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And that wasn’t part of the plan.
Scarlet’s instructions had been concise but clear—by CIA standards, at least. The Agency never made things too explicit in writing—even with space-age encryption combined with zero-logging and disappearing messages. Paranoia was the rule. Assume anything whichcanbe discoveredwillbe discovered.
So of course, Scarlet had to do a little reading between the lines, fill in some blanks, extrapolate and elucidate.
The message had been coded with standard CIA terminology and purposely ambiguous acronyms. Loosely translated, the message said O’Donnell was the target and Wagner was the patsy. But the rest of the carefully worded message made it clear—in that murky CIA way—that the kill didn’t need to hold up in a court of law, didn’t need airtight evidence, wasn’t going to be put in front of a jury and subjected to rigorous tests of reasonable doubt.
CIA didn’t play by those rules.
That crap was for the FBI, who actually had to pay attention to the U.S. Constitution.
So all Scarlet needed to do was kill O’Donnell while the woman was in Wagner’s presence, making sure not to kill Wagner himself in the process. And do it surreptitiously, without Scarlet herself being seen, without making it obvious that a third party was involved. The circumstances of the kill needed to be inconclusive enough for it to seem plausible that Wagner pulled the trigger.
Not that anyone would be pulling any triggers. Scarlet couldn’t use a gun. She’d have been able to sneak a handgun into the hotel no problem, but leaving a bullet in O’Donnell’s head which wouldn’t match Wagner’s weapon felt too risky. Besides, goingbang-bang-bangat sunrise in a hotel corridor with security cameras watching wasn’t going to cut it.
Especially not with an armed Delta guy in the mix.
Scarlet didn’t fear death, but she didn’t have a death-wish either.
Not yet, at least.
Because it felt like she wasn’t done hunting yet.
Felt like there was still some purpose to living.
She’d been feeling it more and more as she got older, as those troubling images from her past got clearer even as they got darker.
At first Scarlet had assumed it was the massive hormonal changes that were hitting her as she passed fifty. But she’d been prepared for those changes, had enlisted the services of an excellent endocrinologist, was using top quality synthetics to replace the hormones her body no longer produced as she crossed that threshold which all women were cursed to traverse.
Or in Scarlet’s case,blessed.
No more popping the damn pill.
No more inserting those wretched sperm-killing devices.
No more wondering if she’d ever have to dothatagain.
Do what she’d done thirty years ago.
Scarlet shoved aside the memory as she tapped the laundry-room’s touchscreen monitor, pulled up the logged entry, checked to see if O’Donnell’s clothes had been washed and dried and picked and packed.
Not yet.
Scarlet had a few minutes. She stepped lightly away from the computer screen, disappearing silently into the rows of hanging clothes like the ghost she was.
Waiting alone in the shadows was part of her work.
Though lately it had become the hardest part.
Because all that time gave Scarlet’s mind too much space to wander down the misty alleys of the past.
Wander and wonder.
How would her life have turned out if that CIA manhadn’tshown up that morning all those years ago?
Shown up because he knew what she’d done.
Shown up like he already knew how he was going to use it against her.
