Assassin

by Seiters, Nadene

  Another female nurse comes into the room and turns around immediately when she sees Troy’s backside exposed for all to see. She has a needle on a tray in her hands and sets it down on a table by the door gently. With one clearing of her throat, Marty glances in her direction finally.

  “I’m here to give him his tetanus shot. He’s going to need it.” Troy grunts as he pulls on his pants and then winces when he pulls his shirt over the stitches across his back and chest. He’s going to need some pain killers if he’s expected to take any long trips.

  “Fine, give that to me and some Vicodin. Then I’m out of here.” The woman gets a stern look on her face as she holds up her hands in front of her when she turns around. Troy is fully dressed, to her relief, and she grabs the needle off the small tray.

  “I’m afraid you should stay here for a few days. And we need to know what happened. The police are investigating-” Marty puts up a hand to stop her spiel and gets a small smile on her lips.

  “I’m sorry, Ms-” He waits a long while before she understands.

  “Jessica, everyone calls me Jess.”

  “Jess, you see, I’m a federal agent, and this man is coming with me whether the local police like it or not. You can tell them whatever you want, but as soon as that tetanus shot is in this man’s arm and a bottle of Vicodin is there too, then we’re out of here.” She huffs once and jams the needle into Troy’s arm with remarkably little fineness. When he flinches, she only rolls her eyes at the absurdity. He didn’t flinch when he almost tore out some of his stitches putting on the shirt. The baby can handle a rough injection.

  “I’m afraid I cannot give him a prescription without a name.” The woman clips as she disposes of the needle into a medical waste bin.

  “Put it under Marty Summers dear, and make it quick. He has a plane to catch.” Troy almost groans aloud at the word plane, but it will get him to Cassidy sooner. He just wants to see her face and smell the scent of her.

  The woman waltzes from the room the a perturbed look on her face, and both men stand silently as they wait for her return. Marty checks his phone three times and taps his foot when two minutes pass. He narrows his eyes when the clock hits three minutes, and Troy chuckles aloud at the man’s impatience.

  “What’s so funny, Jack?” Troy stretches his right arm and tries not to break any of the precise stitches.

  “I think you’re more worried about getting out of here than I am.” As if proving his point, Marty’s eyes flick in the direction of the hanging wall clock again, and the woman finally returns with a bottle of pills and discharge papers. A doctor is following her with a none-too-pleased expression on his face.

  “Mr. Summers, right?” Troy shrugs once with indifference as he takes the pills from Jess. Her jaw is set as if she’s upset with him, but he ignores her and turns his attention to the doctor. The discharge papers are shoved into his hands along with a pen.

  “So I can go?” He asks while glancing in Marty’s direction.

  “You’re supposed to be detained here until the police arrive, Mr. Summers. But your…associate has insisted that if you want to leave, you’re leaving.” The doctor looks miffed by all of this, but Marty Summers steps forward to rescue Troy finally from the verbal abuse.

  “He’s healthy enough to travel?” He sounds bored, and Troy recognizes his own tell before he starts using force.

  “Well, yes if he’s careful with those stitches he can travel. They need to be in for fourteen days, Mr. Summers. Then you will need to find a local doctor that can check on them and take them out for you.” Troy nods along impatiently, and as soon as the doctor takes a breath to continue, Marty walks from the room followed by his ward for the time being.

  “This is all bullshit, Summers, let’s spring this joint.” The older man walks briskly down the hall and takes the stairs down to the first level. Troy barely has enough time to catch up to him as he exits through the front doors. There’s a vehicle already pulled up to the curb with a driver wearing a pair of dark sunglasses inside. Marty, or whoever he truly is, slides into the back and waits for Troy to follow.

  “You got water, Ishmael?” The man in the front tosses back a miniature water bottle, and Troy takes two of the Vicodin. They take off at a slow rate until they’re on the highway. By the time they reach the airport, Troy has determined the Vicodin is not working and takes another for good measure.

  They board a private jet rather than a commercial flight, and Troy furrows his brows when he sits down in a leather seat.

  “I thought you said we were going to miss our flight? Can’t this take off at any moment?” Marty just gives him a sideways grin and leans back in his own seat. The driver was left with the vehicle, and their pilot seems to have a sense of humor.

  “Please fasten your seatbelts, gentleman, and hold onto your beers. We’re going to have a bumpy takeoff.” Marty idly rummages through his cellphone and Troy thinks about telling the man he shouldn’t have it out during takeoff, but changes his mind. His fingers grip the armrest on either side of his seat as the jet starts to take off, and he barely feels the ripping of a stitch in his back.

  “I’m curious, Evans.” Troy flinches at the false name and wishes he could go back to Troy Red. But maybe he can have them change it to Troy Evans. At least the first name would be the same.

  “About what?” The plane has steadied, and he dares to unlatch his seat belt long enough to head for the flight attendant’s cabin. This is where they keep the good stuff, but he grabs a bottle of water. He’s already hopped up on Vicodin, so there’s no reason to be drinking too. Troy doesn’t want to be too inebriated when he finally gets to see Cassidy again.

  “Why did you do it?” Marty asks when Troy sits down. “You could have lived a happy life in Colorado and left it all for the police in LA to take care of.”

  “Do you want the truth?” Troy asks as he uncaps the bottle of water and takes a long swig. There’s nothing like pain pills to give a man dry mouth syndrome.

  “Yeah, the real reason you did it. Not the heroic version.” Marty looks genuinely interested in Troy’s motive for killing three people, and he wonders if it’s human curiosity or if it’s a professional’s curiosity. Marty Summers and Troy are not that different in nature, really. They both kill in cold blood as a career. It’s just a matter of who they do it for that makes it right or wrong in most people’s eyes.

  “It’s who I am, Summers. They were a threat to me and mine, and I took them out. It’s as simple as that.” They both sit in silence as they contemplate what Troy just said. Marty wonders if this man would have become an agent if he had not been born into the wrong family. He would have made one hell of an agent.

  “So do you think that you’re going to be happy sitting at home with a cute wife and nothing to worry about but whether or not your next paycheck will be on time?” Troy snorts as he studies his water bottle and watches a small bead of moisture fall down the plastic side. He’s thought about that ever since he was captured and put into that dark room. He has the scars to prove that he cares about the ones he loves, but is that enough for him?

  “The truth?” He asks again. Marty nods with narrowed eyes. “No, I won’t be happy sitting at home with a wife.” He pauses as he takes another sip of water and swallows roughly. “I’ll be ecstatic, over the moon, in heaven and hell at the same time, Marty. I want nothing more than to forget about the terrible things I’ve done in my life, yet I can’t. But I’ll spend my entire life trying to make up for it.”

  Marty nods his chin once as he sits back in his seat with a satisfied look on his face. He has a knack for knowing when perps are telling the truth or not, and the man sitting across the aisle from him on the plane is speaking from the heart. He’s glad to hear it. Because one more screw up on Troy’s part, and he’ll be out of the program for good. But Marty doesn’t see that happening.

  The plane touches down onto the tarmac in Idaho, and Troy groans as he thinks of the state known for its potatoe
s. If he had his choice of places to live, he’d be in Hawaii right now. But he has a feeling that no-one ever gets to go to Hawaii in the witness protection program. That would be too good for people like him.

  “We’ve still got a few hours to go by car to get to Cassidy. Do you think you can make it?” The water bottle is empty, and he’s feeling pretty high from the pills, so he smiles. It’s a goofy smile that has Marty returning it, but it falters when he sees that Troy pulled a few stitches in his back.

  “We’ll have to stop real quick and get that cleaned up.” Troy attempts to twist and turn so that he can see what Summers is talking about, but it’s useless. He’s led from the plane like an invalid and across another tarmac into a small building. It reminds him of the tiny airport in Morgantown, Pennsylvania.

  They exit out the front and get into another car. This time it’s a black, nondescript vehicle with Idaho license plates. Marty doesn’t say much as he starts the car and immediately gets onto a highway nearby. The cool air of the mountains washes over Troy, and part of him thinks that maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to live in a place like this. It’s remote, and it reminds him of when he first met Cassidy.

  * * *

  I insisted on coming back, she reminds herself as she grooms a foal. There are over eight horses here for the guests during the summer months, and they all need care. Yet she has a feeling she’s not allowed to clean a stall because no one wants her to turn green again. Everyone on the ranch knows, and everyone has their own opinions about the father not being present.

  Cassidy tries to ignore the pitying looks and goes about her daily business. She insisted on being discharged from the hospital on the grounds that there was nothing they could find wrong with her. Victor stomps through the field with another bottle of water in hand and a banana muffin his sister made this morning. If she has to eat another thing in the next hour, she’s going to kill someone!

  “I thought you might be hungry.” Victor’s kind eyes crinkle at the corners as he hands her the muffin, and she proceeds to feed it to the horse. They’re all going to get fat if she keeps this up, but she’s not hungry at the moment.

  “I told you. When I’m hungry, I’ll come inside to eat. I’m fine.” A few of the other workers nearby glance in her direction with worried expressions, but Victor is smiling.

  “If you can have that much zest when you speak, I guess you are fine. But honey, if you’re going to say ‘fuck you’ to me, just say it. Don’t mask it behind words like ‘fine’.” She can’t help it. The smile ghosts across her face as she puts the brush back over her hand and starts to groom the foal again. This one reminds her of Reese’s Pieces, and stroking across the blaze on his face makes her heart ache.

  “Fuck you, Vic.” She says with an amused voice. Her hair falls into her face, and Victor follows her to the other side of the horse. His hand comes up to brush away the new streak of black in her hair rather than pink, and she freezes. The gesture cannot be construed as anything but romantic, which makes her heart stop in her chest.

  “Cassie, I know there’s someone out there you’re waiting for. But what he never comes back?” The words are quiet and no one else can hear, but her cheeks flush just the same. Cassidy knew this moment was coming the second she laid eyes on Victor, but the spark he felt was just a fizzle for her.

  “He’ll come back.” She says heatedly as she steps away from him, but it’s not Victor that she’s upset with. It wouldn’t be fair to blame it on him.

  “If he doesn’t…” Victor doesn’t finish the sentence as he walks away. Cassidy feels her eyes fill with the familiar tears and wipes at them angrily. She blames it on her raging hormones, and the doctor confirmed that this would happen.

  “He’ll come back.” She repeats quietly as she watches Victor’s retreating form. Her hand trembles as she lifts it and the brush up to continue her job. Feeling guilty for the twinge of doubt in her heart, Cassidy tries to think of something else other than the fact that she’s alone on this dude ranch with three lives depending on her. It’s surreal and frightening at the same time, but she will never wish it hadn’t happened. That wouldn’t be fair.

  The afternoon slips into the evening, and she’s exhausted by the time she goes in for dinner. No one complains if she eats more than her fair share at a meal, and the women ooh and ah over a stomach that hasn’t even begun to show yet. Cassidy fears the babies will be underweight, but her doctor insists that even if they are the technology available today gives these kids a much better chance at surviving than if it were fifty years ago. It still doesn’t quell her fears much.

  The stars are bright this evening as she sits on one of the porch swings with a book in hand. Cassidy was never much of a reader before, but sometimes things change when people are thrown into a strange environment. Now she knows how Troy must have felt those few weeks he was at her father’s farm. The man must have been more home sick than her right now. He came from the city; at least she’s still on a farm of some sort.

  At first, the sound of a vehicle doesn’t register in her mind as she marks her place in the book and stands up from the porch swing. Everyone else is either inside watching television or they’ve gone to bed already. It was a rough day for most, and she’s no exception. She wishes she could do more than just groom a few horses and water them, but she’s not allowed to lift anything over ten pounds around here. Those aren’t the doctor’s orders. They’re Victor’s.

  Headlights wash over her as the vehicle pulls up to the house, and something tells her to turn around rather than run. She can’t see who is behind the steering wheel or sitting in the passenger seat, of anyone, because of the headlights. They flick off, and she’s still seeing spots. Someone opens up the door behind her, but she’s not paying attention to anyone within the house. If there’s a threat, it’s the person in the vehicle.

  Cassidy inhales sharply as the passenger door opens and a large silhouette steps out. He sure is a threat, but not to anyone here. There’s this moment where she knows he’s staring at her, and she’s staring back at his hulking frame. In that moment, she’s assessing whether or not she wants to go to him, to accept him for who he is and what he’s done. It’s not the times that he frightened her that runs through her mind. It’s all the times that she saw him with his guard down around Hannah or Reese’s Pieces. Specifically, it’s the moment where she realized she could love him even though she didn’t know every detail of his life. They could be best friends and lovers if she could get those walls down.

  “Troy.” It’s a barely audible, breathed word from between her lips as the cool night air comes rushing back into her senses. The man standing beside her with a gun is Victor, and he has it pointed at the stranger like an old time westerner.

  “Cassie?” He asks, unsure if he should be shooting or asking questions. But she’s not listening to him as she takes that first step forward. It’s all the answer that Troy needs from her, and she doesn’t make it to the first step before he’s up them and pulling her into a tight hug.

  It’s not along hug because he pushes her away to study her face and look her over as if he’s looking for battle wounds. She feels her bottom lip quivering when his eyes finally reach hers again, and he says her real name over and over again while he kisses her face. It’s a lot different from their meeting his home in Colorado, and it’s only been a few days. But perspectives can change within a few, short moments.

  “Troy I’m-” He cuts her off with a long kiss as his large hands move to her lower back and pull her in. When he finally pulls away from her, the two of them breathless, he’s beaming.

  “I know.” He tells her, and she immediately looks at Marty Summers. He throws up his hands in surrender and shakes his head, so she looks back at Troy imploringly. “You had your hand to your abdomen when you were in Colorado, and you looked different. It wasn’t until I saw a pregnant woman in LA that I realized-” She cuts him off short with a hand to his mouth, muffling his words.

  “You w
ent to LA?” She screeches, causing the hairs on every man’s arms to rise. Her hand falls away from his mouth when she realizes that he can’t speak with it there. Victor clears his throat and invites Marty inside for a glass of brandy.

  “We have a lot to talk about.” Troy says quietly as he sits her down on the swing. Cassidy notices the stitches on his arms at that point, and hisses when she starts to inspect them. He stops her from lifting up the shirt with his hands enveloping hers.

  “We sure as hell do, Troy Red. Or whatever your name is now. Who did you kill?” His face falls as he looks down at the wooden porch boards below his boots.

  “I think it’s best that the details are left out.” He says with a rough voice. Cassidy inhales deeply and holds her breath as she counts back from one hundred. She reaches sixty eight before she feels her heart rate starting to slow down.

  “I’m not a mobster’s girlfriend or wife, Troy. So you’re going to tell me exactly what happened. I will not be left in the dark! This is your first lesson in having a relationship.” She sees his ears visibly perk at the word relationship and can’t help the small smile on her lips. But it’s short lived.

  “Where do you want me to start?” He sounds beaten and defeated, and it’s not how she wants him to be. Cassidy pulls his hands up to her lips and kisses each one his knuckles gently. Her gut twists with each bruise and scrape she sees on them, and she wonders if she can do this. Can she live with a man who killed? Maybe if she knew the reasons, the real ones.

  “Tell me what happened after I left Colorado.” And so he begins. He tells her about meeting up with people he knew in LA, and about the club. He confirms her suspicions about having frequented there often, and he tells her about the other two hit men he met. Then he tells her why her father was murdered and exactly how he landed himself in the witness protection program in the first place. Then he says the most chilling words of all.