But I wanted to know.
Lucita looked at me, then looked away. “There are some regrets, yes. I always thought my father cared for me more than this, but I should have known it was otherwise. Do you know he killed my uncle and grandfather?”
“It was in his file.”
“My mother was the only person he truly loved. He always said I was his treasure, but if that were the case then he wouldn’t have made me into an assassin. He wouldn’t have sent me to the Zombie to break me and remake me into something strong.”
“Break you?”
“We do not know each other well enough to discuss that sort of thing.” A haunted look passed over Lucita’s face before she shook her head. “What the hell, since we’re plotting patricide together. There’s a place not far from the Palace of Miracles called the Campus. It is a place where recruits are made into my father’s loyal soldiers. He did not wish me to be weak, and I was treated no better than the other women in the camp.”
“I see.”
“I castrated one of the instructors and left him hanging from a tree by his foot. That was my graduation.”
“The Hanged Man element is a nice touch.”
“Thank you. I thought so.” Her expression turned serious. “My father must die, and it must appear that my brother is responsible.”
“And how are we going to accomplish that?”
“That would be telling.”
I paused, wondering if I should press the issue. “I can help.”
“I know you can.” Lucita looked up. “However, I want you focused on the Mondo issue first.”
She turned the laptop around to reveal a newspaper article with a picture of a beautiful Italian villa that easily had over two hundred rooms and occupied a massive estate. The article talked about how Luigi had purchased the property during the Financial Crash of 2008 and added on to it extensively with his immense personal fortune.
“Impressive home,” I said. “How are we going to get in?”
“That’s the simple part. You’re my date tonight.”
I blinked. “Your date?”
“Luigi is hosting a fundraiser tonight for his campaign.”
“A bit early, isn’t it?”
“Never for someone who wants into power. It’s not important, though, as the election is already fixed.”
“Ah,” I said, not even surprised anymore by the various things I found out about the world these days. “If he’s planning to use the military to crack down on the Carnevale, won’t he object to the daughter and second-in-command of that organization coming for a visit? Or is this an Italian custom I don’t know about?”
Lucita got up from the bed and started going through her clothes. I decided now was a good time to start doing the same.
“Luigi is still acting friendly to the Carnevale,” Lucita said, slipping on her underwear before putting on a gorgeous backless black dress. “He thinks that we don’t have eyes and ears listening to his activities. We put him in power though, and know who is trying to turn him against us.”
I paused, realizing who she was talking about. “The Society.”
Lucita nodded, turning around to have me zip up her back. “Yes. They or their supporters have wanted to turn the Italian government’s assassination needs over to the Letters for some time. When Luigi sabotaged the debt talks with Greece, he put himself the fast track to being rewarded with a place in the history books. The price they’re demanding, though, is an expansion of their franchise.”
“Very clinical.”
“Murder is a billion-dollar industry that oversees all the other ones.”
Putting on a new set of underwear and dressing myself in a freshly purchased tuxedo, I tried to figure out how this information squared with the causal way the Society had sanctioned Luigi’s murder. Were they really that desperate to get rid of the Carnevale? Did they have someone to replace Luigi if he was killed? Or was Lucita simply mistaken, and her belief that the Society was operating a KGB- or CIA-level job just the musings of a woman raised in a megalomaniac crime lord’s household?
I decided to ask.
“Marissa?” I said, giving her a call. “I need you to verify some information for me.”
“Finished with your exercise?”
I felt strangely uncomfortable. “Can you see all I’ve been doing?”
“Only hear, and only when you’re transmitting. You’ve been doing that off and on this entire time. We may have some bugs to work out in the system.”
“Ah.”
This wasn’t the first time I’d used sex on a mission to get closer to a target. It was one of the most readily available tools to an assassin who wanted information or a favor. It was, however, the first time it had happened after my relationship with Marissa had turned serious. I hadn’t given much thought to how it would make her feel, and had rather causally assumed she would get over it. Strangely, it wasn’t her reaction that bothered me, but how the event was making me feel.
I felt… ashamed.
These new emotions were troubling. Were they a function of my new IRD implant? A breakdown in my conditioning? Marissa and I falling in love? If love it was. Was I simply defective? Dammit, I didn’t need this. A mission was the last place I required an existential crisis.
Explaining the situation to her, I asked a simple question. “Is any of this true?”
“Yes and no,” Marissa replied. “Luigi is the candidate being supported by Persephone, but he’s being put in power by the World Banking Organization. We have little to do with it other than the fact that we own a substantial portion of that group’s members.”
“Your definition of ‘little’ is rather peculiar. Is there any luck with finding the second spy?”
“Yes. I found plenty of e-mails and other material belonging to Lisa Simple. She killed herself instead of letting herself fall into the hands of the Discipline Unit.”
I thought of the mousy young woman with two kids who had considered her adultery a great rebellion against authority. “Lisa doesn’t fit the profile of a traitor.”
“Trust me on this. Finish your mission quickly. We’re running out of time.” That was when Marissa broke our connection.
What the…?
“Frank?” Lucita said behind me.
I turned my head. “Sorry, lost in thought.”
Lucita looked positively stunning in her attire. It was elegant and formal, but still on the daring side with the way the fabric accented her frame. I wasn’t really attracted to her, mostly because she was a psychopath, but could still admire the beauty of her form. I made sure to look like I desired her, though.
“That’s a dangerous habit for an assassin,” Lucita said.
“It’s only started up recently,” I said, putting on my cufflinks. “You mentioned there was a plan to destroy the Society in the works.”
“Did I? I don’t recall that.”
“Perhaps you implied it.”
“And I should share this with you because . . .?”
“I have an overwhelming hatred of the organization, saved your life, and am an amazing lover.”
“Two of those are true.”
“No, I truly do hate the International Refugee Society to an intense level. I say that as a man who thinks refugees get the short end of the stick. I mean, they at least help a couple every year.”
Lucita snorted and then walked over to adjust my bow tie. “The President of the United States.”
“Sarah Douglas?” I asked, surprised.
Since defeating her opponent in the primaries seven years ago, the two-term President had been a political dynamo for the Republicans. Her healthcare reforms, military strategies, and vigorous anti-corruption measures had all proven extremely effective. There was a dark side to the President, though, as she also favored militarizing the police even more than they already had been, as well as doubling down on expanding the federal government’s ability to curtail civil rights.
Despite this, Pr
esident Douglas was something of a lame duck when it came to dealing with the various secret societies that really ran Washington and Wall Street. A suspicious number of her political supporters and political allies had suffered mysterious deaths over the past few years, making the initiative to allow her to run for a third term unlikely to succeed. I’d killed two of those individuals.
“She knows of the Society,” Lucita said, chuckling. “My father’s allies slipped her information about them. I’m sure she’s already planning a suitable revenge for all the trouble they’ve caused her.”
My mouth went dry as I pondered the sheer stupidity of that act. There was an unspoken agreement between the two dozen or so independent intelligence and assassin societies working for the world’s major governments. One of them was that you didn’t directly involve the Heads of State in our affairs or inform on the other societies. If you did, breaking our informal omerta, or code of silence, then you were targeted by all the other factions combined. It was too dangerous to us all.
How could Caesar be so stupid?
How could Lucita?
I didn’t react, though. “Brilliant.”
If the President of the United States decided to destroy the International Refugee Society, then there would be absolutely nothing it could do to prevent it. Our organization depended on both secrecy as well as the general ambivalence of its host country to survive. The Carnevale might be willing to eliminate the future president of Italy here, and perhaps had the political patronage to survive, if not thrive, but that wasn’t the case back in the USA. The Society would be stormed by the FBI or Special Ops, its members arrested or more likely killed, then its archives of sensitive information confiscated.
Unless I warned them. But did I want to?
If I could get my memories back from Doctor Gordon now, then what use did I really have for the Society at all? I could let the organization die and be free of them. I might even sign up with whatever replacement emerged to fill the void following its destruction. There were a few people I might care to see survive such an event, but not many. Most of the Society’s employees I’d be happy to see consigned to the dustbin of history. Most were acceptable collateral damage. It was an intriguing proposition, one that required careful consideration.
Assuming I survived this mission.
Lucita gestured to the door. “We could go arrange for some transport to Luigi’s palazzo. After he’s dealt with, I’ll tell you how we’re going to eliminate both my father and Alonzo. Then we can discuss how the two of us will reshape the Carnevale.”
“Of course.”
Chapter Fifteen
It was about an hour past sundown when we arrived at our target’s location. As we pulled up to a large line of cars in front of his mansion, a valet opened the door for Lucita, and the two of us stepped out onto the finely tended walkway leading up to the front doors.
Luigi’s “fundraiser” was already in full swing and honestly was one of the more impressive gatherings I’d attended. Everything from the surroundings to the guests was a remarkable sight. The estate was, in simple terms, a palace. Lucita hadn’t been understating things when she’d called it that. The front doors alone were at least four times the size of a normal mansion entrance, emphasizing the sheer scope of the palace. There were hundreds of guests as well, perhaps as many as a thousand.
Walking in, arm in arm with Lucita, I immediately noted that security was being provided by J5R Securities. The world’s largest private military contractor (PMC) had public agents stationed at every entrance and interspersed among the guests and staff. My IRD conjured little golden circles in my vision that identified the make and model of their armaments as well as which ones were wearing body armor.
While useful information, it was rather distracting, and I wondered how long it would take me to engage and disengage scanning mode. I was also a little put off by knowing plenty of information about the people around me that hadn’t been included in my briefing—they were just things I knew. I had the suspicion I was a guinea pig for Fourth Generation cyberware, and I did not appreciate it one bit. Not that my opinion mattered to the Society.
The estate’s interior was just as disgustingly opulent as the exterior, with a grand marble staircase heading up the middle of the front hall, polished gray flagstone floors, statues of Michelangelo-inspired angels along the corners of the ceiling, and an enormous crystal chandelier.
“It seems a lot of people want to see him become president,” I said, watching a security guard scan the barcode inside Lucita’s engraved invitation. She’d been keeping it in her purse the entire time and I was surprised there wasn’t blood on it.
“Most of them, yes,” Lucita said, causally scanning the crowd. “The rest are here for the tax write-off.”
“Tax write-off?”
“Speak Russian. Few people understand that here,” Lucita said, switching languages. “Luigi is officially raising money for the refugee crisis. He’s getting his final push into office by trying to get private enterprises to donate hundreds of millions in Euros to construct housing for the poor brown people on territories well away from proper Italians.”
“Ah.”
“Not that most of the money will ever be seen by them.”
“All for an election that’s already fixed,” I replied in Russian.
“Italian politics are much more honest than American. There, they do some truly despicable things.”
“You’re right,” I said, sucking in my breath. “I’ve done some of them.”
It seemed Marissa hadn’t been understating things when she said Luigi Mondo was dirty. Stealing millions meant to buy food and shelter for starving refugees made him lower than Redmond, who was one of the more repellent people I’d killed.
“Any updates from your people and their mission?”
“Don’t talk about it here,” Lucita said, putting on a pair of sunglasses. “Also, keep an eye out for my father’s men.”
“You think they’ll be here?”
“We survived, didn’t we? He’ll send another set of assassins to finish me off soon. Probably under the guise of protecting you from the International Refugee Society.”
“Not a very good cover story.”
“It only has to last until we’re dead.”
I didn’t expect there to be any assassins threatening us here. After all, the Caesar wasn’t trying to kill his daughter. He might know the Black Tide was responsible for attacking her, but the only people who might know who hired them were dead now since they operated in cells. Marissa had chosen a very good set of mercenaries for my plan.
At least as deniable expendable assets.
I wasn’t about to abandon my probing Lucita for information, though. I needed to control the situation and that required a firm understanding of what was going on. Lucita was running on emotions and adrenaline, which did wonders for my plan to manipulate her but very little for my belief we could pull this off. Emotions were the enemy of any artfully planned hit and inevitably resulted in things becoming sloppy.
I hated sloppy.
“I need to know what our status is,” I said, sighing. “It’s the only way I can help you.”
A waiter brought us both champagne as we moved through the crowd as if we belonged witht t them. I’d made almost a hundred thousand dollars for each of my hits and sometimes more, generating a fortune of almost ten million dollars. But none of that money was even a drop in the bucket to the fortunes present here.
To my left, I noticed Solomon “The Grocer” Ginsberg, a man who smuggled NATO weapons to various groups in Africa and the Middle East on behalf of the Syndicate. He was talking to Marcus Wellington, a member of British House of Commons whose son was deeply involved in both the slave trade as well as blood diamonds. In the corner of my eye Mahad al-Malik, good friend to the late Marshall Redmond, was arm in arm with a Turkish crime lord named Jasmine. I had my suspicions that Mahad’s presence here was less about any connections he had to M
iddle Eastern terrorists and more about whatever deal he’d managed to cut for rolling on his friends back in Chicago.
Luigi Mondo had some very interesting friends.
Lucita took a sip of her champagne. “Very well. I’ve already sent my people to start dealing with my father’s associates. I’m keeping the information circle small and doing it on the orders of my father through the codes he’s prone to using. After we deal with Mondo, I’ve set up a place for my father and brother to meet us. A restaurant he believes to be lucky because the old woman who runs it covers it in folk magic charms. I’ve hidden weapons there for us to retrieve and deal with the issue. The staff will also include outside contractors.”
I nodded. “Sounds good. I can deal with him if you’re conflicted.”
“No,” Lucita sat, finishing her glass. “This is my kill.”
I nodded. “As you wish.”
“We’ll take you to Gordon afterward. He’s in the laboratory underneath the palace, a converted dungeon from the days our home belonged to the Pazzis. There’s a private elevator in the library that leads right down to him. There, is that enough?”
“Yes,” I said. “I’ll need you, of course, to convince him to help me get my memories.”
Lucita snorted. “As well as get down. The elevator is rigged to only respond to our family’s voices.”
Little did she know how many samples the Society had of her and her father’s voices on file. I now had all the information I needed to accomplish my primary mission and, should things turn south, to simply leave the current premises and make my own way to the Palace of Miracles. I wasn’t about to abandon my current plan, though, especially since it would hopefully diminish the amount of resistance I’d face from the Carnevale’s people.
“Do you see Luigi?” I asked, switching topics.
Agent G: Infiltrator Page 12