by Samson Weld
“There’s a man watching us,” she said, somewhat alarmed.
Nick followed her gaze and yet didn’t slow his walk. Just as he had feared, it was Xavier who was observing them.
“Don’t worry about it. Probably just some panhandler.”
That son of a bitch was everywhere and, despite Nick’s calm tone of voice, he was a little shaken. Their last meeting had caused bodily harm. Xavier’s beef was so trivial that it didn’t rank high on Nick’s list of priorities. But again, what if his involvement was deeper?
No, he ultimately decided. Xavier was smalltime. He was inconsequential. He had a good thing going with his agency and he wasn’t looking at the big picture. For this pimp, his business was the big picture.
Nick had half a mind to write a one-line recommendation for his shitty agency and be done with it. He could do it right now on his phone, but not only was his heart not into it, he had spent his entire hobbying career giving rigorous and honest reviews. He was morally opposed to being a shill.
As they entered the building, he decided that he would deal with the slimeball later. They rode the elevator up and went through the glass doors of Hozalex Solutions.
This being Sunday should have been a blessing as no one was supposed to be here to hamper their movements. But this late afternoon proved busier than the morning had been. Helmbold was in, along with some of his personnel. Everyone seemed genuinely busy. Nick led Anne-Marie to the conference room so they could regroup.
“You sure you can do this?” he asked her, knowing fully well she was jeopardizing her future.
“Turning down guys who asked me out to the prom was hard. This is easy.”
They kissed, shared an edgy smile, and stomped out. He watched her walk out into the hallway. She stood up straight, dignified and in charge. She reminded him of tall redheaded Joan from Mad Men with her attitude. It said, “Get out of the way, world. I’m here to get shit done.”
Anne-Marie headed toward the CEO’s office. The mission was simple. All she had to do was go in without anyone seeing her. That part of the plan was immediately blown. Helmbold appeared at the end of the corridor and came toward her.
Panicked, she went over her options and spotted the water cooler standing against the wall, twenty feet ahead. She went to it and turned her back to her boss.
She had no illusions that he wouldn’t see her, but she thought her stance would keep him from joining her for a chat. She took her sweet time filling the paper cup with water and drinking it.
Glancing toward the conference room, she noticed Nick was observing her. He offered her a conspiratorial wink which made her sigh with relief. He understood her predicament. A second later, he stuck his head out further into the hallway.
“Excuse me, David,” he hailed. “Would you mind joining me for a moment?”
Out of the corner of her eye, Anne-Marie noticed her boss wavering. Clearly, he wanted to speak with her for some reason and yet he was being pulled away. She almost choked on the water as she sipped it. Her throat was bone dry.
“Certainly,” Helmbold finally replied.
He continued walking toward Nick and entered the conference room. She took a deep breath, crumpled the paper goblet, and dropped it into the wastebasket.
~ ~ ~ ~
The CEO closed the door behind him and strode forward pleasantly, looking at Nick.
“What’s on your mind?” he asked as he sat down and swiveled his chair to face the standing younger man.
“It’s this whole business with Stanley, you know?”
News of Stanley having been killed in the middle of the street had traveled fast. Not only did everyone in the office know, but it was on every TV channel. It was trending on Twitter, locally anyway.
“Yes, it’s quite disconcerting,” Helmbold said. “One of my employees was mugged once, it shook up the office for days. This is… different.”
~ ~ ~ ~
Anne-Marie’s heart felt much lighter now that her boss was being entertained. With him gone, she’d have no trouble completing the task.
She went faster to his office, but as she rounded the corner her heart lurched. She came to a halt when she saw his plump secretary was at her post, sitting upright behind her desk.
She cursed herself, she should have known. Danielle was known around the office for loathing her family. Any excuse was good enough for her to come in on weekends and holidays. Anne-Marie rapidly went over her options. She needed to get her out of here.
“Hi, Danielle,” she said in French. “I just saw Mr. Helmbold a minute ago. He asked me to tell you to get some toner for the copier. He says we’re out.”
“Right now?”
“That’s what he said.”
“Can’t someone else–”
“He said it’s urgent. Some big report to print out and distribute.”
The secretary blew air out. “I’ll never understand that man.”
She reluctantly stood up and walked away.
Anne-Marie lingered in the area, even pretending to walk in the opposite direction—this being a corner office, it was at the junction of two hallways. The moment Danielle was gone, Anne-Marie turned back and entered the CEO’s office, closing the door halfway behind her.
“Here we go,” she muttered to give herself the courage to go on.
She stood still for an instant, trying to get her bearings, before cautiously making her way to the closet. She opened the door and scanned what was inside.
On the floor, just where Nick had told her to look, were the boxes labeled New York Investors.
~ ~ ~ ~
Nick leaned forward on the back of a leather chair.
“For three years I was partnered with Stanley. You know, he liked to live in the fast lane. Skydiving, bullfighting… He certainly never thought he’d get killed from a random gunshot in one of the safest cities in North America.”
He was making it up, but the older man wasn’t aware of that.
“Goes to show you, you never know when your time has come.”
“Tell me about it.”
Covertly, Nick glanced at his watch. He wondered how long he’d be able to stall without it seeming like he was.
He said, “I was wondering, perhaps you’d be okay if I talked with my people in New York and asked for an extension for the report. I mean, in light of everything that’s happened, that doesn’t seem unreasonable, right?”
At that, Helmbold’s face hardened. “I’m not sure if I’m in favor of this. Any delay would be, uh, prejudicial.”
That made Nick scowl in genuine bafflement. Who in the world was in a hurry to get audited?
~ ~ ~ ~
Anne-Marie was convinced she couldn’t go any faster as she rummaged through the boxes.
Lift the box cover, rifle through folders, decide on the spot if they were worth her time. Her heart beating a mile a minute wasn’t helping matters.
The folder labels sounded innocuous so she needed to open each one to see what they were about. Even then, the contents were mostly letters and spreadsheets which could mean anything without further inspection.
But it didn’t matter, she told herself. She had time.
~ ~ ~ ~
What she couldn’t possibly know was that Danielle was cursing to herself outside the elevators.
There was no way she could go down to the Bureau en Gros office supply store—what they called Staples in Quebec—without her corporate credit card. She realized she had left her handbag in her desk drawer.
“Maudite marde...”
She headed back to her desk.
~ ~ ~ ~
When Anne-Marie heard the footsteps, it was too late.
Ever so slowly, she entered the closet as best as she could, which wasn’t much, certainly not enough to hide. Her heart thumped so fast that it had to be heard all the way down in the lobby. She froze and didn’t dare breathe.
The secretary stopped by her desk. Her eyes narrowed when she noticed the door to her
boss’s office was ajar. It was always closed, whether he was in or not. Was it like that when she left?
She went to it and peeked in. “Allo?”
She scanned the area. Helmbold wasn’t there. No one was there, the closet door was closed, nothing seemed to be missing or out of place. With a shrug, she closed the office door, grabbed her purse, and left again.
After waiting for a full minute, Anne-Marie climbed out from under the desk which she had decided at the last moment was her best option.
She prairie-dogged from behind it to make sure she was indeed alone and returned to the closet. She still had some files to go through.
And now time was running out.
~ ~ ~ ~
In the conference room, Nick was still bewildered by Helmbold’ last comment.
“What do you mean about a delay being prejudicial?” he asked. “Why don’t you want me to delay my report? It’s really no problem, I’m sure. My boss listens to me. If I say we need an extension, one will be granted.”
“Mr. Eversull, we had an agreement that you would file the report on my company by Monday at noon and I expect you to keep your word.”
“Surely, you’re not that strapped for cash, are you? What’s going on?”
The older man’s features hardened. His usually genial expression was gone. “I like for people to keep their word, that’s all.”
Through the glass door, Nick saw Anne-Marie walking down the hall with a stack of files in her arms. It was time to wrap things up even though he was curious about the CEO’s meaning.
“Okay, sir. I’ll do my best to honor that commitment.”
“Great, wonderful,” Helmbold said, his cheery disposition promptly returning as if Nick had said the magic word.
The older man stood up and left. For his part, Nick couldn’t wait to see what was in those secret files.
Chapter 28
Neither of them could postpone the discovery one second longer. But they had to leave the Hozalex offices first. There was no sense in being too hasty and getting caught. Nick had gone too far and done too much to have everything snatched away from him.
As soon as Nick and Anne-Marie got to her car, they sat inside and spread the files over their laps. He immediately set out to see what they were about, flipping madly through the pages.
In a sense, he didn’t mind that the files weren’t digital. Sure, he could have easily run a search, but for what? This way, he could let his eyes scan the paper and, as was often the case, something would jump at him. That was the nature of his job in the first place. That was what auditing was, detecting patterns which didn’t belong.
“Can you make any sense of this?” Anne-Marie asked.
“Jesus…”
She perked up but was also concerned. “What is it?”
“Here I have correspondence between David Helmbold and William Aylward. It’s dated two years ago. It seems like Aylward used to be in business with your boss.”
“What? He never mentioned anything.”
“Never?” Nick asked, still going through the pages. “You would think that if you were in business with a billionaire, it wouldn’t be a secret.”
“This is news to me, I swear.”
He glanced at her and, from the blank expression on her face, he believed her. How could something so high profile remain hidden? When prominent billionaires bought a new house or attended a party, it made the news. That went double for investments, especially in the Wall Street circles Nick traveled in.
He read a letter and his mouth went dry. “Oh, my God.”
He eagerly flipped to another page, still reading.
Anne-Marie shifted toward him. “What?”
“I’m starting to see the bigger picture here. Aylward gave Helmbold two years to develop a new accounting system for his business. The deal was off the books, made out to another name, payment through accounts in Macau.”
“What were the terms?”
“Helmbold at the time was having financial difficulties so he sold forty percent of the stock to various New York investors. Then, Aylward pressured him for results and he had to sell another twelve percent to some people in Europe.”
Anne-Marie frowned. “Helmbold isn’t the majority stockholder anymore? Wouldn’t you already know about this? You’ve been going through the files all weekend.”
“I guess it’s been well concealed. The documents were forgeries.” He inspected another document as he went on. “Aylward was getting restless and he issued an ultimatum: deliver the system or I’ll buy this company from under you and sell it for parts.”
Anne-Marie was beginning to understand, just like he was. This was more than just about funding. This was about hiding evidence of past deeds.
She said, “If Aylward takes over Hozalex, he’ll be able to erase all trace of his involvement. If he made the deal off the books, then he really doesn’t want to acknowledge his involvement.”
Nick ran a hand through his hair. This went much deeper than he’d realized.
“I need to get some air.”
He exited the car and took a few steps down the sidewalk to stretch his legs.
~ ~ ~ ~
Fullerton observed Nick Eversull over the ledge of the building across the street.
He was twenty stories high, but had studied the photograph long enough to be able to recognize the New Yorker anywhere. He pulled back and finished screwing together his Barrett M98B sniper rifle, complete with high-powered scope and sound suppressor.
He hated working in North America, especially big cities. These days, he was smart enough to charge extra for that. What he preferred was hunting in Africa or South America, places that were less structured. Asia was a growing market, but he found it difficult to blend in, not to mention that getting caught there was unforgiving.
He’d been a professional assassin since retiring from the New Zealand Special Air Service. A second career in private security led him to becoming a bodyguard and then to strong-arm tactics.
The leap to murdering people had not been difficult. His price was high and he was in demand. He was of the firm belief that no one ever died for nothing. You had to have done something very wrong for someone to put a hit on you, he thought.
Guilt was never a problem.
Into the rifle, he inserted the box magazine containing ten .338 Lapua Magnum rounds before racking the bolt. He shouldered the weapon and approached the ledge with it, being careful not to protrude out so he wouldn’t give himself away.
He looked down at the sidewalk through the scope until he found his target. Nick Eversull was right there pacing back and forth next to a Mercedes. He took long, deep breaths, going through his personal ritual to slow down his heartbeat. It was essential for firing accuracy.
He nudged the rifle sideways and put the crosshairs right on the New Yorker’s forehead.
Now all he had to do was squeeze the trigger.
~ ~ ~ ~
Nick was glad that the weather had turned cool and it wasn’t raining anymore. It was helping him to clear his head. He tightened his leather jacket around his chest and focused on the concrete pavement, watching the cracks escaping in every direction.
There had to be a logical explanation for all this, he pondered. Everything that had happened to him since he had come to Montreal had to be somehow connected. He continued pacing and kept close to the car.
“Nick,” Anne-Marie called from inside the vehicle as she herself read through the letters. “Have you ever heard of a guy named Lars Mousetrap?”
“What did you say?”
Intrigued, he hurried to the passenger side window and put his head inside to see what she was talking about.
~ ~ ~ ~
With his finger already having taken off the slack in the trigger, the hitman was exhaling in preparation of the kill shot.
He pulled with more pressure, but then his mark’s head dipped at once inside the Mercedes. He no longer had a shot.
“Bloody he
ll…”
It didn’t matter, he was a patient man. For the money involved, he could wait a very long time.
~ ~ ~ ~
From her spot behind the wheel, Anne-Marie was still going through the files, but there was one particular letter in her right hand which was holding her attention.
“Lars Mousetrap,” she said. “Oh, sorry, I meant Lars Moultrup.”
“How do you know that name?”
Nick snatched the paper away from her. She tried not to act surprised before launching into her explanation.
“There are some files with his name on it,” she said. “Aylward wrote in a couple of places that paperwork and payment should be arranged through Lars Moultrup.”
“Son of a bitch!”
“You know him?” She was waiting for him to explain, but he didn’t say anything. Nick was simply shaking his head in disbelief. “What is it?”
“He works at my company, been there for a year. He heads the legal department.”
Still holding onto the letters, he pulled out of the car and began pacing once more as he read. Mostly however, he needed to work off steam.
~ ~ ~ ~
Patience paid off, Fullerton found.
His target was again in his sights. He tightened his grip on the stock and focused on slowing down his breathing. The trick was to be calm in order to avoid yanking back the trigger because that was how shots were missed.
He tracked the man as he paced along the sidewalk. What he needed to do was to figure out his pattern. It was like skipping rope, really. Once you had the timing right, you could anticipate where the man would be.
Come on, come on…
The assassin squeezed the trigger.
Chapter 29
So many thoughts were jumbling through Nick’s brain that he wasn’t paying attention to where he was going as he paced.
His eyes had been looking at the horizon, seeing nothing, while he tried to make sense of Lars Moultrup’s involvement. So much had been happening, so many disjointed things, and now for some reason it all seemed related.
Think, think, man!