The Silenced

by Brett Battles

  “Oh, my God. When?”

  “A little over a year ago.”

  “But you were running today.”

  “Prosthetics have come a long way,” Nate said, echoing one of his doctors.

  She moved around the bed to get a better look.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Just sore. Like anyone would be after the day we had.” Perhaps not like anyone, but it was more the truth stretched than a lie.

  “Do you want to sit down?” She moved out of his way so he could get to the bed.

  “I’m not an invalid,” he said.

  “I didn’t mean to—I’m sorry.”

  “Hey, it’s okay.” He pivoted around, then sat on the bed and smiled at her. “Thanks.”

  She sat next to him.

  “Were you in the car when it happened?”

  “I’d rather not talk about it,” he said. “You didn’t answer my question. Which side of the bed do you want?”

  She was silent for several seconds. “This happened because you were working for my brother, didn’t it?”

  “Liz, please. I don’t want to get into—”

  “What is he?” she asked. “An assassin? Is that what it is? He kills people for a living?”

  “No,” he said, knowing he was walking a fine line. “That’s not his job.”

  “Then, what is it? What could he do that would make those men come after me? That would cause you to lose your leg?”

  “I really think this is something you should hear from him.”

  “He’s. Not. Here,” she said. “And I need to know. I want to understand.”

  He thought for a moment, then took each of her hands in his. She didn’t fight it. “I’m not going to tell you everything,” Nate said. “I don’t think that’s my place.”

  She started to pull away, but he held on.

  “I will, however, try to tell you what I can. Okay?”

  She bit her lower lip, then nodded. “Okay.”

  “Your brother doesn’t work for a bank.”

  Liz snorted. Then they both laughed.

  “He’s also not an assassin. He’s hired by certain agencies and governments to provide a very specific service.”

  “He’s a spy?”

  Nate tilted his head to the side as he raised his shoulders a few inches. “Not exactly. But I think it would be fair to say that’s the world that he plays in.”

  “So he doesn’t kill people,” she said.

  “That’s not what he’s hired to do.”

  “Then, what does he do?”

  Nate hesitated. “That’s where I’m going to have to stop.”

  She looked away. “And you? What do you do?”

  “I’m his apprentice.”

  “His apprentice?”

  “He’s been training me to be—” He paused. “To do what he does.”

  The corner of her mouth rose. “I almost got it out of you, didn’t I?”

  “Almost.”

  “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful or anything, but he left his apprentice to take care of me? If he was really concerned, wouldn’t he have stayed himself?”

  “Three things,” Nate said. “One, thanks for the confidence.” He smiled so she’d know he was giving her a hard time. “Two, I’ve been his apprentice for several years now. I know what I’m doing. And three, I’ve never seen him act the way he has since he found out you might be in danger. He’s usually one of the most calm, patient people I know. At the moment, he’s scared and pissed. And the only reason he’s not here now is because he’s trying to find the source to stop this.” He paused. “Liz, I don’t know exactly what happened between the two of you, but I can tell you one thing. I don’t think he cares for anyone more than he cares for you.”

  He’d expected her to laugh that idea off, but she remained silent, her gaze fixed on a point on the floor in front of the bathroom.

  “Look, we should get some sleep while we can,” he said. “I’m probably going to have to run out for a little while at some point between now and the morning.”

  She looked scared again. “Why?”

  “I need to pick up something that will help us get someplace safe. It won’t be for long.”

  “Out of Paris?”

  Nate nodded. “We need to leave town as soon as we can. So we’ll get up pretty early.”

  “What are you getting?”

  Keeping the promise to himself, he said, “A false ID for you. So we can travel anonymously.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  “Not kidding at all.”

  She was silent for a moment. “Then where are we going?”

  “Someplace safe.”

  “That’s the best you can do?”

  “For now.”

  She thought for a moment, then nodded.

  “Good,” Nate said, pushing himself off the bed. “Now pick a side. I’ll be right out.”

  “Where are you going?”

  He hopped to the bathroom door. “Forgot to brush my teeth.”

  Once inside, he shut the door and turned on the water. He then picked his pants up off the floor and got his phone out of the front pocket. He shot off a quick text to Julien.

  Status?

  While he was waiting, he decided to go ahead and brush his teeth again, anyway. No lies.

  His phone vibrated. Julien had responded.

  Active search still on. R u safe?

  Nate typed:

  Safe. But need car. Can u help?

  Twenty seconds later, from Julien:

  Think so. When?

  Nate thought for a moment, then texted:

  5:30 a.m.

  It was almost a minute before Julien responded.

  Ok. Will text meeting place once arranged.

  Nate sent a confirmation, then put the phone back in his pants pocket. When he opened the door, the bedroom was dark. He flipped off the bathroom light, but he’d seen enough to know Liz had taken the far side of the bed. She had also folded back the covers on his side so he could get in.

  “I was thinking,” he said. “I mean if it makes you feel more comfortable, I could sleep on top of the blankets.”

  “You’d get too cold,” she said.

  “It’s fine. I can put on some of my clothes.”

  “No,” she said. “Please just get in.”

  He stood by the bed, paralyzed.

  “Nate, please,” she said. It was the first time she’d called him by that name. “It’s okay.”

  He lay down on his back and pulled the covers over him. He and Liz weren’t touching, but he could feel her warmth only inches away. He could also sense that her eyes were open. He was about to tell her to go to sleep, but she spoke first.

  “Tell me that I have nothing to be worried about, and it will all be okay.”

  “It will all be okay,” he said. “I’ll make sure of it.”

  Silence.

  “Why are they coming after me?”

  “They think they can control Quinn if they have you.”

  “But they can’t?”

  “No.”

  “He’d just let them have me?”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Nate said. “They wouldn’t be able to control him, because if they did somehow take you he would come after them and get you back. And if that happened, they wouldn’t know what hit them.”

  “He could do that?”

  “Yes.”

  More silence, then the rustling of blankets as Liz turned on her side toward the window.

  “I’m sorry I lied to you,” he said. “We weren’t sure if there was going to be any trouble, so it seemed best to—”

  “It’s okay. I get it,” she said.

  Nate hesitated, then said, “We should get some sleep.”

  She didn’t say anything, but he thought she nodded her head.

  “It’s all going to be okay,” he said as he instinctively reached out and put a hand on her shoulder. “Just try to sleep.”

  Her
left hand touched his. He thought she was going to push his off, but she grabbed it instead, pulling it around her so that he was hugging her. As if it were a single movement, they moved closer together, her back pressing against his chest.

  She seemed about to say something, but her voice remained silent. He, too, opened his mouth to speak, but no words came.

  After a few minutes, he could feel her body begin to relax. He thought she had fallen asleep, so he started to pull his arm into a more comfortable position. As he did, his hand brushed against her breast.

  Before he could pull it away, she turned under his arm until she was facing him. She looked at him, her eyes soft. The fear was still there, but there was something more, too.

  He leaned forward, his lips finding hers.

  As her left leg slipped over the stump of his right, she hesitated. But it was only a second, and after that it didn’t seem to matter to her that he wasn’t whole.

  THE 2 A.M. PICKUP WENT OFF WITHOUT A hitch. Nate had slept for just over an hour and a half before he got up and made his way to the trash can on Rue de Rivoli across from the Jardin des Tuileries. Just as arranged, inside he found Liz’s false documents wrapped in a paper bag, stuffed halfway down.

  Nate had been afraid when he returned he wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep. But within a minute of closing his eyes, he was out.

  At 4:30 a.m. he woke again, courtesy, as it so often was, of the alarm on his phone. Liz was draped across him, her head on his chest, her legs intertwined with his.

  He started to stroke her hair, then stopped, suddenly realizing what he was doing. I should have slept on the floor. Or the bathroom. Hell, I should have taken a second room. His hand started moving again, lifting strands of hair from her face.

  Her eyelids parted and she looked at him.

  “Time to get up?” she asked.

  “Almost,” he said.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Your hair fell on my hand.”

  She smiled, then pulled herself onto him.

  “You probably shouldn’t do that,” he said.

  “You want me to stop?”

  In his mind, he said, Yes, but in the real world, he slid a hand behind her head and pulled her mouth to his.

  When they had made love before falling asleep, there had been an urgency to it, a want and desire that possessed them both. This time their motions started slower, as if they wanted to remember every second. But then the intensity overtook them, and by the time they finished, Nate now on top, they were both drenched in sweat.

  Nate held on to her for a few moments. “We’re already late.”

  “Just a little longer.”

  “I want to.”

  “Then do it.”

  “Julien is going to meet us with a car at five-thirty,” he said.

  “When did you arrange that?” she asked.

  “Last night.”

  “Sneaky,” she said. “What time is it now?”

  He looked at his watch. “Crap,” he said.

  “What?”

  “It’s almost five. We need to move.”

  “Once more,” she whispered. “He’ll wait. And we might not get another chance for a while.”

  She slipped her hand between his legs and moved her lips to his ear.

  Yeah, he thought. Julien can wait.

  • • •

  By the time Nate and Liz left the hotel, it was already twenty minutes after five. There was no way they were going to make it on time. Nate pulled out his phone and sent Julien a quick text:

  + 15

  Outside, it took a few minutes longer than he’d hoped to find a taxi, but once they did, traffic was light, so it wasn’t long before the driver dropped them off near the entrance to the Sully-Morland Métro station on Boulevard Henri IV. As soon as the cab left, Nate pointed at the station entrance.

  “Wait down there,” he told Liz, then handed her a piece of paper. “That’s your brother’s number. Give me fifteen minutes. If I’m not back, find a pay phone and call him.”

  “What do you mean, if you’re not back? Why wouldn’t you come back?”

  “It’s just in case. Don’t worry, I’ll be back.”

  “Then I don’t need this.”

  She held the paper out to him, but Nate insisted. “Just keep it. For me, okay?”

  She didn’t look happy, but slipped the paper into the pocket of her jeans. Once she’d descended the stairs, he walked to the end of the small cobblestone square and turned onto Rue de Sully. Julien’s message had said he’d be parked somewhere along the northeast side.

  Rue de Sully was a one-way street with empty cars lining each side, narrowing the useable space to a one-car lane down the middle. Keeping to the opposite side of the road, Nate searched the parked cars for the silhouette of a man sitting behind the wheel. But the further he went without seeing anyone, the more concerned he became. Had Julien already left?

  He glanced at his watch. The deadline he’d given Liz was already a third of the way gone. Either he found Julien in the next few minutes, or he turned around and figured out some other way to get them out of town.

  Empty, empty, empty, he noted as he continued to check each car. Where the hell are you?

  He was almost ready to give up when he spotted Julien six cars ahead on the other side. At least he thought it was Julien. The silhouette sitting behind the wheel of the beat-up blue Peugeot looked right, but all Nate could see was the back of the man’s head and his shoulders.

  Still pretending to be out on an early morning stroll, he didn’t cross the street until he was three cars past Julien’s position. As he did he allowed himself a quick glance back at the Peugeot. Definitely Julien. But, he realized, something was wrong. The Frenchman was in the exact same position he’d been when Nate first spotted him.

  Nate turned down the sidewalk so that he would pass the Peugeot. As he neared, he could see that both of Julien’s eyes were closed. For a split second he thought that the Frenchman had fallen asleep. But another step closer brought something else into view.

  A dark, damp stain surrounding a hole in the middle of Julien’s shirt. Not asleep.

  Nate’s mind screamed at him to run, but his pace didn’t falter. He knew showing no reaction was the only thing that might save him. He’d only gone about five car lengths when he heard footsteps on the sidewalk behind him. He searched the road ahead, thinking there would be others coming from that direction, boxing him in. He pulled out his phone, accessed the keyboard, and began typing.

  The steps behind him increased their pace. He counted three separate sets.

  “Pardon, monsieur,” a voice called out.

  Nate was almost done. Only two more words.

  “Monsieur,” a second voice, more forceful than the first.

  Nate looked over his shoulder, his face displaying the appropriate mix of caution and uncertainty. The three men were only twenty feet away. Two were about the same size as Nate, while the third was a few inches shorter. Nate had seen them all before. He’d watched from across the street as they’d come rushing out of Liz’s apartment building with Julien the previous afternoon.

  “Oui?” he said.

  “Parlez-vous anglais?” one of the tall ones asked.

  “Un peu … a little,” Nate said, hoping his accent was convincing.

  “You’re French?”

  “Of course.”

  “You live around here?”

  “Pourquoi? Eh, why? Are you lost?”

  The one doing the talking smiled, while the other two stared at Nate. “Not lost,” he said. “And I’m willing to bet you’re not from around here either.”

  “Je ne comprends pas,” Nate said.

  “I think you do.” The talker looked at the other tall one. “What did Julien call him? Nat? No, it was—”

  Before he could finish, Nate’s foot slammed into the man’s stomach. The talker flew backward on his ass, doubling over as he lay on the sidewalk.

&n
bsp; The other two were quick to respond, but not quick enough. Even as he was kicking, Nate had switched his phone to his left hand and had reached under his jacket with his right, grabbing the Glock he’d gotten from Julien.

  The short one was pulling his own gun free, so Nate shot him first. The second guy didn’t even try for his gun. Instead he rushed forward before Nate could aim at him.

  They crashed to the sidewalk, the attacker landing on top of Nate and nearly knocking the breath out of him.

  The man reached for the gun, gripping Nate’s wrist with one hand and going for the barrel with the other. Nate rolled to his left and threw the guy’s weight off him. A movement beyond the man caught Nate’s attention. It was the first guy, the talker. He was pushing himself to his feet, a pistol already in his hand.

  The guy on the ground didn’t see this, so Nate let the man twist his arm until the barrel was pointed at his partner. Nate pulled the trigger. The bullet hit the talker just below the neck, dropping him to the sidewalk in a heap.

  The shot, having gone off less than a foot from the ear of the guy struggling with Nate, stunned him. Nate wrenched his hand free and pushed himself away along the ground. As the man clawed at his jacket, going for his own weapon, Nate shot him in the chest.

  Three dead, and enough gunfire to wake up several blocks’ worth of potential witnesses.

  Nate scrambled to his feet.

  He spotted his phone and picked it up, but it was immediately apparent he would never be able to use it again. The display screen was smashed in and the frame was bent. Not wanting to leave it behind for the police to find, he stuffed it in his pocket, then began running down the street.

  There were no sirens yet, but they’d be coming, and soon.

  Nate headed back toward the Peugeot. As he passed it, he realized there weren’t three dead. There were four. “I’m sorry, Julien,” he whispered.

  He ran as fast as his one and a half legs could carry him, circling around the neighborhood so that he’d approach the Métro station from the opposite direction. Ahead he could see the police had already arrived at the crime scene, the flashing lights of their cars reflecting along the buildings down Rue de Sully.

  Nate again looked at his watch. He was ten minutes late. If Liz had done as he’d asked, she should have already called Quinn, and he would have told her to get the hell out of there.