Page 37 of Assassin Anonymous

What a tangled web of bullshit we weave.

And I’m the one who has to untangle it.

Sakai, along with a group of his men, plus about a dozen neo-Nazis, should have been here by now, but there wasn’t snow in the forecast this morning.

My phone buzzes with a message from Ravi.

Ravi: Sitrep?

Me: Our friends are running late.

Ravi: Probably the weather.

Me: Thought so. Hey, where should I eat after this?

Ravi: La Degustation. Michelin-starred. Classic Czech cooking. Unbelievable.

Me: Thanks, bud. Hey, do you get your meals expensed?

Ravi: No, but I’m not married and don’t have kids. What else am I going to spend it on?

Ravi: Your flight leaves tomorrow but I can push it back a day.

Me: Think it’s safe?

Ravi: You worried?

Me: Nah. I’ll try to book a table. You want to join?

Ravi: I went yesterday but I’d happily go again.

I click through to the restaurant’s website. Nothing open for dinner tomorrow, but there’s a table free at one thirty p.m. I book it under the name George Joubert and pass that information along to Ravi.

That’ll be fun. Ravi will tell me what a good job I did here and then he’ll pick up the tab. That’s never a bad way to end an assignment.

Then I wait.

A lot of this job is waiting.

The snow continues to fall. I pull out the tablet again, quadruple-checking the status of the kill switches that’ll put out the lights, the triggers on the flash-bangs, and the relay on the gas canisters that’ll pump the space with BZ. I can barely contain my excitement about that.

Also known as 3-quinuclidinyl benzilate, it’s a gas that induces cognitive dysfunction, delirium, and hallucinations. It’s usually a little tough to track down, but we’re in Eastern Europe, where it’s a buyer’s market for shit like this. I’ve been wanting to try it forever. Intel suggests there could be up to twenty men, and I’m not too worried, but my job gets a lot easier if they’re all tripping and disoriented.

Satisfied that everything is set up and ready, I check the cameras again—still no sign of the rest of these idiots—and go back to blowing in my hands. The air is still, that quiet so loud you can hear the snow hitting the ground. All that quiet, almost turning into its own layer of sound, so I nearly miss it: the soft crunch of snow underfoot.

It came from my left. I pull my trusty SIG Sauer P365 from my hip and swing around the side of the stairwell enclosure I’ve been tucked behind, where I find a dark figure crouched and waiting. I notice him a moment before I notice the long silver katana he has pressed to the side of my neck.

“Anatahadare?” the man says.

Who are you?

He’s dressed head to toe in black, a balaclava wrapped around his head. He’s older, fit, left-handed, obviously Japanese. I don’t think he’s part of this crew. First, because he’s sneaking around on the roof. The guys downstairs are sloppy—I did a pretty good job hiding all my gear, but they didn’t sweep the space like they should have.

But also, I recognize the look in his eyes.

It’s the same look I see in the mirror.

He’s a professional.