“Fuck, no!” I stood up from the windowsill and yelled loud enough that she jumped. “I’m sorry! Shit!…But, no, Lia—no! I’d never hurt you; I swear.”
Even as the words flowed from my mouth, I wondered if they were true. How could I guarantee that to her, considering what I’d done in the past? I wasn’t even sure if I could manage to keep her safe through what was to come. Even if she decided to get as far away from me as possible, she was likely already in danger.
“But you…you shoot people? That’s your job?”
“Yeah.” I nodded. “I mean, I have to pick the right spot, the right timing and all that, but in the end, I’m not paid for the recon, I’m paid for the hit.”
“You do this for the mafia? That’s the mob, right?”
“Yeah,” I said, “and yeah, it is.”
“The Chicago mafia?”
I nodded again.
“That’s real?”
A laugh escaped through my nose.
“Yeah, it’s real. It’s not quite the way it ends up portrayed in the movies but real enough.”
“Who do you…um…” Lia paused a moment, and I saw her throat bob again. “Who do you kill?”
“Anyone my boss tells me to,” I said. “Mostly, anyway. Sometimes there are others.”
“Others?”
“Yeah, like when I need someone else out of the way to get to my target—sometimes I’ll kill them, too.”
“Do you get paid for those as well?”
“No, they aren’t on my roll.”
“Roll?”
“Kill roll,” I told her. “My list of people who I’m supposed to kill.”
“Your…your to-do list?”
“Something like that,” I laughed. I had never thought of it like that, but it was as accurate as any other analogy.
She looked away from me, her eyes focused on absolutely nothing interesting across the room, obviously not finding anything humorous in the conversation. She swallowed and closed her eyes for a moment.
“How many?” she whispered.
“How many are on the list now?”
She shook her head and took in a long breath.
“How many people have you…have you killed?” Her eyes moved back to mine as she waited for the answer.
It was my turn to look away. I licked my lips and tried to find words that would make anything any better, but I was way past lying now. It wouldn’t make sense; she already knew everything.
“I have no idea,” I admitted.
“A lot, though, right?”
“A lot,” I agreed. I’d never bothered to keep track though I probably could have come up with a relatively precise number if I thought about it long enough. I didn’t really care to do that and figured even estimating what had to be approaching a hundred people over the last three years of working for Moretti wasn’t going to help my position with Lia now.