“Not really, but I know what an audible is. But you also have to consider the fact that he is your partner. If you want him to remain your partner you should consider his view on your task at hand.”
“So you’re saying, if I don’t like a potential partner, just ignore them and they’ll eventually go away? That’s good advice.”
“No! That’s not at all what I’m saying. How did you get that from what I said?”
“But you just said that if I want him to remain, my partner, I should consider his view. Flipside of that is if I don’t want him as a partner, I should ignore him.”
She grips her pen so hard, her knuckles whiten. “Let’s move onto something else.”
“Let’s,” I agree. “So, you said you had an interest in people, is that why you became a therapist? I mean, you could’ve easily went into a different field of psychology, right?”
“True, I guess I really just want to help people.” She shifts in her seat and crosses her leg over the other as her skirt rides up her thighs, revealing more of her smooth dark caramel legs. I can tell she’s not comfortable talking about herself.
“So, let’s talk more about your time at the boarding school,” she says.
“What more is there to talk about? We were pushed to the brink of our limits. Pitted against each other and taught how to become a lethal weapon. What more is there to say?” I sigh.
Her eyes narrow as she clicks her pen. “I get the feeling that you’re hiding behind the ideology of a dream you’ve had growing up. I totally understand what it’s like to want to escape our reality, but we do so at the cost of the present.”
I can’t help but chuckle. It’s clear that she doesn’t believe a word I said. I mean, if we’re being honest, who would believe me?
“Tell me about what happened to your parents? Growing up without them must have been hard,” I say.
Her eyes widen, showing the whites surrounding her irises. “Excuse me?”
“Your parents, your mother left you and your father died when you were young, isn’t that right?” I ask.
“How… how did you know about that?” she asks.
“I know a lot about you, Dr. Woodcomb. I’ve done my homework.” I spread my arms out on the couch. She shifts uncomfortably as her eyes narrow at me. “I know about the incident that got you expelled from your high school. I know about your transition in college and a lot of other stuff.”
“I don’t understand. Are you stalking me?” she asks as she nearly snaps her pen in half.
“No. Not really. Honestly, it was never really about you. You see, it’s more about your ex-client, Thomas Bilton.”
“My ex-client? I just spoke with him yesterday. And I can’t talk about my clients,” she says crossing her arms against her chest.
I reach into my coat as I explain things. “Well, Thomas was murdered last night. He was a bad man involved in shitty things. Unfortunately for you, you were his therapist.”
“So…” she says the panic is starting to take over her face.
I pull out my gun. Right on cue, another hitman is walking up to her office. They’re too late. “Well, you see, there’s now a hit on your head.”
I pull the gun up at her. “Please, don’t do this. I…” She closes her eyes as she puts up hands up and begs.
I pull the trigger as soon as the guy busts through the door.
Thank god for the silencer. It makes things a lot less noisy. Sure, it doesn’t make things less messy, but it does keep it quiet.
The wall gets painted red as the body hits the floor.
Dr. Woodcomb opens her eyes as tears fall down her cheeks. She looks down at her body and pats herself down. Then she looks over at the entrance and gasps. Sprawled on the floor is the body of a dead assassin drenched in a pool of his own blood. I change the video feed in my glasses to show the hallway and entrance.
“Fortunately for you, I’m after the people who are after you,” I say.
“What the fuck!” Her eyes look like they’re going to pop out of her head.
“I don’t know how I can explain it any other way. There’s a contract on your head. People other than me want to kill you.”
“Why me? I’m his therapist. He never told me anything that seemed off.”
“It’s a precaution. The people we’re dealing with don’t like to take any chances. He was murdered and they want to make sure the things he knew don’t fall into the hands of the good guys.”
She’s now just totally speechless. I guess I can’t really blame her. Any normal person would be shitting their pants right now.
“What do I do now?”
“Well. We’re probably going to want to… How do I say this… Get the fuck out of here. I’m sure there’ll be another one coming after this guy.”
“I can’t just leave! I have a life here. What about my friends and family?” She stands up and starts to pace back and forth as she runs her hands through her hair and yanks on it. “I can’t just up and leave my practice. What are my patients going to do? This… this is absurd!”
“Look, do you really think the men who are after you care about your family, friends, and clients? They’ll kill anyone who gets in their way to claim their payment. You’d be helping them if you left town.”
“Where should I go?”
“Like I said earlier, you’ll have to come with me.”
“And why should I trust you? You just pulled a gun on me earlier.”
“To be fair, I did save your life and I’m one of the few assassins who doesn’t want to sever your head from your body. But in all honesty, I wouldn’t trust me either. As long as I’m being honest, I’ll admit my only interest in you is using you as bait to draw out my enemy and kill them all. But at least I’m telling you the truth.”
She looks awfully pale. ”Who are they?”
“You know, you don’t look so good, I would suggest that you might want to sit down, but honestly if we stay here any longer I’m going to have to kill another one of them.”
I get up and start heading to the door.
“I have to pack a bag. I can’t leave without…” A man I recognize as Shawn Banks, another assassin from my ex organization walks into the building.
“We can’t wait for that. We have to leave now!” I say as I grab her arm and start dragging her out of the office. I switch the feed on the camera to the stairway just in time to see Banks on his way up.
“At least let me grab a coat!” She yanks her coat off of the coat rack as I pull her out of the office and down the opposite side of the hall to the far stairway away from Banks.
“Where are we going, it’s much quicker to go the other way.”
“Yeah. no… If you want to run into the Serpent’s assassin that way. Sure we can go there. You have a much better chance of living if we go this way.”
She doesn’t say a word, just follows me. We make it down the stairs to the parking garage to the car I’m using currently, an old Ford fusion I found at a Walmart parking lot sits waiting for us.
I peel out of there as if a skunk let loose a stink bomb. I make quick time through the streets of downtown Chicago eventually making it to the freeway.
After we’ve been on the freeway for a while, she finally speaks up. “Will you finally explain what the fuck is going on?”
“Look, your old client, Thomas worked for an organization known as the Jade Serpent. They’re pretty much the epitome of evil and want to control every aspect of the world. Anyways, I killed him last night. Now they’re trying to close loose ties.”