Vince Flynn: Consent To Kill

She tried to talk several times, but he shook his head.

"If you want your baby to live…keep your mouth shut and don't say a thing."

"You would never kill this baby, or any other baby."

She said it with such calm conviction that it surprised Rapp. "No, I wouldn't, but I would kill you, so if you'd like to see your baby grow up, be quiet." Rapp looked at his watch and added, "There is a sniper outside, and he's very good. The best I've ever seen. If you say a word, he will run, and he will be killed before he reaches the beach."

She shrugged. "Then why did you come in here? Why didn't you just have him shot on the beach?"

"Because I'm not a coward. Because I don't have other people do my work for me. I do it face to face. I don't blow up houses and kill innocent bystanders."

Claudia looked away and swallowed hard.

Rapp checked one more time and then turned the radio off. Half a minute later, Rapp felt the door in the other room open. The bedroom door moved slightly with the air that rushed out of the house and then settled. Rapp kept the gun pointed at the mother's head and whispered, "Don't say a word or you both die."

She closed her eyes and kissed the baby's head.

The door to the bedroom opened slowly and Gould poked his head in. He saw his wife sitting up in bed and smiled. They had married. He stepped into the room and said, "What are you doing up?"

Claudia looked to the corner of the room and he followed her eyes.

"If you so much as twitch you're dead."

Gould was dripping with sweat from his run. He looked at Rapp and very slowly raised his hands above his head. "I'm sorry about your wife."

Rapp didn't reply. Now that he was in front of the man, he was at a loss for words.

Gould looked at Claudia and dropped to one knee and then the other. His hands were folded behind his head.

To Rapp it was almost as if this had been rehearsed. Like they had discussed what to do if he ever found them.

"I'm sorry," Gould said again, his voice cracking. "Please understand, Claudia had nothing to do with it."

"Did you know she was pregnant?"

Gould slowly nodded, as if he was deeply ashamed. "I knew. Claudia didn't know until after. She cried for days."

Rapp glanced at the woman. She was crying now. A tear fell and splashed on the baby's face. She squirmed in her mother's arms.

"I know I'm in no position to ask for anything, but…" His voice trailed off.

"Let's hear it."

Gould swallowed hard and took a deep breath. "Would you please spare Claudia, and if you don't, would you please bring the baby to her parents in France?"

Rapp kept the silencer leveled at the man's head. He wasn't going to kill the woman. Any thought of that vanished the second he saw the baby in her arms.

"Anything else?" Rapp asked.

"I'm very sorry for everything I did to you. I should have never taken the job. Claudia was right."

Rapp acted bored. "Is that it?"

"May I please kiss my baby and my wife good-bye?"

Rapp's eyes narrowed and he nodded slowly.

Gould kept his hands behind his head and he got up slowly. He stepped over to the bed and sat next to his wife. He wrapped his arms around Claudia and they both cried. Gould stroked her hair and told her how much he loved her. He then bent down and kissed the infant on the head.

"My sweet Anna," he said, "I am lucky to have seen you born and to have held you in my arms…even if it was only for a few days." Gould's shoulders began to shake and he wept over his baby. Claudia wrapped her arms around him and kissed the top of his head just as she had kissed the baby earlier.

Rapp stood there in the corner of the room with his gun pointed at the father, mother, and child. What have I turned into? he asked himself. This was his life, or what it would have been, if only Anna had lived. The pain of the last nine months came rolling back and slapped him with the memory of his wife and his unborn child. Standing there, his resolve teetering, he asked himself one simple question: What would Anna do? It was her life he was avenging, not his own. He could hear her calling out to him as if she were alive and standing right next to him.

The baby woke up and started to cry. "Anna, don't cry," the father said. "Everything will be all right. Your mother will take care of you, and I will love you forever."

Claudia looked up at Rapp, her eyes red and moist with tears.

"You named her Anna," Rapp said.

"After your wife."

Rapp nodded and slowly lowered the gun. He took a deep breath and left the room without saying another word. He stepped out onto the patio and went straight down the stairs to the white sandy beach. He never looked back. He never feared for his life for a second. He would give Anna, both of them, what they surely wanted. If Gould was still the calculating killer that he had been, he wouldn't be far behind. There would be other weapons in the house. He would grab one and he would step outside and that would be the end of it. Wicker would shoot him in the head before he ever got off a shot. If he truly loved Claudia and that little girl, he would stay right where he was and hold them until the sun went down.

Rapp stood in the surf with his gun in his hand and counted. He got to a hundred, thought of his wife, thought of the baby, and smiled. It was the first genuine smile he'd had in over nine months. He glanced down at the gun and then tossed it up in the air, catching it by its thick black silencer. Rapp hesitated for a moment, and then threw the weapon end over end into the ocean.