The Agent
The last time I had knots in my stomach was my first field assignment. Like this one, it was a simple task: identify and apprehend a criminal hiding out in a bar. I remember wondering if I was really built to be an FBI agent - to carry the torch my father once held so fondly.
Now, as I stood in the shadows of a two star motel, I was practically back to square one. Only this time I wasn’t wondering if I could uphold the law, rather, I was wondering if I could break it.
We’d gone over the plan a million and one times on the plane ride back to the states and the road trip to Florida. Maria was going to distract the plainclothes cops watching the target’s room while I snuck inside and took care of him.
The most versatile option for the kill was strangulation with a rope. They chose leather to prevent any defense wounds appearing on the target’s hands. Once he was dead, I needed to string him up with the same rope to make it look like he hung himself.
With the stress of being in witness protection and possibly facing time if his deals fell through, the authorities likely wouldn’t question it.
Watching Mateo and Maria initially discuss the plan was almost like being back in my field office, going over tactics with Gabriel and our colleagues. Each thought was technical and strategic.
The only difference was there was no determination or conviction in either of their voices. They spoke almost as if they were going over the directions in a cookbook. Not as if they were about to take someone’s life.
I kept trying to understand their apathy. Tried to mimic it myself when I inserted myself in the conversation. Yet, with every mention of death, my stomach clenched.
The sight of Maria’s signal, a discrete lift of her heel, revealing the red bottom brought me back into reality.
Shaking off the discomfort in my stomach, I jogged across the small sidewalk and pressed myself against our target’s room door. I pressed the key Maria had programmed against the knob and pushed down on the handle once the light above it turned green.
Quietly, I slipped into the room. Inside was larger than the others on the property, specially designed as a suite for witnesses the county’s police often held here.
The tiny hall was dark, leading further into a living area with a small couch and an adjacent kitchenette. A voice bounced around the empty walls.
I followed it, keeping my body close to the wall. The sound led me to the cracked bedroom door. Molding myself against the wood, I peered through the crack.
A man in a pair of striped pajama pants and a white tee shirt stood in front of the window with a phone to his ear.
Stripes of gray decorated his dark hair, and freckles sprinkled over his tanned skin.
“I know, honey,” he murmured, his voice soft.
“I miss you so much too. No, I’m not sure when I’ll be home.
There’s some important business Daddy needs to take care of first.”
My chest tightened. He didn’t seem like a criminal. Not with such gentleness in his voice and the frown I could see from his reflection in the mirror. He was just a man who’d made some bad decisions. It was almost unfair he had to die like this because of them.
“Don’t worry,” he spoke again. “Everything is going to be okay. Yes…yes, I promise. Alright, honey, you’ve gotta get some rest. You have school in the morning. I love you.” He chuckled at the tiny voice coming through the other end. “Goodnight, honey.”
Sighing, he lowered the phone and ended the call. He stared out the window for a few moments, consumed in his own thoughts.
His stagnancy gave me the opportunity to sneak up behind him, wrapping the ends of the rope around my knuckles. He didn’t even get a chance to notice another reflection accompanying his in the window before the rope was flying over his head and curling around his throat.
Gasping, he stumbled backwards from the pressure. His hands raced to the leather around his throat, clawing desperately at the material.
I pulled the rope tighter, erasing any gaps between the rope and his neck.
“Please,” he croaked as his knees went out from under him. His blue eyes, bulging with fear, looked up at me. “Don’t…”
My brows pinched at his desolate expression. The pleas in his gaze weren’t for himself. They were for his daughter. His family.
I didn’t want to care. I shouldn’t. But, the tone of his voice as he spoke to her echoed through my mind. It reminded me of my own father’s voice the last time we spoke.
Taking away someone else’s father the same way another took mine made my stomach roll.
He must’ve seen the hesitation flash across my face. Moving quickly, he jutted his elbow back and shoved the sharp bone straight in my shin.
Distracted from the pain, I unintentionally loosened my grip on the rope.
He took the moment to suck in a breath and crank his elbow back again. This time, he hit me in the ribs.
The blow caught me off guard, and I stepped backwards from the impact.
My target ducked his head from out underneath the rope, freeing himself from the hold. He scrambled across the floor towards the open bedroom doorway.
Before he could reach it, a black gun emerged, aimed directly at his head. “Where did you think you were going?” Mateo’s deep voice came from the other side.
Startled, the target stumbled backwards and landed on his ass. He pushed himself backwards as Mateo strolled into the room. “Please,” he started to beg again. “Don’t do this! I have a little girl and she’s sick and she needs-”
“I don’t give a fuck,” Mateo replied, his voice void of any emotion. He nodded at me without sparing a glance in my direction. “Finish it,” he demanded.
I twirled the ends of the rope tighter around my fist as I approached our target, hoping the pain would distract me from the discomfort in my stomach.
“Wait, wait,” the man said, turning his head to me.
“Please! I didn’t have any other choice!
They were going to put me in jail, and my daughter…
” He sat up on his knees and clasped his hands in front of them.
Tears dripped down his face as he continued.
“She’s not well. I’m all she has. She needs me. ”
I tore my eyes away from his pitiful expression and looked up at Mateo.
His gaze was on me, empty yet tense. Not a word the man said moved him. I didn’t know why I expected it would. I’m sure he’s heard far worse sob stories than this.
Hands grabbed at my legs, and I looked down, noticing the man clutching my calves. “Please,” he whispered, his eyes turning red from his cries. “I’ll…I’ll do whatever they want. Just don’t…don’t do this.”
I opened and closed my mouth, unsure how to respond. My heart ached for his situation - for his child - but this wasn’t my call.
I had no authority over the consequences of his actions. I was just the messenger carrying them out. I hadn’t expected the weight to be so heavy.
The rope was yanked out of my hands before I could utter a response.
Without hesitation, Mateo looped the rope around the man’s neck and tied a tight noose around his neck. He used the loose end like a leash and tugged him across the floor towards the high windowsill. “Grab the chair from the dining room,” Mateo commanded, ignoring our target’s pleas.
I only stared, horrified at the scene happening in front of me. There was absolutely no regard for this man’s life. He might as well have been a puppet on a string with the way he was dragging him.
Mateo shook his head at my insubordination. He threaded the other end of the rope around the curtain rail. Wrapping both hands around the rope, he yanked the rope down.
The man’s legs flailed as his feet raised off of the floor. With every second he spent kicking and squirming, more color faded from his face. Moments dragged on like hours until finally, his body went completely limp.