First and Only

First and Only

Late afternoon, downtown Charlotte, North Carolina, a decrepit city alley, the statuesque Anya Keating, forty-something, five-foot-nine, a hundred twenty pounds, stepped into winter, breath frosted, feet crunched ice, and pulled her jacket tight.

Garbage bags, litter, and homeless people arrayed the walls. Eight to her right, bundled and sleeping. Four to her left under a warm vent. Seven wandered between her and the dark blue Mazda sedan, twenty yards to her left. Its exhaust pumped vapor.

She pulled her weighted duffel under her arm and strode, gaze fixed on the front grill.

Ten feet from the car, to her right, feet cracked ice.

She slowed and turned toward him with a scowl.

The fifty-something smiled, grimy clothes, disheveled hair, eyes predatory. Everything else about him said weak, overweight, slow, not a threat. Until he produced a knife.

In a slower stroll, Anya revealed the Sig semiauto from under the duffel, muzzle down.

His gaze froze.

The car’s horn honked. Her daughter in the driver’s seat raised both palms, eyes wide, wagged her head, painted with frustration.

Anya accelerated toward the car, hopped into the passenger seat, and slammed it shut.

The driver, Jodi Keaton, athletic, five-foot-seven and slender, crossed arms and squared on her mother. “You’re not supposed to kill people.” She put the car in reverse. “Anymore.” She pulled into the city street, changed gears, and gassed it.

The cityscape’s canyons loomed overhead and streetlights passed like ghosts beyond the window’s mist.

“I left him alive,” Anya said. “Happy?”

“Good grief, Mom.” Jodi fidgeted. “What’s in the duffel?”

“Go bag,” Anya said. “All you need to know.”

“Wish I’d never seen your stash.”

“The only reason I had it open,” Anya said. “Was I needed stuff inside it for what I’m about to do. I’m sorry you saw it, too.”

“All those weapons,” Jodi said. “And the passports. Some you. Some not. Like you wear masks.”

“Oh, sweetheart,” Anya said. “Everyone wears masks. The guy who kisses his wife and hugs his children, goes to work, puts on a mask, makes cut-throat deals and destroys his competition. He leaves and puts on another mask, heads to a bar, and shares drinks, plays pool, and laughs it up with friends—”

“I get it,” Jodi said. “Are you wearing a mask right now?”

“No, it’s the real me,” Anya said. “But when I get into my workplace, my mask is — uhh—”

“What?”

“Scary.”

Jodi huffed. “Like loaded-gun-scary or don’t touch my coffee, scary—”

“Stay out of my way, scary,” Anya said. “Bad idea to get in my way.”

Silence dripped. Rain hit the windshield. Jodi activated the wipers and cleared her throat. “How many people have you killed?”

“I never killed anyone, honey.” Anya squared on Jodi.

“Do you lie for a living—”

“Not true,” Anya said. “I deliver hard truths. But I never killed anyone and don’t intend to start today.”

“You were about to pop that homeless guy—”

“Everyone,” Anya said, “Unless they’re on drugs, recognizes real danger. Besides, he had a knife—”

“And if on drugs, with a knife—”

“Would it surprise you to learn.” Anya brushed her pant legs. “That the vast majority of law enforcement have never fired their service weapon in the line of duty?”

“You’re not law enforcement.”

“It’s the principal, honey.” Anya glanced out the window. “Perps would rather comply now and finish the fight another day.”

“What about your — colleagues?” Jodi said. “They kill anyone for you?”

“Nobody that mattered.”

Jodi jolted and swallowed. “Who are you?”

“I’m the person who’s cared for you and kept you safe,” Anya said. “Because I love you to the Sun and stars. If you were in trouble, I would help you.” She adjusted herself in the seat. “And heaven help anyone who gets in my way.”

Jodi smirked. “Fair enough.”

“Almost there,” Anya said. “Eight blocks, drop me off at the corner.”

“I can take you—”

“I don’t want you seen with me. Liability, and all that.”

“Because you’re ashamed of me?”

“No,” Anya said. “So the people I’m meeting won’t connect you to me and — harm you.”

“Oh.” Jodi gripped the wheel. “Sorry.”

“It’s a lot, I know,” Anya said. “I don’t expect you think like a—”

“A criminal?”

“A problem solver.”

Jodi offered a nervous chuckle, faint smile, and shook her head. “You’re right, I don’t want to know and wish I’d never seen it. Is this why so much travel?”

Anya sighed. “Been five years since I was on a plane anywhere. But I recognize my absence affected you. Like I could get on another plane any minute.”

“Like now?”

“I’ll disappear for just a little while,” Anya said. “And you’re a grown woman with your own life. I’ll return when my business is complete.”

Jodi’s eyes welled. “Promise me I’ll see you again.”

“Sweetheart.” Anya glanced toward her. “It’s just another day at the office.”

The streetlights passed them. Rain made wiggle-lines on the glass.

Anya tapped Jodi’s hand, pulled it free of the wheel, and clasped it. “Everything will be fine.”

“I know.” Jodi choked a tear.

“When you get home, text me with a question,” Anya said. “Is this Rosemary? And I’ll know you’re safe. If you’re not, text — Mom, can we talk? And delete the message.”

Jodi wagged her head. “That’s just so clever. I mean, bad guys would expect me to—”

“One more block,” Anya said, “Next light. Stop at the corner. I exit. You drive. Got it?”

“Got it.”

Jodi slowed to a stop.

Anya bent toward her, kissed her temple, jumped from the car, and strode hard into the rain. Jodi’s car shooshed water into the distance.

Anya traveled a block, turned right, three more blocks, a left, and one more block into a parking garage. On the third level, her sleek black Audi sedan was under a tarp and seemed intact and untampered.

After this, maybe I’ll get to drive this baby around like I actually own it.

She tossed the duffel inside, fired the engine, and headed south. Six hours to Jacksonville, Florida. An hour gone, Jodi texted the Rosemary message.

One stop for gas and later topped-off at the edge of Jacksonville city limit.

Everything was as she remembered, frozen in time. Five years doesn’t change an area all that much. More restaurants.

Her smartphone reported the Laughing Pelican Resort was five miles ahead on the coastline. Photos showed its extravagant interior, beach bar, outdoor recreation area, and surrounding shops within walking distance.

And I don’t miss any of it.

The hotel’s outdoor lights and parking lot glared into the sky. Anya approached the posh twenty-story building, parked, and strode hard past courtesy kiosks and palm trees, the ocean air crisp and salty. She arrived at its opulent interior, hit with a wall of aromas, cinnamon, vanilla, and dark roast coffee. She beelined to the registration desk seventy feet distant and didn’t break stride.

In her periphery, men’s heads swiveled toward her. Many for her looks. Three in recognition moved in her direction on intercept paths.

Anya arrived at registration and waited.

A coiffed thirty-something man closed his work on a keyboard and glanced up, bright smile, eyes wide. “Why, as I live and breathe, Anya Keating. So good to see you again. I honestly thought I never would.”

“Good to see you again, Jonathan,” Anya said.

“Eddie’s in Parlor Eight,” Jonathan motioned to his right. “I’ll make sure he’s expecting you.”

The three men, athletic, expensive business suits, bulges under their armpits, formed a wall between her and the entrance.

She strode the wide concourse past the other parlors.

The three paced two steps behind.

Walls covered with popular prints, some from Renaissance artists. The chandeliers and muted lighting triggered memories from years prior.

Another three lackeys lined themselves across the concourse at her destination. The silent blockade signaled that a left turn into the parlor was her only option.

From the parlor doors, two businessmen burst in a rush and strode past her.

A lackey held his palm out and braked her. Another lackey frisked her shoulders to ankles.

Anya chuckled. “Really, guys?”

The third lackey held the door and waved her inside.

The parlor’s decor appeared makeshift. Three desks toward the front, beyond that, the floor littered with boxes, steamer trunks, bubble-wrap, and one giant desk fifty feet from the door.

The man behind it, Eddie Martin, leaned backward in his ergo-chair, hands clasped over a bulbous tummy, gray hair pulled into a ponytail, and a cheshire-cat grin as if he’d just won the lottery.

“Anya Keating,” Eddie said. “Just who I’ve been looking for.”

Anya approached, grabbed a metal chair, dragged it before the desk, produced her phone, and pressed its face. Eddie’s voice said, “Look, we know Anya didn’t take the money. But she’s connected to Stanick. We find her, we find him. That simple.”

Eddie leaned forward.

Anya lowered to the chair and crossed her legs. “Now we both know what you know, that I didn’t take it.”

“Stanick put me in Oberlin’s crosshairs.”

“He killed Oberlin for the money,” Anya said. “And tried to kill me. His only witness.”

“Like we’d suspect someone else?”

“He wasn’t all that smart.” Anya crossed her arms. “I come bearing gifts. The first one is this recording and a dozen others more incriminating, in a vault. Let’s just say they’re in flight and will never land. That is, unless something happens to me. Then they’ll crash land. On your head.”

“That’s some gift,” Eddie said. “One notch above a bag of coal.”

“The gift is my silence.” Anya reached into her jacket pocket.

Two lackeys pulled their weapons and leveled on her.

She slowed, produced a flash stick, and skittered it across the desk to Eddie. “Stanick tried to contact me. A lot. He blocked it, but I had a friend backtrace it and they were all from the same location. I traveled there. Saw him with my own eyes. That was a year ago. He has a nice place, nice car—”

“Spending my money well,” Eddie said. “Oberlin told me he had a surprise that day. Didn’t say what. I guess Stanick got that, too?”

“He took everything,” Anya said. “And fired on me. I ran for cover. When the smoke cleared, he was gone. You’ve heard this story a hundred times.”

“Just wanted to see if you’d changed it.”

“To what? That’s the truth. A hard truth. But likely not as hard as what you intend for Stanick.”

“Don’t even get me started.”

“A suggestion,” Anya said. “Arrive and stake him out. Watch where he goes. I doubt the money is where he lives. Wait until he accesses it, and pounce.”

“Sure you didn’t spook him?” Eddie said.

“Sure as I can be.” Anya indicated the stick. “He tried calling me since then. Same location. He thinks he’s safe.”

Eddie smirked, chuckled, and wagged his head. “I miss you, you know that? Nobody closed deals like you. Clearly from this little exchange, you haven’t lost your edge. Come back to work for me. I can make it worth your while.”

“My while is worth a lot more these days.”

“Oh, yeah?” Eddie raised an eyebrow. “Who you workin’ for?”

Just lie.

“Contracts,” she said. “Pays a lot better than you ever did.”

His eyes. Like I can see into his soul. He wants me dead. In a hole. Next to Stanick. Nothing has changed.

Glad I came prepared.

“First,” Anya said. “Tell everyone to stand down.”

Eddie’s gaze rose past her. “Everybody, holster your weapons, stand down. All of you.” He tapped his phone.

A female voice responded. “Yes sir?”

“The Search and Rescue for Anya Keating,” he said. “Cancel it.”

“Sir, she’s in the hotel—”

“She’s right in front of me,” Eddie said. “Cancel it.” He closed the call and met her gaze. “Tell you what. If we find Stanick and recover my money, I’ll cut you a finder’s fee. The same fee I would’ve paid anyone for your head.”

“It’s the mention of my head,” Anya said, “that troubles me. I was consummately loyal to you and when Stanick bolted, you turned on me like a rabid dog. I’ll never understand that.”

“I have a couple of ex-wives with a similar sentiment,” he chuckled. “But you and Stanick were a thing—”

Anya sat forward and drilled his gaze. “We were not.”

“Everyone knew—”

“They knew nothing.” Anya raised an eyebrow. “I’m not his type.” She cocked her head. “And he’s not mine.” She leaned back slow and brushed her knee. “You stuck us together and I suffered that existence.”

“You never complained,” Eddie said.

“Like that would’ve mattered.” Anya glanced to the right and left. In her periphery, the lackeys all stood against the wall and her exit path was clear.

Time to play him like he played me.

“But your offer is interesting,” Anya said. “What paycheck did you have in mind?”

Eddie rolled off numbers and ended with one triple her prior pay. “Does that work for you?”

“Add fifty percent to that,” she said. “And it works for me.”

“Heck, I’ll double it,” Eddie chuckled. “Welcome back.”

Seriously? We argued incessantly over his blowing all his cash on booze, babes, and gambling. He gave us peanuts in comparison.

And now, Cheapskate Eddie is opening his purse?

No, Anya, he’s lying.

Eddie waved everyone out. “Tell me what you need.”

“A week,” she said. “Maybe two. Tie off some loose ends. The rest can wait.” Her gaze fell on a Macallen-12. “Shall we drink?”

“You bet.” Eddie seemed to grin to both ears.

Anya pulled two shot glasses, poured one, and extended it to Eddie. This action extruded a thin, flesh-colored tube from Anya’s wrist, across her palm, curved toward Eddie’s glass, squirted clear liquid, and retracted.

She poured a second. “To the future.” Anya tipped her head back and dumped the Scotch.

“Ditto.” Eddie turned up his.

“MMM.” Anya snapped her head with a hard swallow. Her mouth and tongue burned hard. “Love the heat.”

“Don’t I know it.” Eddie raised both eyebrows. “I have a sticky situation with Tomassini—”

“He’s a pussycat.” Anya smiled. “I’ll square it away.”

Eddie cocked his head. “There it is. That confidence. I miss it.” He glanced down, leaned back and clasped fingers over his tummy. “Go take care of your business, Anya. See you back here in a week?”

Anya pulled a sticky-note from Eddie’s desktop dispenser and scribbled her burner phone number. “Reach me there.” She spun, strode to her car, and turned.

Nobody followed me? A good sign. Maybe.

Did they put a tracker on my car?

Anya drove south to St. Augustine, found a row of hotels, one run-down, checked-in, entered her room, surveyed it once, dropped her room key into the hotel’s night-drop, drove to the adjacent hotel’s lot, and slept four hours in the Audi.

At daybreak, she sped to the nearest interstate, north toward home, nonstop. She arrived in Charlotte at her bank at three o’clock, pulled her duffel from the trunk, entered, gained access to her safe deposit box, and emptied the duffel into it.

My Sig’s still in the car. I’ll keep it close.

The deposit box was otherwise stuffed with her various IDs, cash in dollars, pounds, and euros, ammo, and vials of controlled substances.

She reached into her right armpit and wrestled-free the delivery unit. The small latex bladder and the long tube came out with it, past her wrist, elbow, and into the box. She focused on it for longer than intended.

I only ever used it for light sedatives. It kept my opponent laughing and malleable. Today it carried poison. In one week, Eddie’s internal organs will falter. He’ll see a doctor. They’ll call it fatigue and give him over-the-counter instructions. He’ll fall asleep and his heart will stop. And all my problems end.

Anya closed the box and pushed into its chamber.

Yeah, Eddie. Oberlin arrived with his usual ten million dollar payment and the separate fifty million dollar bonus nobody knew about. That mysterious gift. Stanick killed him, snatched the payment case, and left me with the rest. I had maybe five minutes to find a stash for it. When you arrived, Stanick and the money were gone, and you knew only of the payment. Not the bonus.

Her gaze fell to a much larger deposit box near the corner.

But that bonus vanished, too, didn’t it? Eddie now thinks I’ve been working lucrative contracts but it only ever came from Oberlin’s money. I’ve pilfered it to live on. But once Eddie’s gone, once Stanick’s gone, I’ll live a bit more upscale. Get better “contracts”. How could they ever tell where the money came from?

I’ll return in two weeks, ready for work, and get the sad news.

I told Jodi I never killed anyone. Still haven’t. Not technically.

Eddie will be my first and only.

And I’ll be free.