The Assassin (Max Doerr Book 1) (5 page)

“I
knew the senator would be due for reelection in 2014, good timing for him.”

Gayle
was listening with her mouth agape. “Then what happened?”

“I
sadly realized how cold politicians could be. They were ready to compromise
national security for a piece of pork. I had read about that fast train project.
It was estimated that less than a hundred people a day would ride that route,
if it were ever built. I was sad and angry. I felt that I could not get my men
what they needed. I felt betrayed. I stood up and blurted something at the senator
and left. I would come to know later that the senator didn’t take that lightly.

“The
next day, when I met Lazarus, he asked me to apologize to the senator or resign.
So I gave my resignation.”

Doerr
looked into Gayle’s eyes. “This was in September 2008. I had met you two months
before.” Gayle nodded, and Doerr continued. “I am sorry I didn’t tell you
everything before. But I made a promise to myself on New Year’s Day in 2009,
when we skated together on the ice in Central Park, to never lie to you or
withhold anything knowingly, except about my CIA past. I’m sure I just broke
some of their code of conduct by telling you those details. But I don’t care.”

Doerr
glanced at his watch. It was 12:10 a.m. He had been tired when he had reached
home. After talking for over an hour, he felt even more so. “Do you have any
other questions?”

Gayle
hesitated and then said, “Just one more.”

“What
is it?”

“Was
Billy your biological son?”

Doerr
sighed. He never talked about his first marriage. But he wanted to get over it.
“All right, I will tell you everything. I met Sally during my first year of training.
It was love at first sight for me. We met through a common friend. Billy was
Sally’s son from an unfortunate teen pregnancy. It didn’t bother me at all. At
that time, she was attending school to earn a degree in Mass Communication, and
Billy was being taken care of by his grandmother. We dated for a year, and then,
after I had finished the operation in Lybia, I proposed. She said yes, and after
our wedding I took a month off. Together we went on a month-long tour –
SanFran, Yellowstone, and Las Vegas. It felt like we were in heaven.

“A
few years passed by. She was busy with school, and I was busy with my job. We
were together whenever I was home. Neither I nor Sally was interested in having
another child. Then the worst day for our family came in June 1999. It was a Tuesday;
I picked up Billy from daycare and reached home around seven p.m. I got a call
from the police. Sally had been killed in a car accident. A truck rammed into
her compact car and sent it into a tumble.

“After
her death I legally adopted Billy and changed his name. There wasn’t a single
day I thought he wasn’t my son.”

Gayle
placed her hand on his shoulder. “I don’t know what to say. I’m sorry I made
you go through all this.”

“Don’t
worry. I was going to tell you soon, anyway. But I’m happy that I did it
tonight. I feel relieved. Why don’t you go to bed; you’ve got work tomorrow.”

THE
NEXT MORNING, Doerr woke up late, as usual. He was surprised to see Gayle was
still home.

“Good
thing you took a day off,” he said. “You needed it.”

They
had their breakfast together. Doerr chomped a large piece of bacon, and his gaze
fell on Gayle’s gloomy face.

He
figured out what it was. Because of him, she was under so much stress, and he
knew her mom was always urging her to spend some time with her.

He
suggested that she go and spend a few days with her mom, maybe a few weeks;
after all, she had a fairly stressful job.

“No
way,” she said and put her coffee mug down. “And leave you here in this
situation? Never.”

“I’ll
be fine. Remember, I’m trained to endure much harsher conditions. Trust me.”

“If
I go, who will take care of you? Who will make your morning coffee, and who
will wash your laundry? I can’t go.”

“No,
please go. I can’t see you suffer with me. Go to your mother’s. I will still be
sad, and pain will cover my heart. But apart, our pain will be less. Do it for
me. Please.” In his mind, Doerr still felt that she would be in less pain if
she stayed with her mother for a while.

After
more persuasion, she agreed to go to her mom’s place. “I don’t know how jolly I’ll
be at my mother’s. I won’t be able to stop thinking about you. I hope you’ll be
able to think clearly and not worry about me when I’m gone,” she said. “By the
way, someone named Samuel left a voicemail for you.”

SAMUEL.
THE NAME struck him like a broken note from the Mozart symphony number forty,
which Doerr often played on his Yamaha piano to cool down his nerves. Samuel
was a CIA colleague who many people had avoided, though many people had loved him
as well. Samuel had done weird things. Behind his back, many had talked foul of
him, but no one dared to say it to his face. He was a tall man with broad
shoulders and a distinctive, deep scar on his right cheek, which made him look even
more masculine.

Days
after walking out on the senator and losing most of his privileges, Doerr had
wished he had Samuel by his side to smooth out the tension that had filled the
air when he had decided to resign from the agency. By the time Samuel had called
him, he had already handed in his resignation letter and lost even the simplest
privileges that even a junior agent used to have.

He
wanted to forget about Samuel. Samuel’s memory only brought back the past, the
painful past. Doerr walked to the piano and started playing. As his fingers danced
across the keys, he could feel his stress levels decreasing. But, after a few
minutes, he wasn’t sure if the music was relieving or bringing back the pain.
He stood up, determined not to check the voicemail; he entered the bathroom and
started a long cold shower. When he came out, it was already twelve p.m., time
for him to head for work.

WHEN
HE ARRIVED back to his empty home late that night, he went straight to his
piano. He switched it to silent mode; as he pressed the minor keys, he felt emptiness
in his chest that the symphony could not fill. He played for a few more minutes,
and then he poured himself a glass of red wine. After drinking it quickly, he
poured another. The resulting dizziness made him rush to the phone. He was
about to dial Gayle’s number, but he stopped. He didn’t want to transfer his
stress to her.

It
had been a while since he had slept alone. He poured another refill of wine
into the glass. As the red liquid danced inside the glass, it brought back the
memory of Billy as a toddler, running around the house, and the days when he
had taken care of him all by himself. Alcohol ran down his esophagus, spreading
the pain all around his body. That was when he walked to the base of the landline
phone and hit the play button. 

Doerr
heard the message and was confused by it.

Samuel’s
message did not leave a number to call back. It was late at night, but Doerr
called a few friends and finally found Samuel’s number. He immediately dialed it.
“Hello, Samuel?”

After
pleasantries, Samuel asked, “How are things? Are you happy with an editor’s
desk job?”

“What
can I say?” Doerr decided not to mention the family tragedy. “It pays the
bills. I wanted out of the agency, and I
am
out.”

“That
bastard, Lazarus, gave you such a raw deal. If I were you, I would have sued
the hell out of him.”

“Maybe
I should have.” Doerr knew very well that the agency could not be sued, let
alone one of its employees. “So what is this job you left me a message about?”

“Right,
right. The thing is…if you’re not too busy,” Samuel paused; the sound of a
beverage entering a glass could be heard on the line. Samuel was known to be a
hard drinker. “You know the CIA has been trying to outsource some of the dirty
work lately. Five years back, this would have been called ludicrous. But they’re
pushing us to the brink. Do you think the job of a well-trained agent can be
done by anyone else? Israeli or British Intelligence – maybe. Mossad or MI6. Anyway,
we have to hire someone for three specific jobs. One in Europe, one in Asia and
one right here in America. The jobs require some specific skills. I think you are
the right candidate. I would like to have you back at the agency; the CIA never
produced a better sniper than you. We all know that.”

“But
what do I get?” Doerr said in a surly voice. He took his shirt off and held the
cordless phone close to his ear.

“Depending
on how things go, you could get your job back. You may get all the unpaid
benefits – that could amount to over hundred grand.”

“I
don’t care about the money.” Doerr took a sip of his wine. “Give me the details
of the job, and I’ll think about it.”

“It’s
getting late. I will be in the big city this Saturday. Why don’t we meet at our
favorite bar, by Thirty-Third Street? You haven’t forgotten about that place,
have you?”

“How
could I forget? We met there a million times.”

“All
right then. Let’s meet on Saturday around, say, seven?”

“Okay.
See you then.”

“And
by the way, two other old buddies will be there. It will be a nice get-together
for the agency men.”

“All
right.”

THE
DOORLESS, NONDESCRIPT entrance to the shabby building on Thirty-Third Street gave
the impression that it was perhaps a drug joint. The cracks on the concrete stairs
told passersby that it did not hold the corporate house of any healthy business.
If any visitor decided to check it out, they would be first greeted with a
‘PRIVATE PROPERTY’ sign at the turn of the stairs. At the next turn, the
intruder would read a second sign – ‘DO NOT ENTER, VIOLATORS PROSECUTED.’ If
anyone dared to pass those signs and proceed upstairs, four heavily armed men
of huge proportion would confront them. The men wouldn’t listen to any lame
excuse and would send the startled visitor back down the stairs in less than
thirty seconds. They were authorized to use force to keep people out. But that
was never necessary.

Doerr
had gone upstairs there many times. In fact, his second meeting with his
recruiter, Ted, had occurred there, on the seventeenth floor, the floor
reserved for human resources. All twenty-three levels of the building were used
by the agency. Each floor had its own security guards, and there was eight-inch-thick
glass on the wall where windows were supposed to be installed. The specially
made glass was designed to protect from bullets and even small missiles. No one
could see anything from outside, but they still dressed the windows with white
blinds.

As
Doerr passed by the building, he glanced at the entrance. It looked the same as
it had when he had gone there the first time, deserted and desolate, heartless
and lonely. A homeless man sat next to the entrance, begging for quarters. Doerr
put his hand in his pocket, pulled out a five-dollar note and gave the money to
the beggar. He walked two more blocks till he reached Susie’s Bar, the old favorite
meeting place.

It
was seven p.m., and the place was already getting crowded. There were about
twenty tables, but none of them were empty. All the stools around the bar were
occupied too. Doerr looked around for Samuel but was unable to locate him. He
glanced at a young man at the corner table, who was sipping his beer, seated
uncomfortably between two older men, one of whom had a dense beard. Doerr kept
walking and then turned, hearing his name. Samuel and two other guys were
seated on three stools facing the bar.

Doerr
recognized the other two men; one man’s name was Victor, but he didn’t remember
the other man’s name.

“Hey,
Max.” Victor stood up and extended his hand for a shake; he leaned in and
bumped chests with Doerr as his thick brown beard touched Doerr’s shoulder.
“It’s a shame that we live in the same damn city and don’t even meet once a
year.”

“Sorry,
I’ve been busy,” Doerr greeted him.

After
more pleasantries and ordering drinks, Doerr stood talking to his old buddies.
With his wife gone, in some way it felt like he was regressing back to the
past. Feeling uneasy, he looked straight at Samuel and asked, “When are we
going to discuss business?”

“Let’s
just enjoy tonight,” Samuel said as he raised his beer bottle, “with these
wonderful guys.” He pointed to Victor and the other man.

“Okay.”
It made sense to Doerr. This noisy place wasn’t suitable for business anyway.
Some sort of dance music was blaring through the air. Conveniently, two men
beside the group finished their drinks and left; Doerr sat down on one of the
vacated stools and settled in next to his friends. The four men sat there,
drinking and enjoying the Yankees baseball game that was being shown on the seventy-two-inch
plasma TV.

After
a while, Doerr said, “Walking by that building on Thirty-Third Street gave me a
chill down my legs. It brought back so many memories.”  

“But
don’t go there. Many floors have been leased out,” Samuel said. “And you know
how we operate. If you’re not within their operation, you’re as good as an
outsider.”

Doerr
nodded. “I know.”

They
kept watching TV, drinking and talking. Before he knew it, a few hours had passed
by.

It
was getting late. Doerr glanced at his watch – 11:50 p.m.

“How
long are we gonna stay?” he asked. 

“Let’s
enjoy it, man! Night is young,” Samuel said. “What have you got to do at home?”

Doerr
knew he was right. Another hour passed by; the crowd thinned out, and the
laughs waned. Other than him and his friends, only three other customers
remained to enjoy their drinks. A single bartender, looking tired, was taking
care of business.  

Doerr’s
eyes drifted to the mirror on the wall. In the reflection, he saw a thin figure
appear at the door. Doerr was shocked to see a gun in the man’s hand. The
gunman sprinted within five feet of Doerr. Raising the gun, the man pointed it
directly at Doerr’s head.

“Give
me your wallet!” the man yelled.

Doerr
turned and looked straight at the skinny man’s black mask.

“Give
me your fucking wallet or everyone here dies,” the man shouted again and raised
the gun a few inches higher.

Shocked,
Doerr reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet and glanced at Samuel. Samuel
looked like he was waiting for him to hand over the wallet and end the
confrontation.   

Doerr
extended his hand to give him the wallet. The gunman inched forward, expecting to
grab the black leather wallet. Doerr took one step, swinging his right hand up,
hitting the man’s lower jaw. The noise of crashing teeth was audible, even over
the music. Doerr moved his left hand with supersonic speed to snatch the gun
from the thug’s hand. But the son of a bitch had good reflexes; he pulled his
arm away and then hit Doerr in the face with the butt of the gun. But Doerr was
not to be outdone. He hit the mugger’s right elbow, and the gun flew out of his
hand.

The
masked man stood there, stunned, but only for a second, before sprinting off
like a startled deer. Doerr ran after him, but the thief ran into the darkness
of Gotham City, and Doerr could not see him. On the way back to the bar, he
touched his face and felt the warm blood there.  

Once
back in the bar, Samuel looked at him with a big smile. “You saved everyone
today.”

“It
was nothing,” Doerr said. “I don’t know why he came to me. I mean, there were
others.”

“I
don’t know either,” Samuel replied. “Maybe because you were closest to the
door.”

The
bartender came up and showed appreciation. “You’re my hero. We get thugs like
that coming in once in a while. We installed a security camera, but the
bastards have adapted, and now they wear masks. Now, tell me, what drink would you
like as thanks?”

“Nothing,”
Doerr said, feeling tired from fighting and running. “No, thanks. I should be going.”

“No
way,” Samuel said, “let’s celebrate. Everyone wants to spend time with a hero
like you.” He turned to Victor and the other man. “Right, guys?”

“Yeah,”
Victor and the other man shouted together.  

Samuel
turned to the bartender, who was still staring at Doerr with admiration. Samuel
said to him, “Get him a Grey Goose vodka with orange juice. And get the
first-aid kit, will you?”

“Right
away, sir.” The bartender went back behind the bar.

When
he came back with the kit, Doerr put a Band-Aid over the cut on his face. “I
really need to go,” Doerr said with a serious voice. “Goodbye, fellas,” he said
and left.

He
walked a few blocks and again passed the building on Thirty-Third Street. This
time, however, he did not think of his past profession, which may soon become
his line of work again. He was thinking about Gayle. His heart ached; he
doubted whether sending her away was the right decision.