Sister's Revenge: Action Adventure Assassin Pulp Thriller Book #1 (Michelle Angelique Avenging Angel Assassin) (4 page)

And so it went. G-Baby bought her some fresh clothes, then drove her out of L.A. County and down to his Vietnamese friends in Orange County. The briefcase held five hundred seventy-three thousand dollars, some of which G-Baby used to spirit Michelle out of the country and pay for what was to come in the next three years. The rest was placed in a safety deposit box in a bank in Westminster, or as some called it, Little Saigon.

Michelle boarded a flight to Hanoi, Vietnam, and a week, four buses, and a train trip later, she showed up in Bangkok, Thailand, where she disappeared off the grid for three years.

* * *

N
ow, after what felt like a lifetime, the three friends sat in her cottage in Playa Del Oro, twenty minutes and a world of difference from where her old life had ended so outrageously.

There was more—a lot more—and Michelle knew the next part would be the hardest, but there was no way around it.

M
ICHELLE SAT HER
A&W Root Beer on a coaster, hugged her knees, and told them the rest of her story. A lot had happened in three years.

“So now you know why I disappeared like that”—Michelle snapped her fingers—“and as my rowdogs, you deserved to know what happened. What you don’t know is where I’ve been, and what I’ve done since that day. All of that’s important, but not as important as what I plan to do about it.”

“I’m pretty sure I can guess what you’re planning,” Nikky said. “But instead of guessing, I’ll ask. What is it?”

“Revenge—pure and simple.”

“That’s pretty much what I thought. Is that what you need our help with?”

“Yes.”

“How do you plan on doing that?” Deja asked.

“For that, I’ll need to explain what I’ve been doing for the past three years. What I’m about to tell you now takes your danger to the next level. You sure you want to go there?”

“Yes, I’m in,” Deja said.

“Me, too,” Nikky said.

“In that case, I have another confession, something I lied about when I was gone, something I can tell you about now.”

“Wait.” Nikky held up a hand. “Don’t even think you can slip that past us. What do you mean? If there are things you can tell us, does that mean there are other things you can’t tell us? What sort of things
can’t
you tell us about?”

“Good point.” Michelle smiled. “I can’t talk about a lot of things, but not because I don’t want to or because I don’t trust you. Some things will put you in additional lines of fire, which will make sense in a few minutes. I’ve already lost too much. There’s no way I’ll lose you, too, for being stupid about what I reveal. By the time we leave today, you’ll know enough to land me in prison for the rest of my life in a couple of countries. You’ll also know enough to make a final decision on how we’re going to play my coming back into your lives.”

“Yeah, I guess some of the people you’ve been dealing with might not be happy about having outsiders know too much.”

“Glad you understand.”

“So, what’s the lie?”

“Remember those emails saying I was working in Germany, England, and Spain?”

“Yeah. They didn’t say much,” Nikky said.

“I didn’t live in any of those places.”

“Girl, you better not be telling me you’ve been here all this time!” Deja said.

“No, I was gone, all right. But not where I told you. I lived in Thailand first.”

“Where’s that?” Nikky asked.

“Down by Argentina and Mexico, right?” Deja said.

“No, Thailand’s in Asia, near China, on the other side of the world.”

“No shit, you were living with the Chinese all this time?”

“Not the Chinese, the Thai people. They have their own country and their own language. The Thai and the Chinese can’t even talk to each other, kind of like Mexicans and Americans. They have different cultures, different languages.”

“I can talk Mexican,” Deja said. “Taco, burrito, enchilada, chili relleno, and lots more like, umm, tequila and Kahlúa.”

Nikky bumped fists with Deja. “Shit, girl, you’re damned near bilingual.”

Deja grinned. “Call me bilingual, even bicultural because I eat their food, as long as you don’t call me bisexual, because I don’t . . . well, I just don’t.”

“So, anyway,” Michelle said, “they all speak English to talk to each other, and they do a
bad
job of it. It’s funny as all get-out to hear them screwing it up. Most of the time I couldn’t understand what they said. I was the only one from the hood, and they couldn’t understand me at all. I had to learn to speak real correct, like some White college girl.”

“Why the fuck would you want to do that?” Deja asked.

“You just proved my point. After a while, I realized talking that way helps me act more like I’ve got a silver spoon up my ass. You know, real formal, quiet and ladylike. That’s why I call it ‘silver-speak.’”

“Again, why the fuck would you want to do that?”

“Sometimes, to keep a low profile, I need to be very forgettable. I use it when I need to blend in. I can’t hide that I’m from America, but I can sound like I’m from some Mayberry town. I’m not ashamed of where I come from. Fuck that. I’m proud I’m a Black woman from the hood.”

“Good,” Deja said. “You were starting to scare me with all that talk like you were too good for where you came from.”

“Not a chance. Even if I want to, it wouldn’t work. One thing this whole experience has shown me is: we are who we are. Things happen and we respond, but we respond as who we are. That’s something you can take to the bank.”

“I’m soooo relieved!” Deja said. “I thought you were going to tell me I had to stop being the beautiful hottie I am.”

Michelle rolled her eyes at Nikky. “Like I said. Some things never change.”

“Okay, what were you doing in this Thailand place?” Nikky asked.

“When Uncle G picked me up that day, we didn’t know what I would do. There was one thing I was sure about, and still am: I knew I had to kill every one of the muthafuckas that murdered Michael and Gabe Jr. Plus, it wasn’t safe for me to be in the hood right after the shooting. Whoever set up that shit wasn’t straight. They’re a bunch of double-crossing muthafuckas. I had to be careful; still do. Besides, what did I know about killing?”

“You grew up in the hood,” Deja said. “You should know a little something about killing. We’ve all seen enough of it.”

“Like you? You grew up here, right next to me, and what do you know about killing? Nothing, that’s what. Look, girl, we all know a lot about shit-talking drama and too much about dying. Outside of the bangers, most of us don’t know the first thing about killing. Take you, for example. You’ve never killed anything bigger than a roach.”

Deja gave a sad smile. “I guess big talk gets to be such a habit, it’s easy to forget what’s real and what’s not.”

“I was worse than you. I couldn’t even step on a roach. I wanted to do something, but this wasn’t about just talking trash. It was real. I wanted to get even, but I also knew what I didn’t know, and I didn’t know shit about killing. So Uncle G took me down to his friends in Orange County who have the hookup in places like Vietnam and Thailand, and they sent me to assassin school.”

“Girl, you’re shitting us, right?” Deja asked.

Michelle smirked. “Yeah, I’m pulling your chain a little. Of course, it’s not like you walk up and apply to United Assassin University of Asia. It started out with one old guy in Thailand teaching me some basic martial arts, moves that most anyone can do. I worked my butt off and kept my focus. Every day I told him I wanted more. After about six months he got the message, or maybe he just thought I was ready. He took me to another old guy who taught me about different kinds of knives and bladed weapons, and how to kill, up close and personal. Also, to be quiet doing it.”

“You mean like those ninja, throwing things in the movies?”

“It was mostly how to kill silently with a knife, and how to stay alive when the other guy had a knife. I worked with those two old guys for almost a year. Then they hooked me up with another guy who taught me how to use guns up close. From there, I went to a place up north in Thailand to learn how to use a long-range rifle for sniper training. The whole time, I still worked on physical training, kickboxing, and hand-to-hand shit. I also worked with an amazing cat burglar who taught me how to get in or get out of any kind of building. I got pretty good at it, but I’ll never be a master like her.”

Eyes wide, head tilted, Deja asked, “You’re serious?” She clutched her glass of Pepsi and ice, condensation dripping onto her lap. “You know how to kill someone, with a knife? This isn’t like getting pissed and just grabbing some kitchen knife, but doing it on purpose, right?”

“Knife training came first, because it’s emotionally the hardest. It’s damned hard to kill someone up close and personal with a knife. Shooting a target is easy; stabbing a dummy is surprisingly hard. It makes you think about what you really want. So yeah, I’m telling you I learned how to kill someone close enough to touch.”

“If it’s the hardest, why do they make you do it first?” Nikky asked.

“I don’t know. It’s not like you can’t still shoot people. And maybe those guys just did it that way. They may do it differently with the government, or in other parts of the world, but that’s how I was trained.”

“Maybe they just wanted to be sure you were the real deal,” Nikky said. “You know, weed out the wannabes.”

“Well it must have worked, because someone figured I needed to learn more, so they sent me to Vietnam. I lived in a jungle, doing hardcore training for seven months. The whole time, it was only me and two men. They didn’t speak any English, and I didn’t speak any Vietnamese. Pretty quick, we figured out the basics. I needed to know when to follow them, they needed to know I’d slit their throats if they tried any funny business. You know, the important stuff.

“But that training was some hard-ass shit. The one guy, not even tall as Nikky, kicked my butt almost every day. The little shit would run up a steep mountainside, and I had to follow. He’d sit in the shade, waiting for me to drag up to where he’d be relaxing, then he’d make me fight him for a drink of water.”

“Some prick kept me from having a drink when I’m thirsty, I’d be kicking his butt,” Deja said.

“The first time, I thought, ‘What the hell, it ain’t no thang,’ and let it go. I figured it was some kind of training on how to deal with thirst. I was wrong. A couple of minutes later when I tried to get something to drink, that bastard wouldn’t let me. Finally, I got pissed and tried to shove him outta the way. The little shit didn’t move. With no warning—nothing at all—he slapped me like I was some kind of bitch or something. Pissed me off! And the fight was on! Soon as he’d kicked my butt real good, he smiled and gave me a bottle of water. Shit like that happened all the time. After a while, I’d walk up and start swinging on the little cocksucker.

“Before then, I was still a little afraid to get hit. In the ring where I was learning how to kickbox, we always wore headgear and guards. Up in those mountains, all I had on was some light clothes and sports shoes. That little bastard didn’t care about me being a woman, either; he hit me in the tit, or kneed me in my pussy so he could beat me. After that, I learned being hit can hurt real bad but still not stop you. Unless you’ve been shot bad or had bones broke, the pain doesn’t have to stop you. You stop because your mind says so and you agree. But you don’t have to agree.”

“So you spent three years running up and down mountains, getting the shit kicked out of you, and then you came back here?” Deja asked.

“No. I spent the first two years going from one training system to another. The third year, I mostly stayed in Bangkok. Bangkok is a big city in Thailand, and it’s kind of like L.A. I still trained every day, and learned about electronics in security and computer systems. Some of it was done in back rooms, some of it in legitimate schools with college students.”

“How did that work?” Nikky said. “Can you speak their language?”

“A little; enough to get by. It wasn’t a problem, though; all of the advanced texts are in English, and the students have to learn English to get into college. While I was studying that stuff, little by little, I started getting jobs. Some paid crap or were stupid dangerous, but all of them helped me gain experience and build my rep.”

“What do you mean by jobs?” Nikky asked. “What kind of jobs?”

“Assassination contracts.”

“No shit!” Deja blurted. “You really killed people?” Then she shrunk back. “Sorry, that just came out.”

“My first time was in China,” Michelle said. “Some rich businessman from Europe doing business and taking in the sights. Seems he’d screwed over the wrong associate. I acted like a tourist to get access to him, and that was that.”

“For real? You got close to this guy and killed him?” Deja asked.

“It’s real, homegirl. It doesn’t get any more real than what I’ve been doing for three years.”

“How many did you do?”

“Shit, girl, you can’t ask her that,” Nikky said.

“She’s right, Deja. I can’t say what and where and how many. I shouldn’t have even told you about the guy in China. He was just some low-level businessman, but telling you about some of the others would be a big mistake. Let me put it this way: I’ve never done anyone in Africa, Canada, Russia, or South America.”