by Jon F. Merz
I revealed it while she drank a cup of black coffee at the local Beanery while I sipped some tea. I kept my own history out of it, of course.
She stayed quiet while I hit the highlights of Cosgrove’s illustrious and decidedly bloody career, seemingly absorbing everything that came out of my mouth. When I’d finished, she took another sip of her coffee, put the mug down, wiped her mouth on the coarse brown napkin and looked at me.
"How did you find out?"
"I’ve been hunting him for a while. I know his style. His preferences." I shrugged. "You can almost crawl inside the mind of the killer, isn’t that what they say?"
She nodded, but seemed detached momentarily. "I’ve heard that, yes."
"Well, as much as it disgusts me to crawl around such filth, I’ve done it. I know him. Well. I wish to hell I didn’t."
"You do what you have to, apparently. Makes sense if you are hunting him."
"I am."
"Information is the most valuable of all commodities, Lawson. With the right knowledge, governments can be toppled. A man can be reduced to a mere shell of his former stature. Even driven to suicide." She nodded. "Your information about this Cosgrove is valuable as well. We will use it to kill him."
Something about the way she said it sent a small shiver up my spine. I’d never met someone who could remain so detached about killing, except my fellow Fixers. I cleared my throat. Suddenly, I needed some verbal space to breathe. "Talya’s an interesting name. Is it Kazak?"
"Short for Natalya, actually," she said. "It’s fairly common in Russia."
"Gotcha." I watched her stare into the ebony coffee and cleared my throat. "So. Want to tell me exactly what you do for work?"
She looked up, squinting. "What do you mean?"
"What do I mean? Hell, back on the church steps you told me you’d kill Cosgrove. There was no indecision there. And it wasn’t simple revenge naiveté." I took another sip of tea and looked out the window at Huntington Avenue. A bus zoomed by vomiting dirty sludge out of puddles onto the rain-slicked sidewalk. I watched the water drift back toward the street. "The signs are too obvious."
"Signs?"
I nodded. "Maybe not to anyone else. Maybe not to the people you pass everyday on the street. But to me…" I let it go and fixed her with a solid stare. "You’re a pro."
She said nothing, but just looked at me. Piercing eyes that drew me in.
I broke the stare again. "Who do you work for?"
"No one."
I shook my head. "That’s bullshit and you know it."
"I owe allegiance only to myself."
I took another sip of tea, realizing it finally. "A freelancer."
She inclined her head. I sat back marveling at the woman before me. Like I said before, I’ve been around a while. Long enough to learn all about the world of human covert operations. I’ve read it all, seen a lot of stuff first hand, heard even more through the grapevine. But never, had I ever come into contact with an actual human freelance assassin. Let alone as good a one as I presumed Talya would turn out to be.
Damned if I wasn’t having my world tilted on its fucking side today. The revelation that Talya was what she was threw me for a loop. As a general rule of thumb, I don’t have much respect for humans. Like I said, she was rapidly becoming an exception to that rule.
"How long have you been solo?"
"Long enough to know my way around."
"You wouldn’t have survived without proper schooling. You must have had formal training somewhere."
She shrugged. "I was employed once, by the Russians."
"KGB?"
"Yes. I was an illegal."
I nodded. The KGB had run illegals – their deep undercover agents – and penetrated them into the West. Some of them had gathered intelligence, others had orchestrated whole networks, still a few select illegals had engaged in wet work.
Assassination.
I had no doubts what line of work Talya had been in and said as much. She nodded.
"I aspired to it."
"You wanted to kill?"
Talya smiled. "There was a sense of prestige associated with it. I don’t know if you have read about the Soviet intelligence apparatus?"
"Some."
"Then you’d know that the two primary gathering organs were the KGB and the GRU."
"Soviet Military Intelligence."
"Yes." She took a sip of coffee. "The GRU prided itself on never having killed anyone. Their tactics were designed to keep them forever hidden. With the KGB, it was the exact opposite end of the spectrum. We used whatever tactics we could to get what we needed. We tortured, blackmailed, bought and stole our way into the biggest secrets of the West. And when all else failed…if someone crossed us…we killed."
"You operated alone?"
She shrugged. "Depended on the assignment. But the pride of killing for your country helps take the sting out of what you actually do. I saw it as doing my national duty."
Something about that sounded vaguely familiar. I smiled. The irony of life could kill you if it didn’t make you laugh first.
She smiled with me. "I saw a movie over here once back in the early 1980′s. One of the characters said to another that ‘professional assassination is the highest form of public service.’ I took that to heart in my work."
"Interesting quote. What about after the Berlin Wall came down?"
"I went freelance after Glasnost. I worked globally."
"Forgive me for asking, but what did Simbik think of your profession?"
She smiled. "He never knew. As I said, my mother was from Kazakstan and my father was Chinese. If you know the region, you understand the borders are quite close."
"Yes."
"My father was the local Chinese commander for troops based at Karamay. Every so often, they would stage a lightning raid across the border."
"Chinese incursions into the Soviet Union?"
She nodded. "Don’t seem so shocked. It happened on both sides with a degree of regularity." She took a sip of coffee. "My father, he was a Chinese platoon leader. He raped my mother." She shrugged. "I was the result."
I was speechless. Being the child of a rape victim isn’t the kind of thing most folks would share with you. Talya didn’t seem fazed by it.
"I’ve made peace with the fact that I was a bastard child, Lawson. If that’s what you’re thinking."
"It was."
She smiled. "You’re honest. That’s good." She took another sip of her coffee. "I could have handled it the way people nowadays do. I could wail and moan about being a victim. I could cry myself to sleep every night of my life. Doesn’t change a damned thing. You can’t change the past no matter how hard you try, you know?"
My tea tasted cold and my stomach ached. "Yeah, I know something about that."
"So, it came down to either living in the pain or forging ahead with my life. I chose the latter. And I’ve almost never looked back."
"Almost never?"
"I looked back once. Let’s leave it at that."
"So, how did you meet Simbik?"
She smiled, as if granting me the right to change the subject. "I met him once when I was fifteen, on a state-sponsored school trip to Istanbul. He saved my life."
"He did?"
She tilted her head, remembering. "One of those crazy bus drivers, you know? I was lagging behind in my school group, distracted by the sights, and never saw the silly thing bearing down on me."
"And Simbik did."
She nodded. "Yanked me out of the way. When my mother found out, she wrote to Simbik’s family and promised me to him as his wife."
"Pretty old fashioned, wouldn’t you say?" I motioned for the waitress to refill my tea.
She smiled. "My mother was like that. She so wanted her only daughter to have a proper marriage and a decent family. I think she felt like she’d somehow gypped me of that by not having a father."
"Wasn’t her fault."
"Of course not," she said. "But
a lot of rape victims somehow get convinced it is their fault. It’s not, but something happens during the trauma."
"And you went along with the arrangement?"
"When I was younger, I thought it was cool to have a potential husband already. Took a lot of stress out of puberty, you know? Simbik was a charming young man. He sent me pictures and letters regularly. In later life, once I started working for the government, it became a convenient cover for me. I used it."
I took another sip of tea, found it a little bitter and added two more sugar packets. "Did you love him?"
She smiled, almost remembering. "Once, I think I did. But I think we both knew somehow that it wouldn’t work. It couldn’t work. People nowadays don’t follow through on arranged marriages unless they’re part of some religious cult. As I said, I saw him once when I was fifteen, a few times after that." She paused. "Then today at the funeral."
"That’s a long span of time."
She shrugged. "Today gave me a chance to talk things over with Simbik’s family. As soon as I find Simbik’s killer, I can concentrate on my job again."
"Interesting line of work you’ve got for yourself."
"You’re one to talk." She gestured to the waitress for another cup of coffee. "Seems to me that we’re cut from the same stone."
Not bloody likely. If she knew what stone I’d been cut from, she probably would have run. No, check that. She’d probably try to waste me.
Instead, I just smiled. She smiled, too. And we sat there smiling at each other like a couple of fools until a fresh cup of steaming blend arrived, breaking our toothpaste commercial.
She took a sip, seemed totally unfazed by the obvious hot contents, and licked her lips slightly. I found it vaguely appealing.
Talya looked at me. "So, what do we do about this man Cosgrove?"
"We?" I shook my head. "There’s no ‘we’ in this equation, Talya. This isn’t the sort of thing you just pick up like some secondhand recipe out of a magazine. Leave it to me. I’ll kill him."
Her eyes crinkled at the edges. "Should I be naive and suggest we contact a priest?"
I smiled again. "Not much good in that. Things are a helluva lot different than the legends you grew up with."
"What makes you such an expert?"
"I’ve been tracking Cosgrove a long time. I know what will kill him. And it won’t be silly superstitions. He can wear crosses with ease, drinks holy water like it’s a fine wine, and he eats garlic like a wetback Dago fresh off the boat from Sicily." I sipped my tea. "Make no mistake: Cosgrove is a vicious bastard who can only be killed by pumping some of my specially-designed bullets into his black heart. That’s it."
She said nothing for a long time. Then she nodded. Slowly.
"Then that’s exactly what we’ll do."
"Anyone ever tell you you’re stubborn?"
"No."
"No?"
"Usually they just call me a bitch and be done with it. An ambitious, powerful woman is assumed to be menstruating. Silly, isn’t it? Equating drive and discipline with an unavoidable monthly biological function. Men are movers and shakers, women are bitches."
"Listen, I don’t want to break up this feminist bent you seem to be on, but I don’t work with partners. It’s no slight on your abilities. I’m sure you can hold your own. But hunting Cosgrove is different from anything you’ve ever done before."
"Lawson," she said. "I have killed a great many people in my years. Diplomats, spies, assassins, drug kingpins, terrorists, and others. I have seen my life flash before my eyes more times than I care to remember. And I have come across a great many foes who were far stronger than I have ever been. But I beat them all. And I will beat Cosgrove as well. He will pay for killing Simbik."
I finished my tea and set the cup down on the stained napkin. "If you say so, Talya." I fished a tenner out of my pocket and laid it across the bill. "But believe me when I tell you this is a whole new world you are stepping into. Your world of conventions does not apply in it. And if you go in thinking it does and that you’re the exception, you will die. It’s that simple."
"Then if I die, I will at least take him with me."
I stood up, but she grabbed my hand. "See you on the hunt, Lawson."
"We’ll see."
"I’m at the Four Seasons." She cocked one of her eyebrows. "When you change your mind…"
Her tone told me she was finished listening to any reason I might have been able to dredge up. Whether Cosgrove was a vampire or not, Talya was going to kill him. And in her mind, that was enough.
I only hoped it was enough for me, too.
Chapter Seven
I left Talya sitting at the table and wound my way back to my car parked in the underground garage. I checked my watch. About eight o’clock would be a perfect time to go hunting. That’s when Cosgrove would emerge on his nocturnal foray again. He was, after all, something of a traditionalist. While he might be able to stand the sun, he liked the night much more. As we all did.
I found myself amused and intrigued simultaneously with the thought of having a partner in the unlikely guise of a human assassin. Even if I’d wanted her along for the ride, there was no way I could justify it. I work alone.
I kill alone.
Part of me wanted to call McKinley and tell him. Hell, it’d be good for a laugh. But I couldn’t do that. Interacting with Talya, let alone telling her about the existence of vampires, was verboten.
Made me wonder why I’d even done it.
I’d always loved women. I enjoyed impressing them. I needed to impress them. Part of me felt crushed when they weren’t interested in me. Jealousy was something I should have conquered a long time ago. But we all have our faults. And right now, mine was that I wanted to impress Talya.
Somehow I knew that it would take a helluva lot to impress a woman like her. She’d probably seen a ton of stuff I hadn’t. And that was saying something.
So, maybe if I killed Cosgrove first, that would impress her. Especially since I’d just built the freak up. Or had I? I adjusted the rearview mirror and checked my reflection.
I grinned. Lawson, you are one desperately lonely dude.
It was a standing joke with myself. I’d get the hots for some woman and then find ways to get under her skin. I’d think about her nonstop. Total infatuation. Then, of course, I’d never follow through because of who I was and what I was.
In the end it didn’t seem like such a joke after all.
I sighed. Monday night. Things would be a little different tonight with the nightclub scene around Boston. Clubs usually perked between Wednesday and Saturday nights. Sunday nights were when most clubs marketed themselves to the gay community. Mondays and Tuesdays were therefore the slim nights. Most of the clubs were closed. Cosgrove would have his field of prospects narrowed down to the bars and pubs. Cosgrove would hunt, but he wouldn’t necessarily like it the way he did when he was in a night club.
Truth was, even though I’d denied it back on that godforsaken rooftop, Cosgrove would never be just another assignment. Like he said, we went way back. Back before either of us knew what we’d be doing at this point in our lives.
Hell, he’d grown up down the street from me.
If I’d ever had the kind of foresight my parents used to suggest I develop, I would have known back then things would eventually come to this point.
I met Cosgrove on a clear, sunny summer day when his family moved in, freshly transplanted from London. Resettled into a new community of vampires. Sounds like Suburbia meets Blood Bath Avenue, doesn’t it? Still happens that way, too.
I was eight. Pretty tall for my age, with a mop of shock black hair that was forever too long. I had been watching the movers unloading carriages all day long, heaving heavy travel trunks into the house with bangs and scrapes that produced a lot of yelling from Cosgrove’s mother.
He had emerged after the movers finished. As he came out on to the front porch, I watched him. He stopped and simply stared at me. Ne
ither of us had said anything. Finally, I’d wandered over, stuck out a grimy hand and introduced myself.
His handshake was like holding a wriggling ball of earthworms. His voice dripped like sap in the Fall. Needless to say, I wasn’t too keen on him.
The remainder of the summer consisted of me trying to avoid contact with him. It wasn’t difficult. Cosgrove gave new meaning to the term "loner." He never went down to the swimming hole, never made friends with any of the other children, kept to himself, and seemed to spend an eternity on his front porch reading big books with black leather covers and spines in an assortment of foreign languages.
The other kids dismissed him as weird.
I suspected something else.
When school started, things came to a head early on. Cosgrove had established himself fairly easily as the self-appointed leader of the outcasts in class. He thought that gave him rule over everyone. My friends and I didn’t agree and since Cosgrove lived on my street, it was decided that I would teach him a lesson.
School fights in the 1870′s were pretty basic tackle-and-punch affairs. I gave Cosgrove a fairly decent working over and then left him bleeding on the field near school.
I wish that was the whole story.
It never is, though. Cosgrove stopped trying to overtly assert
himself but he was always up to something. In class, small spitballs would find their way into my hair. Tiny tacks on my chair after recess. A dead bug in my lunch pail. I could never pin it on him, but I knew.
As we grew older, my thoughts were less of him and more of girls. There was one in particular. Her name was Robin.
I loved her.
A blaring honk jerked me back to reality and cut the memory of Robin short. I hauled my black VW Jetta to the right down Newbury Street and then turned right on to Massachusetts Avenue and drove another block before wheeling the car on to Beacon Street for a quick trip into Kenmore Square and beyond into Allston.
The Jetta handled well. I could have easily afforded a Mercedes or other finely tuned car, but that would have made me more conspicuous. I chose the Jetta because it was German and handled as well as some other cars at twice the price. Plus, lately I’d been seeing the damned things everywhere. That made it a lot easier to blend in. And I’m real big on blending in.