Chance Assassin: A Story of Love, Luck, and Murder Page 7

  The job he was on now was some businessman who worked in the financial district. That was the most I’d gotten out of him. Because the man spent the majority of his day sitting behind a desk, Frank wasn’t obligated to watch him until nightfall. I was pleased to say that gave him more time to be with me, though I still had to make an appearance back at the hotel during The Warden’s regularly scheduled visiting hours.

  Frank seemed to find the deception even more satisfying than Charlie’s original punishment. I did my best to be annoying, but not so annoying that it appeared deliberate, and then I’d report back to him with his reaction so we could laugh about it.

  Although it was getting closer to the time when the two of them would leave Illinois, I wasn’t worried. Frank constantly reminded me of his promise, and he’d agreed to come visit me the next time he was in the area. We’d even gone apartment hunting one afternoon following Charlie’s lunch cancellation, but that hadn’t gone very well. I’d lived in the building before, and the doorman even recognized me as the “nephew” of one of the tenants. The guy I’d lived with there had been pretty nice, so I didn’t let Frank go upstairs to share his feelings about statutory rape.

  The only thing we hadn’t really talked about was the saying goodbye part. I think neither of us wanted to admit how close we’d gotten in such a short period of time. Not with the end so quickly approaching. So when Charlie asked me if I wanted to work for him again, it undoubtedly got my interest.

  I didn’t give him a definitive answer because he didn’t give me any details. All he said was that it wasn’t like the last one, and that it would be something I was good at. I fantasized about going with them. Even if I had to ride with Charlie, at least Frank and I wouldn’t have to say goodbye yet.

  I was sitting on the bed, leafing through the five-week old TV listings, when Charlie came over. And he brought a guest.

  “Oh, Charlie, you have outdone yourself,” the man said, ogling me in a way that made my skin crawl. He was taller than both of us, but he had the same doughy physique as The Warden. The two of them standing together brought the creepiness factor way past acceptable levels.

  “Who is that?” I asked, keeping my eyes on Charlie because just looking at the man made me feel sick to my stomach. My pulse had started beating so fast it was practically audible.

  Charlie completely ignored me. “He’s underage, so it’ll be a hundred for oral and two for full sex.”

  It was like my body was carved out of ice; I went cold all over and I couldn’t move. I couldn’t even breathe. I felt hollow, completely devoid of every ounce of confidence. Selling my body was the one thing I promised myself I’d never do, the line I’d never cross no matter how bad things got. It was a matter of pride, a sense of control over their desires for me. They couldn’t have me if I didn’t want them. I was not for sale. And believe me, there’d been a great many rich and handsome men willing to pay for my services, had I not been giving them away for free.

  “Well worth it,” the man said eagerly, and handed him two bills.

  Charlie looked at me finally, a deer in his headlights. “You said you wanted a job,” he told me, as if I’d brought this upon myself.

  As soon as the man started to approach I stood up, leaping back into the real world in a desperate attempt at self defense. I could smell him from the bed, like someone had thrown up rotten meat. “Get the fuck away from me!” I shouted. It was like my voice was as frozen as the rest of me, not even loud enough to disturb the neighbors. But it got his attention. He hesitated, looking back to Charlie questioningly.

  “Go ahead,” he said. “He’s just shy.”

  He’s just shy. I thought of Frank. He wouldn’t let this happen. He’d protect me. I just had to keep it together until I could get to him.

  I was no match for my purchaser, but I could easily get past Charlie. He had to be sixty if he was a day, and if I couldn’t push down a senior citizen then there was no hope for me. “I will fucking kill you if you get near me!” I said, my voice still too quiet, though it had more force behind it than before.

  For being such a sickening pervert, the guy obviously had some sense of decency. He didn’t come any closer. I could see on his face that he knew he wasn’t getting any excitement from me today.

  I grabbed my shoes, not bothering to put them on before heading toward the door. I was prepared to bludgeon Charlie to death with them if needed, but he moved out of my way.

  “See you, princess,” he said mockingly.

  I glared at him. The instinct to defend myself warmed the blood in my veins. As he stood there I knew that hitting him would only give him what he wanted. It would prove that he was right about me. That I was capable of violence. I’d be damned if I gave him that satisfaction. But I wouldn’t allow him to get away with it either.

  I spat in his face, seeing a fear of disease flash in his eyes that quickly turned into bitter disgust. And then something new came over him, a look that terrified me more than the vile man standing by my bed: calm.

  He wiped my spit from his face, his eyes chillingly serene. And he smiled.

  I backed away, not daring to take my eyes off him. A parking space was worth killing over, and I’d debased him with my queer germs. Looking into his face, I could see my life cease to matter, my existence blinked away like switching off the TV.

  “Heya, Frankie,” he said, stopping me dead in my tracks. I spun around, forgetting all about keeping up appearances and running into his arms, choking back a sob that shook my whole body. I wanted so badly for him to put his arms around me, to hold me and make it all okay. But he just stood there. “I’ve got a job for you, kiddo.”

  “What is going on here?” Charlie’s friend demanded. Finally Frank moved, and there was a flash, and a sound like slamming a door. A smell of smoke. I tried to pull away from him, but he held my head against his chest, preventing me from turning toward the bed, more strength in one arm than I could summon from my whole body.

  “What is going on here, Charlie?” Frank asked.

  “I’ve got a job for you,” he said again, and I shuddered as I felt his eyes move over me.

  Frank said something in French, his voice cold but the words sounding so beautiful that he surely must have been proclaiming his love for me, and then Charlie laughed incredulously, and Frank said “I mean it.”

  Whatever he meant, I believed it. So did Charlie. He left without another word, walking like a man who’d lost a bet, but won the race.

  Now that I’d stopped crying, I could hear the steady beating of his heart, the warmth of his body comforting me even as he wouldn’t. He’d killed someone for me. Just like that. But he wouldn’t hug me. “What did you say to Charlie?” I asked.

  “I billed him,” he said distantly, releasing his cement grip on my head. He was staring past me, seeing something I was glad I couldn’t see. There was so much hatred in his face, such inhuman anger, and at the same time he looked incredibly vulnerable, like it was all too much for him to bear, guilty past the point of redemption.

  “For that guy?” I asked, gazing up at him, no longer interested in the corpse on my bed.

  “For you.”

  I laughed. Apparently that wasn’t the right response. Frank grabbed my shoulders and shook me roughly. “Do you think I’m fucking around?”

  “I don’t think you’re gonna kill me,” I said. Charlie was such an idiot. If he really wanted me killed, he never should’ve asked Frank. All that did was prove I needed protection. He may as well have paid him to be my bodyguard for as safe as I was now.

  He let me go, moving away from me and clenching his hands in universal gesture of I’m about to strangle you. “You have no idea how bad this is. For Charlie to actually put up money to have you killed…no one has ever gotten under his skin like this.”

  “How much?”

  “Vincent!”

  “A lot, then?”

  Frank grumbled, so frustrated at my lack of alarm that he couldn’t s
peak.

  I went to him, putting my arm around his shoulders as best as I could reach. “I understand the severity of Charlie wanting me dead, Frank. I do. But if you think I would believe that you’d be the one to do it, you’re out of your mind.”

  He looked down at me and sighed. “You’re not afraid of me at all, are you?”

  “You’re a pussycat and you know it.”

  For just a second he smiled, as if he was relieved that I considered him harmless. Then the body fell off the bed, and I leapt behind him for safety. “Did he hurt you?” he asked, glancing back at me as if I was completely overreacting to the dead man who would be my rapist suddenly moving. Frank hadn’t even flinched.

  “No,” I said, peeking out at the corpse from behind him. Now that was a lot of blood. The mattress was soaked, and now he was leaking all over the carpet. There was a small hole in the exact center of his forehead, and a giant one in the back. Blood and chunks of gore had made it all the way to the back wall.

  The guy looked somehow smaller now that he was dead. And although I never would’ve thought it was possible, he smelled worse.

  I had no sympathy for him, but as I watched blood pool around what was left of his head, I could feel the tears forcing their way back. It was all over. No To Be Continued…, just the end credits and some sad music. “You’re gonna leave tonight,” I said.

  “Yes,” he said. “We need to talk about something.”

  I lowered my head with the weight of defeat. I’d heard this before. He was about to break his promise, tell me he was sorry but it wasn’t going to work out, insert reason here. I’m going back to my wife. It’s not you, it’s me. I have to leave town before I can find you an apartment because I killed someone defending your born again virginity. It hurt more than it usually did. It hurt too fucking much. “Don’t,” I whispered.

  “Vincent, what are—”

  “Why don’t you fucking kill me?” I sobbed. “Huh? I’m dying anyway!”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Forget it,” I sniffled, pushing past him to get my—his—coat out of the closet. “Thanks for killing that guy for me. And for the socks.”

  Frank grabbed my arm. “Where are you going?”

  “Like you care,” I turned away so I wouldn’t start crying again. It didn’t do me much good, since I couldn’t get very far as long as he had his hand around my arm.

  “Teenager is not one of the languages I speak, Vincent. You want to tell me what’s going on?”

  “Which languages do you speak?” I asked. Even if he was about to break my heart, he was still the most interesting person I’d ever met.

  He sighed. “English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, German, and Czech. My Russian is mediocre. Pick one and talk to me.” I couldn’t help but smile. Frank gripped the sides of my face, forcing me to look at him. “Talk to me.”

  “You promised.”

  “I know,” he said sympathetically, “and I’m sorry.” But there was no guilt in his face. No maliciousness, no deceit. “You’ll just have to stay with me until we can find a better place for you. Illinois is no longer an option.”

  I gaped at him, struck completely speechless. I got to leave Illinois! I got to stay with Frank! And I was crying?

  “You won’t be able to come and go as you please anymore,” he said, continuing the tragedy of what would be my life. “At least not at first. And we should change your appearance in case he sees you. Your clothes. And your hair.”

  My hair had gotten a little too long for my liking; having a pretty face made a lot of styles un-wearable without running the risk of passing for a girl. But Frank hadn’t said he’d cut my hair. He’d said change. Maybe I was right to cry after all.

  “You mean dye it?” I asked with a frown. I loved my hair. It was the same almost white shade that both of my parents had, the kind of color most people can only get from a box. And it looked good on me. Having such fair hair made my skin seem almost normal. Anything darker and I’d likely turn fluorescent.

  “It’s temporary, Vincent. Charlie will forget your face soon enough.”

  “Not black,” I pouted.

  Frank smiled. “Of course not black. It has to look natural. Otherwise you’ll stand out even more.”

  “Even more?” I asked. Fishing for compliments was one of the few sports I was actually good at.

  He didn’t take the bait. “And what the fuck are you talking about dying?” he asked, as close to yelling at me as he’d ever been.

  “I don’t know. I kinda feel it. Not like I’m sick or something, just…not going to live very long.”

  “You’ve been through a lot. A month ago you were almost dead.”

  “No, it’s not from that,” I said. Whoever came up with the phrase “The truth shall set you free” had never envisioned their own death. Actually saying those words made it seem more real, and I was suddenly terrified. “I’ve always felt it. Even when my parents were still alive, I knew I wouldn’t—”

  “Before they died, did you sense anything?” Frank asked, his tone tinged with anger. “Any bad omens? Or when you were stabbed?”

  “No, I―”

  “Then what do you know about it?”

  Why was he mad at me? Frank was scary as hell when he was pissed off. “I’ll tell you what I foresaw. This morning, after I dropped you off, I knew something was wrong. If traffic hadn’t been so goddamn heavy, I would’ve been here sooner. And the moment you first knocked on that door, I knew you’d cause me trouble for a very long time. That is the truth. You are not going anywhere.”

  I stared at him. What I’d said must have scared him even more than it scared me. But when he raised his voice at me, I could see that it was out of affection. “You think I’ll make it to eighteen?”

  “I bet you a hundred thousand dollars that you do.”

  I laughed. “I don’t have a hundred thousand dollars.”

  “Yes, you do. Charlie’s paying me tonight. It’s yours.”

  “A hundred thousand dollars? Really?” I asked. It didn’t even sound real. “I’m worth a hundred thousand dollars?”

  “No,” Frank scoffed. In that moment, I could have killed him. For free. “But it was the highest amount I could reasonably ask him for. He could easily get someone to underbid me if he felt compelled to look. They might actually do the job.”

  “I’m worth more?” I balked.

  “We should go,” he said. “No more talking about dying.”

  “If you get the feeling that something’s gonna happen to me, would you protect me?” I asked.

  “Nothing is going to happen to you. You probably just saw something you shouldn’t have when you were little. Even going to a funeral can fuck a kid up. Trust me on this.”

  Had he seen something that fucked him up? Was that why I felt so close to him; we were kindred, damaged spirits who happened upon gruesome scenes as children and were too young to make any sense of them? I wondered what Frank must’ve witnessed to enable him to be friends with Charlie. That had to have been some serious trauma; a skewered little girl in a ditch wasn’t enough to make him tolerable to me for more than an hour at a time.

  “I saw a dead body,” I confessed. That was something else I’d never told anyone, but now that I had, I couldn’t believe I’d never put the two together. No wonder I’d been so inclined to thoughts of death.

  I remembered seeing my mom cry, and being forbidden to leave the house. I’d gotten angry at the girl, because I wanted to go play with Bobby Wilson at the park, and I didn’t understand why her being missing had anything to do with my being punished.

  But a little over a week later, when things had returned to normal for everyone but her parents, and I’d seen that white patent leather shoe sticking out from under a piece of dirty cardboard, I’d finally understood. Missing meant kidnapped. Missing meant dead. And not in the way that the actors on soap operas were dead; pretty and sleeping and ready to come back to life during sweep
s.

  I’d sat down next to her and lifted away the cardboard. Her eyes had been open, bright blue and wide, finally brave now that there was no more left to fear. There was nothing wrong with her face except for some slight bruising around her lips, and her hair was still pinned back with pink barrettes, pretty blonde curls framing her head. But the rest of her had been in tatters, sliced and stabbed with pieces torn away, her skin carved in places that resembled the decorative lace of her dress.

  Her clothes weren’t torn at all, just stained, soaked not splattered, like he’d cut her up and then dressed her to hide what he’d done. Only there was no amount of ruffles in the world capable of hiding that.

  It hadn’t scared me, seeing her in her white Sunday dress, lace and ruffles and shiny shoes, slaughtered like a lamb. I had stayed with her for a long time, looking at her mutilated body and watching her lifeless eyes, her face so much like mine that we could’ve been siblings. I even talked to her, mainly about school although we didn’t have any classes together, but also about me, my name, where I lived and how I was going to marry Bobby Wilson once we were old enough.

  The people of Branford eventually forgot all about what had happened, ready and willing to go back to the peaceful quiet life of suburbia. But I was still dreaming about her, and that made her mine.

  It was like having an invisible friend, real only to me. Then I got older, and she never would, so I let her die just like everyone else.

  “I think I was seven. She was around that age, too. She’d been kidnapped, right out of the church parking lot. I found her in the ditch behind my house. She was all hacked up.”

  “You’re from Branford,” he said.

  I gaped at him. “Oh, God! Please don’t tell me you killed that little girl.”

  “Jesus, Vincent! Of course I didn’t. But I remember it. The man who killed her got off on a technicality. Then he skipped town. It took Charlie six months to track him down for the girl’s parents.”