How the Hitman Stole Christmas
“In my line of work, an online presence is discouraged. The internet makes it very easy to find information about people. We prefer to keep to the shadows.”
I try—and fail—to bite back a smile as I drag my hand through the bubbly water. “You sound like an old curmudgeon.”
“Bah humbug,” he deadpans.
I look over at him and grin. “How old are you, anyway?”
“I’m 32. What about you?”
“I’m 24. A smidge younger.”
“That’s Nora’s age,” he says. “You must have been young when you moved to Syracuse with the cheater.”
He draws another smile out of me. “Is that what we’re calling him? I could tell you his name.”
“Nah, the cheater is sufficient. Brady’s going to be ‘the asshole’ when we’re looking back at him, in case you were wondering.”
“The cheater and the asshole,” I echo, nodding. “I can accept those. What are you?”
“The thief,” he says, only halfway joking.
I shouldn’t smile at him when it’s so true, but I do anyway. “I like ‘the captor’ better.” I miss a beat, pulling some water and bubbles closer to my body. “Are you a thief? Is that your… job?”
“If that’s what I need to be,” he says, rather evasively.
“What does that mean?”
“My job isn’t just one thing. You could say I’m a jack-of-all-trades when it comes to criminal pursuits. I can lie, cheat, steal, kill—whatever a job requires of me.”
He says that so casually, my heart jumps into my throat. I try not to let it show. I doubt he’ll open up to me if it seems like I’m judging him. “Oh. That’s some arsenal you have.” I glance over to see how he takes my remark.
He doesn’t say anything, but he’s watching me closely. I know one wrong step will shut down any possibility of new information.
I don’t want that. Maybe it’s cat-killing curiosity, but I want to know more about him and the life he leads. I know he’s not right for me and I know nothing can really happen between us, but maybe if he explained why, the thought would stop flitting through my mind.
If I saw a beautiful scorpion treading sand in the desert, I might stop to look at it, but I wouldn’t try to take it home with me.
“Is it hard? Doing that kind of work?”
Jasper shrugs, still watching me. “Is it hard to do your job?”
My job?
“No,” I say, laughing a little. “No, it’s not hard to do my job, but it sounds like my job is a lot easier than yours. How do you even get a job like that? You said you have a boss, so I guess you work for someone.”
“I can’t talk about that,” he says, almost apologetically.
“I wasn’t asking for specific details, I was just curious. What kind of person employs that kind of… jack-of-all-trades?”
“The dangerous kind.”
“I figured that.” I gather a mountain of fragrant bubbles in my hand, focusing on them instead of looking at him. “Is he a bad guy?”
“Everyone’s a bad guy to somebody,” he answers. “I don’t think he’s a bad guy, but there are plenty who would disagree. Personally, I wouldn’t work for him if I thought he was a bad guy. He was just born into a certain lifestyle and it’s not the kind you can really get out of. He embraced it, used the tools at his disposal to keep his family safe. I understand it. If I had the opportunity to straddle both worlds the way he does, I would too.”
“Are you… Were you… Is it a lifestyle you can’t get out of?”
“Not the way it is for him.” He sits forward, still eyeing me. “Just as an example, say I worked for the mafia. Not saying I do, just…”
“An example,” I say quickly, nodding. “I get it.”
“He was born into it. There’s no way out for him. He’s the boss until someone kills him or his son takes over, and he has a very expensive, very skilled army of men around him to ensure no one’s gonna kill him.”
“Like you.”
He nods once. “Like me. But I’m just that—an employee. The king has a life sentence, he reigns whether he wants to or not. But the king’s men… there’s a little more wiggle room there.”
“So you could quit if you wanted to.”
“Technically, I probably could. It’s not the kind of job where you put in a two week notice and then you’re on your way, but say things changed and I decided I wanted out of the life. The people I work for are reasonable. They would very likely try to find a way to make that happen for me. The problem is, I’m the guy that does the dirty work, not the one who lives in a $40 million mansion with a fortress around my house. I’ve dirtied my hands plenty over the years and made a lot of enemies. For the most part, no one messes with me now, but it’s because I work for who I work for. If I didn’t anymore, all those people I’ve crossed, the ones that are still alive or the ones nursing a grudge over people I’ve killed… well, maybe then they come after me. Protection is a two-way street as long as I’m doing what I’m doing. I protect the boss and his interests, my association to him protects me.”