Scuse Me While I Kill This Guy Part 4

John Smith: "What's new?" Eddie: "Same old, same old. People need killing. "

-Mr. & Mrs Mrs. Smith Smith

"All right, we want details!" Liv and Dak faced me with their arms crossed. I had just gotten back from taking Romi to school and found them on my doorstep. Apparently, Liv had told Dak about my date last night. a.s.sa.s.sins are such nosy b.a.s.t.a.r.ds.

"Why didn't you tell me you had a date?" Dak asked.

"Because I made the decision to call him after you left."

"Well?" Liv asked. "Who is he?" She enunciated each word as if I were three years old.

I sighed and took another drink of my coffee. I had a mild headache from the two bottles of wine I had consumed. "His name is Diego. He's Australian. I met him at the bookstore."

"Ooooh! A man with an accent!" Liv squealed.

Dak rolled his eyes. "And?"

I shrugged. "What?" I knew I was p.i.s.sing him off, and it amused me.

Dak sighed with frustration. "Details! I want details!"

I pointed at him. "Do I ever ask you for details of your dates?"

"No. But they don't seem to be as important to me as this guy is to you."

I arched my right eyebrow. "How can you tell?"

Dak counted on his fingers. "One, you haven't dated since Eddie died. Two, Liv said you were out for four hours ... on a weeknight. And three, you're hiding something."

It was my turn to roll my eyes. "You're an idiot. I'm not hiding anything. I'm just not telling you everything."

"And there's a difference?" Dak asked.

"Yeah, there is."

"Do I have to put you both in timeout?" Liv pushed us apart. She turned to me. "We're just curious. And we're happy for you. That's all, Gin."

Liv knew which b.u.t.tons to push. But I was afraid to tell them too much. It wasn't real yet. At least not to me.

"What do you want to know?" I offered my olive branch.

"How about his name, Social Security number and mother's maiden name?" Dak asked.

"Right. Like I'd let you do a background check on him." And he would too.

"How about just a little info?" Liv asked gently.

"Okay. He's probably our age, gorgeous as all get out in that tall-dark-handsome kind of way. He's very funny and smart and likes kids. Happy?"

"What does he do for a living?" Dak asked.

And there it was. The thing I didn't want to tell them. Why? Because there was a teensy, weensy chance that there could be, in the way distant future, a slight conflict of interest there.

"He's a bodyguard." I couldn't lie to them. Dak and Liv knew me too well.

"A what? Gin! Are you crazy?" Dak jumped in.

"Now, Dak, we don't know that it'll be a problem," Liv said.

Dak rolled his eyes. "Oh, sure. Won't be a problem! He just happens to be a bodyguard in a small city where my immediate family of a.s.sa.s.sins lives! I'm sure there won't be any conflict of interest there." Wow. He was p.i.s.sed!

"I didn't know that when I met him! It's just what he does. It's not like he's FBI or a cop."

Okay, I'd admit to that one time I'd had a date with a Fed by mistake. But it had never come back to haunt me, and there'd been no second date. (Relax. I didn't kill him.) "At least she had a date!" Liv interjected.

I threw my hands up in the air. "Now, that doesn't make me sound pathetic at all!"

Poppy padded into the room and looked at us. Apparently we'd woken her up. Finding nothing interesting, she waddled to her food dish and began eating.

"See what you did? You woke the baby!" I yelled at Dak.

Dak waved his hands in the air. "Okay, fine. I'm overreacting. I'm glad you're seeing someone. Even if he is body armor." Body armor was what we called bodyguards. They usually slowed the process of hitting our target with bullets.

"I accept your apology," I said rather magnanimously.

"So." Liv popped a Hostess mini-m.u.f.fin in her mouth. (The girl never, ever gained weight.) "Are you going to see him again?"

"Did you get laid?" Dak cut in.

I threw my hands into the air. "Yes," I said to Liv. Then I turned to Dak. "Not yet, not that it's any of your business. Besides, he's only here for six months, then it's back to Europe with his client. I can't imagine us having a long-distance thing after-G.o.dd.a.m.nit! It's only been one date! Why am I telling you all this?"

Liv looked to Dak. "She's a little defensive, isn't she?"

"No s.h.i.t," he responded. "She needs to get laid."

"I'm right here!" here!" I shouted. I hated being ignored. "And there's nothing to discuss!" I shouted. I hated being ignored. "And there's nothing to discuss!"

I scooped up the fat pug puppy, walked out the back door, and set Poppy down in the yard. I followed her while she used my lawn as her personal toilet, then brought her back in. Liv and Dak were waiting for me.

"Okay, we'll change the subject." Dak smiled. "What's the job?"

I blinked at him. "What are you talking about?"

"The job! Who's Vic?"

"What?" I had no clue.

Dak stared at me. "The envelope I gave you yesterday! Who's Vic?"

"Oh." I'd forgotten about that. Vic was the name we gave our victims, kind of like a secret code. Not the most difficult code to crack, but we're kind of lazy. "I didn't open it." I had forgotten about the hit. I'd been too wrapped up in Diego's eyes-I mean, Romi's (and Poppy's) training.

"I'll open it later." We had a couple of weeks. And I needed to focus on other things first.

"You have to do it before the reunion," Dak pressed.

"I know." I scratched between Poppy's ears. "I'll get to it. When have you ever known me to screw up a job?"

"Never," Dak mused, "but there's a first time for everything."

"Out." I pointed to the door.

Liv fondled the pug's ears, then smiled as she grabbed Dak by the arm and pulled him out of my house.

"Now, you, I like," I said in a baby voice to Poppy. She wiggled in my arms. "You don't ask any questions." I set her on the floor and walked into the living room. The pup trailed me, trying clumsily to climb onto the couch next to me. I lifted her up, and she snuggled onto my lap, promptly falling asleep.

The envelope sat on the end table, unopened. I supposed I shouldn't leave it there, but I was getting careless these days. I picked it up and turned it around in my hands, giving myself one nasty paper cut.

"That's enough for you," I said as I set it down and sucked on my finger. There was a lot to think about. A hit that had to be taken care of, the family reunion, training Romi, housetraining Poppy, and an impending second date with the delectable Diego.

I thought about the kiss he had given me last night. It had been perfect in every way. I wanted more. When would he call? Oh yes, he had said today sometime.

Now, a.s.sa.s.sins don't usually sit by the phone waiting for Australian bodyguards to call them for a date. Okay, so I was breaking that rule. I knew there would be a second date, followed by a third, fourth, all the way to 100 if I could make it happen. How many days are there in six months? Something like 180 to 186, I would imagine. Minus the reunion time and, of course, I'd be working some of the time too. Hmmm ... this relationship had to move fast in order for first date plus consecutive dates to equal mind-blowing s.e.x.

Okay, so I'd break with convention and wait by the phone today. Poppy snored loudly on my lap. It wasn't like I could move anyway.

And that's where I sat for four hours, waiting for the phone to ring and my bladder to explode. Funny business, this dating thing. Finally, I had to get up to pick up Romi from school. Diego hadn't called. b.a.s.t.a.r.d.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

Mr. Newberry: "I visualized you in a haze as one of those slackster, flannel-wearing, coffee-house misanthropes I've been seeing in News "I visualized you in a haze as one of those slackster, flannel-wearing, coffee-house misanthropes I've been seeing in News-week."Marty: "No no no, I went the other road. Six figures, doing business with lead pipe cruelty, mercenary sensibility. You know . . . sports, s.e.x, no real relationships. How about you-how have the years been treating you?" "No no no, I went the other road. Six figures, doing business with lead pipe cruelty, mercenary sensibility. You know . . . sports, s.e.x, no real relationships. How about you-how have the years been treating you?"Mr. Newberry: "Well you know me, "Well you know me, Martin-still the same old sellout, Martin-still the same old sellout, exploiting the oppressed . . ." exploiting the oppressed . . ."

-Grosse Pointe Blank

I'd spent all day waiting for Diego to call. And I hadn't given up yet, as evidenced by the cordless phone sitting next to me. However, Dak had been right. I had a job to do and that monkey would be on my back until I did it.

Now, with Romi in bed and Poppy curled up with her, I had some time to check out the hit. It was just an ordinary manila envelope, nothing special, no scary seal in bloodred wax. You weren't expecting that, right?

Jobs were handed down through the family, a.s.signed by the Council to the a.s.sa.s.sin, based on location, specialty, and so on. The Council consisted of the oldest Bombay generation, which in this case was Grandma Mary, her brother Lou, sister Dela (as in Delaware) and cousins Troy and Florence, who headed up the European branch of the Bombays. You might think that sounds efficient to have American and European branches. But basically it goes back 150 years when only part of the family wanted to come to America. The other sn.o.bs refused to leave The Continent.

It was useful to have us working internationally. And I got along well with my European counterparts. It also gave me a place to crash when in England or France. Anyway, the Council met quarterly, handing down a.s.signments to their children (Mom's generation), who were divided into subsets with Greek letter codes-a tradition going back to our Greek heritage. Mom was the head of the Alpha group, the group to which Dak and I belonged. Liv and her brother, Paris, were in the Beta subset. Mom's sister, Virginia, hadn't lived long enough to have kids, so she had zip. It was a small but lethal family. I wouldn't cross us.

So I sat in the living room with the drapes drawn and security system on. Technically, I should have been in the lab to do this, but I was feeling pretty lazy. That's right, I was a lazy a.s.sa.s.sin.

"Let's see who our bad guy is today, Gin!" I announced in my game-show voice to no one in particular. (Insert embarra.s.sed a.s.sa.s.sin here.) Leonard Burns's forgettable face glowered at me. Soon, it would be a dead face, if I had anything to do with it. Let's see, busted for selling military secrets to Iran. Who's been a bad boy? You have, you have! Who's been a bad boy? You have, you have!

Apparently, Leonard, now to be referred to as "Vic," had turned federal witness and got away with s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g over his country. For some reason, Leonard cheated death through the federal witness protection program by hiding out in my backyard. It took a while to find him, but Grandma had tracked him down. Mental note: appreciate Grandma more. Maybe Mental note: appreciate Grandma more. Maybe send a card or flowers-just because. send a card or flowers-just because.

Hmmm, currently employed with our local farm implement manufacturer as an engineer. Nice. Didn't live far from me either, only two blocks away.

So the next morning, after taking Romi to school, I set my evil (dun, dun, dun!) plan in motion.

"Come on, Poppy," I said cheerfully as I wrestled her into a harness, "we're going for a walk!" By the way, have you ever tried to put one of those things on a dog? I swear they were designed by the s.a.d.i.s.t who came up with the straightjacket. And if you've ever had to put a straightjacket on someone, you know what I mean. If you haven't, um, well, just take my word for it.

It was a gorgeous day for surveillance work. With the memorized address, my mirrored aviator sungla.s.ses and baseball cap (I had other clothes on too), I'd look like anyone else taking a two-month-old pug for a walk. Poppy bounced beside me, seemingly happy with this particular interruption in her intensive napping schedule.

It only took a few minutes to find Vic's house-without looking like I was trying to find his house, that is. It was probably not called a house as much as a palace.

In fact, I hadn't realized I lived in such a nice neighborhood. The large, brick neocla.s.sical monstrosity loomed three stories above me. Four fluted columns rose in front of the entrance to the top floor. The trim was oddly eclectic. How did you hide out in something that begged for attention?

Okay, I had to check the grounds. If he had a garden, I might get lucky and find rhubarb or rhododendron to poison him with and make it look like Li'l Ol' Leo just had an accidental hankerin' to eat from his garden. But how did I explain snooping around?

A whimper at my feet gave me an idea. I bent down to scratch Poppy, surrept.i.tiously unhooking her leash. There was no better excuse than chasing a runaway puppy.

There was one problem with that, however. I hadn't factored in the complete lack of interest my dog had in doing anything more than sitting on the sidewalk.

"Go, Poppy! Go on, girl!" I whispered, nudging her gently with my foot. She lay down.

"Come on!" I whispered a little loudly. "This is your big chance! Make a break for it!" Poppy lifted her head to stare at me, eyes bulging, lips permanently etched in a sour look. She sneezed, then wiggled her curled-up tail.

Maybe I was getting somewhere. "That's it! Go on! Check out the house! Look at those bushes! I'll bet there's a dead bird or something just as gross over there!"

Poppy rose to her feet, then yawned while stretching her front legs. I was impressed. I'd never seen her do more than one thing at a time before. She remained standing, looking to me for more encouragement.

"Good girl!" I said as she finally waddled off toward the house. We would need to work on that. I wondered if there was a disobedience cla.s.s I could take. While Poppy traveled at speeds that would allow a paralyzed snail to catch her, I pretended to be fascinated by my watch. Out of the comer of my eye, I spotted her lying down beneath a shrub in front of the house. Okay, so not in the backyard, but I could still pull it off.

"Ginny!" Diego's voice called out behind me, and I turned to see him get out of a black town car and walk toward me.

You would be glad to know I didn't panic. I may have vomited a little in my mouth, but no trace of panic. "Diego? What are you doing here?"

"My client lives on this street." He looked at the empty leash in my hands. "Did you lose your dog?"

"What? Oh! Yes! I was just looking for her." To make it appear more realistic, I shouted, "Here Poppy! Poppy! Come here, girl!" I prayed that she wouldn't hear me.