Ebony Makepeace is Dead

1. The Shooter

1

THE SHOOTER

She hunched over the table. Her long, dark, dank hair formed a curtain around the sides of her face. She wrote furtively, checking every few minutes to see if anyone was watching. I caught her eye; a glimpse of despair emanated from the wide, brown spheres. She turned away from my gaze. Head down, hunched over her secret, she kept writing.

I sauntered over to the table and sat down opposite her. She smelled of musk, a pleasant musk, not mouldy or stale as I had imagined. Her clothes, although dated and worn, were clean. She was writing with a pencil so badly chewed on the end, that the lead protruded through the ragged pieces of wood. Her fists clenched and her knuckles whitened. She kept writing. Her head was so low over her work, that the hair curtain now covered the front of her face.

I cleared my throat. ‘Nice bit of rain we are having.’

She ignored me. It wasn’t the ignoring that stunk of arrogance; it was different, as if she didn’t hear me. I sat for a few more minutes watching her, her head almost resting on the table.

I’d watched her come to this café most mornings for two weeks. The café had a nice ambience, not my scene. I am a trendy fellow, and this place was, well, mundane. There was nothing about its décor to set it apart from any other café on a suburban strip. But something drew her to it. The staff perhaps?

With my right hand, I reached into my jacket and slid the small gun out from its hiding place. Resting it on my lap, I touched the tip to make sure the silencer was still attached. I would wait for the right moment.

This was the second time I’d been told to kill someone. She was my target. The instructions were brief, but clear. I was expected to point the gun that hid on my lap at her abdomen, pull the trigger, put the gun back in my jacket, and walk away.

The security cameras would record me approaching her table, would watch as I attempted small talk and would take no heed when I got up from the table to leave. They would not identify me because my disguise had me looking so ordinary, no one would look twice. But this was conjecture, I hadn’t pulled the trigger yet. She raised her head and stared through my disguise into my soul.

‘Why do you think you can encroach on my space?’ she hissed. ‘I am using every ounce of strength I can muster to prevent myself from leaning over the table and slapping your smug, superior expression. Go away, leave me alone.’

The menace she tried to force into her voice struggled to find its way out. Instead, she was left with a rasp that bordered on a whisper. Her intent was clear, however: she wanted me away from her, to leave her alone. But that was not for her to say.

‘I don’t know what you have done,’ I whispered across the table. ‘You may not know either, but you have pissed off someone powerful. Don’t speak. Listen.’

A glimmer of fear washed over her face, and she nodded ever so slightly.

‘Under the table, I have a loaded gun fitted with a silencer, pointed at your abdomen. You should have started bleeding three minutes ago.’

She frowned; confusion burrowed its way into her eyes.

‘The only way you will live is to pretend you are dead. I am going to shoot you. I won’t shoot to kill, but I do have to shoot you. I’m going to smile at you, a nasty, vindictive, self-satisfied smile, and when I get up to walk away, you will drop your head to the table. If you’re unnoticed, fall off the chair onto the floor. Chaos will ensue. They will call an ambulance. If you are not unconscious, pretend to be. When my employers look over the camera footage, they will see I’ve done my job and you’ve collapsed on the floor, presumed dead. Or, at the very least, dying. If you don’t follow my instructions, we will both die.

‘I will organise your death.’ I raised my index fingers and indicated quotation marks around the word death. ‘Just do as I say. You will see me soon.’

She stared into my very being.

I squeezed the trigger.