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Asher smiled sardonically. “His was not a nice government.”
“So you captured him instead of killing him and told him you’d both be better off working together,” Harry deduced. “That sounds very familiar too. Is that how you begin all working relationships?” He motioned between them.
Asher almost smiled. “You were easier to convince than him.”
“You held a gun to my head. Literally.”
“And you had one pointed at mine.”
“I’m still unsure if not pulling the trigger was the right thing to do.” Harry wanted to lighten the mood to keep him talking. “We’ve managed okay so far. Without being killed. Or killing each other. Though we are on Interpol’s Red Notice list, which is great. It’s a first for me.”
Asher sighed, his smile fading slowly. “He’s working on having that revoked. I don’t know how. I didn’t ask. I never ask how he does what he does.”
“You trust him implicitly? Whatever he says, what he tells you to do.”
“Yes.” Asher’s gaze, his reply, was so certain. “I saved his life. I reported the job complete. I found some drug dealer, made him dress in my friend’s uniform before I shot him. A shotgun blast to the face. Took most of the head off. I sent in photos as proof, but the local police found his blood-splattered ID and passport, and the uniform, and called it in officially. His own country never even asked for the body.” Asher shrugged. “I got us out of the country we were in. He was a free man, I got paid, and we set him up in a place where no one would find him.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.”
“What was the trade-off?”
“He’s like my handler. He works his computer magic, manoeuvres me as needed. I find him information on the ground that he needs.”
“Information he needs for what?”
Asher shrugged. “To get rid of bad guys.”
Harry stared, having to blink a few times. “Vigilantism, extortion, blackmail. Pretty sure that makes you the bad guys.”
Asher laughed. “We’re all bad guys, Harry. You and me,weare the bad guys.” He shook his head, amused. “You kill for your government. I kill for anyone’s government. They might call it service or honourable duty, but it’s all murder.”
Harry chewed on those words for a long moment, bitter and sour. True.
Except...
“You kill for anyone’s government, but then you said that Four manoeuvres you, helps you.”
“He does. It’s freelance work. You might be surprised by how many governments prefer someone”—he put his hands to his chest—“without allegiance to any flag.”
“I wished it surprised me.” Harry sighed, heavy with the weight of that fact. “What does Four get out of it?”
“He looks into the targets and who wants them dead. More often than not there’s money laundering, terrorists financing, fraud, bribery, the list goes on.”
“Corruption.”
“To the core, in most cases.”
“And what does Four do with that information? Sell it to another government?”
Asher laughed again. “Oh no. He takes it.”
Harry blinked, joining the dots. “He steals money from corrupt governments? Because, fuck, that’s gonna end well.”
“He intercepts it, redirects it. Data networks cover almost every corner of the globe. Satellites, relay stations, encryptions. There’s nothing he doesn’t have access to. And the money? It’s just numbers, zeroes and decimal points. And it’s completely untraceable.”
“Someone will catch up with him.”
