The Iscariot Agenda

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Stanley Hardwick was just as amazed as his brother, and filled with the same inbred disdain for any measure of cowardice, as he stared at Kimball from across the counter, his hardcore features twisted into a leer and his arms folded defensively across his chest. “I should kick your ass.”

“You could try, but you wouldn’t get too far.”

“My brother tells me you’re a priest of some kind.”

“An emissary,” he corrected. “Or is that a ten-dollar word to you as well?”

“I know what it means.”

Stanley looked at the collar and gave off a chortle that sounded more like a single, snide bark of condescending amusement. “Here we are mourning your loss while you were sipping cognac in Italy.” He shook his head. “You cowardly son of a bitch.”

Jeff Hardwick pulled up next to his brother. They looked so much alike, thought Kimball. Not exactly twins, but close to it — same features and physiques with bully-like mindsets that were perhaps more of a learned trait rather than a genetic one.

“All right,” said Jeff, “you’re here, so now what?”

Stanley remained fixed with a hard stare as he remained unmoving behind the counter.

Sliding out the first photo, Kimball pointed out that Walker, the first of the Pieces of Eight to be targeted and killed by an unknown assassin, then continued with Arruti and Grenier in the posed sequence of the photo starting from the top row from left to right, then the bottom row, once again in the sequential order from left to right.

Stanley Hardwick seemed less hardened and more sober to the situation.

“We run an operation,” he told Kimball, “of selling hard-to-find wares.”

“You mean illegal weapons.”

Stanley held his hands out as a gesture to emphasize the store in general. “You think we actually opened this place up to sell this crap? Of course not. Our profit comes from selling arms. We were Arruti’s and Grenier’s top suppliers.”

Jeff Hardwick picked up the photos of Walker, Arruti and Grenier and held them in his hand like the splayed cards of a poker hand. “Now we know why they haven’t contacted us,” he said.

“How did you get these?” asked Stanley.

“Through contacts.”

“I know that. Are you doing this through the Church?”

Kimball remained silent as Jeff put down the photos and picked up the glossy of Victor Hawk, AKA ‘The Ghost,’ lying face down in red clay. The letter ‘R’ was carved into his back. “There ain’t anybody good enough on this planet to take out The Ghost,” he said.

“Apparently there is,” Kimball returned. “He could have killed me too, but he didn’t.”

“That would have been no big loss,” commented Stanley.

Kimball could almost feel the venom flowing from Stan Hardwick’s lips.

“The Ghost was old, brother — lost his edge. That’s what happens when you don’t train consistently. You lose your edge.”

“Really?” Jeff held up the photos of Arruti and Grenier. “Then what about these two?” he stated rhetorically. “We know they didn’t lose their edge. They were still at the top of their game and we both know that.”

Stan Hardwick refused to look at the photos. Instead, he kept his steely eyes on Kimball.

“This man, this assassin,” began Kimball, “is targeting us for whatever reason. He killed five skilled soldiers in such simple fashion it’s hard to believe that it’s just one man doing so.”

“And you’re sure it’s just one man?”

“There was only one set of prints at Hawk’s ranch.”

“That only means to me that it took one guy to take out Hawk.” Then: “Look, Hawk was nothing special. Not anymore. He let himself get fat and his skills suffered for it… He became nothing more than an old man living off the memories of a time long faded. A boy scout could have taken him out.”

Kimball could hardly dispute the claim, since one set of footprints could have meant that the assassin performed the mission solo. But assassin teams usually worked in unison with team concept essential to the movement of completing the task successfully. Man power was always critical in order to keep a solitary out of the crosshairs. If this assassin had backup, he found no evidence.

“Oh, no,” he said. “I’m sure it’s just one man. You know the rule: No one works rogue unless you are rogue.”

“Then that begs a couple of questions, doesn’t it?”

“Obviously.”

“Like, who is this guy? And why is he doing this to begin with?”

All three men stood stone faced.

No one had an answer to either question.