Page 5

5

STEFI

A ccording to Marcus, Zaworski is dining with a business associate in a fondue restaurant on the outskirts of Zurich on Thursday.

The morning of the meeting, I fly into Zurich and take a train to Sihlwald. I leave my rental car in the parking lot of the train station, two kilometers away, and hike to my destination. Partly so that no one can get a photo of my license plate but also to steady my nerves.

Zaworski has been one of my most difficult targets. I’ve been trying to get at him for years, but I’ve never found an opening. The former bounty hunter is retired now. He lives in a tiny village an hour north of Krakow and rarely leaves. Even if my Polish were fluent enough to pass me off as a native—which it isn’t—the small, insular village is the kind of place where a stranger will instantly be noticed.

Which makes this rendezvous at the fondue restaurant a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to cross him off my list.

As much as I’ve been trained to be detached on a job, restless anticipation buzzes through me. I don’t know most of the people I’ve taken out over the years, but I do know Varek, and this hit is personal.

So personal that my heart is racing, and my palms are damp with sweat.

The trail is quiet. It’s a Thursday evening in October, and I don’t encounter too many people on my walk, just a couple of old men with binoculars around their necks who nod at me in greeting but don’t stop to engage in conversation.

The forest is lush and green, with tall pine trees towering on either side of the trail. Peaceful. There’s been an acute shortage of peace in my life, and I soak in the atmosphere as I hike toward my destination. It rained a few hours ago, and the smell of petrichor fills my nostrils.

Petrichor.

The moment that word flashes through my mind, memories of Joao follow. My husband was delighted by odd words. Petrichor—the earthy scent after a rainfall—was one of his favorites. Defenestrate was another.

Every time I think of Joao, a stab of pain goes through my heart. Today is no exception. For a moment, it hurts to breathe, and I stop walking and slump against a tree, waiting for it to pass.

He’s been dead for seven years, but the pain of his loss has never faded. Every Internet article I read promises me that time is supposed to soften the grief, but they all lie. The wound is as raw as ever.

I breathe, long and deep, and count backward from ten in my head. You can mourn him for the duration, I promise myself. But when you get to one, you need to walk again.

I count down slowly, feeling the warmth of his body against mine and hearing the sound of his laughter in my ears. I hold him in my heart for as long as possible, and then I let him go and start to move again.

The trail comes to an end twenty minutes later, and my footsteps slow as I near my destination. I’ve wanted to kill Zaworski for a very long time, and the moment is finally within reach.

I take a deep breath, cross the street, and make my way to the fondue restaurant. The sign in the pothole-filled parking lot proclaims in three languages that Frau Augsburger is the home of the best fondue in all of Switzerland. Somehow, I doubt that’s true. There is an air of neglect about the place. The windows are dusty, the paint is peeling, and it very much looks like its glory days are in the past.

Four cars are parked in the lot, but none of them are the black Audi that Zaworski drives. There are no lights in the windows either.

Something’s not right here.

I approach the front door, my senses on high alert.

According to Google, the restaurant is open today. It’s ten after five, and the dinner rush should just be beginning. It’s maybe a little early to eat by Swiss standards, but Sihlwald is a tourist destination, and this restaurant, serving fondue and rosti in the foothills of one of Zurich’s mountains, is a tourist trap. Even on a random Thursday in October, there should be some signs of life. Music, the noise of conversation, the banging of pots and pans in the kitchen.

But there isn’t.

It’s as quiet as a tomb.

This is a bad idea, my intuition whispers.

This is the best chance of getting Zaworski, my heart counters. Nobody knows who you are. You’re dressed like a tourist—jeans, long-sleeved black T-shirt, hiking boots—and you have Google Maps on your phone screen. Nobody will suspect you of anything. This is as easy as it gets.

My heart wins the argument. The doorknob turns in my hand as I push open the door.

And freeze.

The smell hits me immediately, a sharp, coppery tang that I am all too familiar with. My eyes take a few seconds to adjust to the dimness, and then I see blood everywhere. Blood splattered on the walls. Blood dripping down photos of celebrities posing with the proprietors, blood staining the mirror behind the bar.

What the fuck happened here?

Then there are the bodies. Slumped over tables and draped over the bar, pools of blood spreading from under them. I count instinctively. There are six dead and dying people, all dressed in black.

It’s such a shockingly unexpected sight that, for a split second, I have no idea how to respond.

Then, before I can make myself run, I hear the click of a gun being cocked.

A tall man glides out of the shadows, the barrel of his weapon pointed straight at my head. His shoulders are broad, and his waist is narrow. He takes another step forward, and light from the setting sun falls on his face.

I suck in a breath.

High cheekbones, full, sensual lips, and vividly blue eyes. I’m staring at a face that was once as familiar to me as my own.

“Hello, Stefi,” my dead husband says. “Fancy meeting you here.”

Am I hallucinating?

The room swims around me. It can’t be Joao—I’m seeing a ghost. Joao died seven and a half years ago. He drowned just off the coast of Marseilles, and when I found out, I lost my mind. I’d already been teetering on the edge of madness, and his death pushed me over, the triggering event that led to me being locked up in a psych ward for five months.

But here he is, standing right in front of me, menace radiating from him in icy waves.

My brain tries desperately to make sense of what I’m seeing and fails.

“How can you be here?” I ask in a shocked whisper, my heart hammering in my chest. “You died.”

His lips tilt into a smile that does not meet his eyes. The gun barrel never wavers. “Surprise, little fox,” he says. “I’m still alive. And so are you. Turns out you didn’t die in that house fire in Mexico after all.” An edge creeps into his voice. “You faked your own death, even though you knew it would wreck me.”

I swallow hard. I knew that Joao would hate me for what I did, but I didn’t realize how hard it would be to see him staring at me with loathing in his eyes. He’s never looked at me this way.

The Joao I knew was in love with me.

This man looks like he wants me dead.

“I’m sorry,” I force out through numb lips. “I had to. . .”

He doesn’t let me finish. His jaw tightens, and his knuckles whiten around the gun. There’s a flicker of emotion in his eyes, but it’s gone almost instantly, replaced by a mask of ice. “Nicely done, Stefi,” he sneers. “Just the right amount of emotion, the right amount of regret in your voice. But I’m not buying your act.”

“What act?” My brain is struggling to comprehend Joao’s presence here, but one thing is clear: this version of Joao isn’t the boy I married. My Joao—the love of my life—would never, ever point a gun at me. Not in a million years. My Joao would die before he hurt me.

“Let me guess why you ran,” he says mockingly. “You didn’t want to be an assassin any longer; you never wanted to be one in the first place. And the only way to escape Henrik was to fake your own death.”

I wish it had been that simple, but the truth is far, far more painful than that. “Yes.” Tears fill my eyes. “We both know?—”

“Oh, come on. Drop it. I’ve seen your record, Stef; I know the truth. I know you’ve been killing people for the last eight years, ever since you left. Even worse, you’re a mercenary, someone who murders people for the right price.” His face twists in disgust. “Take off your clothes.”

I can’t have heard him right. “What?”

A muscle ticks in his jaw. “You heard me,” he snaps. “I know how you operate, remember? There’s the gun tucked in the small of your back, but that’s not your only weapon. You came prepared to take out Zaworski. What else do you have?” His eyes run over my body. “Throwing knives strapped to your ankles, lengths of wire to garrote your hapless victims, and probably some kind of explosive to cover your getaway.”

His finger moves to the trigger. “I’d be a fool not to search you, Stef. And my days of being a fool for you are long over.” He gestures with the gun. “You heard me the first time. Strip.”