Assassin (5 page)

On Wednesday afternoon Makedde Vanderwall strode along the labyrinthine streets of the Barri Gòtic area with a dog-eared map tucked discreetly into the pocket of her leather backpack. Even after weeks living in the area, she still occasionally found herself on undiscovered streets that twisted and turned until her inner compass was in a spin. Like Catalonian architect Antoni Gaudí’s iconic Barcelona buildings, each appearing to melt and curl, there was nary a straight line in all of the old town.

Mak wore the casual garb favoured by the locals — skinny jeans, a lightweight leather jacket over a sleeveless hoodie and flat-heeled boots that were good for walking. She pulled her hoodie up, and kept her head down.

Over time she’d begun to feel less paranoid on the streets. Around every corner she’d feared another assassin, another Luther, but now she could see she was anonymous. She’d opened her eyes to the beauty here, the obvious friendliness of the locals. And everywhere in the gothic quarter there was history. The spectacular Barcelona cathedral, built on an
ancient crypt. The countless museums. Medieval walkways sculpted in sandstone; wrought-iron lamps so old that they would have once lit up the night with dancing oil flames instead of the modern blink of electricity. Tapas bars overflowing with loud patrons. Stained glass. Carved signs. Well-worn stone. Gargoyles watching from above.

Many times now, Mak had wondered whether it was possible to successfully take on a new identity, to live here happily. Hers was a lonely existence, but only because she worked so hard to be invisible. The Spanish were not a solitary people. All through the night they talked and drank and danced, while Mak locked herself inside Luther’s apartment, only venturing out for exercise or to buy supplies. Would she ever bring herself to forget, to move on? Could she let justice take its own course? Could she live with herself, as someone else?

She was about to find out.

Mak pulled the hood forwards on her head as she walked.

She arrived at La Rambla, the popular tree-lined pedestrian mall flanked by single lanes of traffic on both sides, that stretched about twenty blocks, from Plaça de Catalunya to the seaport. It was busy, as always, and she moved down the promenade without attracting attention, the locals engrossed in their own shopping, or selling to the tourists, and the tourists busy gawking at the architecture. The Spanish were friendly, but not aggressive, as Mak had found the Italians in Milan when she’d been modelling there. The men in Barcelona did not leer or follow her, did not pinch her bottom as she walked up the steps from the subway, or brazenly sing the praises of her female form as she passed the cafés. No, here she could remain unmolested, unharassed. Vendors smiled. Waiters were flirtatious but respectful. She was left in little doubt that she
could have company if she wished, but she did not, and in time, as she’d grown more familiar with her daily routines, she’d realised that she could go about her life as invisibly as she needed to.

Despite everything, she’d begun to feel almost safe.

Mak arrived at the entrance to the famous Mercat de Sant Josep de la Boqueria, a public market that dated back to the thirteenth century. The large open-air marketplace was announced by the presence of an enormous crowd of local Catalonians and tourists, over which the oft-photographed blue, gold and red stained-glass sign hung, featuring the name of the market and an insignia: a shield below a large crown. Above the crown, a silver bat was proudly displayed, its broad wings spread. Mak wondered about the significance of the winged creature.

She stopped, took her backpack off and put it on back to front. There were many pickpockets in crowded areas like this. Once prepared, she stepped into the crowd, passing vast and impressive displays of vividly coloured fruits — perfectly formed apples, oranges, bananas, pears, lemons, avocados — and exquisite handmade chocolates shaped as tiny shells, beetles, poodles, cats or miniature replicas of the Sagrada Família. Other stalls held mountains of nuts, dried fruits or dried mushrooms behind spruikers hoping to attract the tourist Euros, instead of merely the interest of their clicking camera lenses. Mak moved past each familiar display, barely giving them a glance, and made a beeline for her favourite cheese stall further inside the market.

Today a woman with short hair manned the stall.

‘
Hola. Quisiera comprar
…’ Mak began and scanned the latest offerings. She pointed at one of the hard sheep’s cheeses that looked appealing. ‘
Me gusta comprar un queso de oveja buena
.’

The woman lifted the cheese out of the glass case and nodded, speaking in rapid, singsong Spanish, only half of which Mak could catch. She sliced off a small sliver and handed it across. ‘
Buena.
’

Mak nodded in agreement, tasting the sample. It was very good. Strong and nutty in flavour. She made a sign with her index finger and thumb to indicate approximately how much she wanted. The woman placed a knife over the block and Mak stopped her.

‘
Un poco
,’ she said and indicated a smaller amount.

The woman shifted the knife. ‘
¿Tanto?
’

‘
Si.
’

‘
¿Algo más?
’

‘
No. Es todo
,’ Mak replied.
No. That is all.

She put the block of sheep’s cheese in her backpack and walked to the next stall, where she bought some penne pasta, fresh tomatoes and basil. On the way out of the market, she averted her eyes from the grim displays of whole pig’s ears and trotters, thick cow’s tongues, tripe layered and folded like fleshy curtains, and flayed whole sheep’s heads of all sizes — almost enough to make her a vegetarian again. She stopped at a popular stall that was literally overwhelmed with dozens of cured legs of
jamón
, ham, hanging from every available square inch of the display. They had particularly good
jamón serrano
, the famous dried hams, and the stall was always very busy. When the vendor was free she purchased a typical Catalan chorizo from him. He wrapped it up and she popped it in her bag and thanked him. She left the market and continued southeast down La Rambla, slinging the pack back over her shoulders once more, now heavy with her fixings for dinner.

Now, where is this place?

She wasn’t quite sure what to look for. What kind of a shop would it be? Surely no one
advertised
what she was seeking to buy. Would it be a private residence, perhaps? Luther’s address book did not make it entirely clear.

Only a couple of blocks down from the market, directly across from the famous Chinese dragon hanging over La Rambla, she found the entrance to Carrer de l’Hospital, a road she had not had reason to venture down before. It was still single lane, but this road was set between actual kerbs and was a little less narrow and winding, an indication of relative modernity compared with the opposite side of La Rambla, where every lane was twisting and medieval, barely able to take a car. Carrer de l’Hospital was hemmed in from the sidewalk by tall eighteenth-century terraces with flat roofs, each five or so storeys high, adorned with evenly spaced balconies of intricate wrought iron. Here, after only a few minutes, she felt a subtle change in atmosphere. Tourists came to this street, certainly — she could see several of them, and the presence of a money changer and some tiny tourist stalls indicated as much — but it seemed most foreigners did not venture too far from the attractions of La Rambla, and the area had not been gentrified. The rows of terraces grew a little more decrepit as she walked further from the main street: balconies rusted, laundry hung out in limp lines, flapping in the breeze. There was more graffiti here. Mak felt herself grow instinctively more alert to potential dangers. The area was slightly reminiscent of some of the more run-down streets of New Orleans’s French Quarter, she thought. She paused as she passed a lovely square with a large church built, as per the charming, typically Spanish habit, in two distinct eras. Part original Roman church, part eighteenth century, perhaps? It had five huge archways with
wrought-iron gates across the front, beneath a flat-faced façade of stonework so old it appeared to be crumbling. Next to it, a hotel appeared to have been made from what once was a convent: there was an old statue of Mary in one window.

Mak kept walking.

Then, in an area of graffiti-stained stone and increasingly dire-looking shops selling the same tired souvenirs — plastic bulls covered in bright shards of glass, T-shirts with vulgar slogans (
SPAIN
apparently the acronym of
Sex Paella Alcohol Is Needed
), red polyester flamenco dresses swaying in the breeze out front — she found the address she’d seen in Luther’s contacts. Before her was a single door and a narrow shop window of dirty glass, lined with gold watches, glass costume jewellery, fake Rolexes and dusty clock radios. Deeper inside were cardboard boxes brimming with what looked to Mak like junk. A show of desperation and broken promises frozen in time and locked behind glass — wedding china, engraved anniversary gifts, vinyl records that once meant something to someone. She checked the address again and shrugged.

Could this be it?

She pushed open the door, the edge of which hit a small bell rigged to chime, and she walked over a doorstep that was worn smooth like a river stone from more than a century of use. ‘
¿Hola?
’

A strong, swarthy man of about five foot nine emerged from a back room, frowning. His hair was black and curly, his eyes dark. His beard was the result of at least two days’ growth. He wore jeans and an unironed, collared shirt, gold rings on his fat fingers.

‘
Hola. No parlo el catala
,’ Mak told him. Her Catalan needed work.

‘
Ingles.
English,’ he replied in a heavy accent. It was a comment, not a query. He looked her up and down from the tips of her motorcycle boots to the top of her dyed raven hair, eventually settling somewhere in the upper half.

She nodded, wearing her most good-natured expression, but not a smile. ‘Javier Rafel?’ His dark eyes flickered with recognition.
Yes, it’s him.
‘Mr Rafel, you come highly recommended.’

‘By whom?’ he replied slowly, with a long gap between the two words, as if his brain was searching for both the right language and the right response for the circumstances. He hadn’t decided yet what he thought of her. He moved behind his cash register, and placed his hands on a broad open book — a ledger.

Mak removed a thick wad of Euros from her satchel and calmly laid them on the table under her palm, right in the crease of the book. Between her thumb and index finger the number
100
was visible. Javier quickly took the bills from her and slid them under his ledger, then lifted the edge to count all twenty of them. His grubby hands were swift and no one would see the transaction from the street. Yup, this was her guy. He lumbered past her to the door and flipped the sign over to indicate that he was closed. ‘You come,’ he said in a gruff voice and led her to the back room he’d first emerged from. It would have been big enough for perhaps four people to stand comfortably if the space had not been filled with tatty boxes, a wooden chair and an overpoweringly large black safe, much newer and more high tech than the shopfront would lead one to expect. As it was, the two of them could barely fit in the remaining floor space. Mak was immediately on high alert. If something went wrong, there was only one exit, possibly with
a time lock or other security device on it that this man could activate if he chose. If he somehow had an idea of the money he could make by capturing her, dead or alive, he would not hesitate to lock her inside.

No paranoiac. Don’t get paranoid.

She fought to remain composed as he closed the door, locking the two of them together into the windowless space.

Luther Hand had trapped her in that dank cellar while she was drugged and unconscious, but she was alert now. She could defend herself. She’d brought Luther’s Glock, a gun she’d practised with every day. It was loaded, but the safety was on. This man could not trap her. She was more likely to kill him here in his shop, out of paranoia, then to end up at his mercy.

Her gun hand itched, and she rubbed her jeans pocket absent-mindedly.

‘How long for a Euro passport?’ she said in a steady voice. ‘It has to be fast.’ She had not seen her Canadian passport since Luther Hand had abducted her. She felt certain it had been burned to cinders in the French farmhouse. She had never made a move abroad without it, but her passport had been in her handbag, along with her mobile phone, all taken by Luther when he’d abducted her. They were doubtless destroyed. She had considered visiting an embassy to apply for another passport, but that would quickly put her back on the grid. Considering the reach and resources of her opponent, such a risk seemed unwise. But acquiring false identification brought its own risks. She’d wrestled with this step.

‘You
policía
or something like this?’ the counterfeiter asked her.

She looked him in the eye. ‘No,’ she said.
Daughter of a cop, yes. And no, he would not approve.
‘I am not a cop,’ she confirmed, plainly and decisively. ‘I’m someone in need of a service, and I hear you are the best to provide it. Have I been misled?’

‘This passport. It is for you, yes?’

She nodded.

‘I don’t know …’ He was obviously fishing for more cash. ‘It is difficult.’

‘That’s two thousand I just gave you. I’ll give you another eight when I have that passport in my hands, as long as you can do it quickly. But if I’ve been misled …’ She frowned and put out her hand, palm up. ‘You can just give me my two thousand Euros back now and you won’t see me again.’

His eyes widened. ‘Let’s see now,’ he protested quietly.

It was a good starting price. Not crazy enough to make her stand out as a fool, she figured, but good enough to show she meant business.

‘Top quality. Fifteen,’ he said. ‘Five now.’