I
smiled to myself as I took off my new backpack. It must’ve been a school
night, but days of the week no longer held meaning for me. Most seventeen
year olds would be asleep in bed, visions of book reports and senior prom dancing
through their heads. I had visions of our mark’s head exploding, my first
ever sniper job.
Frank
sat on the roof ledge, watching in silence as I put together our rifles.
An angel-faced teenager with a backpack was a hell of a lot less conspicuous
than a murderous looking man carrying a black duffel bag, although making me
carry both guns up twenty flights of stairs was hardly fair. Especially
on a school night.
Once
the backpack was empty I put it on again, since it was so windy on the roof
that I was likely to lose it. I handed Frank his rifle and sat beside
him. “What happens if I miss?”
“Don’t
miss.”
“What
if I do?”
“Then
I won’t.”
I
held my rifle. My hands were steady, despite how nervous I was. And
excited. But I knew that Frank not only hated sniper jobs, but snipers in
general. “The prima-donnas of the assassin world,” he called them.
Shooting someone who didn’t even see them coming. I couldn’t decide which
was worse; hating that type of job and being stuck doing it anyway, or loving
it and having Frank think badly of me. I set down the gun. “Do you
really think snipers are cowards?”
“They
can be.”
“Am I?” Bravery wasn’t exactly one of
my strong points. Even after months of assassin training, flight was still my standby response
when it came to survival.
“Vincent,
you weigh about ninety pounds. Being up here in the wind is courageous
for you.”
I
swung at him. Frank caught my hand and flung me off the roof, his fingers
around my wrist the only thing keeping me from falling to my death. He
laughed as I dangled below him. “You didn’t even scream.”
Of
course I hadn’t screamed. Frank would never let me get seriously hurt,
much less do the hurting himself. “I’m saving the screaming for tonight.”
“Tonight
we’ll be on the road,” he reminded me.
I
cried out in despair, “Just drop me, Frank! I’ve had a good life.”
He
pulled me back up, no longer amused with our game. Frank took my
blemished childhood more personally than I did, and I was way better at
self-pity than I’d ever be at bravery. “You’ve had a terrible life.”
“The
last few months have more than made up for it.”
“Have
they?”
“Of
course they have. I’ve made you happy too, right?”
“I’m
just happy I don’t have to do sniper jobs anymore.”
This
time he didn’t stop me from punching him, and even gave me a kiss
afterward. “You know, Bella loves sniper jobs. She’s a lot of
things, but a coward isn’t one of them. And anyway…” He pushed me
onto my front and straddled me. “I think you’ll make a great sniper.” Frank placed my rifle in front of me, moving
just far enough off me so he could position his own rifle. “You’re a good
shot, V. You won’t miss.”
“And
you’re there if I do.” I adjusted the scope, and we settled in to
wait.
Gregor
Braun was a low-level German Embassy employee who’d stumbled upon a high-level
government secret. From what we’d been able to tell with three weeks of
surveillance, or what Frank could
tell at least, since I couldn’t understand a word of what Gregor was ever
saying, our mark didn’t have the slightest idea of the importance of what he’d
found. He never met with anyone wearing
trench coats and dark glasses to sell the information; he didn’t even really
have any friends to tell. His social
life consisted of drinking a lot of beer, eating a lot of sausage, and watching
a lot of television. Kinda like me. Except without the beer.
Being
assassinated would speak louder about what Gregor had discovered than Gregor
ever could, but you can’t really argue with the kind of people who keep a
hundred grand in the petty cash drawer.
The
lights in Gregor’s apartment flicked on and I tensed, keeping my finger off the
trigger lest I shoot him too soon. He
shut his door and flipped the deadbolt, then checked his messages. Frank was staring through his scope, just
like I should’ve been. But I couldn’t
help but look at him, watching the corner of his lips raise into a smirk. “Are you going to take your shot?”
I
turned back to Gregor, following his head around his apartment. “Now?”
“Whenever
you’d like.”
I
took a deep breath and gripped the trigger, slowly exhaling as I squeezed. It felt like it took forever for the trigger
to depress, and then suddenly there was a red mist in the air where Gregor’s
head used to be. “I got him!”
Frank
was already up, dismantling his gun with a proud smile on his face. “You got him.”
I hopped
into a sitting position, practically ripping my gun apart in my
excitement. “That was…fun!”
He smiled
even wider. “That was an excellent shot.”
I
quickly kissed him on the cheek, shoving my gun into the backpack on top of
where he’d carefully placed his. “That’s
it? We’re done?”
“We’re
done.” He held open the door to the roof
entrance. I’d forgotten all about the
wind. I’d barely been able to get the
door open on our way up. I ducked under
his arm, bouncing down the stairs as Frank walked beside me.
“You
really don’t like these?”
“No.”
“So
I get to do them?”
“Yes.”
“All of them?”
“Yes.”
I
shoved the exit door, pushing forward into the alleyway and the cold night
air. Frank instinctively moved to the
other side of me, keeping me safe from traffic even though the only car in
sight was ours. “What if it’s like, some
huge high profile thing where the client goes to Silva instead of Charlie?”
“You
just did.”
I
tripped on my shoe and would’ve face-planted on the sidewalk if Frank hadn’t
grabbed hold of the backpack. “That
was…really?”
“It
was.”
I
gaped at him. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why? So you could be nervous about it?”
“But
what if I fucked it up?”
“You
didn’t.”
“What
if I did?”
“Then
I wouldn’t have.”
I
sighed and adjusted my backpack. “I just
worked for Silva?”
He
smiled. “You did.”
“And
I didn’t fuck it up!”
“You’re
about to if you don’t get in the car.”
“Right. Sorry.”
I hopped in the passenger seat and stared up at Gregor’s apartment
building. I couldn’t see his window from
the street, but it was nice of him to leave the light on for me anyway. “Frank?”
“Yes,
dear?”
“How
do you say ‘international super assassin’ in German?”
He
gave me a stern look and started the car.
“Are you expecting me to say your name?”
“You
know it, baby.”
Frank
rolled his eyes. “Ich habe ein Monster
geschaffen.”
