***
She had never killed anyone before, but she had seen a killing up close and personal during her Bangkok days. One pimp killed a rival pimp by thrusting a custom knife into his throat several times. The knife he used was shaped like a T. The grip was the horizontal part and the blade was the vertical part of the T. It was short, a little less than 4 inches, but it was very effective. She hadn’t decided yet whether she would kill him, but it would be a good idea to buy a knife, just in case she decided that the kill option was the best one. She didn’t like guns. Too noisy.
She did an internet search and found several places in the Miami area that sold knives. One of them advertised itself as having the largest selection of knives in south Florida. She decided that was where she would go first. She looked at her watch. It was after 9pm. She would go tomorrow.
5
A Shopping Expedition
The next day she went to the bank as usual. Shortly before noon she got up from her desk. As she strolled into the outer office, she turned to her assistant. “Jane, I’m going to lunch now. I’ll be back in a little over an hour.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
As she walked toward the parking garage she went over in her head what she would say. She knew it would be unusual for a well-dressed Asian woman to walk into a knife shop in the red-neck part of Miami and ask to see their selection of knives. The thought of it made her feel a little apprehensive. The self-confidence she had built up over the years would be put to the test.
She thought about what she would say again as she got into the car. She exited the parking garage, put on some music and tried to relax, although there was a knot in her stomach. The ABBA version of I Have a Dream started playing, but it was the Spanish version – Estoy Soñando. Since moving to Miami she had learned a little Spanish, enough to get by. It was a nice addition to her collection of language skills, which now included Thai, English, Mandarin and Cantonese.
About fifteen minutes later she arrived. It was a large, dirty looking building on a side street just off I-95. As she exited the car she looked around, hoping no one would recognize her. She didn’t want to have to explain what a bank president was doing in such a place.
She grabbed the handle of the front door and pulled. It felt a little gritty. She took a step and found herself in another world, far from the world of corporate banking she had grown accustomed to. She walked toward the counter, which was about 30 feet in front of her and off to the right.
As she approached, the guy behind the counter, a scruffy and pudgy, middle-aged white guy looked up from what he was reading. He did a double take. He had seen Asian women before, but not like this Asian woman. She looked stunning, in a red, white and dark blue pants suit with low heels that clicked with every step she took.
“May I help you?”
She looked straight into his bloodshot eyes.
“I’d like to look at your selection of knives.”
“If you’re looking for dinnerware, I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place. We sell hunting knives and knives for self-protection.”
“I’d like to see what you have in the self-protection category.”
He got up from his stool, turned to the right and took a few steps.
“The whole store is full of those kinds of knives. Did you have anything special in mind?”
“Yes. I don’t know what you call it, but it’s shaped like a T.”
“Oh, yeah, I know what you mean. That’s a push knife. I have a few of them over here.” He walked toward a display case filled with what appeared to be military and martial arts knives and daggers. He picked one up and showed it to her. It had a black handle grip with a double-edged blade a little less than 4 inches long.
“This is our most popular model.” He gripped it so that the blade protruded between his fingers.” Then he grabbed the blade with his other hand and passed it to her.
She fondled it in her fingers for a few seconds, looked at its features, and thought about the last time she had seen a knife like this. “I’ll take it.”
“You’ll need a sheath.” He picked one up and showed it to her. “It will fit in this one. I can give it to you for two dollars. They usually go for five dollars.”
“OK, I’ll take it.” She smiled at him, trying to play the part of an ingénue, but she was a little too old for that, and more than a little too experienced.
“Do you know how to use one of these?”
“Yes, I’ve seen them in movies.” Actually, she hadn’t ever seen one used in a movie. But she could remember how she saw it used in that Bangkok bar. The pimp on the receiving end of it had been standing about five feet from her when it was thrust into his neck.
The guy kept talking as though he hadn’t heard a word she said. “These knives have a long and distinguished history. Gamblers used them a few hundred years ago. They were a nice concealed weapon they could pull out of a sleeve or pocket. The military still uses them for close quarters combat. Just grip it like this,” he said, as he gripped it again, “and pretend you’re punching somebody. Go for soft tissue, not bones. The stomach or solar plexus is good. So is the kidney or throat.”
“Thank you. I’ll just put it in my purse for now.”
He smiled. “I hope you never have to use it, but a pretty little woman like you needs protection. Have you ever thought of carrying a gun?”
She smiled back. “No, not really.”
They walked back to the cash register. “Cash or charge.”
“Cash.” She reached into her purse and pulled out a fifty dollar bill. She took her change, placed the push knife into her purse and closed it.
“Thank you, ma’am. Come again.”
“Thank you. Maybe I will.”
She sighed in relief as she walked out the door. It had not really been an unpleasant experience, but she did feel a little uncomfortable being in that place. She got into the car and started driving back to the bank. But first, she had two more stops to make. She would skip lunch, but she had a few energy bars in her desk. She could have one of them when she got back.
The next stop was a hardware store. It was on the way to the bank. Not really out of her way. The one she had in mind was in a small shopping mall. She arrived a few minutes later and pulled in.
She could smell freshly cut wood as soon as she walked through the front door. The lumber department was off to her right, just beyond the cash registers. She spotted a young Hispanic guy wearing a red shirt with a name tag. She guessed he was an employee.
“Excuse me. Could you please tell me where the duct tape is?”
He motioned with his thumb. “That would be on aisle three, ma’am.”
“Thank you.” She walked in the direction where he pointed, the low heels on her shoes clicking with every step. She looked out of place. People who go to hardware stores don’t usually wear expensive pants suits.
She arrived at aisle three a few seconds later and found two shelves filled with more than a dozen varieties of duct tape. She selected a gray, medium-width roll. One would be enough. She only planned to use it once, if at all. She walked toward the registers, paid cash and left.
The mall also had a wig shop, which was within walking distance of the hardware store. It was not an up-scale shop, but it had what she needed. A cheap wig.
A short, chubby Hispanic woman greeted her as she walked in. Her name tag said Mercedes. “May I help you?”
“Yes. I’m looking for a short, blonde wig.”
Mercedes got a puzzled look on her face. “It’s none of my business, but I don’t think you would look good as a blonde. Your hair is beautiful just the way it is. I think something short and black would look good on you. You could keep the same color you have now, but something short would be a change of pace. Let me show you what I have.”
Annie smiled and looked off into the distance. “No, that’s OK. I really just want a short, blonde wig. It’s to play a joke on someone.”
Mercedes got
a look of relief on her face. “Oh, I understand. If it’s just for a joke, then a blonde wig would work. Then you probably don’t want to spend much?”
Annie turned to her and smiled. “The cheaper the better.”
Mercedes motioned to her left. “Let’s go over here. I think I have exactly what you’re looking for.” She walked over to one of the display cases and picked up a ruffled, short blonde wig. “We call this one the Chonga model. No respectable Cuban woman would even think of wearing it. If you really want to look cheap, I suggest you also wear some large hoop earrings, a short skirt and platform shoes. And lots of makeup.”
“Well, I don’t know if I really want to go that far, but thank you for the suggestion.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right. That combination would be too over the top for a Chinese woman. Are you Chinese?”
“Sort of.”
She took it in her hands and examined it closely. “I’ll take it.”
They walked over to the cash register. Annie whipped out a fifty dollar bill and got lots of change back.
Her shopping expedition was finished. She didn’t know if she’d use any of the items she just bought, but at least she had them. Just in case.
She got in the car and started the engine. She wanted some relaxing music, so she turned on the radio. The Lydia Canaan song, Never Set You Free was playing. The title was appropriate, given the fact that if she paid Senator Garrett’s blackmail demand, it was unlikely that he would set her free.
As she turned onto I-95 she remembered a passage from a book she had read at Wharton – “Plan your work and work your plan.” She had followed that advice throughout her career. It was a major contributing factor to her rapid rise on the corporate ladder, first in New York, then in Miami. The problem was, this time she didn’t have a plan. She had two partial plans, either give him the money or kill him. She had bought the knife. That brought her a step closer to completing one of her potential plans. Tomorrow she would extract the million dollars from the bank. She thought she had figured out how to do it. She was moving forward with both plans, although she still hadn’t figured out all the details of the killing option, or whether she would even choose that option. She would have a few days to think it over, but she would have to make a decision by next Thursday.
6
Thursday
Thursday. Time had run out. She had to decide which plan to carry out. She had the cash and she had the push knife. Giving Senator Garrett the cash would solve the merger problem, and her IRS problem would go away. But it wouldn’t solve the potential blackmail problem.
Killing him would solve the blackmail problem, but it wouldn’t solve the IRS problem or the merger problem. Her head told her to give him the cash first, then kill him after the merger problem and the IRS problem went away. But her gut feeling told her to just kill him and then figure out another way to solve her other problems. She decided to go with the kill now option.
The next step was to figure out how to do it. And then there was Ken Tollison, his weasel assistant. He probably knew about the Hong Kong story, too. She would have to find a way to kill him as well, just to be on the safe side. And she would have to do it at about the same time as the senator. Otherwise, he would have a chance to either go to the police or disclose her background, or both.
If she eliminated the senator first, it would be on the news almost immediately. Ken would be put on alert, and would be more difficult to kill. If she killed Ken first, it would also make the news, but she could make it look like a robbery. The senator probably wouldn’t think he was next, and wouldn’t feel threatened, since he thought of himself as invincible.
She decided to get Ken first. She didn’t have his address, but it wouldn’t be difficult to find. Practically anything is available on the internet. She knew he lived in Georgetown, but that was it. She took out her cell phone, went to her favorite search engine, searched for his name, and up popped eight Tollisons. But only one of them was Ken. He had a Georgetown address.
He lived around the corner from Filomena, an upscale Italian restaurant on Wisconsin Avenue, NW. She had been there once. Good food. High prices. Well, all the prices in Georgetown were high. A lot of the people who visited that part of town were either on expense accounts or were in the top 1 or 2 percent income wise, or were young single guys trying to impress their girlfriends, so price was not a big deal.
The closest Metro stop was Foggy Bottom. But it wasn’t that close to his place. She’d have about a fifteen-minute walk after she got off. Not a problem. The night was young.
It wasn’t too crowded at the tail end of rush hour. You could usually get a seat. One big difference between the D.C. Metro and the New York Metro was cleanliness. Another was ambiance. The waiting areas were brightly lit and the ceilings were high and curved. You didn’t have to feel apprehensive about getting mugged or getting pickpocketed. Not in the early evening, anyway. And the smell was much different, too. No urine odor at most of the stops.
Although she had lived in New York, and now lived in Miami, she had been to Washington often enough to become familiar with the Metro system. She knew that if she had to make a quick escape, she wouldn’t be able to use the Metro. Hopefully, she wouldn’t have to get out of there quickly. The thought that he might overpower her, or that her attempt might fail, never entered her mind. Ken was bigger than she was. Most men were. But she would have the element of surprise on her side. And she had studied Muay Thai, a form of kick boxing, during her Bangkok days. She would be able to deal with him if she had to.
She exited the Metro and started walking in the direction of Wisconsin Avenue and M Street. Washington was easy to get around. When the city was being built in the 1790s, Pierre L’Enfant designed the streets in a rectangular grid pattern. The lettered streets ran east and west. The numbered streets ran north and south. He named the diagonal streets after the states. Thomas Jefferson had given L’Enfant the designs of the street patterns of several European cities, and L’Enfant referred to them when he drew his design. President Washington later fired the designer for meddling in the construction of the city.
She arrived at Filomena, then turned onto the street where Ken lived. She walked past his place from the other side of the street. It was a town house. The driveway on the side of the building probably led to parking in the back. She didn’t know whether he drove to work or took the Metro, but it didn’t matter. Either way, he would likely enter through the back. That’s where she would wait for him. There was a possibility he would already be inside, but congressional staffers usually worked beyond the normal rush hour. Except on Fridays. Today was Thursday. The lights were out on both the first and second floors, so it appeared no one was home yet.
There was no telling when he would arrive. If he decided to stop for dinner at a restaurant, it could be hours. It didn’t matter. She would wait for as long as it took. She looked left and right to see if anyone was watching, then crossed the street and headed toward the rear of the building. There were four parking spaces and some thick shrubbery. Behind the shrubbery was the garage of the house on the next block. She would hide there until he arrived.
About forty-five minutes later, she saw someone walking toward her in the driveway. It was Ken. He reached into his pocket to get his keys. Her heart started pounding as she slid her hand into her pocket.
***
Ken perceived something moving off to his left. It was Annie. She had a look of anger on her face. No, it was more a look of determination. She was holding what looked like a knife. But not a regular knife. The blade protruded through her fingers like it was attached to her arm. She thrust it right at his throat.
He partially deflected it with his left arm, but he wasn’t totally successful. He felt a sharp pain as the blade punctured his cheek and sliced through his tongue. His scream was muffled by the thick liquid that rapidly filled his mouth. Then there was another pain, this time like a bee sting, on the left side of his neck. He saw blood spurti
ng out of the corner of his eye.
Next he felt a shooting pain in his solar plexus as a hard foreign object plunged in deep. He felt it rip out almost as quickly as it had entered. Suddenly he felt pain in his lower abdomen, then another ripping sensation. As he turned to escape he felt a shooting pain in his kidney.
He could hear his forehead collide with the concrete, but it didn’t hurt. Just a thud. Then something entered his back and punctured his lung. He could feel the object, but there was no longer any pain. Anywhere.
He felt someone grabbing at his arm. Turning him over. It was Annie. He could see her hand reaching into his breast pocket. Pulling out his wallet. Her face was right in front of him, inches away. She was staring directly into his eyes. He couldn’t move.
He felt cold. Annie’s face faded away.
***
She had tried to be careful as she thrust the knife into Ken repeatedly. She didn’t want his blood splashing all over her. But she wasn’t totally successful. Some of it has spilled on her shoes. She noticed a few spatters on her sweatshirt as well. And of course the latex glove she wore on her right hand was partially covered with his blood.
The glove would be easy to take care of. She slipped it off, turning it inside out as it slid from her hand. She crammed it into a pocket of her backpack, then took off her sweatshirt, reversed it, and put it back on, inside out.
Getting the blood off her shoes would present more of a problem. It was mostly on the toes. She wiped them across Ken’s pants a few times. His pants were the only part of him that wasn’t drenched in blood. She was able to get some of it off, but she couldn’t get it all off. She stepped off the driveway and scraped her toes across the grass and dirt. Another partial success. She was able to get enough dirt on the toes of the shoes that the dark stain no longer looked like blood.
Annie and the Senator: A Story of Vigilante Justice (Annie Chan Thrillers Book 1) Page 2