Prayers for the assassin

CHAPTER 22

“Jesus, mister, this is some kind of record.” The Catholic teenager behind the counter had bright red pimples with white centers. “You must really like strawberry malts.”

Darwin stuck a straw in the malt. “Food of the gods.”

“What’s that mean?” The teenager’s face was shiny with grease, the neon lights turning his confusion incandescent. He rested his elbows on the counter, a pumped-up hunk with tiny blue eyes and an idle curiosity. “You got a pregnant wife at home, is that it? We get that sometimes, little mama goes on a milk-shake binge and hubby sprints out the door.”

Darwin took the strawberry malt. “There’s no mama at home, just me and my appetite, but thanks for asking.” He slid a $5 bill to the kid and told him to keep the change. Darwin was a generous tipper, unfailingly polite, and he never littered. A perfect citizen. He walked away from the counter of Dick’s Drive-In whistling a happy tune.

It was almost midnight and not a star in the sky as he strolled down the street to where his car was parked. He had been waiting across from the church parking lot for almost three hours, leaving only to walk to Dick’s. Three hours and four large strawberry malts. He sucked at the straw, siphoning up the sweetness. Dick’s made a great malt, with real ice cream and real fruit. Their burgers and fries were supposed to be good, but Darwin avoided meat and fried foods. He sucked at the straw, imagining himself as a giant wasp with gauzy wings and flat eyes, a giant wasp with a curved black stinger, living on sweetness.

One block over, Aurora Boulevard was still busy, but this residential street was quieter, the houses dark. An old working-class Catholic neighborhood with small, spotty lawns and beat-up cars in the driveways. He slid into the front seat of his own gray sedan, still sucking on his strawberry malt, his palate deliciously numb from the cold.

From the shadows under a magnolia tree, he had a clear view of the church parking lot, Rakkim’s car next to a dozen other vehicles, unmarked cars and patrol units. A cop watering hole with stained-glass windows-a man had to take comfort where he found it. Darwin smacked his lips. Amen. The lot was surrounded by a ten-foot chain-link fence topped with razor wire, a video camera keeping watch. Darwin didn’t care. Rakkim would have to come out eventually, and Dick’s was open twenty-four hours a day. The blond kid behind the counter had no idea what a record really was. He picked a strawberry seed from between his teeth with the nail of his pinkie.

It had been easy to follow Rakkim and the fat cop from the crime scene, the fat cop leading the way in his government-issue ride, Rakkim right behind him on the freeway. Darwin stayed well back, using a tractor-trailer to shield his own nondescript, dark blue sedan from view. He had caught Rakkim checking his rearview a few times, but he was certain he hadn’t been spotted. Just as he’d told the Old One, Rakkim had been knocked off stride by the cheerful little scene back at the house. The old man should mind his own business. Darwin had left the Fedayeen almost fifteen years ago and had taken assignments from the old man almost ever since. You’d think he would have learned to trust Darwin’s judgment. Good thing for him that Darwin didn’t take such slights personally. Another pull of the strawberry malt. Darwin hadn’t been there beside Rakkim when he’d walked into the master bathroom, but he had been close enough. He had seen his face. Guys like Rakkim could shrug off what Darwin had left on the sofa, but it was the subtle touches, the love taps like Marian in the tub with her eyes bulging out of their sockets…That got the tough guys every time.

And Rakkim was a tough guy. About an hour ago Darwin had gotten a call from one of his contacts in government records, a senior-level tech able to cut through various security clearances. Rakkim Epps had been an outstanding Fedayeen recruit, top of his class, quickly given charge of small-unit ops in the Mormon territories. Dangerous duty with hit-and-run raids here, there, and everywhere. Training time, part of the blooding essential to the elite force. Two years later he had been rated exceptional in all categories-with his contacts he should have been shifted into command and control, but instead he had volunteered for long-range reconnaissance, become a shadow warrior. Darwin had raised an eyebrow at the news, asked his contact if he was sure of the information.

Shadow warriors infiltrated enemy territory for months at a time, becoming part of the population, solitary, deep-cover operators who avoided killing. It was the most dangerous designation in Fedayeen, even more dangerous than assassins. Shadow warriors faced not only the risk of being caught behind enemy lines, but a more insidious danger of going native, of internalizing the habits and traits of the enemy, an internalization required to function in-country, but one that eventually made them unable to fit back into the Fedayeen. Too dangerous to cut loose, too dangerous to keep close, they were sent back again and again until they were killed in action. Shadow warriors averaged just over two and a half years from the time of their first mission to their death, but Rakkim had survived for almost six years, done it all, then walked away when his tour was over. Amazing. Darwin was glad he didn’t have to kill the man, not yet anyway, glad that he would get a chance to know him better first.

Darwin swirled the strawberry malt, took another long drink, eyes half-closed. Delicious. Shadow warriors and assassins were the two most extreme Fedayeen specialties, lone wolves set loose on their covert assignments. Shadow warriors were sent into the Bible Belt or the Mormon territories to assess the capability of the enemy, and to help plan future attacks. Assassins were used strictly for overseas missions, taking out business and political leaders, creating turmoil while maintaining an inner peace. Assassins were limited by statute to foreign operations, it was clearly specified in the federal guidelines. Darwin smiled. At least that’s the way it was supposed to work.

He reached into his jacket, took out the Cyclops. It was a receiver-playback unit designed to mimic a cigarette case, its outer shell sterling silver. Russian-made, of course. The screen was the thickness of a human hair, the surveillance cameras that came with the unit sized like a pinhead. He flipped open the Cyclops, speed-forwarding. He had marked his favorite parts. There was Rakkim walking into the Warriq living room, then leaving, then coming back, like the brave little toaster. He slowed the playback, zoomed in on Rakkim’s face, impressed by the way the man managed to put aside his disgust quickly, bending close to the meat, getting right to business. Fedayeen forever.

Darwin had put four cameras in the house: inside front door, inside back, one in the living room, and one in the master bathroom. The cameras gathered and stored the information continuously, then transmitted it in one brief burst on command. Almost undetectable. It was a good system, but it had its limitations. He watched Rakkim and the fat cop each carrying a cardboard box out of the house. The front-door camera had caught them leaving, but he had no idea what was inside the boxes. Other systems could scan through clothing or cardboard, could read if a woman was pregnant, but they were bulkier and had a louder electronic signature. Darwin preferred a quiet approach. He backed up the footage, watched it again. From the way the fat cop was grunting, whatever was in the boxes was heavy. Whatever it was, it was something Marian must have known about, something she had withheld from him. Well, good for her. He meant it too.

The old man was really spooked. All the work Darwin had done for him, this was the first time he’d sensed that the old man was worried. Four years ago, the old man had had Darwin kill an army intelligence officer, a three-star general on the fast track after a stint reorganizing the state archives. It had been a difficult assignment. The general was a martinet who never left the military compound and surrounded himself with his own personal security detail. The old man had been concerned about the general, but nothing like this. Darwin was never told why the old man wanted the general dead, or why he wanted Sarah kept alive. Wanted her found and followed. The old man must expect her to lead him to something, some kind of treasure…but, the old man already was richer than anyone needed to be, so it must not be valuable in the normal sense of the word. Maybe it wasn’t something, but someone that the girl was supposed to lead him to? Darwin didn’t really care; it was only the job that mattered, the challenge. Still, for this girl to make the old man repeat himself-I don’t want her harmed, Darwin. Not her, or Rakkim. Not yet-well, you couldn’t really expect him not to be curious.

Darwin had slid down in his seat before becoming consciously aware of footsteps approaching. Using the car’s side mirror, he watched a young couple amble down the sidewalk, holding hands. They stepped into a pool of light from a garage and he glimpsed the woman, a thick, pale redhead with a smear of lipstick, her boyfriend slump-shouldered. They stopped, kissing now, bodies pressed together. They finally untangled themselves, the girl slogging up the steps to her house, the boy heading back the way he had come. She waved from the porch, but he didn’t see her, hurrying away with his hard-on. Darwin went back to his malt, almost to the bottom now, sucking air as much as sweetness, and he thought of Marian in those last moments, gasping for air, bubbles pouring from her nostrils.

In a fundamentalist neighborhood the young couple would be stoned to death for their debauchery, stoned by their fathers and uncles for disgracing their families. Even moderns avoided intimate physical contact in public. Catholics, though, seemed to revel in such provocation. Holding hands, kissing, displaying their skin for all the world to see. Such egregious behavior was an act of rebellion, a sedition of the flesh, as one of the ayatollahs had said in a famous sermon. Darwin finished the malt, tossed the empty plastic cup into the trash bag he kept in the car. He didn’t care if Catholics fucked in the middle of the Grand Mosque at the height of Ramadan, or if fundamentalists burned homosexuals alive and toasted marshmallows on the embers. It didn’t matter to him, and he was certain that if there was a God, He didn’t give a shit either.

Fundamentalists always talked as if God were easily offended, but Darwin knew better. Any God who could create this raging shithole of a world had no fragile sensibilities. Nothing offended God. Anyone who kept his eyes open would have to conclude that all we knew about God, the only thing we could be absolutely certain of, was that He thought the screams of men were sweeter music than the singing of nightingales. Darwin smiled. He probably was partial to strawberry malts too.

Fedayeen recruits were ostensibly Muslim, either converts or born to it, and Darwin had been no different. Religious instruction was part of training, with prayers said five times a day and dietary laws scrupulously kept. It didn’t help. Devotion might help those who lacked courage on their own, but to a man like Darwin, faith was a distraction, if not a hindrance. When he was accepted into the assassins, he no longer had to pretend. There were no laws, no restrictions, no prayers for assassins. They were free.

Darwin fiddled with the Cyclops, watched Rakkim in the master bathroom again. He liked the part where he lifted Marian out of the tub, cradling her against him. His clothes got wet, her dripping hair splashed his boots, but he carried her with a strange, tender respect, trying not to look at her. Darwin was going to use that very tenderness against him. That tenderness was going to get Rakkim killed.

A touch and the Cyclops downloaded the last hour of surveillance. Darwin zipped through the footage, the screen divided into quarters, one for each camera, filming in infrared now. The Warriq house was quiet and dark, the bodies removed. Too bad. He had hoped that whoever was in the taxi this afternoon might have come back for a look-see once the police had left. Whether or not it was Sarah, there was a connection. Darwin had an instinct for such things. He slipped the Cyclops back into his jacket, smiled. Maybe Sarah was waiting for a suitable period of mourning before returning to the house.

The door to the church basement swung open and Rakkim and the fat cop walked out, the two of them slightly unsteady.

Darwin was ready. He would follow Rakkim and find out where he was living these days. The old man’s people had staked out the Blue Moon, but Rakkim had stayed away. Morons. Darwin had actually found Rakkim’s apartment, but it hadn’t been used in days. Rakkim had cleaned out anything that might have been useful, but Darwin had enjoyed being there, trying on the clothes in the closet, sitting on the bed, giving it a little bounce. Rakkim probably had hiding spots all over the city, rooms and studios and garage apartments rented under fake names. Rakkim was full of tricks, but none of them would help him tonight. Darwin just needed to know where his base was, the safe spot where Rakkim laid his head and dreamed his dreams. Once Darwin knew that, the rest would take care of itself.

Darwin saw Rakkim open his car door, take out one of the cardboard boxes, and load it into the fat cop’s vehicle. He did the same thing with the second box, the fat cop not offering to help. Was there evidence in the boxes? Unlikely. If it were evidence, it would have been put into the fat detective’s car from the start. Interesting. Rakkim’s car was stolen, of course. Darwin had run the plate. So why were the fat cop and Rakkim standing around? What were they waiting for?

The door to the church opened again, and three cops staggered out, whooping it up, throwing pretend punches at each other. Rakkim called them over. The fat cop got into the act too, his voice so loud that Darwin could almost make out the words. The three cops separated, got into their patrol cars while the fat cop walked over and unlocked the security gate. The three cops drove slowly out of the parking lot, waited, engines idling, sweeping the street with their spotlights.

Oh, you are a clever boy. Darwin eased below the dashboard; the spotlight slid across the windshield. He could hear a car roll slowly past, then another, but he stayed put. The spotlight returned, a regular pattern. He heard cars accelerate, peeked up, and saw red taillights in the distance. The patrol cars were strung in a line behind the fat cop’s car, peeling off at each corner, trolling for anyone who might be following, making sure he made it to the freeway without company.

Darwin started his car, but didn’t bother trying to give chase. He had to hand it to him-Rakkim always acted as if he were being followed. A tough guy who knew how easily even the toughest could be brought down. The power of humility, a real shadow warrior move. Darwin had only known two or three of the breed; they were all easygoing until circumstances changed, then watch out. Like assassins. Drop them anywhere in the world and within ten minutes they would fit right in, become part of the human landscape. It took an effort to be invisible, though, and the slightest slip could be fatal. Eventually even the best shadow warriors were found out and killed. Except for Rakkim. The survivor.

For some reason, he thought of the young cop at the crime scene this afternoon, bright and shiny as a new penny, eager to find an apartment and move out on his own. Ah, to be young again. Darwin pulled away from the curb. He felt like another strawberry malt.