The Hitman's Last Job by Max Freedom Page A

you’re coming
with us,”
And Jorge
grinned maniacally.
~
It was early
morning. Carl was walking through the streets of the little town on
the edge of St Louis while constantly looking over his shoulder.
The anxiety was unbearable and although he knew that it was
unlikely the Don and his men would know where he was, he knew that
it wouldn’t be long until they did. He turned around to check he
wasn’t being followed one last time and then swerved into a women’s
clothing store. If he was seen buying women’s clothes they’d know
he had Anna and he’d be a dead man for sure. He felt the ridiculous
need to dive in amongst the clothes racks but tried to retain some
composure. He quickly picked out some basic underwear, half a dozen
comfortable looking t-shirts, sweaters and a few pairs of leggings
before taking them up to the counter.
    “ Oooh is it someone’s birthday?” the attractive sales assistant
asked as she began to ring through the clothes.
    “ My girlfriend’s,” he lied smoothly and the word stuck in his
head and sounded strange as he said it. It didn’t seem weird to
think of Anna as his girlfriend but it was strangely
comforting.
He felt
slightly dizzy as he paid and left the store. Things had moved so
fast and so dramatically that he felt as though he was dreaming. He
raced back to the motel and found Anna watching TV with a scared
look on her face.
    “ What is it?” he said as he placed the bags down beside
her.
Her hair was
tumbling down over her pale naked body and she was staring wide
eyed at the television. She pointed weakly to the screen.
    “ Look,” she whimpered. “Do you think it’s a warning of some
kind?”
Carl sat down
beside her. A news report was blaring loudly and he could see the
female reporter standing in front of a burning building. Her words
hit him fast:
    “ I’m standing here at the Sleep Eazy Motel in Chicago’s south
side, where a mysteriously set alight fire in the middle of the
night took the lives of 6 guests as they slept, and 2 members of
staff,”
Carl felt his
hands begin to shake and he gripped the bedsheets to steady
himself.
    “ This is more than a warning,” he grimaced. “This is a preview.
We need to move….and now,”
The couple
quickly set into motion as they packed up their belongings and Anna
threw on some clean clothes. She didn’t think that she had ever
worn new clothes in her life, she was always given her cousin’s
hand me downs. The feel of the new labels and freshness of the
fabric was new to her. She breathed in the smell as Carl closed to
door behind them. The TV was left on in the background and as they
ran across the parking lot Anna could still hear the news
reporter.
    “ We’ve had many acts of arson in this state in recent years but
nothing on a scale like this. The police have declined to
comment,”
~
Jorge had got
the details from the internet kid and was now sitting in his Buick
while admiring his new shoes. He had a real penchant for snakeskin
boots and these were super fine. He bent down to graze his fingers
over the purple scales and they felt divine. Quickly turning his
attention back to the house he saw there was still no movement.
This was the boring part of the job, the waiting, the boredom. It
was a job of two worlds - either hectic, villainous excitement or
just waiting.
He flicked
open his lighter and lit a cigarette. Something about the way
Zippo’s burned always pleased him and he remembered the smell of
the motel walls from last night as they peeled down in flames
before his eyes. Arson wasn’t his favorite act of violence. He
thought it would maybe come second to slashing. He sat in his car
and remembered his childhood fondly; summers in Puerto Rico with
his grandparents, and cold winters in Chicago in a neighbourhood he
pretty much had free reign over.
One of his
favorite hobbies was to torch random people’s cars just to watch
the ensuing chaos. But that fun came to an end when he set fire to
a young