Kill Code (12 page)

He looked into her eyes. “We need to get the
information that Patrick had set aside for you. These people are
very sophisticated, and very good at what they do. The sooner we
find out who is pulling the strings, the quicker we can shut it
down.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“I'm trying to figure that out.
When I was in the assassination business, there was a secret
organization called the 'Black Hand.' It was named after a group of
assassins founded in Serbia in 1910. While spreading murder and
mayhem throughout that part of the world, they were the people
responsible for the assassination of Archduke
Francis
Ferdinand and, by the way, starting World War I.

“I had been approached about joining the new
organization and instead picked retirement. There are five of them,
each specializing in a certain way of killing.”

He held up his hand with one finger up. “We've
probably seen the work of the fire guy in the death of the building
inspector.”

Another finger went up. “The explosive guy almost
got you and probably killed your accountant.”

Finger number three went up, “There is someone,
probably a woman, who kills with poison.”

What the hell had she gotten into?

He must have seen her momentary distraction, because
he put up a fourth finger and said, “Pay attention, please. The
fourth person kills via accidents of various sorts, including faked
muggings.”

“I don't see how this affects me ...”

Putting his thumb up in the air, he said, “Because I
want you to be bait for the fifth assassination, a sniper.”

Jill Ringler, the Third Finger of the Black Hand,
started reeling in her prey.

A Denver City Councilman, his health circumstances
made completing her assignment that much more difficult—she had
already poisoned the City Council coffee pot with thallium
sulphate, but because of his health, he couldn't drink coffee. Some
of his fellow council members may survive, but they would be bald
and have the potential of major organ failure for the rest of their
lives.

Phil Van Wyk, her target, was an insulin-dependent
diabetic who needed to inject himself at least twice a day. His
diabetes was probably a result of his obesity.

The poison she had selected was
one of her favorites—death was instantaneous and
undetectable—
Saxitoxin.

Yes, it was a major pain in the ass to create,
raising butter clams and culturing them with Alexandrium minutum, a
dinoflagellate—a type of marine plankton. Then boiling the poison
from the gastric tract of the butter clams and concentrating it to
the level that she liked to work with. It had the advantage of
being one hell of a great poison—she had read that one gram was
enough to kill a million people. The bad news was that she couldn't
just poke him in the arm with it in public as he would die within
minutes—she wanted to be somewhere else when the body was
found.

So she had passed him a note on his way to the
current council meeting, held every Monday night at 5:30 p.m.,
unless it was a major holiday. She had expressed an interest in
meeting with him to discuss something of major importance to him
and his constituents. Of course, she was appropriately dressed for
her flirtatious invitation—in a low cut dress that showed off her
assets appropriately. A blonde wig and a smattering of makeup would
help confuse any investigation into what would look like a death by
natural causes.

She maintained eye contact with him during the
meeting. It was ironic that he only drank bottled water while his
fellow council members slurped poisoned coffee.

 
Thallium sulphate is soluble
in water, colorless and virtually tasteless and odorless. It's
mechanism of action was mainly from the fact that charged thallium
atoms are almost exactly the same size as potassium ions, which are
critical to many bodily functions. It essentially mimics the action
of potassium, replacing working ions with inert ones that cripple
the nervous system. One decent-sized dose was generally enough to
kill someone if it wasn't caught in time.

Yes, there was a cure for it—potassium ferric
ferrocyanide, a chemical better known as the dye Prussian blue. But
the treatment had to be started very quickly otherwise a horrible
death would result. There was an irony in her dosing of the coffee
pot labeled “For use of the City Council ONLY!!!” Their
snobbishness would lead to their death.

As the meeting was wrapping up, she retired to where
she had set her trap—a nearby hotel bar. Van Wyk was single;
divorced and, despite him being an obese slob in her eyes, had
managed to do pretty well scoring young women—power was always a
powerful aphrodisiac.

The implication was that if her proposed 'meeting'
went well, they would retire to a room in the hotel for
consummation of the deal.

She settled into a darkened corner booth,
luxuriating in the feel of use softened leather on her legs. The
air conditioning blew cool, tasteless air into her face. There were
several other couples scattered throughout the place, all in
similarly secluded tables and booths. A travel weary salesman, his
ill-tailored suit revealing that he should have replaced it ten
years or fifty pounds ago, hit on everything that walked by with a
vagina. He had given her lecherous stare as she had passed by and
she had ignored him, hopefully letting him know that she was
completely outside his class. It didn't stop him from completely
undressing her with his eyes, and it almost made her wish that she
wasn't on a job, otherwise she'd have shown him that it wasn't
right treating women like disposable pieces of meat. Death, after
all, was the final high and she had a couple things in her purse
that could make that more than true.  

Right on time, Phil Van Wyk waddled into the bar.
Thank goodness, Denver had a ban on smoking in bars—she hated the
smell of cigarettes and this job was thankless enough. As he
approached, the overwhelming stench of his body made her reconsider
her dislike for the smell of cigarettes.

He settled into the booth, causing it to creak in
protest and gave her a toothy smile.

“Hello, Ms. Martin. I understand you have a proposal
for me?”

Fluttering her eyelashes, she said, “Why yes.” She
deliberately lengthened out her vowels, almost like a soft drawl.
In her experience, vulnerable men loved that way of speaking—it
melted their hearts kind of thing and made it easier to kill
them.

Eight years of advanced education ending in a
doctorate in pharmacology with a minor in bioengineering meant
that, unless she was willing to be a slave for a drug company, she
would not be able to even service her student loans while earning
thirty percent less than her male colleagues, and led to this
career choice. She was one of five highly trained killers in a
highly secret organization and had fifty-six operational kills to
her credit—not including tonight's tally. She had been able to pay
off her student loans within one year and purchase beach houses on
both coasts and in several places around the world so she could
continue to study poisons from ocean, sea and lake dwelling
creatures.

She could hardly wait to get back to her studies of
the Blue-ringed Octopus—the venom contained in one golf-ball sized
creature was enough to kill twenty-six people.

The bartender, in obvious deference to the powerful
man at her table, shuffled over and handed Van Wyk a wine list.
“Councilman Van Wyk, thank you for gracing us with your presence
this evening. What can I get you both this evening?”

Van Wyk's piggish eyes glanced over the wine list.
“How about a 1978 Leroy Meursault Narvaux, if you have it. If not,
I guess we'll have to suffer with the 2003, but don't bother with
the 2002.”

She tried to keep her expression neutral—he'd just
ordered a four-hundred-dollar bottle of wine. Yes, she did indulge
herself occasionally with a bottle of outstanding wine and did know
a bit about them. Chemistry was chemistry to her, be it a complex
neurotoxin or a fine Burgundy.

Hopefully, he was paying for it. But that probably
wasn't in the cards for her. And what the hell was a hotel bar
doing stocking such an expensive wine? There was something fishy
going on here. Probably it was a relabeled crap wine of a lesser
vintage and the pin heads that Van Wyk picked up wouldn't know the
difference and be impressed enough to shed their good taste and
panties.

No matter, she realized that she wasn't going
anywhere with this man further than this bar and kept from
vomiting. She had a backup plan—the Saxitoxin was best used when
injected, but could be taken orally—death would occur later, but it
would still happen.

The bartender came over with a bottle and made a
great show of uncorking it in front of them, handing the cork to
Van Wyk for sniffing and examination, before pouring a couple of
ounces into Van Wyk's glass. He swirled it around in the glass,
stuck his pig nose into the glass and snorted. Van Wyk, apparently
satisfied, took a tentative sip, swirled it around in his mouth and
then nodded in satisfaction.

She had to appreciate the entire performance
although it disgusted her.

The bartender finished his pour into Van Wyk's glass
and then poured a similar amount into hers. Taking a cautious sip,
she knew that the whole show was an act—this wine had come no
farther than from California. Yes, it was a decent wine, but was a
Merlot, not a Burgundy—not even with a stretch of the
imagination.

She nodded, playing along. The bartender set the
bottle on the table and shuffled off to leave them in peace.

Van Wyk raised his glass and said, “A toast.”

Tapping her glass against his, she
said, “To a successful future business relationship.”
Where I kill you and then go buy a great bottle
of wine with the proceeds.

Taking a large swallow, he said, “I agree. What did
you wish to discuss with me tonight?”

While fiddling with her small satchel under the
pretense of finding some papers, she palmed the container of
Saxitoxin.

She handed over the fake proposal for a new shopping
mall in Van Wyk's district and watched as he poured through them.
If the plans had been for real, they would bring a multimillion
dollar project, providing lots of new jobs from construction to
store clerks. It was a scam that she had used before with some
success—just changing the names, dates and locations as
appropriate.

His eyes gleaming in anticipation, Van Wyk said,
“Are these for real?”

Taking a sly sip of wine, she nodded. “All I need is
some help with getting rezoning. I have the financing, tentative
contracts with a dozen stores and a couple that want to be
anchors.”

“And you put this together?”

“Yes. I represent a consortium of real estate
brokers, financiers, banks and interested investors. They put up
the money and I speak for the group.”

“What do you get out of this?”

“I set it up, getting a percentage off the top of
the gross for the first five years. The percentage then lessens,
but I do pretty well for myself.”

He glanced at the documents again. “I need a moment
here. I'll be right back.”

Van Wyk slid out of the booth, still clutching the
documents in his sweaty hands.

She knew that he was going to make some phone calls
to see if she was legit. This wouldn't be a problem as she had a
fully licensed and respectable corporation set up in friendly
Delaware that, while looking more than legit at first glance, had
layers upon layers of concealment as to the true purpose and
ownership. A phone call or two, no matter to whom, wouldn't knock
anything loose that she couldn't deal with.

Under the pretense of pouring more wine into his
glass, she emptied the vial of Saxitoxin into his glass. Another
tasteless, odorless and generally difficult to diagnose poison.

She added some more wine to her glass and took a
sip. Serendipitously, she wiped down the surfaces of the table that
she had touched with a small, flesh-colored cloth. She'd clean her
glass and the bottle before leaving.

Van Wyk came back, a greedy smile on his face.

Settling down, he took a long swallow of his wine
and said, “So, what's it worth to you for this process to all go
smoothly?”

She shrugged. Very shortly, he was going to start
feeling the effects of the poison and she wanted to get out of here
before that happened.

The chirping of a new text message on her Blackberry
saved her, breaking the conversation.

“Excuse me a second.”

She had another job. Anyway, it was time to get this
resolved.

“I'm sorry, I have to go, it's an emergency.”

The look of disappointment on his face was something
she would remember for a long while—maybe fifteen minutes.

“Give me your card, and I'll get back to you as soon
as I can.”

He dug out a card and wrote another number on it.
Handing it to her, he said, “That's my private cell. Don't hesitate
to call me day or night.”

Yeah, all I'm gonna need is a Ouija Board to be able
to do that.

“Thanks. I'm so sorry about this. I was so looking
forward to our discussing this further.”

And he was going to have to pony up for the
wine.

Taking another sip of wine, he made a face.

“Something wrong?” She asked. The poison was working
as expected.

“No.”

She made a point of taking another sip of her wine,
leaning down so that he could see her cleavage, and wiping down her
glass. Yes, there were probably traces of something that could be
traced, but it wouldn't lead to anywhere.

Shaking his wet, meaty hand, she gathered up her
papers, put them back into her briefcase and made her way out of
the bar. She had an appointment with a member of the Colorado House
of Representatives.