Maggie Lee (Book 10): The Hitwoman's Act of Contrition (12 page)

She didn’t exactly scream “fun!” An impression that was solidified when she began droning on about the restorative power of the next day’s silent session.

“Two hours of silence?” Millie asked. “What kind of hell have we gotten ourselves into?”

“I’m only silent when I sleep.” Putting her palms together and resting her cheek on her hands, Donna pantomimed the act of sleeping for those who didn’t know what that meant.

Linda, practically vibrating with excitement, silently clapped her hands. “Maybe we’ll make spiritual breakthroughs.”

I resisted telling her that if she kept it up,
I’d
want to break something, but it wouldn’t be a spirit. As though she could read my mind, Gladys knocked her knee into mine and gave me a warning look.

I refocused my attention on Shirley, who was telling us how we were expected to clean up after ourselves when we were done dining.

“And I dreamed of room service.” Millie sighed.

“Personal responsibility builds character,” Linda chirped.

Donna shook her head, but mercifully stayed quiet.

I realized my brilliant idea to sit at the back of the room had backfired when we were the last table to be called up to the buffet line to get our food.

“I was expecting more than bread and water,” Millie groused.

For once, I couldn’t fault her.

Only the dregs of the offerings remained; the salad bowl looked like it had been licked clean, a tiny bit of dried-out chicken bits were drowned in gelatinous gravy,  and brown noodles stuck to the edge of the pan.

The only thing that was plentiful was a tray brimming with brussell sprouts.

Brussell sprouts!

I didn’t even get bread to have with my water because that bitch Millie snagged the last dinner roll. I returned to my seat with a plate that had a little bit of chicken and a couple of noodles I suspected I could crack a tooth on.

“You could have warned me,” I groused to Gladys as I slid into the seat beside her.

She shrugged.

Noticing she didn’t have a plate in front of her, I narrowed my gaze suspiciously. “You’re not eating?”

She shrugged again.

“I just adore brussell sprouts,” Linda declared breathlessly as she returned to the table with a plate loaded with the offensive green things.

I took one bite of what was supposed to pass for chicken and put my fork down in disgust. If I’d wanted to dine on rawhide, I could have gnawed on one of DeeDee’s chewies.

I sensed Gladys’s shoulders shaking again.

Not pleased that she was laughing at me, I turned a cold eye on her.

The corner of her mouth lifted and she winked at me as though we shared some great secret.

Across the table, Millie, Linda, and Donna were having a discussion about flavonoids and antioxidants and other healthy stuff I wanted no part of. Deciding it was the perfect time to escape the talkative trio, I stood up, grabbed my plate, and walked away, muttering, “I’m going to take a walk.”

Gladys followed closely behind.

I couldn’t blame her for wanting to get out of there, but dusk was falling and I wanted to find the Krout Estate before it turned pitch black. I couldn’t do that with the silent one trolling behind.

I turned to tell her I needed some time alone, only to find she’d veered off on another path and was walking away, her back to me.

“We’re alone now,” I told God.

He clambered out of my bra to perch on my shoulder, making a point of inhaling loudly. “Ahh, fresh air!”

I wasn’t sure if that was some sort of dig about my body odor, but I didn’t dare ask. Besides, it didn’t take long for him to give me a hard time about something else.

“You didn’t eat?” His tone was laden with reproach.

“It was disgusting.”

“You need sustenance to keep up your strength,” he lectured.

“I’ll remind you that the next time I bring mealworms home from the pet store because they’re out of crickets.”

He absorbed that threat for a moment and then changed the subject. “What’s the plan?”

“I want to scout out the Krout place. Get a feel for the grounds and security.”

It would have sounded like I knew what I was doing if I didn’t stumble over a tree root at that moment, pitching forward, almost dislodging the little guy.

“Watch where you’re going!” he shouted in my ear.

“It’s getting dark,” I said through gritted teeth.

“So much for your plan.”

Ignoring him, I continued to tramp through the woods in the direction I thought I should be heading.

“What’s with your roommate?” God asked.

“Dunno, but it could be worse. I could be stuck with a real talker.” I didn’t add aloud, “
Oh wait, I already am,
”  but I thought it as loudly as I could.

“There,” he said suddenly, as though he expected I could see where he was pointing in my peripheral vision.

“Where?”

“To the left.”

I looked in the direction and saw far-off lights glinting through the trees. “That must be the Krout place.”

“Stealth and silence,” the lizard reminded me. “You can’t get caught.”

I crept in the direction of the house slowly, trying to be quiet, but branches snapped and crackled with every step. Finally, we reached a six-foot-high wire fence that separated the property of the retreat and the Krout home. I stopped and studied it.

“Afraid you can’t climb it?” God goaded. “If you’d eaten something, you’d have the energy to.”

“I’m wondering if it’s electrified. Want to be the one to test it? I’ve heard fried lizard tastes just like chicken.”

I felt him shudder. “Not funny. Cold.”

“I
am
a heartless, professional hitwoman,” I reminded him as I picked up a branch from the ground.

“More like a bumbling amateur,” he countered.

I tossed the stick against the fence. There weren’t any sparks, so I took that to mean it wouldn’t electrocute me. At least that was my guess, but really, I didn’t know anything about fences or electricity.

“Do you want to wait on this side?” I asked the lizard.

“Well I certainly don’t want to go on the ride while you do your best Olympic gymnast routine. That kind of thing is best observed from a distance.”

Lifting my hand to my shoulder, I let him climb onto my palm. Swiveling my wrist, I brought him in front of my face so I could look him in the eye. “Do you think that, just this once, you could keep your commentary to yourself?”

He stuck his tongue out at me.

After putting him gently on the ground, I eyed the fence, determining my angle of attack. Deciding the best approach would be to take a running leap at it, I backed up a few steps.

“The crowd waits as the high-jumper takes her place,” God mocked.

Ignoring him, I ran toward the fence and leapt into the air.

I bounced right off the fence.

I’d meant to catch it, but my fingers weren’t fast enough. I ended up lying flat on my butt, breath knocked out of me, staring up at the night sky through the canopy of trees.

The sound of chirping crickets was drowned out by God’s laughter.

“Shut up,” I groaned breathlessly, slowly getting back on my feet.

“Wait until I tell the others,” he chortled.

I surveyed the fence again. Apparently, a running start wasn’t going to help me. I’d have to climb the whole thing.

Interlocking my fingers, I stretched my hands in preparation.

“Maybe you should get a ladder.”

Pretending not to have heard him, I grabbed the fence overhead and tried to stick the toe of my sneaker between the links.

My hands already hurt and I hadn’t started pulling myself up yet, but I was determined to get over the fence.

Lifting my other foot off the ground, I started to wobble uncontrollably. Desperately, I tried to jam my shoe into the nearest foothold, but I missed.

Hands aching, arms shaking, I fell the whole four inches back to the ground.

God guffawed.

I glared at the fence. He was right. I was going to need a ladder.

But first I needed something to eat and I didn’t care who I had to kill to get it.

I stalked toward my car, not caring how much noise I made. Hunger made had made me grouchy. Failing to scale the fence had left me frustrated.

“You don’t really think you’re heartless, do you?” God asked quietly.

“What?”

“Before, you said you are a heartless assassin. You don’t really believe that.”

I made a non-committal sound. Considering I was traipsing around in the woods, trying to figure out how to break into a house so I could kill one of its occupants, I obviously was never going to be considered for sainthood.

“Your problem is your heart is too big,” God opined.

I snorted my disbelief.

“No. Really.” He sighed heavily. “You got into this because you love your family so much.”

I couldn’t argue with that logic. I
did
agree to do crazy things to take care of my family. Still, what I’d become didn’t sit well with me, so I said, “Look, I know you’re trying to be nice, but I really don’t need a pep talk.”

“It’s
not
a pep talk you need,” he said slowly, implying I needed something else.

I wasn’t going to fall for that trick. I kept my mouth shut as I reached my car, opened the trunk, and pulled out my box of food.  This was definitely the kind of situation that required breaking into my emergency rations.

I thought of Angel teasing me about my Apocalypse preparation and shook my head. I had a job to do. There was no reason to be thinking of a man I’d never see again. If only he hadn’t seemed so familiar…

Wrestling the box out of the trunk, I wondered if it was against retreat policy to bring in one’s own sustenance. The idea that I was bringing in contraband gave me a giddy thrill. The fact that I also had a rope ladder made me more prepared than a Boy Scout.

Sometimes, the fact I was a competent adult surprised me.

Closing up the car, I shifted the weight of the box. The ladder, stored in a cloth bag, acted as a lid for my feast, and I marched in the direction of my cabin. Even if I was breaking all the rules, who would rat on me? Gladys, who didn’t speak?

I half-expected her to be asleep when I crept back into the cabin, but she was tapping away at the screen of her phone. She put it away and looked at the box curiously.

I put it down on my bed. God scrambled down my arm, ran to my pillow and curled up on top of it.

I looked to see whether Gladys had noticed the reptile.

Considering her wide gaze and the fact her mouth was hanging open, I assumed she had.

While she was distracted, I kicked the ladder beneath my bed.

“My pet,” I explained.

She nodded like it made sense for someone to bring her pet lizard on a retreat.

Shrugging, I rummaged in my box. “I think I’ve got some crackers in here. Do you want someone?”

I dug through beef jerky, olives, peanut butter, and oatmeal cookies, but couldn’t find the crackers.

Suddenly, Gladys was standing beside me, her hand on my arm.

Startled, I shook her off. “Look,” I muttered, “I know this is probably against the rules, and I’m not acting in the spirit of the goals of this place, and you could get me tossed out of here, but I’m starving.”

She grabbed my elbow and tugged gently.

“What?” I sighed, exasperated.

She put light pressure on my arm, urging me to turn around.

I did so slowly, trying not to lose my temper and not flip a table or something. Only an idiot gets between a starving woman and her food.

Then I focused on what she wanted me to see, and I gasped.

She smiled.

“For us?” I asked, staring at a bottle of wine, a loaf of bread, and a wedge of cheese laid out on her bed.

She nodded.

Impulsively, I hugged her.

She tensed, but then amazed me by hugging back.

“You’re full of surprises, Gladys,” I told her as she poured wine into a pair of paper cups. Then I remembered the jar in my box. “I’ve got olives. Want some?”

She nodded excitedly.

Together, sitting on her bed, we feasted.

“So this is why you didn’t get any dinner?” I asked after I’d finished my first cup of wine.

She nodded.

I repeated what I’d said in the dining hall. “I like a woman who plans ahead.”

She looked at the half-eaten jar of olives. “Me too.”

She spoke so softly that I thought for a moment the wine had gone to my head. I peered at her closely. “You speak?”

“Only to people I like,” she replied shyly.

I grinned. “If only the rest of the world did that.”

And she laughed, a pretty, tinkling sound that reminded me of my mom. I felt my smile fade as a heavy pressure built behind my eyes.  Looking away, I swallowed hard and blinked rapidly, but I wasn’t able to stop the tears from filling my eyes.

The face of my roommate creased with worry. “Are you okay?”

“My mom threw gelatin at me,” I gasped as the tears began to roll down my cheeks.

Gladys nodded as though she understood.

“She didn’t know who I was,” I said, dashing away the tears with the back of my hand.

“I’m sorry.” Gladys threw an arm around my shoulder and squeezed. “That must have really hurt.”

“What really hurt was when she slapped me.” I sniffled.

“When she didn’t know you?”

I nodded.

“Is that why you’re here?” Gladys asked gently. “To forgive her?”

I wanted to deny it, but I couldn’t. Not when Armani predicted I had to. Not when God wanted me to. “I don’t know,” I admitted miserably, looking at the lizard on my pillow.

He didn’t so much as twitch his tail.

I wiped away the rest of my tears. “Sorry about that. I guess the strain of the day got to me.”

Gladys nodded her understanding. “This place does that to people.”

“You’ve been here before?”

She pointed to the remains of our feast, proof that she’d endured the dining hall before.

“Why are
you
here?” I asked curiously.