She kept her head down as she shuffled through the main entrance, offering a shy smile to the older nun who eyed her with suspicion as she passed but smiled back all the same. The story she’d given them was that she was an actress set to play a nun in an upcoming movie and wanted to get an authentic feel for the character – that Method Acting nonsense she’d read about. La Madre Superiora hadn’t been too welcoming of the idea at first, especially not when she’d explained (speaking on the phone as Valentina Morales, her own Spanish agent) how the actress would want to wear the full habit. Yet funnily enough, a donation of twenty-thousand euros to the convent roof fund had changed everyone’s mind rather promptly. Money, the universal easer of all problems. It never failed to both encourage and disgust her in equal measure. Whether you were good or evil, black, white or brown, as long as you had the green you could reach some sort of arrangement.
The nuns had put her up in the annex built sometime in the last hundred years, rather than the main building. There was a long corridor with rooms leading off on both sides and hers at the end. From what she could gather, the rooms adjacent to hers were empty. A little insulting perhaps, but right for her needs.
Inside, she stripped down to her underwear and grabbed her towel before walking back down the corridor to the communal shower unit. Her first time bathing here she’d expected nothing but a lukewarm trickle, so was surprised when the water burst out of the showerhead like sharp needles. Now, cocooned inside a cubicle, she closed her eyes and put her head under the water, letting the flow cascade down her face and into her open mouth. She held her hands up in the flow, the blackened blood between her fingers and under her nails turning to red and then pink before washing clean away.
Washing away her sins.
Once cleansed, she dried herself off and padded back to her room where she dressed in a modest nightshirt and pants before sitting on the edge of the bed. There was no television in the room, no books. Nothing to engage with at all, apart from a tiny window that looked out onto rough grassland and a narrow road that was no longer in use.
She closed her eyes as if in prayer. But she didn’t pray. Not anymore. She hadn’t done for many years. Despite everything that had happened to her, despite who she was now, despite what she did, she still hung onto her faith but she’d long ago ceased talking to God. What she was doing here was connecting with her anger and shame. Turning her rage inwards, letting the intensity of her pain and fury fuel the fire blazing in her belly. Because whilst it felt good to be back in her home country after all these years, this was not the career trajectory she had planned out for herself.
And it had been going so well…
At the age of fourteen she’d left her pathetic, simpering parents and older sisters behind and never looked back. They weren’t terrible people, they were simple, god-fearing. But they’d never believed her about the attack – or maybe didn’t want to – going so far as to plead with her to keep quiet about the ordeal. To save the family name, they said, and for her to remain pure in the eyes of the town.
Espíritu maligno.
They were lucky she hadn’t cut their throats.
Once on the road she’d allowed her bloodlust to flourish, working freelance as a killer for hire in Spain and then Germany. And after racking up a total of fifteen hits in three years, she’d saved enough money for fake papers and a one-way plane ticket to the States. She landed in Washington DC on the eve of her eighteenth birthday and set about making a name for herself. Word of mouth mainly, with clients coast to coast, followed by a year as a fixer and cleaner for a ‘legitimate’ businessman with a plethora of off-the-book dealings. After that she found herself in Mexico for eighteen months as the top sicaria for the Los Continuados Cartel. It was here they gave her the nickname, La Urraca – Magpie – on account of the white streaks in her hair that had appeared not long after her encounter with the three men.
Then one day whilst in Vegas on a job, she ran into another assassin who was gunning for the same contract. Despite being a rival, the man was incredibly charming and they’d got on well. A little too well, it could be said, but that was another story. The rival told her how he’d been freelancing for many years but was now working for a new organisation based out of London, England. One that was fast becoming a major player in the industry. The man (calling himself Spitfire Creosote, of all things) talked of big money and a job for life. He explained how the big boss had gathered together a team of highly skilled assassins, each of them taking a new name when they joined, forced to leave their old life behind forever. Well, that suited her just fine. Spitfire went on to explain how the man in charge was a real force of nature, fancying himself as a businessman and entrepreneur as much as he did a killer. The organisation was called Annihilation Pest Control and they needed new recruits. She’d fit in perfectly, he said.
And she had. Ten years later she loved her job as much as she had that first day in London. It was a new life, along with an impenetrable new persona that she could mould however she wanted. She’d made the organisation – and herself –
