I was almost convinced that it was all coming to fruition now, that word did get out about what Izabel knew, after all. I thought perhaps the bounty was so high because several ‘high-profile’ clients all chipped in and hired The Order to find her. But still, it did not make sense to me why, if someone held that many powerful lives in the palms of her hands, she would be wanted alive.
And then something else occurred to me.
I turned my head to see my sister.
“You said Niklas and I are also wanted alive?” I asked.
She nodded. “Yes. That is the condition.” She laughed lightly under her breath, and shook her head. “Brant wasn’t happy when he found out about this. He wanted you dead more than anyone—he could’ve killed you once. I was there; he had you in the sights of his scope; he almost pulled the trigger.” She sighed and looked back out ahead of her. “I think maybe he would’ve if I hadn’t reminded him that if he killed you, they’d come after him next. For a moment, I knew he didn’t care about that; he was going to do it anyway. But at the last second, he moved his finger from the trigger and packed the rifle away. He didn’t speak to me for two days. He didn’t speak to anyone for two days.”
A question I had been asking myself since I set up in Boston and began conducting hits of my own outside of The Order, had finally been answered. How did I manage to stay alive for as long as I did? I may have been smart about it, worked out in the open but stayed out of the open; I may have covered all of my bases, killed anyone who seemed suspicious—except Kessler—but I knew something about still being alive, was too good to be true. And as I sat with my sister on the bench, outside the room where the woman I loved was lying in a hospital bed, the answer had become clear to me. Killing me would have been easier than apprehending me—and killing me was not an option, despite what Morrison said.
Well, you almost had me, Morrison, I thought to myself as I sat there, staring at the wall. And while I was relieved that things did not turn out the way Morrison wanted them to, I was disappointed in myself that he got as close as he did.
“Why are you helping us?” I asked Naeva. “We have not known each other since we were children; you owe me no loyalties.”
I felt her hand touch mine, but I did not look down at it.
“You are my brother, Victor,” she said, and then squeezed my hand. “And who do we have in this world if we don’t have the love of our family.” Her hand slid away. “You and Niklas are all I have. I’d do anything for you.”
I looked over.
“How did you know I was your brother? Does The Order know?”
She nodded. “They know. I found out after you went rogue and Brant started hunting you. He was the one who told me.”
More silence passed between us, and then sometime later, I asked Naeva, “What do you plan to tell The Order about what happened here tonight?”
“I’ll figure it out,” she said. “Of course, I’ll have to explain something about why Brant is dead, but as far as you and Izabel—I’ll manage. Brant knew that he had to turn you in, but he kept everything quiet: the months he spent watching you; his plans to move in on you once he decided the best way to do it—no one knows about tonight, so I have time to figure it out. He knew that if he reported it too soon that every eye would be at his back, every mouth breathing down his neck.”
“So he never called it in,” I said, understanding.
“No. He wanted more from you first. He not only wanted to be the one to take you in, but he wanted to use you to lure in Niklas and Fredrik Gustavsson; he wanted information, numbers, names, etcetera. Brant didn’t just want what everyone else set out to get—he wanted everything. He wanted to make Vonnegut proud.” She paused and then added softly, “But he wanted too much…”
The shift in her tone planted a seed in my head.
“Were you involved with him, Naeva?” I asked gently.
She shook her head sadly. “No,” she answered. “But he was kind to me. He protected me. And I cared about him. He was my teacher just like he was yours.”
“But you told me you are relieved that he is dead.”
She nodded. “And I told you the truth. As much as I cared about him, he probably got what he deserved.”
She looked out ahead at the door to Izabel’s room, pushing down her grief, it seemed. “I do hope that she’ll be OK,” she said moments later, and with all my heart I knew she was being sincere. “I don’t know her, but I’ve heard a lot about her, and I admire her. She’s strong. She’s what I strive to be every day.” There was a sadness in her voice, and I found myself wanting even more to open that book, but we were still in the same time and place. It felt strange to me, to want to reach out to her, to comfort her, to understand her, to protect her, my beautiful and soft baby sister who I could not for the life of me picture being in such a dangerous line of work—it incensed me. But Izabel was my priority, and so I left it alone. Nothing incensed me more than what Artemis did to Izabel.
Naeva stood from the bench. I did the same.
“You need to go into hiding, Victor,” she warned. “Too many know where you are in Boston; you and your people, you shouldn’t all be under the same roof for more than minutes at a time. Vonnegut may not want you dead, but the longer you stay in the same place, the easier it’ll be for someone to figure out how to capture you.”
I had known this all along, but it took my sister reinforcing it for me to finally make the decision to do what needed to be done.
Then Naeva reached up and plucked a strand of hair from her head, and then handed it to me. Instinctively knowing what it was for, neither of us commented on it. I tucked the hair away deep in my pants pocket.
As she started to leave, I asked, “Naeva, have you ever seen Vonnegut?”
She looked at me as if I had asked a ridiculous question; she even smiled a little.
“Of course,” she said. “Why?”
I shook my head. “I was only curious,” I said, choosing to be vague about the truth. It was apparent to me, just from the little time I spoke with Naeva, that she was an expendable operative, someone who knew nothing, and probably always would know nothing. Like myself and many others, Naeva only believed she had ever seen the face of the real Vonnegut. And I let her leave that night, continuing to believe it—for her safety, the less she knew, the better.
I turn from the window; everyone is looking at me, waiting for the rest. My brother, as expected, is staring the hardest; the cold and unforgiving look in his face that was there for Izabel’s well-being before, has now deepened to include his sister.
Niklas never asked about Naeva after we were taken away from our families and forced into The Order; he pretended not to care about the little blond-haired girl who seemed to favor me as her brother. “I don’t give two fucks about that girl,” he had told me once or twice when I brought her up over the years. “Why should I care? And why do you keep asking?” But the truth was, Niklas cared more about what happened to Naeva than I ever did.
And Naeva loved him as much as she loved me, despite what he thought. “Why is Niklas so mean to me?” Naeva had asked the day he slapped her across the face with a dead snake. “He loves you, Naeva,” I had told her, “but he doesn’t know how to show you.” Naeva dragged a finger underneath her eyes, wiping away her tears. “Well, I love him too,” she had said. “I just wish he wasn’t so damn mean.”