Death Takes a Partner: A Mary Jo Assassin Novel Page 7

  They found nothing, so their stalker was depending on following them in routines.

  This morning Jean had gone out the back in the dark and circled around to where they had a Jeep SUV parked two blocks from their condo. Jean moved the SUV into position and then left it.

  Mary Jo’s morning routine three days a week was to walk along this street to the market, do some shopping and then carry the groceries back. She liked getting out and meeting people, while Jean had her groceries delivered for the meals she cooked.

  Jean sat on the ground in a recessed doorway, hidden, as Mary Jo walked by right on time.

  As she did, Mary Jo touched her hair on the right side, indicating the stalker was behind her. The plan was for Mary Jo to go another half block, let the stalker get past Jean, then turn suddenly and start back, as if forgetting something.

  Jean was going to be interested in seeing how the stalker woman reacted when that happened.

  Jean kept her head down enough for the hair to cover most of her face and make it look as if she was a junkie sleeping. But with one eye she could see the street and those passing by.

  Following Mary Jo at about one block distance, the stalker passed.

  Jean had out her small pistol that contained a dart with enough drug to stop a horse in its tracks.

  She stood and stepped into the street just behind the stalker, keeping the pistol hidden.

  The woman was dressed in jeans, tennis shoes, and a very fashionable blouse that Jean could see the sports bra under. Her pitch-black hair almost shone in the morning sun and her face looked freshly scrubbed and radiant.

  The woman was a stunner, of that there was no doubt. Jean hoped they didn’t have to kill her. It would be such a waste of beauty.

  The stalker also had the walk of a member of the order. Even though she was just strolling down the sidewalk, Jean could tell she made not one sound.

  Suddenly one block ahead, Mary Jo turned and started back, as if she had forgotten something.

  The stalker did exactly as Jean would have done. She just kept walking at Mary Jo. The stalker was going to be looking at something else purposely when she passed Mary Jo.

  There was no sign of the stalker carrying a weapon, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have one.

  As Mary Jo got ten paces away, Jean put the dart into the beautiful skin of the stalker’s neck, right above her blouse collar.

  The stalker spun instantly, seeing Jean, but at that point the stalker was already heading for the ground.

  Mary Jo caught her and lowered her down on the edge of the sidewalk, out of the path of others.

  Jean joined her.

  “Looks like she fainted,” Mary Jo said, pretending to check the woman’s pulse and breathing while making sure the dart in the woman’s neck vanished from sight.

  “What do we do?” Jean asked, playing her part in the little drama play.

  “We need to get her to a hospital,” Mary Jo said. “Her heart is beating irregularly.”

  Around them a group of five or six had gathered. Jean was paying close attention to all of them in case the woman had a partner. The lookers all seemed to be just lookers.

  “I’ve got a car right here,” Jean said, playing the script they had planned for the broad daylight takedown. “I’ll drive you. We can have here there in minutes.”

  Mary Jo nodded, being very serious. “Thank you.”

  Mary Jo picked up the woman and Jean ran ahead and got the back door to the SUV open.

  No one on the sidewalk objected, but instead just nodded at how two good Samaritans were taking care of the poor woman who had passed out on the sidewalk.

  Mary Jo got into the back seat with the woman while Jean ran around and got behind the wheel.

  Four minutes later they had circled around and were down into the underground parking under their condo building.

  And ten minutes later they had the woman on their spare bed in their penthouse condo.

  Jean was amazed at how she and Mary Jo worked together so easily to make something very difficult seem almost simple. She liked being Mary Jo’s partner.

  And she liked having her as a friend and a lover even more.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  MARY JO SAT in a desk chair across the room from the black-haired woman. They had brought her into the apartment, stripped her and found no weapons, put her underwear back on and then put zip-ties on her hands and legs. She was on the bed in their guest room, looking almost radiant against the tan spread.

  Sun from the one window in the room beamed through the closed blinds, warming the room a little.

  As a trained assassin, the woman was still dangerous, but Mary Jo wasn’t worried about her at all. If she had wanted them dead, chances are they would already be dead.

  No, this woman had allowed herself to be seen for some reason and Mary Jo was dying to find out why.

  “Awake yet,” Jean asked as she came into the room and handed Mary Jo a screwdriver, then took the other chair facing the bed.

  “Yeah, she’s been awake for about ten minutes now, but pretending to still be out.”

  “Tricky,” Jean said.

  “Why did you take me?” the woman on the bed asked, opening her eyes and staring first at Jean, then at Mary Jo.

  Mary Jo was stunned at the intensity of the woman’s dark eyes. She was built almost exactly the same as Mary Jo and Jean, but seemed to have an energy that felt slightly different.

  Independent, actually, and a little feeling of being a trapped animal. Mary Jo wouldn’t have liked being tied up as she was either.

  “She speaks,” Jean said, tipping her glass in a toast to Mary Jo.

  “Why were you shadowing us?” Mary Jo asked.

  “You would not believe me if I told you,” the woman said.

  “Give us a try,” Jean said. “Amazing what we might believe.”

  “I wanted to ask for your help.”

  Mary Jo glanced at Jean, then back at the woman on the bed. Of all the things she might have said, that wasn’t one that Mary Jo had expected.

  “Start at the beginning,” Jean said, sitting forward. “Your name and your order name.”

  “I go by Susan at the moment. My order name is Leila Dark.”

  Jean nodded and stood. “I’ll check with the order to make sure you exist.”

  Jean left and the woman looked at Mary Jo. “She talks with the order?”

  “She does,” Mary Jo said, smiling.

  “I was hoping she would,” Susan said. “Even though I seldom do.”

  Mary Jo said nothing. She sat sipping her screwdriver in silence as the two waited for Jean to return.

  Mary Jo didn’t know what to think of this assassin they had captured. But at the moment Mary Jo wasn’t getting a bad feeling about Susan. And since no one had paid to target either Mary Jo or Jean, there had to be another reason Susan had shown herself as she did.

  Jean came back into the room after just a minute, walked across the room to the bed and sliced the bindings, then returned to sit next to Mary Jo, taking another sip of her drink as she did.

  “She checks out with the order,” Jean said.

  Susan sat up in the bed and put her back against the wall, propping herself up with a pillow but not bothering to ask for her clothes.

  Mary Jo wouldn’t have either in Susan’s position.

  “I assume,” Mary Jo said, “that you let us see you so you would get this meeting. Correct?”

  Susan nodded.

  “Took a chance we wouldn’t kill you,” Jean said.

  “No order assassin kills without cause and you had no cause with me,” Susan said.

  “She has a point,” Mary Jo said. “But you could have just knocked on our door and introduced yourself.”

  “No fun in that,” Susan said, smiling. “But besides, I still wasn’t sure you two were who I was looking for. It is not often you find two assassins living together.”

  Jean shook her head and Mary Jo dec
ided right then that she was going to like this woman.

  “So how did you find us, first off?” Jean asked.

  “I have been looking for you, Mary Jo,” Susan said, “for almost three years.”

  Mary Jo was stunned at that. She started to ask why, but Susan held up her hand so she could finish her story.

  “When I heard about the killings in the northern part of the state, I knew that had the markings of an assassin. So I started looking at the victims and it became clear that your target had been the sheriff. He was the only one who made sense out of all the ones who died, including the writer.”

  Mary Jo was impressed.

  Susan went on. “So I next researched the sheriff’s wife and the other victim’s families first. Learned about both of you, but honestly didn’t suspect either of you at that point.”

  “Good to know,” Jean said.

  Susan nodded. “Then I backtracked who would have hired any assassin to kill the sheriff and found a piece of trash named Stanton Cobble the Third. So I staked him out until I noticed the sheriff’s wife also staking him out. I wasn’t surprised when I discovered it was you, Mary Jo. That hit on the sheriff was so perfectly done.”

  Mary Jo nodded and let Susan continue. But it wasn’t often an assassin got complimented on a job. In fact, for Mary Jo, that was the first time in centuries.

  “And then I was even more surprised,” Susan said, “to find that Jean was also helping. So I figured the idiot Stanton had hired two assassins for the job and then shorted you both. Right?”

  “Got that exactly,” Jean said.

  “I loved what you both did to Stanton,” Susan said. “Elegant. Completely elegant. It was a joy to watch.”

  “Thank you,” Jean said, smiling.

  Mary Jo toasted Susan and nodded her thanks as well. But the story still hadn’t gotten to why this woman had been looking for years for Mary Jo. And what help did she need.

  “So for the last year I stayed out of sight, occasionally tracking your movements. Finally, this last week I decided it was time to show myself. I am running out of time, it seems.”

  “Time for what?” Mary Jo asked.

  “Time to kill my target,” Susan said. “What else?”

  With that, the three of them just sat there in silence.

  And Mary Jo was more confused now than she had been when Susan started her story.

  And that was going some.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  JEAN STARED AT the beautiful assassin sitting on their guest bed. She had just told them a story that seemed clear and logical and very clean of problems. That bothered Jean a little, but not that much.

  What bothered Jean was that the assassin was looking for help to kill a target. That meant the target was almost impossible to kill. A sniper’s bullet could take down a target from a distance and over the centuries, Jean had used that method on targets she couldn’t get close to.

  Jean was sure that Susan had as well.

  “You’ve been looking for me for three years to help you with a target?” Mary Jo said. “Why me, first off?”

  “You are known for being the best of us all,” Susan said flatly.

  Jean nodded and turned to her partner and roommate, who was looking surprised. “You do have that reputation.”

  Jean watched as Mary Jo just shook her head and clearly ignored that line of thinking.

  “Why is this target so difficult?” Mary Jo asked.

  “Because,” Susan said, “he’s supposed to be already dead. He might be for all I know at the moment.”

  Silence filled the room among the three assassins.

  Jean felt even more confused, but before she could ask her next question, Mary Jo did.

  “Already dead, meaning in deep hiding?” Mary Jo asked. “Or doesn’t exist as in a fictional construct?”

  “Yes, yes, and also,” Susan said, clearly pained by what she was about to say, “the target is supposed to return from the dead in one year.”

  “He’s in deep hiding, fictional, and a religious figure?” Jean asked.

  Susan nodded, clearly pained at that response.

  “Real tough to kill if the target is already dead,” Mary Jo said, sipping on her screwdriver.

  “Now you see my problem,” Susan said.

  Jean wasn’t sure what she saw. She needed a lot more information and getting that information was going to take time.

  “Why don’t you get dressed,” Jean said, standing and indicating that she wanted to talk with Mary Jo for a moment. “Then join us in the kitchen.”

  “Thank you for even considering this,” Susan said, nodding. “I’ve pretty much run out of ideas and options.”

  “I can imagine,” Mary Jo said, shaking her head and standing.

  Then Jean led the way out of the guest room and into the kitchen area.

  “Is she nuts, playing us, or in real need of help?” Jean asked softly as they reached their kitchen. She loved the kitchen area of the condo because it had modern appliances and a wonderful eating nook looking out over a roof garden and the neighborhood beyond.

  “Need of help,” Mary Jo said, sitting at the table and taking another sip of her screwdriver. “She seems as sane as either one of us, approached us perfectly, and I can see of no reason she would play us. No gain.”

  “Agree,” Jean said. “So you want to help her?”

  “I want to hear more,” Mary Jo said. “But if we decide to help her, I think she should move in here for a short time with us. Until we take down the target.”

  Jean nodded. “I had thought the same thing.”

  “So you still cooking tonight or you want me to?”

  Jean smiled. “I’d love to cook and I have enough for three without a problem.”

  She liked the idea of cooking for the three of them. That alone made her happy.

  “Perfect,” Mary Jo said, smiling. “Let’s go for lunch down to Steven’s Deli and talk there for a time, then come back here for more talking and dinner. How does that sound?”

  “Planning a target strike is always fun,” Jean said, smiling.

  Mary Jo smiled and made a toasting motion with her glass. “My targets always end up dead. Never had one already dead before.”

  Jean had to drink to that as well. There was no doubt the day had turned interesting.

  No doubt at all.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  MARY JO SAT directly across a small Formica tabletop from Susan and next to Jean at a window table in Steven’s Deli. The deli was small and had only ten tables and a long meat and sandwich counter. A wall of windows along one wall made the place feel like it was almost open to the city street.

  Only two construction workers at a back table were in the place at the moment.

  Mary Jo loved it here, since not only did they make a great salad with radishes and cucumbers and carrots, but the corned beef was some of the best in the city and that was going some for New York.

  Besides that, the place always smelled heavenly of fresh bread and roasting meat combined.

  Just on the other side of the wall of windows the normally busy traffic of New York streamed past. A delivery truck sat half onto the sidewalk near the back of the deli so that it forced people on the sidewalk into single-file along the windows.

  Mary Jo loved how not a person walking by seemed to mind. It was just all part of a day in the city.

  All three of them were eating basically the same lunch. All three had salads and Jean used an Italian dressing while Susan and Mary Jo both used vinegar and oil with a little salt. All three drank from bottles of water.

  It turned out Susan came here often as well and the owner behind the counter had even called her by name when they came in. You had to be a regular in New York before that started happening.

  And that meant that Susan lived somewhere in this neighborhood as well.

  After they got seated, Mary Jo put a small phone-sized device on the table among them and clicked it on. “Th
at blocks anyone listening to or recording this conversation from anywhere around us.”

  Susan nodded and didn’t seem concerned in the slightest.

  “So back to the beginning,” Jean said.

  “You are going to have to confide everything in us,” Mary Jo said. “I know that’s not something we normally do in the order, but if we’re going to help you, we need to know every detail.”

  Susan nodded again. “I had planned on that when I started searching for you for help.”

  Silence except for the two construction workers across the small deli talking about some football game that Mary Jo didn’t care about.

  Susan took another bite of her salad and then started into her story. Mary Jo couldn’t imagine telling anyone about her getting hired for a target and all the preliminary stuff she did, but they needed to know it all from Susan.

  “I was contracted six years ago to target a man by the name of Jack Kelsall.”

  Mary Jo glanced at Jean to see if she recognized the name. Clearly she didn’t.

  “I was offered three million up front and seven million if I completed the task in a public fashion.”

  “Wow,” Jean said. “Way above order normal.”

  Mary Jo nodded. She had never heard of any assassin being offered that kind of money before. She had never come close to that amount, actually.

  “The money doesn’t matter to me anymore,” Susan said. “Just part of the job. But I took the job and told the client it would take a lot of time. They gave me seven years.”

  “Why seven years?” Mary Jo asked. There seemed to be no logical reason for such a time period.

  “Seven years from the time I was hired,” Susan said, “Jack Kelsall will rise from the dead and speak to his followers and lead them into the new world, or some such garbage like that. Mostly he’ll just take a lot more of their money.”

  “A dead guy has followers?” Jean asked a half second before Mary Jo could ask the same question.

  “Millions and millions of them,” Susan said. “More by the day now. All waiting for him to rise from the dead. If he does, it will be sensational beyond words, a long con that took twenty-five years to set up and play out.”