by N Kuhn
“Going black,” she said, as he got into the elevator. They had set up an interference to break the feed on the elevator cameras. Security would see an empty car, while he headed to the floor above. Gene slid his hacked card—the one that would let him into the Presidential suite—into the slot. As the doors dinged open, he stood in the room. Only a slight glow from the full moon outside, cast any light onto the floor. Gene gave himself a few minutes to allow his eyes to adjust then pressed the button to switch to night vision.
He blinked a few times, as the room came into focus. “I’m in,” he whispered.
Slipping his fingers into the gloves, Gene moved silently towards the television in the sitting room. It was a wall mounted flat screen, above a stone-encased fireplace. He reached behind the TV and put the bug in place then leaned over, to check that it remained attached. Satisfied, he moved to the bedroom. As he was placing the camera into a vent over the bathroom door, he heard a shuffle on the balcony. It was barely noticeable, but to his trained senses, in the silent room, it registered. He slowly climbed down from the chair he stood on.
Moving slowly, he backed into the darkest corner of the room. Pressed against the wall, his hope was that the person on the balcony did not have night vision. His hand slid to the gun in his waist, pulled it out. His thumb deftly clicked the safety off. He held it at his side, ready if necessary.
“We have movement on the balcony,” he whispered. No one responded, as protocol. This prevented any noise coming from their end, possibly giving away an agent’s position.
The door slid open quietly and a mass of black squeezed through a small opening. The person stood there, most likely adjusting to the dark. As the figure moved towards the bedroom door to head further into the suite, moonlight glinted off of a large knife. Artemis was known to prefer close action, to guns, a more personal touch.
Gene crept up behind them. Raising the gun, he pressed it into the back of their head. “Freeze,” he growled. The figure stiffened, arms raised in the air. He could see the woman tremble. Her black mask and tight clothing hid any identifying features of this ghost assassin. With his free hand, Gene slid the glasses on top of his head then reached for the light switch next to him on the wall.
As he moved, the woman turned, kicking him in the gut. The breath escaped from his lungs, and he squeezed the trigger. The sound echoed loudly in the room, and a bullet landed in the dresser against the wall. As he bent forward, a fist came down on the back of his head. He held onto his gun, but the figure rushed past him, retreating to the balcony. Sucking in a breath, he twisted his body, sweeping out his leg. He knocked Artemis’ legs from beneath her. She went down with an uttered humph, and her knife bounced across the carpeted floor. She scrambled to her feet, but Gene was quicker. He stepped over her, grabbing an arm as he pressed the gun against her head again.
“Don’t tempt me,” he said through gritted teeth. His diaphragm ached, breathing labored from the blow she had delivered. She yanked her arm, trying to pull away, causing the two to tumble on top of the bed. Gene landed on top of her, and he faltered a moment. The luscious body beneath him felt familiar. Gun forgotten on the mattress next to them, he wrapped long fingers around her wrists, pinning them above her head with one strong hand.
“Phantom, do you need back up?” Justice asked in his ear.
“Give me a minute,” he grunted. He yanked the mask up, swearing under his breath. He tossed it aside, revealing brown hair pulled tight into a bun on top of her head. This couldn’t be happening. His world spun out of control, and everything he thought he knew, no longer made sense. Yanking out the earpiece, he crushed it between two fingers, tossing it aside. He could just claim it was broken in the fight.
“Explain, now,” he yelled.
Chapter 3
Calista Bevard shook, terror creeping up her spine. Being captured and arrested, thrown away into a cell to rot away the rest of her life, was her biggest fear. She wouldn’t allow it to happen. Finding an inner strength, she struggled against her assailant. In their close proximity, she looked closely at the face before her, and froze. All fight left her body. The man crushing her to the mattress was her husband. This couldn’t be. Nothing made sense. She not only recognized the feel of the body on top of her, especially when all her girly parts responded in ways that only happened with one man. His voice, sent her core into a throbbing frenzy. Her husband.
This couldn’t be happening. Eight years. Eight years she had been careful, selective, and true in her judgement. When the heat got too close like when that agent in Paris found her, she’d gone underground. Creating a new life, building an alibi of sorts, had been easy.
Her first week back in the US, she had met the sexiest financier. A boring suburban life was the perfect cover, and he’d seemed to be just as eager to get married. Though they had only known each other a few weeks, they went on several dates and spent a lot of time together. Not only was it good luck, but it felt right, when Gene had asked her to marry him after only fifteen days. Her momma always said, when you know, you know. Time had ceased to exist. A year into their marriage and she had been doing well, hiding from him what she was doing.
The cover job—a language tutor for wealthy families—provided an explanation for why she spoke five languages fluently. It also gave her the flexibility to leave town for a few days for her real job. Her “sorority sisters” were really her team. They went out of town for “girls’ weekends” two or three times a year. The three woman, Becky, Crystal and Jane, were her reconnaissance, intelligence and technology technicians. Together, the four had taken out a lot of evil, dangerous men.
“Now,” he shouted, his warm breath caressing her cheek. Tears welled in her eyes, spilling down the side of her face. The phone next to the bed rang once, then went silent before she could speak. Then came a noise in the other room. The elevator doors whooshed open, and light spilled through the open door. Gene moved quickly, shoving his gun back into the waist of his pants. Taking the chance, Calista rolled off the bed, snatching her blade from the floor. She sheathed it into the holster on the side of her thigh. Gene scooped up what was left of his ear piece, and opened the balcony door quietly. She smoothed the bedspread, then quickly followed. He slowly closed it. Her rope still hung, where she had climbed down from the roof. He glared at her, anger shining in his eyes from the moonlight.
He snapped the glasses off his head, shoving them into a pocket, waving a hand at the rope.
“I’ll go first, no chance of you running away then.” She stood silently, as he quickly ascended, her heart racing.
Was he CIA? Another assassin? Had their whole time together been a complete lie on both ends? She slowly climbed unsure what awaited her at the top. Would he kill her? Turn her in?
As she crawled over the wall of the roof, a hand reached out to help her down. He shoved her aside and snatched the rope into coils. Without speaking, he pulled her back from the edge, fingers squeezing her arm. His grip hurt, but she remained quiet.
Never, in their time together, had she seen him angry. It scared her. Gene had the body of a Navy SEAL, though their talks about the past had never revealed any military service. His claim was college, after the death of his only remaining family members. At the door to the stairs, he paused. Leaning his shoulder against the door, he turned to look at her.
“Calista, explain, now.” She sucked in a deep breath.
“You obviously know. Why bother?” She regretted the attitude that dripped from her words, but the fact that she felt like a weepy teenager facing a break up, instead of a deadly assassin, caused a tornado of emotions inside of her.
He breathed heavily, just staring at her. “You’re an assassin. You kill people.”
“Only ones who deserve it.”
Calista couldn’t believe her husband’s audacity. He looked at her as if her betrayal was the end of the world, but he wasn’t innocent in this either. They had both been lying this whole time.
Before she
could give him a piece of her mind, something caught her eye—a red dot on Gene’s chest. She reacted without thought, reached out and shoved him away with as much power as she could muster. They tumbled to the gravel covered roof, just as a bullet silently pierced the metal door where he’d been standing. He cursed, wrapping thick arms around her, pinning her own to her sides. The embrace, which would have normally felt like home, that had given her comfort when she returned from hard jobs, now felt cold and uninviting.
“Who else do you have with you? I thought Artemis worked alone?” he growled into her ear. His use of her code name sent shivers through her body, the confusion returning to the forefront of her emotional storm.
“No one ever truly works alone,” she retorted and tried to recall the placement of her girls. Becky was her sharpshooter, the one who watched her back as she went in to complete jobs. She would be the one on a roof nearby. Calista bent her arm up, barely able to reach her head, with his still pinned around her. The thick muscle, something that used to turn her on, was now just an aggravation. Tapping the com in her ear, Calista called out. “Hold fire, stand down,” she commanded.
“Sorry babe, orders are orders. Listen, I love you, and you know that, but you and your hubby need to run, now. We were contacted privately and ordered to take you out if you failed or got caught. We also had an order to take him out, no matter what. We’ll hold off the CIA team, but I think someone knew you wouldn’t complete this mission, they set you both up. We aren’t the killers, you are. So, we can easily claim missed shots, so go, now,” she urged.
“Shit,” Calista swore. “What do you mean?” These women were supposed to be her friends. But apparently that friendship only existed up to a certain point.
“Cali,” Crystal spoke up, “We won’t chase you. But, if you stay there, we have to take you out. We told them, we wouldn’t hunt you down if you got away. But the CIA wants you, and that hunky husband agent of yours taken out.”
“Both of us? Why?” Gene looked at her, angry confusion on his face. He was only getting one side of the conversation. She wiggled in his grasp, trying to get off of him, but he held tight.
“Because in trying to lie low, you married a CIA agent who’s being hidden from the cartel. Apparently, he pissed off someone willing to pay a lot of money to see him dead. You know our motto. No one who doesn’t deserve it, so we missed our shot, that’s it, we won’t try again, but I felt you should know. Sorry, babes, we do love you and hopefully, if you survive this, we can meet up again sometime, you know, in a few years, but, for now, you have to run.”
“Why didn’t any of you tell me this before?” she shouted. Her irritation rose. This was almost as bad as finding out her husband was CIA.
“We couldn’t, plus, you’ve never failed before, so we figured it wouldn’t matter.” Jane added this last bit.
It broke Calista’s heart, blood pounded through her veins, echoing in her ears. Over the last five years, these had become like sisters. “There’s a black SUV in the alley behind the hotel, hon. You don’t think we would leave you completely hanging, do you? If you want, we can take him out and help you get away?” The question hung in the air.
She looked into the eyes of the man, and realized that somehow over the last year, she had begun to love this man. “Negative. Thanks girls, just give me two minutes to clear my head? Then we’re gone. I promise. Artemis out,” she whispered, the pain obvious in her voice.
“We do love you, we’ll give you five,” Becky said quietly, the red dot reappearing on Gene though. Calista didn’t respond. She pulled the com out, dropping it to the roof next to Gene’s head.
As if sensing the tension no longer had to do with him, Gene sighed loudly. His eyes darted down to the dot. He looked as if he was okay knowing he would die. And that hurt Calista even more. He loosened his grip, letting her go. She rolled to the side, on her back next to him. Clouds moved in, covering the full moon, casting a slight hazy light around them.
“You should go, I get it,” he said, surrender in his tone.
“Someone set us up. They somehow found out that we were married. That neither of us knew about the other. We were both set up to die tonight.” With each word, her heart raced faster.
“Who?” he said, his mood swinging back to mad.
“I don’t know. But my team is giving us a five-minute lead. We don’t kill people who don’t deserve it. So if we get away, my girls are in the clear and nothing will happen to them.”
“How? My team is all over, too. I don’t know if they have the same directive, but I’ll tell you, deserving or not, they follow orders. So, they won’t give us a head start. I’ve never worked with any of them before. And, now I’m without my coms.”
“Let’s get out of here. They have a vehicle downstairs for us. I have a go bag and money at home, and I’m guessing you do, too. So you should be fine. I have to run.”
“Not until we figure this out. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life running. You don’t either. That much I know about you. Everything else may have been a lie, but from what we knew about you as an assassin, you hid, but didn’t run.”
He sounded almost endearing. She would love for them to go together. But men in the military or working for the government, typically, if they weren’t dirty, followed orders. They put the needs of the job ahead of everything else. She couldn’t risk him turning her in.
“Things are going to get messy. Chike will know someone was in there, since you shot off a round, and I left my mask behind. Let’s go, while we still can,” she said, not answering him. Standing, she went to the rear ledge of the roof, peering over. The SUV was below them. There was a fire escape along the back of the building, but the first landing was about seven feet down, at what would be the back of the presidential suite. Placing her hands flat on the ledge, Calista heaved herself up, pulling one leg to the ledge, and hauling the rest of her body up. She sat, legs swinging over the side.
Without looking at Gene, she spun her body, hooking feet in between the bricks on the side of the building. Letting go of the ledge, she slowly sought a hand hold, and began the painful task of scaling down the side of the building. She cursed, wishing she had brought longer rope. Normally she was prepared for everything, but this should have been an easy in and out.
Glancing up, she could see Gene following suite. He climbed down like a professional. Then again, being CIA, she shouldn’t be surprised. Landing on the street below, she pulled a set of keys from the driver’s side wheel well. Gene climbed in the passenger side, and she sped off into the night. They were both on alert for headlights tailing them.
Chapter 4
The SUV pulled over on a street a block from their home. She turned off the lights, and the pair sat in dark silence. They were both well trained. That made it easier. There was no need to explain what she was doing. She unsheathed the knife on her leg, as Gene pulled out his gun, checking the safety.
“Try not to shoot any furniture this time,” she joked, trying to lighten the thick tension between them.
He laughed quietly, it sounded almost nervous. Neither knew what waited for them in the house. Her team had rules. No one knew where the others lived. In case someone was caught, the others would be safe. But, that didn’t mean his employer didn’t know. Plus, she knew her girls were good at research. As if sensing the questioning thoughts, Gene finally spoke.
“I was with a new team. I didn’t know any of them. So, they know nothing about me, except what’s in my file. Since I was in hiding, the house is under a dummy corporation name. The paperwork has a lot of layers to work through. Not even my handler knows where I was staying.”
“If we had more time, I’d love to hear this story,” her words were quiet and sincere.
Together, they softly exited the vehicle. Adrenaline pumped through Calista. She followed Gene as he maneuvered through their neighbors’ yards and came up behind the home they had shared. It now looked different. What she thought would provi
de comfort and security during her retirement, was now full of lies and doubt.
There were no lights on, and Gene stopped, as they approached the sliding glass door on their back patio. “All my stuff is in the hotel room, I don’t have keys.”
She shook her head. Neither did she. Quickly, her knife was shoved back into its sheath. She reached up, pulling the bobby pins from the bun holding her hair up. Long brown tresses tumbled down, and she bent the pins, molding them into picks. Her finger nails scraped off the silicone coating the ends.
Brushing past Gene, she bent over, using the pins to pick the lock. A little part of her realized the weirdness of doing this in front of her husband, who until two hours ago, hadn’t known she could do this. Then again, he apparently had skills she was unaware of as well.
Quickly, she had the handle unlocked and the door opened. Striding into the familiar kitchen, it struck her that this may be the last time she was here. She couldn’t stop and reminisce though. They cleared the house. No one was lying in wait there to kill them. Calista plopped down on their bed, huffing out a breath in exasperation. Gene sat down next to her. Neither looked at the other. Finally, she broke the silence.
“I was raised in Greece. By my Uncle Ned. My father had been the head of a Greek crime family, basically their version of a mafia. After he was shot in his nightclub, my uncle took over. I saw a lot of things I wish I hadn’t. When I grew up, I was an expert in hand to hand, several forms of karate, knives and guns. They used to call me Little Artemis. I had been trained to hunt, and my uncle thought I would work for him. Instead of becoming the hand he used to kill, I took out my uncle. I left the golden arrow pin he had given me when I turned eighteen. He was a bad man. I had seen him order the murders of families, kids, people who didn’t deserve it. After I got away and no one knew I had done it, I kept going. I found some of his business associates, and took care of them too. In and out. Leaving a pin each time. It started as a way to let others know, that I was coming, to make them pay. It ended up turning into a job.”