Taylor Smith - Guilt By Silence

A runaway truck had plowed head-on into his car as he waited to pull into the driveway of the American International School in Vienna, climbing over the hood and crushing the passenger compartment. Everyone said it was a miracle that Mariah’s husband and daughter hadn’t been killed outright, but it was a qualified miracle at best: David’s skull had been fractured like an eggshell; Lindsay had come frighteningly close to losing her left leg.

But despite the reproachful gaze of the eyes staring back from the mirror, Mariah knew that she had had no choice. She couldn’t give him at home the extensive care he needed, especially with their daughter’s recovery to worry about, too, and a demanding job that provided the income and insurance to cover staggering medical bills—a State Department job, she always told people, the lie second nature by now.

She sighed and turned the mirror away. Grabbing a paper bag off the front seat and slinging her purse over her shoulder, she climbed out of the car.

Across the parking lot, another pair of eyes—a mismatched pair, one green, one ice blue—watched her lock the Volvo’s doors and start toward the building’s entrance.

Rollie Burton gnawed thoughtfully on the inside of his cheek while in his hand, a six-inch blade appeared and disappeared in a steady rhythm. The knife was one he had picked up years ago in Hong Kong—a beauty, with superior balance and a blade of fine Sheffield steel. Its intricately carved ivory handle depicted a Manchu dynasty garden of roses and ivy. There were rust-colored stains in the handle’s deep crevices, as if the roses themselves had bled as they were carved.

He flicked the catch on the ivory handle and the blade snapped open again, glinting under the parking-lot lights. Pushing the point against his gloved left hand, he retracted it, only to snap it open on the next heartbeat. Snap, retract. Snap, retract. Over and over.

He had her picture in the leather case on the seat beside him, as well as the down payment on the job—ten thousand dollars in small, used bills. There was also a loaded Sig-Sauer automatic and an extra clip of ammunition. But he preferred the blade—silent and swift, especially in his skilled hands.

She was prettier in person than in her picture, he thought. The overhead lights in the parking lot emphasized high cheekbones and a full mouth. He would have guessed her to be in her early thirties, but the voice on the phone had said she was thirty-nine. She was small but she moved fluidly, with a grace usually reserved for cats and dancers. Although it was impossible to make out her shape under the flowing trench coat she wore, he knew that a body had to be in superb condition to move that well. He wondered idly who would want to waste her—not that he cared, as long as he was paid for his work.

When the phone call had come the previous day, the voice had said they wanted it to look like a random act—one of the dozens of muggings that happen every day in the greater Washington area. The voice had had an eerie quality: flat, tinny. Burton was used to job offers from odd quarters, but there was something really creepy about that voice. Still, it wasn’t as if it had asked him to do anything unusual. Things were a little slow these days, but in his prime, Burton had handled dozens of wet jobs, most of them in tricky foreign environments. This one looked to be a piece of cake.

When he’d agreed to take on the job, the caller had directed him to a Dumpster behind Bloomingdale’s at Tyson’s Corner. There he had found the case of cash and the photo, as well as information on his target’s regular movements. Sure enough, Burton had picked her up just where he’d been informed she could usually be found each Wednesday evening—at the Montgomery Convalescent Care Home in McLean, Virginia.

There was no fixed deadline—just do it soon, the voice had said. The sooner the better, Burton thought, glancing around the quiet parking lot. He had expected to track her for a few days before making his move, but twenty-five years in the business had taught him that you don’t pass up a prime opportunity when it’s handed to you on a silver platter. No point in dragging these things out.

He had his hand on the door handle, ready to slip out of the car. She was almost halfway across the parking lot, but Burton knew he could be on her in a few quick strides. He was still wiry and fast when he shifted into high gear.

Waiting for precisely the right time to move, he considered his options. With a bigger target, he’d aim for the space between the second and third ribs—a neat slash to the heart, then out. If there was a struggle, an upward slice in the gut was effective but messy, and the target took longer to die. In this case, however, the best bet was the throat. Rollie Burton was a bantamweight, but she was smaller. It would be easy enough to grab her by the hair for the split second it would take to do the job. Cut and run, he decided, stepping out of the car and silently closing the door. He’d have to remember to take her purse, for appearance’ sake.

It was only a little past five, but a cold night had already set in, the lonely smell of an early winter rain in the air. Burton moved through the shadows of the old oak trees that dotted the lot, their dark, skeletal branches trembling overhead. He was coming up just behind her, the fingers of his left hand flexing in anticipation of the grab, his right thumb poised over the hair-trigger catch on the knife.

Suddenly, there was a bustle at the main entrance fifty yards away. He held back, crouching deeper into the shadows as the front door opened and three people came out—an elderly woman and two men who might have been her sons. The men huddled around her, supporting her by the elbows, murmuring as she cried softly.

Cursing under his breath, Burton pocketed the knife as his target walked from the parking lot along a short walkway to the entrance. She stepped out of the path of the family coming down the staircase, watched them for a moment, then ran up the front steps of the nursing home. Burton turned and headed back to his car, regretful but philosophical. No matter—he might still have a chance to get her on the way out. Besides, if this was too easy, he might feel he hadn’t earned his fee. That’d be a shame, he thought, snorting lightly. Guilt had never been his strong suit.

As she passed through the front doors, Mariah noticed that she was holding her breath. Sooner or later, though, you have to breathe. She made it past the receptionist and almost as far as the east-wing nursing station before drawing her first breath, hoping the delay would help—but it was futile, of course. Little sensors in her nose had been at work even as she nodded to the woman at the front desk, an early warning system for the incoming olfactory assault. And when she finally inhaled, her stomach plunged as always at the smell of medicine and antiseptic, starched linen and slowly dying flesh.

The young nurse at the station smiled brightly as she saw Mariah approach. “Hi, Mrs. Tardiff,” she said.

The nurses knew her well by now—knew she normally used Bolt, her own surname, not David’s, but she had told them she had no objection to being called Mrs. Tardiff, if they preferred. Most, especially the older nurses, seemed more comfortable with that, likely suspicious of her disregard for the proper order of things. David would have been more insistent than Mariah herself on her right to use her own name, but he was in no position to argue with anyone—on points of principle or anything else.

“He’s been looking forward to seeing you,” the nurse said. “The orderly rolled him into the hallway an hour ago.”

Mariah nodded and forced a smile. This nurse had a sweet disposition and meant no reproach, she knew, but she gave herself a mental lashing anyway. “Traffic,” she said. “It’s awful tonight.” The nurse smiled sympathetically.