downward glance of the eyes, a nervous tap of the knee, there are dozens of tells that give away when a man is playing fast and loose with the truth. Smoke is skittish, no mistake, but his voice is steady and his eyes are focused. He’s afraid of me, but he’s telling the truth.
The air is dry and stale and the cigarette smoke hangs under the ceiling like a gas cloud, thick and poisoned.
I tap the note with my index finger. “And you have no idea why they want me?”
“I hung around that place for two days, hoping someone would show up and explain things further, but not a creature was stirring, you know what I’m saying? On the third day, I went looking in that safety deposit box.”
“No one followed you to the bank?”
A look sweeps over his face like the thought never crossed his mind. His adam’s apple dips like a yo-yo.
“No. I mean… no… I don’t think so.” Like he’s trying to convince himself.
“Doesn’t matter,” I say so he’ll get back on track.
“Anyway, that’s where I found the file on you.”
“What’s your plan from here?”
Smoke shrugs as he starts on his third cigarette. “Man, I wish I knew. Like I said, Archie told me if he’s ever in a tight spot, to set out to find you. And then your name’s on this here note. I don’t know what to tell you, but you gotta admit, this qualifies as a pretty goddamned tight spot, so I did what Archie asked. Beyond that…”
He lets his voice spool out, joining the smoke near the ceiling like he never intended to finish the sentence.
An image pops into my head, a highway in Nevada I drove a lifetime ago. The sky was clear, the desert calm, and the blacktop was an infinite line across the landscape, a shapeless, endless mirage. Each time I’d crest a bit of a slope or round a slight bend, the line would reemerge before me, stretching out to the horizon, teasing me, sentient, like it knew I could never reach its end.
I am about to drive that road again. I knew it the moment Smoke called me by name. The real question, the one I’m not sure I want to answer: did I ever truly leave it in the first place?
Risina is folding clothes in the back room when I enter, and her face lights up when she sees me coming through the door.
“What’d you bring me?”
Then she spots it in my face, and I guess she’s believed this day would come since we first arrived.
“Someone found you.”
I nod.
“How much time do we have?”
I swallow, my mouth chalky. “We leave tonight.”
“Where?”
“I have to go to the U.S. for a while.”
“What’s a while?”
“I don’t know.”
“And me?”
“I don’t know.”
She folds her arms across her chest and raises her chin. She’s never been one to lower her eyes, and she’s not going to start now. “Tell me what happened.”
I paint the picture of Smoke, about the way he found me and what he had to say about Archibald Grant and the note left behind that called me out by name.
“You told me you were out… that Archie wanted you out, was covering for you, he said. I don’t understand this. His problems are not your problems.”
“I was out. I am. But he stitched me up when I needed stitching and I can’t turn my back on him.”
Risina collapses into a chair, but still she doesn’t lower her eyes.
“I want you to know…” I start but she cuts me off.
“Give me a moment to think, dammit.” This might be the first time she’s ever snapped at me, and I can’t say I blame her. “Can you bring me some water?”
I move to the kitchen and pour some filtered water out of a jug we keep in the refrigerator. This might be the last time I’m in this kitchen, the last time I open this fridge, and even though this place isn’t much, it has been good to us. Better not to think this way. This is no time for sentiment. Better to rip the bandage off quickly.
I return with the water. She takes it absently and drinks the entire glass without taking it from her lips. I’m not sure she even knows I’m in the room. I can see her eyes darting as her mind catches up to what I told her.
After a moment, she finally raises her eyes and focuses on me, maybe to keep the room from spinning. She blushes, blood rising in her cheeks.
“I’m sorry… this is new to me. I thought I was prepared, had prepared myself for something like this, but…”
She swallows and bites her lip. I know she is sorting her thoughts the way a contract bridge player organizes playing cards, bringing all the suits together before laying down the next play.
“Are you going to have to kill someone?”
“I don’t know.”
“What if once you enter this life, you don’t want to stop again?”
She’s trying to read my face, less interested in what I say than how I look when I say it. It’s a skill she’s picked up from me. I answer with the truth.
“I don’t know.”
She absorbs this like a physical blow. Just when I don’t think she’s going to say anything, she finds her voice. There is a strength there that shouldn’t surprise me, though it does.
“I’m coming with you.”
“I don’t-”
“It’s not a question. I’m not asking for permission. I’m coming with you. You offered me a life with you and I won’t run away just because the past caught up with us. Us. Not you. Us.”
“Risina-”
“You can’t send me away. You can’t kick me in the stomach like you did the first girl you loved.” Her eyes are hot now. “I’m coming.”
I turn my voice to gravel. She hasn’t heard this voice from me, but I want the weight behind my words to be clear. “It’s one thing to hear these stories about me and another to live them, to see them with your own eyes. I can’t get back into this and have to worry about-”
She interrupts, fearlessly, her voice matching mine. If I thought I could outgravel her, I misjudged the woman I love. “Yes, you will. You’ll learn to do it and worry about me at the same time. I’m not giving you the choice.”
“You’ll see a side of me you won’t recognize.”
“Don’t you understand a damn thing I’m saying? I want to know every side of you. I must know! I’ve wanted all of you since I first met you. Not just one side or the other. Not just the mask you choose to show me.”
“And what if you hate what you see?”
“I won’t.”
“And what if you die standing next to me?”
“Then I’ll die. People do it every day.”
I start to ask another question and stop myself. There’s a reason I fell in love with Risina the first time I saw her; it’s here before me now. Defiance, ambition, determination, passion… the qualities of confidence. The qualities of a professional assassin. A tiger is a goddamned tiger. The beasts are born that way, and no matter how they are nurtured, their nature always emerges eventually.
“So when do we leave?” she asks.
“Now,” I whisper.
CHAPTER TWO
