kick you out, Vincent,” Frank said cryptically. God, the two of them were so hard to figure out. I couldn’t get it straight, who was working for whom. “It’s pretty late. I should let you get some sleep.” He was changing the subject again.

  “I’m not tired,” I protested immediately. Even if he never answered another one of my questions, I didn’t want him to leave.

  He smiled. “You’re still recovering. And Charlie isn’t taking as good of care of you as he should be.”