The Housewife Assassin's Hostage Hosting Tips (Housewife Assassin Series Book 9) (2 page)

Hardy had just pulled in a whale of an account: an already well-funded terrorist group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or by its acronym, ISIL. Right now, its primary source of income is hostage ransoms.
 

The microdot has the deets about an imminent mission that takes place in some major city outside its usual ’hood. My employer, a CIA-sanctioned black-ops company known as Acme, wants to stop it before it happens.

Unfortunately for Hardy, late one night, he fell overboard.

Make that
pushed
–by Jack.

Had Hardy gone to the bottom of the sea, the mission would have ended right then and there–somewhere around Latitude N 55” 51’ by Longitude W 140” 37’. As luck would have it, he got pulled up in a trawler’s net, so now I’m here to help Jack finish the job he started. It’s my last gig before retirement.

“Yeah…okay.” For some reason, he finds it hard to believe.

That’s okay. I enjoy proving him wrong.

Kindly reader, if you presumed that the corpse herein referred to as my Dearly Departed was anyone previously known to you as
–
Carl Stone–let me set the record straight, here and now:

It is not.

Six weeks have passed since creepy Carl went overboard. In the meantime, acres of northern Pacific waters have been scoured by both boat and helicopter, and voluminous hours of satellite footage have been scrutinized for anything that may prove Carl survived the explosion that took place during his escape.

We’ve come up with zilch, nada, bupkes.

Yes, I am relieved too. Unlike Hardy here, Carl apparently made it to the bottom of the ocean.

Let us rejoice together–champagne, fireworks, dancing in the streets, the whole nine yards–but first things first–

I’ve got to get the hell out of here.

I jump off the table and look around. The room has no windows. “But…where will I go?”

“I hate to say it, but…”

I know why he paused: the morgue drawers
.
I’ve got no other choice than to hop into one.

Preferably empty.

I shudder at the thought that it will be anything but.

There are forty of them: twenty each on two facing walls, in rows of five drawers, stacked four high. I run to the far corner of the room. In the farthest column on the left wall, the three bottom drawers hold bodies. The two above them are empty, but I’d have to use the lower handles as steps to climb into one.

In the same column on the opposite wall, every drawer is occupied. In the column next to it, the top drawer is the only one empty, so it won’t do, either.

I run back to the other side of the room. Pay dirt! The very bottom drawer in the second column is empty. I leap into it, as if it is a luge and this is my one and only chance for Olympic gold, and scoot toward the wall. This is all the motion needed to give the drawer the momentum needed to slam shut.

And just in the nick of time.

Jack is relaying the morgue’s web cam feed into my wireless contacts and my ear bud, so that I can hear and see what is happening outside my drawer. Jerry stands in the threshold and looks around. Realizing that I’m nowhere to be found, he does a double-take, then cranes his neck down the hall.
 

Angrily, Widow Higginbotham pushes past him. Like me, she’s a platinum blonde. She’s also dressed in what passes for widow’s weeds these days: a black Versace dress that hugs her curves, black stiletto heels, and a hat with a veil.
 

I could claim that my ensemble was somewhat more innocent. Then again, sucking face with a corpse was a slutty thing to do.

By the way Jerry stares at Widow Higginbotham’s cleavage and heaving breasts, I’d say he agrees with me. She has got a rack on her that would make any male corpse rise up and take notice.

The one on the slab in front of her is already at full mast, so he doesn’t count.

She glances around the room warily. “I thought you said someone else was here too–and claiming to be me.”
 

He nods vigorously. “There was! Strange…”
 

Before he has a chance to do it for her, she unzips Hardy’s body bag and wrenches open his mouth. No doubt she sees the hole from the missing tooth. She raises her veil to get a better look. When she also notices the spiked tooth is missing its crown, she curses, and storms out of the room.

Jerry looks around one more time, then runs after her.

My teeth chatter as I ask, “Want to take bets that she wasn’t Hardy’s old lady?”
 

“Not a chance,” Jack murmurs. “In fact, I recognized her the moment she lifted her veil. She’s a Russian operative named Tatyana Zakharov. I owe her a bullet to the back of the head.”

Odd. He had never spoken of her to me. I rack my brain for some tidbit I may have heard, but it's no use. I can't think when I'm famished.

“Donna, listen up! Don’t–”

His audio and visual feeds are breaking up. Instead, I get a loud whistle in my ear.

I’d reach up and pull out the ear bud again, but the drawer doesn’t give me much room to maneuver. When I’m hungry, I’m cranky. When I’m cold, I’m cranky. And when I’m locked in a three-foot-by-seven-foot stainless steel refrigerator, I’m downright ornery. I ask my fearless mission team, “Hey, how soon can you get me out of here?”
 

No response.

“Hello? Jack? Arnie?”

Still, no response.

Instead, I hear the following, in this order:
 

The morgue door opening.

A woman’s voice, purring “No! You really don’t want to do that, do you?”

The whoosh of a bullet, silenced by a suppressor.

The thump of a dead weight, hitting the floor. I presume it is this Tatyana person.

Footsteps–Jack’s, I suppose, as he as moves through the room.

I holler, “Yo! Over here! And it’s about damn time!”

I listen as the drawer immediately left of me opens with a click.

“You’re getting warmer,” I jibe him impatiently.

When you’re inside a box made of stainless steel that is three-quarters of an inch thick, eight bullets from a semi-automatic hammering a wall next to your head makes you feel as safe as a piñata in a shooting gallery.

The fact that I’m still breathing means the bullets weren’t able to penetrate the drawer. I consider myself lucky.

The gun must have jammed, because the shooter lets loose with a litany of blush-worthy cusses, and the exclamation–“I don’t get paid enough for this crap!”–in Russian.

Really, I’ve given you a very loose interpretation of a phrase that uses a very common English word beginning with the letter
F
. I’m sure you agree with me that mine weighs lighter on sensitive ears.

Apparently, Tatyana is alive after all.
Does this mean she killed Jack?

The next click I hear is my drawer being opened and pulled out, and the next face I see is Tatyana’s. She’s holding a gun, and it’s pointed at me.

Rage blinds me to the reality of the situation: That her smirk indicates she’ll use it without any hesitation. And that I have nothing with me to defend myself against the woman who just killed the love of my life.

“Where is the tooth with the microdot?” she asks. British accent, veddy posh.

Ah, well, so much for the simple nicety of a formal introduction, perhaps one of the few things that separates us humans from other species.

Then, surely, I can be excused as my own animal instincts kick in. The fist holding the needle-nose pliers swings back over my head, stabbing her in her gut.

Her scream is a shrill squeal, akin to a bonobo in heat.

The bright red blood flowing out of her is the color of cherry Kool-Aid, but has the consistency of a glaze.

In other words, it’s made a mess of her chic black sheath.

Instinctively, she reaches for her wound. It’s only when she stares down at it, though, that the reality of her situation hits her. Shivers run through her body. Her eyes grow big and glassy. She grits her teeth and forces herself to shift her gaze directly at me–

And to take one more shot.

The only way to defend myself is to flip over and squeeze myself as far into the right side of the drawer as possible–

And just in the knick of time. The bullet slams into the left side of the drawer, only to ricochet up, hitting the drawer’s roof, then down–

Into my ass.

I groan from the pain.

Tatyana smiles, even as the light goes out of her eyes. As she slumps to the floor, the weight of her body shoves the drawer back into the wall.
 

I hear it click shut right before I pass out.

I’m awakened by the sound of my pounding heart.

I take that as a good sign.

“Doc, she’s coming to,” says Jack.

He’s speaking to Doctor Fleishman, I presume, who happens to be Acme’s around-the-clock no-questions-asked medicine man. He works out of an urgent care center in the building next to Acme’s, which picks up the tab for it, him, and his staff.

Just hearing Jack’s voice puts a smile on my face. And feeling his lips on mine is all the encouragement I need to attempt to open at least one eye again. He’s laid his head next to mine, so that we’re nose to nose and I’m staring into his sweet green peepers. The concern in his eyes is all I need to know I’ll be alright.

“Ouch,” I mutter.

“I’ll bet.” Jack is trying not to smile. “At least you took it where it could do the least damage.”

“I guess you’re right.” I crane my neck to see what the doctor is up to, but before I turn, Doctor Fleishman stops me with a gentle tap on the lucky cheek without the bullet hole. “Whoa! I’ve got a few more stitches to go!”

“Oh…sorry.” Blushing, I ease back down.
 

Time to change the subject. “Jack, what’s the prognosis on the Russian widow?”

Jack’s smile fades. “You pierced her pretty hard. She lost a lot of blood, and she’s still unconscious. The doc says it’ll be touch and go. We’ve got her under lock and key. The moment she wakes up, I’ll be questioning her.” He shrugs. “Abu is at the morgue, cleaning up after her.”

“I presume Jerry was DOA.”

“Sadly, yes.” Jack winces. “I wish I’d gotten there sooner.”

From behind me, Dr. Fleishman declares, “You’re good to go, Donna. I leave you with two souvenirs.” In one hand, he holds a pill cup. I look inside. It holds the bullet that pierced my rear. The other hand holds an inflatable donut–not the greatest fashion statement.

“Take it easy for the next couple of weeks,” Doctor Fleishman warns me.

“Will do,” I promise, as I ease myself off the gurney. Gingerly, I step forward. Pain pulses through me, but I force a smile through it as I make my way to the front door. “Now that I’m benched, per doctor’s orders, I guess it will make it easier for Ryan to learn to live without me when I formally turn in my resignation.”

“He’ll whine at first, but he’ll get over it,” Jack assures me.

“I didn’t realize I’m so easily replaceable.”

Jack raises a brow. “No one says you are. But you’ve made up your mind, and that’s that. Acme will have to go on without you.”
 

“I do feel right about it,” I insist.

“As you should,” he assures me. “Frankly, your timing couldn’t be better, with what seems to be coming down.”

“What do you mean by that?”

He shrugs. “Tatyana’s reappearance is not a good sign of things to come.”

“You mentioned that you have a history with her.”

“Just a couple of run-ins. She’s a former SVR sparrow. These days, she’s freelancing for the Quorum, which is why she was also coming for the microdot.”

“I see.” I pause.

Nothing else. Apparently, he doesn’t want to talk about it.

About
her.

“Nothing to worry your little head about.” He forces a smile on his lips. “As of now, you’re off the clock, right?”

We’re in a business in which some intel, even between lovers, is only divulged on a need-to-know basis. Apparently, Jack thinks this is one of those times.

I pretend to respect his wishes, and drop the matter.
 

Still, I wish my aim had been just a little bit better.
 

Chapter 2

Choosing a Theme for Your Party

Throwing a posh soirée? Give it a theme!
 

For example, choose a decade. How about the nineteen-thirties? Hand out tin cups to your guests, put Ruth Etting and Ethel Waters blues albums on your retro turntable, and wear chiffon dresses with cap sleeves (to cover up your jiggly batwings). As for food and drink, make revelers stand in a soup line, and dole out gin you really made in your bathtub, out of pure grain alcohol and juniper berry juice (as opposed to holly berries, which may turn your party into a wake for the first to imbibe). Talk about authenticity!

Another example: commemorate a movie. For example, you can have fun with Hitchcock’s “The Birds.” Stage your living room with taxidermic crows. Invite your guests to put their hair up in a French twist and to dress in jacketed sheaths, like Tippi Hedren. Your buffet can include hard-boiled eggs and roast quail. For authenticity, hire a falconer and have him do tricks with his trained peregrine–