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Chapter 16

August 30, 2011 at 10:51 pm (The Job)

The drive to Paris was mostly quiet. They talked very little. It wasn’t like a date where you were trying to get to know someone. Neither one wanted to give away too many details about themselves. Parker could only trust Simon so far. In the end, he was still assigned to kill her. At any point he could choose to take the job. Still, she enjoyed letting someone else lead for a bit.

She’d resisted the temptation to contemplate her job once she got through this mess, but now with so many hours ahead of her and little to occupy her time, she couldn’t get it out of her head. There was definitely no going back to the old ways. A quick and dirty job in Vegas suddenly lacked appeal. Flying around the world, being chased by other hitters, getting shot at and trying to decipher her organization’s plans wasn’t exactly her ideal career move, but it sure as hell was exciting. She felt alive and, even though events were a little out of control, she still felt as though she was in control.

She could admit, to herself anyway, that her previous life had been safe. As safe as killing people for a living could be, true. But the challenge had long left the job. Lately, the most interesting part of the whole thing had been the disguises she would use. Who would she be this time? Choosing the method had gotten boring. In a hotel room in Vegas, your options were surprisingly limited. Guns required silencers, which weren’t all that silent. She hated working with poisons. Mostly, she worried she’d accidentally stick herself with the damn thing and that would put one hell of a damper on the rest of her life. She liked knives, but even that got boring after repetitive use.

She had started taking longer and longer vacations. The time away from the job had been a sanity break. Initially, she’d thought she was losing her touch and couldn’t stomach the work anymore. Now she realized she’d just been bored. Like anyone working an office job or a city job, too much of the same thing would drive you mental. Maybe she wouldn’t have shaken up her world quite so drastically, given the choice, but she was honest enough with herself to realize she’d needed the push.

She only hoped she could salvage her career when the smoke cleared.

***

“What the fuck is Seth trying to do, create an international incident?” Leland demanded.

The Amsterdam police had several videos of the incident in the canal. They’d been posted all over the internet. One had apparently gotten a partial image of Seth on the rooftop. It wouldn’t be enough to identify him, but it was still very damaging. Forty-one people were killed in the explosion and another fifteen died from wounds resulting from the explosion. Another thirty-three were still in hospital, but were expected to recover. And at the very edge of one of the videos, Ingram had spotted Parker getting hauled out of the water, alive and well.

Ingram shrugged. Seth was Leland’s problem now. The board had seen fit to place Leland in charge until they could decide what had become of Donovan. They’d even gone the unprecedented step of putting him 100% in charge, meaning that in three days when the board met on the island to vote, Leland would be there to act as the deciding vote in the event of a tie. Their plans were falling into place. The only person who could screw with them was Donovan and no one seemed to know where he was.

Ingram had an idea about that. He had a few very loyal men who had infiltrated most of the major departments in the agency and one of them had just come to him with some very intriguing information. His man, Willis, had taken over a mid-level position in the tech department. He had the skills for higher, but Ingram wanted him to blend. He’d begun doing sweeps through the computers of all of the techs, trying to find out who was assisting Parker. It wasn’t until recently that he’d even been able to gain access to Petrillo’s system. The guy slept at his desk.

Willis had come to him that morning with two names that may or may not be the ones Donovan was using. It was their source that had convinced Ingram they were legit. He had no idea how Petrillo had successfully hacked the CIA, but he was both impressed and annoyed. Annoyed, only because he now worried how secure the data on his own system was. He’d considered getting Willis to back it up and remove it, but he didn’t have time for that now. Things were coming to a head and he had to be ready to move quickly.

“What can we do about him?” Leland asked.

Ingram closed his eyes and prayed for patience. Leland was turning into a spineless leader. He was fine in the number two spot, because any decisions he made would ultimately fall on Donovan’s shoulders. Now, with that buffer gone, Leland was turning into a weak-willed figurehead who didn’t want to jeopardize his own job.

“There are only two things we can do with Seth and you know what both are,” Ingram replied. They could either let Seth continue to muddle through this job and hope that he finally caught up with Parker and eliminated her, or they could send someone after him to clean up that mess and find another hitter for Parker.

Deciding that it might be a good idea to have another hitter waiting in the wings to act, Ingram pulled out his iPad and started scrolling through the short list of hitters who were at or above Seth’s level. Mr. Chu was out of the question. This job called for some discretion and Mr. Chu didn’t know the definition of the word. Besides, Leland already had him booked solid for the next few months. Jasper Lane was an option, though the files indicated he was in the middle of a job that was scheduled to run another two weeks. That would be too long.

“We could send Simon Halsted after him,” Ingram decided. He would have little trouble stopping Seth and his level of discretion had never come into question.

Leland wouldn’t meet his eyes. Ingram immediately became suspicious. He double-checked that his files were updated before standing and walking over to Leland’s desk. Resting his hands on the edge, he leaned across the desk until he was too close for Leland to ignore.

“What have you done with Simon?” he demanded.

Leland sighed. “I gave him a job, off the books.”

“Why is it off the books?”

“Because I figured if Parker had someone inside who was watching her back, they would see it the second I put it on the books.”

“You ordered Simon to kill Parker?”

“Initially he was supposed to watch her, then he was supposed to follow her, gain her confidence, hook up with her if he could and then, when the time was right, he’d take her down. I told him that if she had any leads on Donovan, to follow them first.”

Ingram was surprised. Leland had actually shown some foresight with that order. Petrillo would certainly have informed her of Simon’s orders if they’d been on the books.

“Where is he now?”

“He’s driving her to Paris. She has a lead on Donovan she wants to follow.”

***

Simon drove into the heart of Paris some five hours later. He’d exceeded the speed limit on the highway once he’d left the Amsterdam city limits behind. Passing through Belgium, he’d kicked it up another notch. Once he’d come close to downtown Paris the traffic had forced him to slow down to a near crawl. Still, they’d made excellent time.

According to Google maps, the Hotel Saint-Honoré was slightly north and east of the Louvre. Situated on a one-way street heading east, Simon passed by it in the car before finding a parking spot further down on the opposite side of the road. The front of the hotel was fairly nondescript. The building jutted out slightly from its neighbor to the east. With four stories above the main floor, the hotel offered only twenty-four rooms.

“On-site surveillance put him on the second floor, back of the building, middle window,” Parker said. Petrillo had called in a two-man team to check the layout of the hotel and confirm that the room reserved for Yoh was indeed occupied. They couldn’t confirm that Yoh was Donovan, because the man never left his suite. Housekeeping said they hadn’t been inside the room since the occupant had arrived.

Simon brought up an aerial view of the block on his phone and saw that some businesses had inner courtyards. The hotel had a small patch of grass behind it that was completely cut off from street access. To get to it, they’d have to go through the hotel and out the back. The chances of doing that without being noticed by the hotel staff were pretty slim, given that the front desk was manned twenty-four hours a day. Just a few doors down was a pub with another small patch of land at the back. It wasn’t directly connected to the hotel’s courtyard, but it allowed them easier access to the back. With it being full dark, they could clamber, unseen, over the buildings to get to the hotel. A second storey climb to Yoh’s room wouldn’t pose a problem, but a quiet entry into the room might.

Simon led the way into the pub and took a table right near the back exit. Staff used the small grassy area to house garbage and unused pub furniture. Simon ordered a beer and Parker asked for a glass of burgundy. Conversation and music was loud enough to give them complete privacy. Parker leaned in to Simon and brushed her hand lightly over his arm. “That side wall isn’t more than ten feet high, I’d wager. Should be easy to scale it.”

A quick scan of the room showed that most of the patrons were tuned in to the TVs. The back area was poorly lit and most of the windows were blocked by stacked furniture. About the only thing that could screw with their plans would be the unexpected arrival of a staff member taking out the trash. As she thought of it, one of the serving girls stepped from the kitchen with two large bags and hauled them out the back. There was no motion sensitive lighting, just the flick of a switch to turn on a single bulb.

Parker sipped her wine, observing the crowd and the movements of the staff. After an hour, she had the system. All of the men and half of the women were so focused on the game playing on the TV that a troop of soldiers in full regimental attire could have marched through the pub and they wouldn’t have noticed. The servers did a pass of the tables every five minutes, unless a patron flagged them over. Food was served up from the kitchen. The servers, arms loaded down with plates of piping hot burgers and chips, passed by Parker’s table fairly regularly.

Simon finished off his beer, waited for the kitchen door to swing closed and then slipped out the back door. Since it was left open he’d opted to go first and, once he’d surveilled the area, he’d signal her. Parker’s seat allowed her an unobstructed view of him as he scaled the wall with ease. Flattening out on the top of the wall, Simon scanned the area. The wall extended another twenty feet, where the grassy area behind the pub took a slight jog east. Inching his way along the wall, he edged past the building next to the pub and saw that the hotel’s inner courtyard met up with the wall separating it from the pub’s. A quick gesture to Parker to get her moving and Simon slipped over the wall.

Parker watched as a server exited the kitchen with plates of food and made her way over to a table near the front of the pub. When she felt certain no one was watching her, she slipped out the back and headed for the wall. Scaling it, she followed Simon’s path along the wall until she spotted the grassy area on the opposite side. Dropping down, she crouched next to Simon in the shadows of the neighbouring building.

Parker glanced around the side of the building, to examine the back of the hotel. Settling back beside Simon once again, she grimaced at what she’d seen. The back of the hotel, on the ground floor, was all windows. She could see straight through the lobby area, to the reservations desk. The fire escape looked like it would squeak, if it didn’t just fall straight off the building the minute she put any weight on it. The only saving grace was that the back area wasn’t lit. She hoped that the hotel also didn’t believe in motion sensitive lighting.

“Nothing like providing us with a challenge,” she whispered.

Simon didn’t answer. He took another look around the inner courtyard, judging distances and estimating lines of sight. As long as no one looked out of their window while he and Parker were back there, they should be fine. The man at the reservations desk had a small TV tuned in to the same game that had been playing in the pub.

The back of the hotel was tiered. Off the main building, someone had attached a one-level shed made of wood. The roof was flat, though the structure looked a little weathered. Simon figured it would hold their weight. The shed didn’t extend out far enough to reach the middle window. The shortfall was close to five feet. The flower basket hanging below the window didn’t look sturdy enough to hang from. Still, Simon felt the job was doable.

“Shall we?” he asked, as he slipped from the side of the building and dashed across the courtyard, to the side of the shed.

Parker sighed, knowing she didn’t have much choice. Checking that the front desk attendant was otherwise occupied, she quickly joined Simon next to the shed. Looking up at the slightly rickety structure, she gestured for him to go first. The wooden shed only protested their weight a little bit. Edging up against the side of the hotel, Parker couldn’t see how they were going to silently get inside the hotel suite. She only hoped Simon had a decent plan.

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Chapter 15

August 22, 2011 at 10:36 pm (The Job)

“I’ve got two names for you.”

Petrillo finally called her back after three hours spent waiting in her cheap hotel room. She’d used the time to complete her latest disguise. She’d picked up a couple of things earlier, as she’d worked her way toward the university. She didn’t want to use another male disguise. The facial hair made her hot and uncomfortable. She’d opted for a New Age hippie, of sorts. A long purple skirt skimmed her ankles, but she’d slit the sides to mid thigh in case she had to run. She’d strapped a knife to her thigh. The skirt barely kept it out of sight.

She wore a white tank top and pulled a black tunic over it. The tunic had a deep V in the front, allowing her easy access to the weapons she carried in her double shoulder holster. The long sleeves covered the handmade holsters she had created to carry extra magazines for her guns. There was no way she could pass through airport security like this, but she had to get safely to the airport, first. Adding a long wig, floppy hat and cheek pads to change the shape of her face, Parker was satisfied with her appearance.

“It’s the best I could do,” Petrillo said.

“No problem,” Parker assured him. “What are the names and where are they now?”

“Roderick Yoh,” Petrillo explained, “flew out of Dulles, changed planes at Heathrow and carried on to Charles de Gaulle. He’s staying at the Hotel Saint-Honoré in Paris.”

“And the other guy?” Parker asked, making a mental note of the salient details for Yoh.

“Phil Boonstra also left Dulles, but he headed for Hawaii. After a short layover, he got on another plane headed for Rarotonga. He’s staying at the Paradise Inn on the northern coast.”

“Any chance Leland’s men have this information?’

Petrillo laughed in her ear. “Not a bloody chance in hell.”

“I’ll take Yoh first, since he’s closest.” Hanging up, she collected her belongings and tucked them back into her bag. With her appearance suitably altered, she exited her room and left the hotel via a side entrance. A quick glance in either direction showed that she was alone. She didn’t think that would last. The bald guy was out there, somewhere.

The Metro station was two blocks away, to the south. Taking a right out of the side entrance and a left at the first street, Parker headed north. A quick search on her phone showed that the next flight out left in five hours. She had too much time to kill in a city that was on the lookout for her.

Simon watched her leave and allowed her to turn the corner and head north before moving from his position. Her disguise was good, but he was expecting them now. A quick glance would fool most people. A longer look likely wouldn’t hold up. Turning the same corner, he spotted her up ahead. She’d picked up her pace, so he increased his own and closed the distance by half after two blocks. He hadn’t bothered to disguise himself. If she looked back, she would spot him.

Parker didn’t look back. She assumed he was there, but if he was willing to keep his distance, she would carry on with her plan. Right this minute, her plan included getting a bite to eat. Her grumbling stomach reminded her that it had been several hours since she’d had any food and then it had only been a granola bar. Turning the corner, she looked ahead to the few restaurants lining the canal and almost stepped right over the man in her path. She recognized him instantly. The image Petrillo had sent her back in London was bang on. Seth stood stock still. He gave her a cursory glance, dismissing her instantly. Offering him a mumbled apology while keeping her floppy hat tipped down, Parker edged around him and continued on.

She wanted to break into a run, but didn’t. She wanted to jump into the canal and swim to safety, but didn’t. Instead, with the sweat beading on her forehead, she kept her back to him as she worked her way across the little bridge spanning the canal. The building across the way had large windows, offering her the perfect view of Seth as he stood near the corner looking at his phone. She watched as the bald guy came around the corner and walked directly past Seth without seeing him. And she watched Seth’s head snap up as he took in the bald guy. When Seth started looking ahead of the bald guy, she knew she was fucked. Somehow, Seth had managed to place her in the same location as the bald guy. Recognizing him gave her away, too.

She broke into a dead run, ducking and weaving her way through the light crowd of people.

Simon watched her and wondered if he’d finally spooked her. Ducking to the side to watch her progress, he felt the bullet whiz past his right ear. Simon dropped to the ground, rolled and came up on one knee with his gun up, tracking the threat behind him. He spotted the gunner as he ran down the canal road. The shot at Simon had been a throw away. Leaping to his feet, Simon tucked his gun against his leg and bolted after the shooter.

Parker zigzagged through the streets, trying to keep some distance between her and Seth. She worked her way south, toward the Metro, with no intention of actually using it. Seth was too willing to shoot in public places and Parker didn’t need all of that potential collateral damage on her conscience. A quick glance over her shoulder showed the bald guy about a block behind her, but no sign of Seth. If Seth had branched off and gone an alternate route, there was no telling which path would lead her to safety and which would take her straight into his sights.

Taking her chances, she ducked down a narrow garden path and jumped a fence behind one of the many sex shops. Crossing the small yard and jumping the next fence, Parker bent over and ran to the edge of the canal road. Scanning the buildings and the roads as best she could, Parker headed east. She’d noticed a car rental agency on her trek in from the university. If she could get to a car, she could get out of Amsterdam quickly.

Parker rounded a corner and almost slammed into a wall of tourists. There was some sort of demonstration going on in front of a cannabis shop and the public were packed like sardines in the small area between the shops and the canal. Parker turned right and headed for a narrow canal bridge. A few feet shy of the bridge, she felt the burn of a bullet as it dug into her outer thigh. Changing direction again before Seth could improve his aim, Parker leaped the short wall of the bridge and dove into the canal.

With a deep breath she managed to swim a fair distance before she risked coming up for air. Still, she wisely kept to the edge of the canal and waited for a passing water taxi to block her from the opposite side. Swimming over to the side of the taxi, she grabbed onto one of the rubber buoys strung along the side. As the taxi picked up speed, it dragged her along down the canal, away from Seth. Keeping most of her body under the water, she attempted to spot her hitter. She’d completely forgotten about the bald guy until she saw him standing mid-span of the bridge she’d just jumped from. As she watched, he spotted her next to the boat. He stared her dead in the eyes and casually turned his head to the left and up.

Parker turned her head to look behind her, following his gaze up to the roof of a nearby building. The instant she saw him she made a horrible realization. The bullet she’d taken had come from in front of her, not behind her as she’d assumed. He knew exactly where she was and had a perfect view of her. All the time she’d been running through the city and he’d probably headed straight for a loftier vantage point.

Parker let go of the buoy and dove under the water. A high velocity sniper round fired from such a relatively close distance would penetrate far into the water. It took her only a few seconds to determine that that wasn’t Seth’s goal. The metallic pinging off the taxi slowly pulling away from her was followed by a tremendous whooshing sound. Underwater, the force of the blast pushed her backward through the water almost fifty feet. It forced what little air she had left out of her lungs. Clawing her way to the surface, Parker gulped down a breath and submerged once again. Remaining close to the surface, she could vaguely make out Seth’s shape still on top of the building. He was searching the water for her, but due to the flaming wreckage on the surface, he couldn’t see her.

Gas and oil spewed forth from the taxi’s tanks. The flames of the boat quickly ignited the liquid, sending a scalding wall of fire down upon the surface of the water. The taxi had been filled with tourists. Some were floating face down in the water. Others were screaming and crying as they tried to paddle their way to shore. Bystanders were crawling down the sides of the canal in an effort to help those who still lived. Sirens screamed as the police and emergency vehicles converged on the scene.

Parker swam back under the narrow bridge to the far side and scrambled up the side of the canal. A hand reached out to help when she started to slip. She took it before checking who the offer was from. She stared into the bald guy’s eyes.

“Let’s move, before he sees you,” Simon urged her, half-dragging her out of the canal. He held onto her hand as he moved swiftly through the crowds.

Now that Parker was out of the water she recognized two things. One, she was freezing. It was sunny out, but the temperature was too mild for running around town completely sodden. And two, her thigh was really starting to hurt. She hoped the bullet hadn’t been more than just a flesh wound. When she stumbled for the second time, Simon slowed his pace a little. Noticing the slight grimace on her face, he checked his pace even more.

“Are you hit?” he demanded.

“Outer left thigh. Flesh wound.”

“Do you know that or are you assuming?”

“Assuming,” she admitted.

Simon pulled her into a tight alley and pushed her up against the wall. Bending down in front of her, he pushed her skirt up her thighs until he could see the damage. “Hold this up,” he said, handing her the fistful of skirt. Prodding the edges of the wound, he confirmed that the bullet has passed through, but it was a little more than just a flesh wound. It needed to be cleaned and stitched and the blood hadn’t clotted yet.

“I have the supplies with me to do this properly, but we can’t take the time right now.” Simon pulled several bandages from his pack and handed them to Parker. Tearing the edge off a packet of Quik-Clot, he poured the powder onto the wound.

Parker sucked in a harsh breath as the powder cauterized the wound. Leaning her head against the building, she took slow, careful breaths. Tilting her head toward the entrance to the alley, she spotted several tourists staring at them and pointing. Parker tossed her skirt over Simon’s head. “We’ve got a bunch of gawkers. Best if they just think we’re having sex in the street.”

“I’m game if you are,” was Simon’s slightly muffled response.

His warm breath on her inner thigh sent an involuntary shiver up her spine. “I like to at least know a guy’s name first.”

“Name’s are a dime a dozen in this business, you know that. But call me Simon.”

Parker enjoyed the feel of his long fingers as they caressed her inner thigh. When it didn’t appear as though he intended to stop, she clamped her thighs together. “Let’s not forget about Seth, OK?”

“That his name?” Simon asked, his attention back on her wound. He reached out from beneath her skirt and requested the bandages. Unraveling one, he began wrapping it around her thigh.

“It’s his agency name.” Which meant it wasn’t the name he’d been born with.

Simon flipped the skirt back over his head and stood up. Leaning into her, he trailed a hand up the side of her hip. His lips brushed the side of her face before he turned his attention to the gawkers. Frowning at them, he pulled away from Parker, slipped his arm around her waist and led her down the alley.

“I bet they’re sad the show is over,” Parker said.

“Over for them, maybe.” Simon gave her waist a little squeeze before refocusing his attention on their surroundings. “Where were you headed?”

“I was going to kill some time before the next flight to Paris. Now I’m thinking I might just rent a car and drive there.”

“When’s the flight?” Simon steered them out of the alley and down another canal road, heading steadily away from the commotion.

“Another four hours.”

“Too long. The car is a better idea.”

Parker pulled out her cell phone and Googled the nearest rental agencies. Giving Simon the directions, they were on the road inside of thirty minutes. Simon used one of his IDs to rent the car which, he said, gave him the option of driving. He opted in, so Parker lounged in the passenger seat. Plugging their destination into the GPS unit, Simon swiftly maneouvered his way out of the city.

“My contact at the agency says you’re a hitter.”

Simon briefly glanced at her before returning his attention to the road. “I am.”

“So why didn’t you kill me back there?”

He shrugged. “I decided not to take the job.”

“You’ve been with me since London. You only decided now?”

“I’ve been evaluating you and the job. You’ve been set up to take a fall and I find it intriguing that you’re not giving up.”

“If I gave up, I’d be dead.”

“Not if you knew how to hide properly.”

“For the rest of my life?” Parker demanded.

“No, nothing at the agency ever lasts that long. This mess will blow over in a month or two and then you could resurface.”

“In case you missed it, I have more than one hitter after me. Just because you’ve decided not to do the job doesn’t mean Seth hasn’t.”

“True. He proved that quite well this afternoon. He’s a case, that one,” Simon muttered.

Parker silently agreed. Seth hadn’t given a shit about any of the people on that water taxi. He’d wanted her dead and he’d made one hell of an attempt at it. She wondered if he knew that he’d missed. Would he remain in Amsterdam until the bodies were all indentified? More than likely, he’d figure a way into the morgue to view them himself.

Could she go into hiding? Almost immediately, Parker dismissed the idea. She would spend the entire time looking over her shoulder. At least her hunt for Donovan would keep her mind occupied.

As if reading her thoughts, Simon asked why she’d chosen Paris. She explained what Petrillo had found out about the two names Donovan had access to from his CIA days.

“Hiding, is he?” Simon smirked at her.

Parker rolled her eyes. “Yes, he’s hiding.”

“What are you going to do with him when you find him?”

“Get him safely to the next board meeting so Leland can’t vote in his absence.”

“You do know that it’s significantly more difficult to keep someone alive than it is to kill them?”

“I like a challenge.”

“Well, then I hope you also like company.”

Parker refused to acknowledge the brief flare of relief at his words. She was confident in her abilities, but an extra pair of experienced eyes never hurt.

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Chapter 14

August 14, 2011 at 8:44 pm (The Job)

“We need to find Donovan before one of Leland’s guys does,” Petrillo said.

“Why?” Parker asked.

“I’ve heard through the grapevine that there’s a vote coming down and if Donovan doesn’t turn up alive, that vote will get postponed. However, if Leland’s guys can find Donovan, kill him and then have the body ‘discovered’ the board will have to replace Donovan. By all accounts, that job will likely go to Leland. With the board being down one member, he would be the deciding vote if it came to a tie.”

“What are they voting on?” Parker asked. Board politics were not her strong suit. She didn’t know anyone on the board, where they met, or what they really did.

“Rumour has it Leland wants to take the agency into deeper waters. He wants us to have more control over the political climate. Not just ours, but the world’s.”

“Political assassinations?” Parker asked.

“Yeah, as well as anyone who has a dramatic effect on a country’s politics, even if they aren’t representing the government. It could mean a tremendous amount of work, but it would also get extremely dangerous.”

Not that her work wasn’t dangerous enough already, Parker thought. Political assassinations came with the highest price tag, both in what they paid and what they cost. Get caught, you could expect a torturous interrogation to determine what you knew and who you worked for. Pull it off and you could expect multiple millions for one job. The Wagner job was peanuts by comparison.

“Any idea where Donovan went?” she asked.

“None,” Petrillo admitted. “I’m working on it though. I’ve got a couple leads to tug on and then, hopefully, I’ll have something for you. In the meantime, keep yourself out of Seth’s crosshairs.”

“Right,” Parker sighed.

When he’d ensured the call was disconnected, Petrillo stared at the man standing next to him. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

“It’s the only way to ensure her safety,” Jack said.

“If you’re not on her side, she’ll hunt you down, you realize that?” Petrillo warned him. It was a bold move, given that Jack could have outed Petrillo as Parker’s internal source. He’d have been executed on the spot. No trial, no jury, no warning.

“We’re all working toward the same goal here. None of us wants Leland in command of this organization.”

When Jack had overheard the rumblings in the corridors about Parker casing Wagner right before the hit went down, he knew Leland was tossing her to the wolves. She’d messed up whatever plan they’d had and now they were trying to recover. They couldn’t say, outright, that she’d done the hit. That would be showing their hand too soon. But a discredited hitter would be left to drift in the winds. She wouldn’t be able to trust anyone. Jack could use that.

“You have any insight into Donovan’s current whereabouts?” Petrillo had already set up a series of searches for Donovan’s likeness at all of the larger and several of the smaller airports. If he’d taken a flight out of the country, Petrillo would find him. If he’d done something sneaky, Petrillo’s job would be much harder. But sneaky would work in Donovan’s favour. If Petrillo had a difficult time finding him, then Leland’s and Ingram’s men would have it even tougher.

“No, but I have an idea where you might focus your attention,” Jack admitted.

“A particular country he likes?”

“No, I was thinking more along the lines of a particular company he used to work for and some documents he might have obtained through them. Specifically, The Company.”

Petrillo felt the sweat break out on the back of his neck. “You want me to hack into CIA databases to find documents they may have given to Donovan?”

“Yes, from when he worked there. I’m certain he must have at least once set of fake IDs that he never employed while he worked for them.”

Petrillo swiped his hand across his neck, wiping the moisture on his jeans. He wasn’t particularly worried about hacking their databases. He was a little cautious of them possibly sending out a tracer bot to find his name. He didn’t need a couple of spooks appearing on his doorstep at two in the morning. Even his wife wouldn’t be able to intimidate them.

If he could create a blind, so it appeared his bots were coming from someone else’s computer, then he wouldn’t worry as much. The more he thought about the idea, the more Petrillo’s fingers itched to get started. He had just the candidate, too. If he made it a decent attempt, but left one tiny little detail for the spooks to find, then perhaps Ingram would be out of their hair for good. Oh, to be so lucky as to get rid of that asshole, he thought.

“Ok, I’ll give it a shot. Any idea where I should focus my attention? I’ve never been in their databases before.”

“There will be a note in their personnel file directing authorized users to a classified database, code worded, password protected and constantly monitored. Trip even a single flag and you’ll get booted out. They won’t bother to try and track you, they’ll just want you out.”

“Where do I find these code words and passwords?”

“I have no idea. I never worked for them. Don’t you have a program that can crack them?”

Petrillo paused in his typing to stare up at Jack as though he’d lost his mind. “Do you have any idea how long it can take a program to crack a single password? If it’s 128-bit encrypted, fucking forget about it. I’d need a Cray and in case you haven’t noticed, this piece of shit at my feet ain’t that.”

“You’ll think of something,” Jack replied. “You have to, for all our sakes.”

“Go away now, I have work to do.” Petrillo muttered under his breath about Cray’s and encryption passwords as Jack left the room. Once the door closed behind him, Petrillo flexed his fingers, cracking several knuckles in the process. He didn’t have a Cray at his feet, but he knew where he could borrow a few cycles from one.

In actuality, it was several Cray’s. All strung together, spitting out millions of bits of data per second and hardly getting the workout they’d been designed for. In his spare time, Petrillo had created a backdoor into the Bowden-Dunlop Military Defense Contractors’ system. They designed supercomputers used in missile defense systems and employed 128-bit encryption in everything, right down to the order form for their daily Starbucks’ runs.

Petrillo hadn’t cracked their system, he’d been allowed in. Not legitimately, mind you. A hacker friend of his who worked for the defense contractor thought it would be interesting to do a test, to see how long it would take someone to notice their system was bleeding cycles. Petrillo’s backdoor access had been open for over two years now. It was a good testament to the shoddy security standards surrounding defense contracts.

But, it worked in his favour, especially now. First taking some time to structure his search parameters, Petrillo then opened his backdoor access and was about to get to work when his computer alerted him to an internal message. Opening the message system, he saw that he had another missive from Ingram. Rolling his eyes, Petrillo clicked on the message, determined to find a way to ignore whatever Ingram wanted. After a few sentences, he realized that that was not going to be possible.

Activate the entire European network to watch for Parker? There would be few places she could go to avoid being spotted. She knew of them, sure, but that didn’t mean she could make use of them. He hoped she had a pack full of truly excellent disguises. She was going to need them.

Breaking the large packet of information into several smaller ones, Petrillo parceled them out to his staff. They were too efficient not to get the orders out in record time.

***

Jack read the report his assistant had handed him regarding the bombing incident the previous evening. The press was calling it a random attack, because they couldn’t determine why the house would be attacked. Jack knew it wasn’t a random attack and, though he certainly couldn’t prove it, he was sure the hit had come from the agency. He knew the target and he knew who used to employ the target.

The Wappel Group was one of their largest competitor’s. Not overseen by a board such as the agency was, TWG handed down jobs from the top. Their vice-president, the man who had just been blown sky high, was the main go-to guy for sanctioning hits. Even if their third-in-command was ready to take over straight away, TWG would likely have a rocky few months. Their current clients would want to know what information the target had given up before he’d died.

Leland was initiating his own agenda. Once the next hit came down, Jack would have a fair idea of how escalated the timeframe was. Until Donovan was found alive, Jack’s hands were tied. He could actively defy Leland and call his actions into question, but with no corroborating evidence to prove that Leland had instructed Mr. Chu to complete the job, it would be Jack’s word against Leland’s. Jack didn’t trust his position enough to put it to the test. Leland had spies throughout all levels of the agency and any one of them could trip Jack up.

As much as it galled him to do it, Jack would have to bide his time and allow Leland to continue, unchallenged.

***

“It’s about fucking time you called me!” Petrillo shrieked in her ear.

“I just talked to you a few hours ago,” Parker reminded him.

“Yeah, well I left you several messages since then. Didn’t you think that maybe I had something important to tell you?” he demanded.

Parker sighed and rolled her eyes. She sipped from her coffee cup and watched the people milling about near the canal. She stood outside the Feels Good café, where patrons could enjoy a tea and a toke and not get harassed about it. She wasn’t a pot head and she’d never tried it. The smell was enough to put her off. She figured she had about twenty more minutes before the lingering odour would annoy her and she’d have to move on.

“I’m sorry I didn’t check my messages sooner,” she replied, attempting to placate him.

Petrillo grunted. “Look, you need to watch your back in Amsterdam. Ingram has the entire European watcher network activated and they’re all focused on you.”

Crap, she thought. Was that who the bald guy was? A watcher? “I think I may have spotted one. He got on the same plane as me.”

“Not a watcher,” Petrillo replied. “They watch, they don’t follow. If he’s following you, he’s a hitter.”

“Then why hasn’t he hit me?” Parker demanded.

“I can’t answer that. His orders would be to take you out with all due haste. If he’s waiting, he’s playing his own game.”

Great, she had an entire network of watchers eyeballing her and a hitter with his own agenda breathing down her neck. And she had no idea what she could do to prove her innocence. She highly doubted the agency would care even if she could prove that the hit was legit. It appeared the agency was undergoing a management upheaval. Those who were currently in charge wanted her dead. That was her main focus. That meant getting those who were currently in charge, out of their places of power. The only way she could see to do that would be to find Donovan. Even that wasn’t a guarantee of her safety. But it was a start.

“I need to find Donovan. Can you get me a name or a location to start looking?” she asked.

“Yeah, I’m working on that. It’s complicated and extremely dodgy, but I’m breaking through the barriers, one by one. I’ll have that info for you as soon as I can. In the meantime, stay invisible.”

Parker disconnected and tucked the phone into her pocket. She could do invisible. She had carried with her a full kit for creating believable disguises. If the watcher network was clocking in overtime trying to find her, she didn’t want to give them an easy go of it. Picking up her bag, she tossed it over her shoulder and headed for the nearest cheap motel.

***

Simon spotted the watcher seconds before Parker did. The guy wasn’t particularly discreet about having spotted her. The minute he saw her he spun around and pulled his phone out of his pocket. Before Simon could intercede, Parker stepped up to the man and jabbed something into his back. Cupping her hand over his mouth to stifle the scream, she dragged him toward the doorway of an abandoned shop and settled him down on the ground. Slipping the phone from his hand, she pocketed it and continued on her way.

Simon stepped into the doorway and felt for a pulse. When he found one, he bent down and gripped the man’s head in his hands. A sharp twist snapped the vertebra and the watcher’s body relaxed against the side of the shop. Moving away from the body, Simon continued down the street, keeping an eye on Parker, while also searching the area. If the agency had called out the watchers, they could be all over the city.

Parker scanned through the list of calls and breathed a little easier when she saw that he hadn’t gotten a message out. She tossed the phone into the canal and carried on. As she passed a row of shops she caught his reflection in the window. The bald guy wasn’t even trying to hide from her. Picking up her pace as she strode along the canal, Parker didn’t notice the watcher until it was too late. He had his phone in his hand and was passing on his message. As she approached him, she watched his eyes bug out. Snatching the phone from his hand, she pushed him into the canal. Carrying on, she started moving faster. She’d have to hole up somewhere and use one of her disguises. She had no doubt the last watcher had gotten through to someone. Soon another hitter would be charging after her. Or maybe whoever was in charge would force the bald guy’s hand.

Simon peered into the canal and watched as the agency’s watcher swam to shore on the opposite side. He didn’t have time to quietly finish the guy and still keep an eye on Parker. He knew she’d spotted him and was getting ready to run. Simon left the watcher to report in and carried on after Parker.

***

Seth got the call from Leland. The watcher who had spotted her in Amsterdam had indeed gotten a message out. He’d given her location and the direction she’d been heading in. Other local watchers had attempted to keep her in their sights, but reported that a man was following Parker and taking out any watcher who made their presence known. Consequently, the information received from Amsterdam was old and inaccurate.

Seth didn’t care. He had a starting point and he could find her once he arrived. He knew that she would soon be leaving Amsterdam, especially if the watchers were being obvious enough to get themselves killed. The new guy could be a problem. Leland had no idea who was helping Parker, but Seth figured he was lying. Seth had finally determined how Parker had gotten the Wagner job done. He recalled watching the male reporter head for the tube station and he vaguely recalled seeing another man head the same way not long after.

Seth had asked Leland if he’d employed a second hitter, but Leland assured him that he had not. Again, Seth assumed he was lying. No matter, Seth was better than anyone the agency could send. He had a decent visual impression of the second hitter and if he couldn’t find Parker in Amsterdam, he could always look for the bald guy. He was eager to get the annoyance of this job out of the way. He knew that Josie Rider was anxiously awaiting his return. He would not let her down.

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Chapter 13

August 7, 2011 at 7:38 pm (The Job)

“Parker, where the hell have you been?” Petrillo demanded.

“I had to get off the grid and get out of London.”

“You could have called me before this,” he said, trying to keep the hurt out of his voice.

“I know I should have, but I’ve been flying and didn’t want to risk anyone overhearing the conversation.”

“You’re somewhere secure now?”

“Yeah,” she replied, looking around at all of the students milling about on the university lawn. She was dressed like them, in jeans and a t-shirt, carrying a backpack that appeared to be stuffed with textbooks. “I’m as secure as I can get. I need to know what’s going on. That Wagner thing just seemed wrong.”

Petrillo nodded his head, though she couldn’t possibly see him. “It was way wrong, Parker. Word is, Wagner was on the board.”

Parker felt the colour drain from her face. If Wagner was on the board, she would be terminated unless she could prove it was a sanctioned hit. She had very little proof of that. Pictures and video of her accessing the website to receive her orders wouldn’t be conclusive. Her meet with Ingram back in North Carolina, which seemed so many months ago now, but was only two weeks, hadn’t been recorded, not that he’d divulged anything important anyway.

“They wanted Seth to take me out just after I took out Wagner,” Parker finally put the pieces together. If she’d gone in to the job as herself, she wouldn’t have made it out. It was only the quality of her disguise that had saved her ass.

“He’s still hunting you. He will keep hunting you until he finds you and finishes the job he was meant to do in London.”

“I don’t think he’s the only one who’s hunting me,” Parker admitted, filling Petrillo in on the details of the bald man.

“That description sounds familiar. I’ll dig through the files and see if I can find him.”

“Any luck finding Jacob?”

Petrillo didn’t answer for a moment. Parker could feel the despair radiating across the phone line. “He’s dead,” she said.

“I don’t have confirmation, but yeah, I’m fairly certain he is. His file has been completely expunged from the system as though he never existed. I’m sorry, Parker.”

“Thanks,” Parker whispered.

“You’ll have to be careful out there. Ingram is putting out the word that you’ve gone rogue. He’s not stating it officially, just whispering it in the halls, you know what I mean?”

“He’s trying to discredit me. If I come back with information about Wagner’s hit being legit, he’ll have done enough damage that people won’t believe me.”

“What are you going to do?” Petrillo asked.

“I’ll think of something,” she replied, before hanging up. Getting up, she brushed a few broken pieces of grass from her jeans and slung her backpack across her shoulders. Striking out across the campus lawn, Parker ran her next steps through her head. She really only had one next step, but it was a doozy.

Before any of the hitters dogging her trail could catch up with her, Parker had to find evidence to prove her innocence. She had absolutely no idea where to start searching.

***

Simon kept his distance this time. He’d had one hell of a time tracking her down, but he’d made the same assumption that she had. The easiest place for her to blend in would be with people near her own age. Even still, he’d damn near walked right in front of her before he’d spotted her sitting on the grass, talking into her cell phone. He’d stepped back, out of her line of sight and then turned and walked a good distance behind her.

Ingram wanted her dead and Simon had to decide, soon, if he was going to accommodate the man. The problem he was having was he hated taking orders from Ingram. The man was a glorified fucking Cleaner, for Christ’s sake. He’d overstepped his authority, though he did have Leland in his corner. That didn’t make the orders any easier to swallow.

Simon had been recruited by the agency when he’d still been in the Marines. Signing up on his eighteenth birthday, he’d served for twelve years, received his honourable discharge and then started with the agency after a month-long vacation. Having just passed his forty-third birthday, he realized that after twenty-five years, he was getting a little tired of taking orders from idiots who had never been in the field.

All of that aside, Simon found he was genuinely intrigued by Parker’s skill. He’d heard about the mess at Wagner’s lab and how she’d managed to escape death-by-mauling, had successfully stolen the prototype to a new weapon and ditched her tail all in one night. Since she hadn’t used the prototype weapon on Wagner, he knew she still had it on her and wondered what her plan for it was.

***

It was difficult for Mr. Chu to believe that the man standing across the street attempting to engage the attentions of a hooker, and failing, could work for an organization that was on par with the agency. The target, a short, thirty-something, balding man with a slight paunch was, according to Mr. Chu’s dossier, the second-in-command at The Wappel Group. TWG handled certain jobs that, until now, the agency had considered too uncivilized. According to Mr. Leland, the agency would soon be handling all types of jobs, no matter their level of civility.

The thought of a broader audience for his work made Mr. Chu’s hands tremble in excitement. He frowned at them, as though they were acting upon their own will. Once he’d gained control of his excitement, Mr. Chu returned his attention to his target. The man had finally gotten the hooker into his car when he’d flashed a large wad of cash. Pathetic, but then Mr. Chu didn’t believe in the needs of the body. He had never tasted a woman’s flesh. His parents had followed a radical cult that eschewed the sins of the flesh and, in an attempt to steer their children along the same righteous path, had advocated mutilation of the genitalia as a rite of passage.

His parents had made him a eunuch when he was five years old. Indoctrinated to the ways of the cult since birth, and sheltered from the ways of the rest of society, Mr. Chu had been seventeen before he’d learned that not everyone thought as he did. It had been a very difficult lesson for him to learn. His parents had sent him off to join the People’s army. Again, Mr. Chu had thought it was a subset of their cult’s teachings. He quickly learned that his parents hadn’t any choice in the matter. If the Chinese government pointed to your child and said they wanted him, you handed him over.

He had nearly died during the first communal shower. The beatings he’d taken, for being different, had left him with a dangerous swelling on his head, a broken collarbone and three cracked ribs. He’d spent the next two weeks in the infirmary before the doctors had decided he was fit enough to return to active duty. His arm still in a sling to secure the collarbone, Mr. Chu had returned to his dorm. He had taken beatings regularly for six months before he’d discovered that he was proficient with explosives. Creating a daisy-chain of fuses attached to small bricks of TNT and attaching each one to a glass canister of hydrochloric acid, Mr. Chu had strung each acid bomb up above his targets. Lighting the lead fuse and stepping outside his dorm, Mr. Chu had peered in the window to watch the results.

When the small amounts of TNT exploded, it was enough to shatter the glass without burning off the acid. The acid rained down on the occupants of the dorm, partially melting them to their beds. Mr. Chu had carefully measured out enough acid to maim, but not kill, except for a chosen few. To the boys who had harassed him the most, Mr. Chu had placed the canisters over their faces. To the rest of the boys, he had placed the canisters over their genitals. Of the forty boys who lived in his dorm, thirty-two would never urinate in the same way again, never mind make love to a woman. The other eight boys lived long enough to experience some of the most excruciating pain they’d ever felt, before succumbing to their wounds.

The Chinese military had been so impressed with Mr. Chu’s talents that they’d immediately pulled him from basic training and sent him away to some of their specialized courses. After four years of training, Mr. Chu had completed his final exam by blowing up a Taiwanese passenger ferry. All three hundred and forty passengers and crew died. His instructors were most pleased.

Four years ago, Mr. Chu had made a slight miscalculation in the timing of his bomb and, instead of killing the Japanese emissary to the emperor he had killed fifteen Chinese military officials, their wives and their children. In all, fifty-three people were dead and the shockwave had quickly swelled through the remaining ranks. Mr. Chu had a target on his back the size of mainland China. The death price on his head was the equivalent of ten million US dollars.

The CIA barely got him out of China alive. Mr. Chu had spent two weeks being interrogated by the CIA before he’d feigned a grave injury and succeeded in escaping from the medical facility they’d taken him to. He accepted a freelance position with the agency in exchange for protection from the CIA. The jobs, though interesting, were few and far between. Mr. Chu had too much idle time on his hands and he tended to get antsy when he wasn’t working. Twice, he’d blown up buildings for the fun of it, because he’d had nothing else to do. He had changed his signature and didn’t think the agency could tie those jobs to him. They had already threatened to send him on a one-way trip to China if he didn’t cooperate with their directives. Mostly, he’d managed to follow them.

He was glad for this reprieve from the endless boredom. Mr. Chu tailed the target’s car, keeping several cars in between them. Once he recognized the area and knew that they were headed for the target’s house, Mr. Chu backed off further. Everything was ready and it wouldn’t take more than ten minutes to get everything set up the way he wanted it. Parking his car one block away from the target’s house, Mr. Chu swung a large hockey bag over his shoulder and headed down the street. The residential neighbourhood was home to some of the wealthiest citizens in the greater-Chicago area.

Casing the place had been a small challenge. His target employed several bodyguards and security personnel who mostly remained onsite at all times. Those men tended to stay in their own section of the house during the evening. Twice now, Mr. Chu had watched as his target brought a woman home with him. He always paid for them. Once, Mr. Chu had stood in the target’s closet and watched as he’d screwed the woman. His penis wasn’t very large. The woman had looked bored, but her voice had been very enthusiastic.

Having learned the security code from one of the guards who didn’t believe in hiding his PIN, Mr. Chu coded himself into the house. The motion detectors were never engaged until the guards turned in for the night. It was a lackadaisical practice that would serve him well. With the layout of the house memorized, Mr. Chu moved carefully through the lower level, heading for the kitchen. At the back of the kitchen was a stairwell that led down to the basement. Taking those stairs, careful not to let the wood make any creaking noises, Mr. Chu placed his bag next to the furnace.

Mr. Chu was under no obligation to make the job look like an accident. In fact, the agency wanted it to look like a targeted hit. They didn’t want to announce their actions, but they wanted to put the other organizations on high alert. The tenseness would add to Mr. Chu’s pleasure as he went about his next few contracts. Unzipping his bag, Mr. Chu removed several large bricks of C4. From a separate pocket in the bag, he removed the blasting caps and the remote detonator. Humming quietly as he worked, Mr. Chu tucked the C4 behind the furnace. Sticking the blasting caps into the bricks and tying them into the detonator, Mr. Chu then keyed in his code and armed the device. The detonator was synced to a second device that would be placed a little closer to the target. Hefting the bag onto his shoulders, Mr. Chu left the basement and swiftly made his way up the stairs to the master bedroom.

Pausing at the door, Mr. Chu slipped a snake cam under the door. The target was distracted by his whore. Mr. Chu opened the door and stepped inside the room. Closing the door around, he crept over to the closet once again. Removing the package from his bag, Mr. Chu checked on the occupants of the room. The target had his head thrown back, his eyes squeezed shut in ecstasy. The woman was on her knees, working at his dick with her mouth and hands.

Creeping out of the closet, the prepped device in the palm of his hand, Mr. Chu walked over to the end of the bed and tucked it just under the bed skirt. Leaving his empty bag in the closet, Mr. Chu slipped back into the hallway and quietly left the house. Back at his car, Mr. Chu pressed the remote to activate the dual devices. With a one-minute countdown, he had just enough time to clear the area before the house blew.

The force of the blast disintegrated the house. The ensuing fireball roasted what little was left. Nothing could be found that could be used to identify the victims of the blast. None of the security cameras from the neighbour’s houses had been directed on the explosion. The police had little to go on.

By all accounts, the job had been perfect. Mr. Chu, however, was disappointed to learn that, even given the amount of explosives he’d planted, the blast was not large enough to take out any of the target’s neighbours. It was a dissatisfying result.

***

“We need to put the word out that Parker is persona non grata.” Leland took a small sip from his whiskey, wishing Ingram’s tastes didn’t lean towards fire water. He had a lovely twenty year Macallan back in his office.

“We can activate our watchers in the UK,” Ingram suggested. “They’re stationed at all of the major airports, train stations and bus depots. If she tries to leave the country, one of them will spot her.”

Leland pondered the idea for a moment. Parker had managed to completely fool all of them and get away with a major hit. He wouldn’t underestimate her again. “Activate Europe.”

“What, the whole European network?” Ingram asked, surprised.

“Yes. She has had several hours already since Wagner’s death and we don’t know what disguise she’s using. She could already have left the country.”

Ingram nodded. Leland had a good point. He never would have expected Parker to pull this off. That’s why he had suggested her. She had always stuck to the low level jobs. He’d obviously misjudged her capabilities. “I’ll have Petrillo send out the orders straight away.”

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