Read Online Requiem for an Assassin by Barry Eisler - Free Book Online
Authors: Barry Eisler
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blurt something out, to betray eagerness. More tactics, I thought. He’s still shaping the battlefield.
I looked at my watch again. It was a stainless steel Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Grande Taille with a brown leather band. I might have worn a Traser, but I tend to avoid anything that could be recognized as tactical. People who know, know. Besides, I just have a weakness for a fine watch like the Grande Taille. I thought about all the care that went into its design and its manufacture, imagined the craftsmen working on it, wearing spectacles, using magnifying glasses and precision tools to get the complications just right…
“I have a job I want you to do,” Hilger said, finally. “Three of them, in fact. Do the jobs, and Dox lives. Don’t do them, and he dies.”
“Put him on the phone,” I said, keeping my voice casual.
I wondered if he would refuse. I would have judged that stupid—I wasn’t going to do a damn thing without what’s known in the kidnap trade as “proof of life”—but on the other hand, in a negotiation, you don’t give anything away for free. Hilger might want to position a few words with Dox as a concession. He’d been staging this thing carefully so far; maybe he’d want to stage it a bit more.
But he didn’t. He just said, “Wait.”
Thirty seconds later, I heard Dox’s baritone twang. “Howdy, partner.”
I was about to admonish him not to call me that because I didn’t want Hilger to think we were close. But he went on: “Just so you know, these four boys have got us on the speakerphone.”
Speakerphone. I should have anticipated that, and it was smart of Dox to tell me. It was also smart to slip in the mention of their numbers. Hilger might not have minded that; he probably hoped to intimidate me with the odds.
There was a down note in Dox’s tone that was entirely unlike the rampantly cocksure persona I had come to tolerate, and eventually to like. A flood of emotions wanted to engulf me again: relief that he was alive, worry about what might happen next, anger that he’d allowed himself to be taken. I struggled to push it all aside, then felt that deep, icy part of me breaking through to the surface and taking the controls. And the feeling that came with it was nothing but relief. Finally, a reason for my fear. A reason not to struggle against the creature inside me.
“You all right?” I asked.
“I’m alive. I reckon that’s what this conversation is intended to establish.”
“You know where you are?”
“On a boat. Wish I could tell you more.”
Then he was gone, and Hilger was back on the line. “We’ll use the bulletin board,” he said.
From the suddenness with which he’d grabbed the phone, I gathered he was concerned Dox might tell me something more, something useful. But what?
“No,” I told him. “What you’ve got to tell me, you can tell me to my face.”
“No. We do it my way, or…”
“Or you can fuck off.” And with that, I pressed the “End call” button.
Or rather, the iceman did. The iceman knew that if I didn’t establish some measure of control early on, I’d always be reacting, always trying to recover, every step of the way, until finally, no matter how desperate my efforts, or feverish my hope, Dox would be dead, and probably I along with him.
I looked at the Grande Taille again, watching the second hand’s smooth sweep. I could feel my heart beating steadily, my pulse rate just a little above normal. I was inside myself, suspended somewhere only I could recognize, disconnected, severed from events.
I watched the second hand’s slow sweep. One circuit. Two. Another. The street was gone. My focus was no larger than the movement on the watch face.
The second hand was beginning its fifth rotation when the phone buzzed. I saw Dox’s number on the screen and pressed “Answer.”
Hilger said, “You’re lucky your number got stored in this phone’s caller ID just now. Otherwise your friend would already be dead.
I looked at my watch again. It was a stainless steel Jaeger-LeCoultre Reverso Grande Taille with a brown leather band. I might have worn a Traser, but I tend to avoid anything that could be recognized as tactical. People who know, know. Besides, I just have a weakness for a fine watch like the Grande Taille. I thought about all the care that went into its design and its manufacture, imagined the craftsmen working on it, wearing spectacles, using magnifying glasses and precision tools to get the complications just right…
“I have a job I want you to do,” Hilger said, finally. “Three of them, in fact. Do the jobs, and Dox lives. Don’t do them, and he dies.”
“Put him on the phone,” I said, keeping my voice casual.
I wondered if he would refuse. I would have judged that stupid—I wasn’t going to do a damn thing without what’s known in the kidnap trade as “proof of life”—but on the other hand, in a negotiation, you don’t give anything away for free. Hilger might want to position a few words with Dox as a concession. He’d been staging this thing carefully so far; maybe he’d want to stage it a bit more.
But he didn’t. He just said, “Wait.”
Thirty seconds later, I heard Dox’s baritone twang. “Howdy, partner.”
I was about to admonish him not to call me that because I didn’t want Hilger to think we were close. But he went on: “Just so you know, these four boys have got us on the speakerphone.”
Speakerphone. I should have anticipated that, and it was smart of Dox to tell me. It was also smart to slip in the mention of their numbers. Hilger might not have minded that; he probably hoped to intimidate me with the odds.
There was a down note in Dox’s tone that was entirely unlike the rampantly cocksure persona I had come to tolerate, and eventually to like. A flood of emotions wanted to engulf me again: relief that he was alive, worry about what might happen next, anger that he’d allowed himself to be taken. I struggled to push it all aside, then felt that deep, icy part of me breaking through to the surface and taking the controls. And the feeling that came with it was nothing but relief. Finally, a reason for my fear. A reason not to struggle against the creature inside me.
“You all right?” I asked.
“I’m alive. I reckon that’s what this conversation is intended to establish.”
“You know where you are?”
“On a boat. Wish I could tell you more.”
Then he was gone, and Hilger was back on the line. “We’ll use the bulletin board,” he said.
From the suddenness with which he’d grabbed the phone, I gathered he was concerned Dox might tell me something more, something useful. But what?
“No,” I told him. “What you’ve got to tell me, you can tell me to my face.”
“No. We do it my way, or…”
“Or you can fuck off.” And with that, I pressed the “End call” button.
Or rather, the iceman did. The iceman knew that if I didn’t establish some measure of control early on, I’d always be reacting, always trying to recover, every step of the way, until finally, no matter how desperate my efforts, or feverish my hope, Dox would be dead, and probably I along with him.
I looked at the Grande Taille again, watching the second hand’s smooth sweep. I could feel my heart beating steadily, my pulse rate just a little above normal. I was inside myself, suspended somewhere only I could recognize, disconnected, severed from events.
I watched the second hand’s slow sweep. One circuit. Two. Another. The street was gone. My focus was no larger than the movement on the watch face.
The second hand was beginning its fifth rotation when the phone buzzed. I saw Dox’s number on the screen and pressed “Answer.”
Hilger said, “You’re lucky your number got stored in this phone’s caller ID just now. Otherwise your friend would already be dead.
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