Raymond Benson - 2012 - Hitman: Damnation (32 page)

 
          
“Honey,
this is a campaign stop. Don’t you get it? All those guys have deep pockets.
They’re here to give Charlie a lot of money.”

 
          
She
shook her head. “I guess I don’t understand politics. Why are they giving him
money?”

 
          
“Let’s
hope he gets what he wants,” George replied. “Charlie’s in a terrible mood.”

 
          
“I’ll
say. I don’t think he’s ever snapped at me like he did this morning. Where
could the Colonel be? How could he just disappear like that?”

 
          
Agent
47 smiled inwardly. Unbeknownst to everyone, the good colonel was still stuffed
in the closet upstairs in the spa.

 
          
“Come
on, I’ll join you at the pool,” George said. “Lord knows I have nothing else to
do.”

 
          
The
pair left the meeting room. Agent 47 started to wheel his cart out of the
Ahera
when one of the hotel employees stepped up to him.
She was a heavy woman in her forties with fierce brown eyes and a permanent
frown.

 
          
“What
are you doing? Are you going to help us or not?” the woman said.

 
          
The
hitman
shook his head. “I have the wrong room. I’m
supposed to take
these
somewhere else.”

 
          
“Where?
You know all catering goes through me.” She looked
him up and down. “Where’s your name tag? Do I know you?”

 
          
“My
name is John Duncan.”

 
          
“Are
you new, Mr. Duncan?”

 
          
“Yes, ma’am.
Yesterday was my first day.”

 
          
The
woman put hands on her hips. “No, it wasn’t. We didn’t start any staff
yesterday, and I should know. You’d better come with me.”

 
          
Now
what?

 
          
Agent
47 had to accept the fact that he’d been caught. She was going to march him out
into the corridor, where the security detail stood at attention. The woman
headed for the door and looked back at him. “Well? Are you coming, Mr. Duncan?
If that is your real name?”

 
          
He
had no choice. The assassin grabbed a china plate and held it behind his back
as he followed her. She led him out into the corridor and then called to the
two beefy men outside the boardroom. Three of the Cypriot hired guns stood
nearby.

 
          
“Gentlemen,
I think you need to speak to this man,” she announced. But as she turned to
indicate “John Duncan,” the waiter smashed the plate on top of the woman’s
head. He knew it wouldn’t kill her, but it did the job of knocking her out. Her
body crumbled into a pile of arms and legs.

 
          
“Holy
shit!” one of the guards managed to cough as he drew a handgun from inside his
jacket. He was the fastest of the five men. By the time the other four
registered what they had just witnessed, 47 had removed the three steak knives
from his pocket. Like a circus performer throwing blades at an associate
strapped to a spinning wheel, the
hitman
snapped the
utensils at the first, second, and third man.

 
          
Thwack!
Thwack! Thwack!

 
          
Each
knife neatly penetrated the soft bull’s-eye between each man’s Adam’s apple and
the top of his sternum. The guard who had successfully drawn a gun dropped it
and fell against the wall. The other two spun around in a macabre and slightly
humorous dance before
they
, too, collapsed.

 
          
Three
down, two to go.

 
          
Best to change tactics.
It kept opponents guessing.

 
          
Agent
47 pulled the three forks from his pocket, positioned two in his right hand and
one in his left, prongs out, and charged the two men. Being inexperienced
work-for-hire employees of the Cyprus A-1 Security Company, neither had thought
quickly enough to draw a gun or even put up defensive fists.

 
          
The
hitman
simultaneously buried two forks in the soft
tissue on the underside of the first man’s lower jaw and the other fork in the
second man’s Adam’s apple. Knowing that the latter fellow would most likely
scream in pain, 47 immediately bent his arm and elbowed the man hard in the
stomach, knocking the breath out of him. The guard leaned forward, providing 47
with the opportunity to clasp his fists together and clobber the guy on the
back of the head. He was dead before he hit the floor.

 
          
The
man with the forks in his jaw struggled to pull them out, but 47 had submerged
the utensils so deeply that the task was impossible. He fell to his knees and
looked at 47 in shock and horror. The
hitman
held the
man’s head steady with his left hand and grabbed the forks’ handles with his
right.

 
          
Another
shove did the trick.

 
          
Only
then did the world’s greatest assassin take a look behind him to confirm that
no one had seen the act. It had been messy but silent. He would have liked to
see Charlie Wilkins’s face when the meeting was over and his cabal of criminal
financiers stepped out of the boardroom to find a slaughterhouse in the
corridor.

 
          
Agent
47 moved quickly down the hall, pulling off the white apron that was now soiled
with blood. He wiped his hands, tossed the garment in a garbage can next to the
elevators, and calmly stepped into a car going up. Three guests were inside.
They paid him no mind.

 
          
In
his room, he dressed in his black suit and red tie and gathered his belongings.
The
hitman
reflected on what was really going on in
Cyprus. Charlie Wilkins was soliciting campaign money from foreign
contributors, obviously men of dubious morality. 47
was
certain that these were men who had an interest in the future of the United
States government. They all had a stake in what happened economically and
politically. They wanted to see the revolution succeed.

 
          
Agent
47 didn’t care. America’s destiny didn’t concern him.

 
          
As
he took the elevator to the lobby, checked out, and rode a taxi to
Larnaca
Airport, he realized he hadn’t experienced any
painkiller side effects since he awoke that morning.

 
          
Perhaps
he was superhuman after all.

 
         
TWENTY-NINE

 
          
Charlie
Wilkins’s entourage flew home the next day, despite the investigation going on
in Nicosia regarding the murder of five security men and assaulting a female
hotel employee outside the reverend’s meeting. Police had interrogated Wilkins
and the other participants for hours. No one had seen anything. Nobody heard a
sound. There were no surveillance cameras in that hallway, so law-enforcement
officials were mystified. But given Wilkins’s high-profile status, they were
convinced he was somehow involved, if only in an indirect way.

 
          
Several
of Wilkins’s VIP associates left the hotel as soon as the bloodbath was
discovered. Many of them had questionable legal standings, so the last thing
they wanted was to be caught up in a multiple-murder investigation. Boris
Komarovsky
, however, was detained by authorities regarding
Bruce Ashton’s disappearance; Katharina the masseuse had broken her vow of
silence after the Americans had left and admitted to authorities that she was
called away from Ashton’s appointment by a mysterious concierge. When
Komarovsky’s
criminal background came to light, he was
arrested on charges of international racketeering. Again, this didn’t reflect
well on Wilkins.

 
          
Before
leaving Cyprus, the reverend held a press conference at the
Larnaca
Airport, denying any responsibility for the killings. He was quick to blame his
“political enemies” in Washington, saying that they feared his rise in
popularity. “They’re running scared and are resorting to drastic measures,” he
declared. “First they kill Dana Linder, and now they try to besmirch my good
name by involving me in these heinous crimes.” The tactic worked. The reverend
was so well loved in America that his supporters had no doubt that he was
innocent of any wrongdoing. As for Boris
Komarovsky
,
Wilkins denied knowledge of the man’s ties with the Russian Mafia. It was
Komarovsky’s
bank that Wilkins was dealing with, not the
man personally.

 
          
It
was only after the Americans had arrived back in Virginia that the Colonel’s
body was finally uncovered in the spa closet, where curiously no one had
looked. Interpol went ballistic. The media was ecstatic and the incidents made
international news. Cypriot politicians decried the fact that Wilkins and his
people had been allowed to leave the republic before questions had been
answered. Still, the entire affair was a mess. Wilkins’s political opponents
milked the incident for everything it was worth. The reverend was accused of
improper fund-raising and associating with criminals.

 
          
At
first Helen was disillusioned. She hadn’t understood why they went to Cyprus in
the first place, and the Colonel’s disappearance and the subsequent murders had
disturbed her deeply. She thanked God that she had followed Charlie’s orders
and gone to the hotel’s pool that morning. She hadn’t seen the abattoir outside
the boardroom, but the description in the newspapers horrified her.

 
          
Wilkins
made a speech to his staff aboard the Learjet. He assured them that they were
moving forward and the events in Cyprus would not halt his march to the White
House. He said he had confidence in the Cypriot police and Interpol. In fact,
he had hired his own private investigator in Cyprus, a man named
Karopoulos
. He would find Ashton, get to the bottom of the
murders, and exonerate Wilkins of any involvement.

 
          
Helen
had no choice but to believe it. Charlie Wilkins was still her mentor and
reverend. He was the Church of Will, and it was the Church that had helped her
in her time of need. By the time they landed at Greenhill, Helen had regained
her complete faith in the man.

 
          
What
was more disturbing was that Stan Johnson was nowhere to be found and hadn’t
been seen in days.

 
          
When
Helen arrived at work on the morning after the return home, the reverend
appeared haggard and stressed. Apparently he hadn’t slept. The loss of his
friend the Colonel—not to mention the murders in the hallway—had upset him
greatly. The entire staff had been put on damage control since the homecoming
the day before. Helen herself had only three hours of sleep. The jet lag adversely
affected her, she was worried about Charlie, and she was concerned about Stan.

 
          
Where
was he? Why hadn’t he left word for her?

 
          
She
had called his
cellphone
the night before and got his
voice mail.

 
          
“This
is Stan. Leave a message.”

 
          
Helen
told him she was back and wanted to see him. She asked that he please call her
as soon as he could. She almost ended with, “I love you,” but caught herself in
time. No need to press her luck.

 
          
She
had little energy to go through the pile of paperwork Charlie had left on her
desk, but she perked up when her phone rang mid-morning. Helen’s heart leapt
with joy when she recognized the caller ID. She answered it with a breathless
“Stan?”

 
          
“Hi, Helen.
Are you all right?”

 
          
“Stan,
where are you?”

 
          
“I
had to go back to Iowa to take care of some legal matters regarding the farm. I
figured I’d do it while you were gone. It took a day longer than I expected. I
wanted to be back before you but was delayed. I’m sorry.”