Naughty Page 6

  The woman cleared her throat and spat, then said, “Who are you?”

  Hammett shook her head. “You’re confused. I’m the one who asks the questions.”

  Hammett reached over to the sniper’s bound hands, stretched out one of her fingers, and bent it until it snapped.

  The woman screamed. Dogs howled.

  “Did you get plastic surgery to look like me?”

  The sniper looked at her, defiant. “No. I was going to ask you the same thing.”

  “The only work I’ve had done are these,” Hammett patted her breasts.

  “ They look good.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I always wondered what I’d look like with bigger tits. I guess now I know.”

  This had to be one of the more surreal interrogations Hammett had ever conducted. Like asking questions of herself in the mirror. “Why do you look like me?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve got as many questions as you do.”

  “But I’m asking the questions.”

  “Fine. You’ve established that. So will you let me tell you something rather than asking?”

  “Technically that was a question, but go ahead.”

  “I was adopted.”

  Hammett had also been adopted. Could the sniper really be her sister?

  Now it made more sense why Heath thought they knew each other. He’d banged this woman in Vegas, and had confused Hammett for her.

  “Who sent you?” Hammett asked.

  The woman hesitated, then said, “We’re obviously related. And by the way you came at me, I’m guessing we had similar training. If so, you know I’ve been trained to resist interrogation for as long as possible, because I know when it’s over I’ll be killed. But something isn’t right here. You’re obviously my sister, or a clone. And I don’t know why I was sent to kill you.”

  “Who sent you?”

  “I’m Clancy. I work for a government organization called Hydra. I was sent by my handler, who I never met. He’s just a voice on the phone. Codename: Isaac.”

  It was a lot for Hammett to absorb. This woman—probably related—had the same training and worked for the same group.

  “Who trained you?” Hammett asked.

  “He didn’t have a name. I knew him as The Instructor.”

  Curiouser and curiouser. “How did you know where to find me?”

  “I arrived in San Diego yesterday. Isaac called, gave me your location at the rental car place. I followed you to the shop.”

  “What were your orders?”

  “Sanction, with extreme prejudice. But I was told to stay at least a hundred meters away at all times. Now I know why.”

  Because up close, you’d realize you were killing your sister.

  Targets didn’t have faces or features through a scope. They were just walking bullseyes. But Isaac was apparently worried about a face-to-face meet.

  Hammett asked more questions, and Clancy answered. When there was nothing left to say, Hammett took the scalpel from her pocket and did what she needed to do.

  “It’s only called a safe house when it’s safe,” The Instructor said. “If it isn’t, flee.”

  The flight to Atlanta had cost six hundred bucks. But Clancy, like Hammett, sewed money into the seams of her clothing, and Hammett had enough for the plane ticket, a mediocre airport Denver omelet, and taxi fare to her safe house in Buckhead, with a bit left over.

  Knowing her former employer was gunning for her made Hammett edgy, and returning to one of her safe houses was a risky move. But there was only one way to call off the hit—kill Isaac. Even if he wanted a truce, she’d never trust the bastard again. But Hammett didn’t know where Isaac was, or even who Isaac was. Only one person in the world, other than Isaac, had that information.

  The Instructor.

  Of course, like Isaac, The Instructor was also an enigma. Or so he thought. Because Hammett had figured out how to find The Instructor.

  The problem was that the key to finding him was at her Atlanta safe house. And there was a high likelihood Isaac had a reception planned for her when she arrived.

  Hammett had the cab drop her off two blocks from her address, in front of a drug store. Inside she bought a Braves baseball cap, a windbreaker, a box cutter, and some cheap mirror sunglasses, and a Chipwich, since she’d been gypped out of the last one back in San Diego.

  She put on the hat and glasses, and while eating the ice cream she took a circuitous path to her apartment, spiraling in one block at a time, taking everything in. She pretended to be talking into her stolen cell phone while she walked, stopping often to yell nonsense into it while she was actually checking out parked cars, open windows, and people on the street. When Clancy failed to check in, that would raise red flags with Isaac. If he was smart—and all indications pointed to him being just that—he’d send a team this time instead of a lone hitter. So besides paying attention to singles, Hammett also focused on pairs.

  Was that really two guys arguing sports, or were they killers waiting for her to show up?

  Was that couple holding hands really married, or were they on the lookout?

  This type of recon was slow and arduous, but in the cat and mouse game the odds were better if you played the cat. Hammett wanted to spot them before they spotted her, and that meant taking her time and being careful. But even as careful as she was being, she almost missed it.

  Just fifty meters in front of her house, standing at the bus stop across the street; a woman, wearing jeans and a white poncho wrap which made her upper body shapeless, a floppy sunhat, and sunglasses.

  Reflective sunglasses, just like Hammett wore.

  The woman spotted Hammett a moment after Hammett spotted her. They stared at each other for a moment as cars passed between them. Hammett knew this woman was after her, knew she was armed, and wished she’d had a more substantial weapon than a drugstore box cutter, having ditched her guns before boarding the flight. She had a weapon cache in another part of town, in a safe deposit box in a bank in Five Points, but her ID for that box was in her safe house. Bringing a box cutter to a gunfight was just plain stupid, and Hammett was considering sprinting away when the woman did something unusual. She shrugged, held out her palms, and mouthed, “What are you doing?”

  Almost as if she recognizes me. Does she think I’m Clancy?

  Clancy had spilled her guts about many things during their time together, but she hadn’t mentioned working with another female assassin.

  The woman in the poncho began to cross the street, but Hammett didn’t detect any threat in her gait or posture. Hammett matched her nonchalant stance, and was grateful she had the sunglasses on because as the women neared, Hammett got even more confused.

  This woman looks exactly like me.

  She immediately wondered if it was Clancy, but that was impossible.

  Which meant this had to be yet another twin.

  Make that triplets.

  Hydra.

  Hammett considered the name of her secret government organization. A hydra was a mythical Greek dragon with seven heads. Why seven? Could Hydra have actually trained seven identical women to be operatives?

  Hammett bit the inside of her cheek, hard enough to draw blood, and let some dribble down her lips. When the twin approached, Hammett dropped to one knee, feigning an injury. A moment later she was being helped up and led to a car parked on the corner, a Chevy rental. The woman helped Hammett into the passenger seat, then got behind the wheel and buckled up.

  “Hit me from behind,” Hammett said.

  “Isaac said she was good. Did you finish her?”

  Hammett nodded and then coughed, spattering the windshield with blood.

  “Where are you hit?”

  “Hospital,” Hammett mumbled.

  The woman pulled into traffic. “When did you change your clothes?”

  Hammett had the box cutter to her neck a heartbeat later.

  “Drive cautiously, no sudden movements.”

 
The woman stayed calm. “You’re not Ludlum.”

  Hammett patted her down, took a Glock 17 from under her poncho, a cell phone, and a Zippo lighter. She did a quick pull of the Glock’s slide to make sure it was loaded, then pressed that into the woman’s armpit. “No. I’m, Hammett, your target.”

  The woman began to laugh. “Hammett? As in Dashiell?”

  “Yeah. And your partner’s name is Ludlum? I assume after Robert.”

  “Makes sense. Whoever created Hydra must have liked thriller writers. I’m Forsyth. As in Fredrick, who wrote Day of the Jackal.”

  Hammett thought of Clancy. Tom Clancy. Their codenames were all spy authors.

  “Where do you want me to drive?”

  “Turn up here.”

  “Right? On Alberta?”

  “Yes.”

  “You look exactly like me and Ludlum. You’re our sister.”

  Hammett didn’t reply.

  “So what did you do for blood?” Forsyth asked. She seemed much calmer than Clancy had been. Then again, she wasn’t hogtied and having her fingers broken. “Bite the inside of your cheek? I used a variation on that trick once, in Istanbul. Spit the blood in a man’s eye to blind him.”

  “Where is Ludlum?”

  Forsyth made a right turn, her driving slow and steady. “We split up two hours ago. Supposed to text each other whenever someone enters your apartment.”

  “She’s covering the back.”

  A nod. “If it matters, when we took this job we didn’t know you were our sister. We wouldn’t have taken it if we’d known.”

  “But when you got close enough to me, you would have figured it out.”

  “We weren’t supposed to get close. Orders. We rigged your apartment with C-4.”

  “Sensor?”

  “No. We were told you were good enough to spot it. Manual detonation, once you went in.”

  Hammett hadn’t found a detonator on Forsyth. “The cell phone? Dial a bomb?”

  “No. The lighter. Don’t open it unless you want your place destroyed.”

  “Wouldn’t want that. I’ve got thousands invested in my clothes.”

  Forsyth looked at Hammett, then began to laugh. Hammett had said it because she’d sewn hundred dollar bills into every outfit, and apparently Forsyth did the same and got the joke.

  “How are you supposed to know when I entered the apartment?” Hammett was curious. Her window shades were drawn, the lights off. She’d been planning on slipping in and out in less than thirty seconds.

  “Ludlum has a scancorder.”

  Hammett had heard of scancorders. They were allegedly devices that used microwaves and Doppler radar to detect a human heartbeat from many meters away, including through walls and concrete. Developed in the private sector to search for earthquake victims in rubble, the military applications were obvious.

  “I didn’t think those existed yet,” Hammett said.

  “Officially, they don’t. Unofficially, they’re cool as hell.”

  She was chatty for someone about to die. Maybe it had to do with working with a partner for a few years. Hammett had always been a lone wolf. She preferred it that way.

  “Have you and Ludlum always worked together?”

  “Only for the past three years.”

  “Recruited by The Instructor?”

  Another nod. “You’re Hydra, too?”

  Hammett stayed quiet.

  “Why does Isaac want you dead?” Forsyth asked.

  “I had some personal business to attend to. He considered it going rogue.”

  “Isaac’s an asshole.”

  That was an understatement. It was also personal. If Forsyth had Hammett’s training, she’d been taught to offer nothing. Yet both Clancy and Forsyth had given up a lot of intel with very little persuasion. Was it their hope Hammett wouldn’t kill them, because they looked alike and were trying to bond?

  Or did they actually feel a bond?

  Hammett had felt something like a bond with Heath. Enough of one to not kill him when she probably should have. But she didn’t know what it was like to chat with a sister. Without wanting to, Hammett thought of her terrible childhood, and suddenly felt an urge to ask Forsyth about hers. Had she had decent parents, rather than a psycho? Friends? Normal relationships?

  Hammett had spent her high school prom beating a rival gang member to death with a bike chain, which probably wasn’t something many seventeen year old girls could claim. What would it have been like to grow up normal?

  “Mathieson is coming up. Left or right?” Forsyth asked.

  “Neither. Pull into the next alley, where you call your sister and tell her to bring the bomb in my apartment.”

  “She won’t listen. She’ll know I’ve been compromised.”

  Hammett knew she could force Forsyth to make the call, but the problem remained. Any weird calls from Forsyth, and Ludlum would be on alert, and much harder to subdue. Besides, even with a weapon, it wasn’t easy to maintain control over one person, let alone two. Especially when both had training. Even as Forsyth drove, seemingly at ease, Hammett could see the wheels turning in her sister’s head, plotting how to get out of this situation.

  The smart move would be to kill Forsyth, impersonate her, and get close enough to Ludlum to kill her as well.

  “You’ll need help eliminating Isaac,” Forsyth said, no doubt trying to remain essential while knowing her minutes were numbered. “Ludlum and I can help. We’ve been thinking about leaving Hydra for a while. If Isaac is a hard target, a team will have better odds. Do you still want me to pull into an alley? There’s one behind the Quickie Dry Cleaning.”

  Something pinged in Hammett’s brain. The things Forsyth said among the banter.

  Right? On Alberta? Mathieson is coming up. Quickie Dry Cleaning.

  Forsyth was telling Ludlum their location.

  Hammett grabbed Forsyth’s scalp by the hair, checked the right ear, then yanked her head over and checked the left, finding the earpiece.

  Shit. They’d been in constant contact, and Ludlum had heard everything. Hammett needed to—

  Forsyth made a grab for the gun at the same time she hit the brakes. Hammett bounced off the dashboard, still gripping the Glock. Forsyth—who’d been smart enough to not only play Hammett, but to also put on her seatbelt—wrenched Hammett’s wrist and made her drop the gun, which bounced onto the floor of the Chevy.

  Hammett drove an elbow into her twin’s nose, breaking it, and then head-butted her in the temple. Human beings had evolved to take head-on punishment well, but they didn’t do so good when hit in the side. Hammett’s head was fine, but Forsyth’s brain smacked the inside of her skull, bringing instant unconsciousness.

  Forsyth’s body went slack, and the car began to roll, picking up speed as it went down an incline toward the intersection. Hammett was reaching for the passenger door when the Chevy rear-ended the trailer of a semi-truck at the stoplight.

  Both airbags exploded, pinning Hammett in her seat. The white propellant powder hung in the air like smoke, clogging Hammett’s nostril and burning her lungs. She found the handle, shoved the door open, and plopped into the street on all fours—

  —just as a gun was pressed to the back of her skull.

  “Hello, Sis. Face down on the street. Now.”

  Disoriented from the car ride, Hammett still couldn’t help but wonder why Ludlum hadn’t killed her immediately. Not that she planned to complain.

  Hammett raised her hands as if surrendering, and then executed a move she’d practiced so often it was practically automatic; she knocked the gun away from her head with her right hand and caught it in both, twisted her body while pointing it away, and pulled Ludlum to the street, face-first.

  Ludlum tried to roll onto her side as they wrestled for the weapon, but Hammett had leverage, and strength, and kept applying pressure until her sister’s grip gave and the gun fell to the ground.

  Hammett searched for it, then catching movement in her peripheral vi
sion, she bunched her shoulder to take a kick that was meant for her head.

  Forsyth. That was the problem with knocking someone out. Eventually they woke up.

  Hammett rolled smoothly to her feet and reached into her belt for the box cutter. A kick caught her in the side. The cutter skittered across the pavement.

  “You chipped a tooth,” Forsyth said, fists in front of her and shuffling on the balls of her feet. “And I thought we were bonding so well.”

  Movement to her left. Ludlum, scrambling for the dropped gun. Hammett did a quick cartwheel, kicked the Glock away, and hit Ludlum with a right cross.

  Ludlum blocked, then tried a leg sweep, which Hammett jumped over. She looked right, saw Forsyth moving in, muay thai style. To her left, Ludlum adopted a taekwondo back L-stance.

  “You girls want to surrender?” Hammett asked.

  They attacked as one, Forsyth with a flying elbow, Ludlum with a side spinning kick. If they’d both connected, Hammett would have been knocked horizontal. But Hammett threw herself into a back handspring, coming up on her feet in time to block a right cross and a spin kick. She backpedaled, ass hitting the rental car, and turned sideways just as Forsyth smashed her foot through the passenger window. Hammett scooped the woman up, WWE style, and body slammed her onto the pavement.

  Ludlum threw a knee at Hammett’s face, but Hammett dropped and shoved upward, sending Ludlum soaring overhead. Then she moved to stomp on Forsyth’s head, but Forsyth was already kipping up to her feet. Hammett lashed out with her palm, clipping Forsyth in the chin, and then dropped down on all fours to search for the Glock. It had been kicked under the rental car, far out of reach.

  Time to run.

  Getting back to her feet, Hammett sprinted toward the truck Forsyth’s car had rammed into. The driver was standing outside of his open door, mouth agape as he stared at the spectacle. She rushed him, clipped him under the jaw, and then swung herself up into the cab of his semi and locked the doors. Then she studied the control console.

  No keys. The driver had taken his keys from the ignition before getting out.

  Hammett checked both side mirrors, saw Forsyth approaching on the right, and Ludlum on the left. Ludlum had found her gun.

  Hammett quickly searched the cab for a weapon, but there were too many shelves and compartments and boxes. Eyes scanning upward, she saw a skylight on the roof, the windows hinged to double as an emergency exit. Hammett climbed onto the bed, undid the locks, and pulled herself up.