#or two assassins/hitwomen again | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

halogensleep · 6 years ago

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pour your gasoline on me (let's torch the whole world down) [ch. 1]

Prompt: Assassin!Charlynch AU - After Charlotte wakes up ziptied to a chair at the mercy of a knife wielding Irishwoman who doesn't take no for an answer, her black and white life becomes colourful in every sense of the word as they begin a game of cat and mouse that won't end well for either of the hitwomen.

Charlotte awoke to a sore head and her good white shirt ruined. For a moment. For the briefest of instants. For the second before her wrists realised they were zip tied behind the chair, numb from the pressure, she was both nervous and impressed, simultaneously.

There was a reason clients handed her the cheque book and told her to write whatever number came to mind… she was supposed to be untouchable, invisible, the queen of shadows, the go to woman when problems needed to disappear. Apparently, somebody hadn’t just been looking in her direction, they had been watching her, learning her, picking apart her cloak of invisibility thread by thread.

Whoever he was, Charlotte became instantly certain that she would kill him the long way around. A bullet or knife would be too fast. A steam iron set to eco-mode on the other hand? Well, it would certainly be an interesting way to show him the scenic route of his own mortality once she got these zip ties off.

“Ah, the bruiser is awake!” A chirpily Irish—and definitely female—voice greeted from the warehouse door.

Charlotte said nothing despite her surprise, her unmoving stare fixed on the damp brick wall on the other side of the warehouse. She exhaled as the sound of footsteps crept around her immobilised position and suddenly became a tangible person to look at with big brown eyes and long gingery copper hair. If it wasn’t for current situation, the zipties, the abduction, the knife glinting in the Irishwoman’s hand, Charlotte would have been looser with compliments. The woman was beautiful, a present threat, but beautiful nonetheless.

There was no mask or disguise which was either fantastic news or terrible news. Charlotte was leaning more towards the latter. An old hitman with eager lips who had found himself the star witness of a federal prosecution had gone to the trouble of warning her once that this wasn’t a career that came with much longevity. In fact, it was the last thing he ever said before the slash wounds on his arms finally bled out—it was important the job looked like a suicide, Charlotte loved the jobs that required a feminine eye for detail the most—but now, immobilised, staring into the eyes of the woman who was no doubt getting ready to deliver a swift coup de grâce with the small knife in her hand, Charlotte couldn’t help but wish she had listened a bit harder to that old snitch.

“Well… not much of a talker, are you?” The Irishwoman pouted and twiddled the tip of her knife. “I won’t pretend I’m not offended.”

Charlotte smiled politely and said nothing.

“You realise I’m holding a knife?” The Irishwoman glanced down at her weapon, eyebrow craned by the oddness of the silence.

“You couldn’t spread butter with that thing.”

“Catty of you,” The Irishwoman didn’t skip a beat.

Charlotte smirked and busied herself with all the creative ways this pretty red haired woman was going to die at her hands as soon as she got loose. And by her own estimations, the Irishwoman with her long slender jaw and bright white teeth was more than just pretty… apparently she was quite the comedian too. It left her at odds with her experience and training. A successful career up until this moment had been based on the ability of reading people, facial expressions, speech patterns, involuntary movements, that sort of thing. Charlotte found herself slightly at a loss trying to pick apart the woman staring at her. There was no nervousness, no anger, no cynicism or bitterness, just overwhelming and abundant chirpiness as if they were two friends meeting after a long time apart.

She felt her disadvantage grow weightier.

“Ah,” The Irishwoman smiled suddenly, nodding her head a bit. “Thinking of ways to kill me?”

“It’s one way to pass the time,” Charlotte said coolly.

“I just want to chat, silly billy!” The Irishwoman rolled her eyes and straddled Charlotte’s restrained hips, plonking herself down on the jerking lap. “It would seem you know a friend of mine, Hadiq Sharma ring any bells?” Her lips curled into a smirk.

Her fingers danced over the white lapels of Charlotte’s shirt during the interim of silence that followed. Charlotte scowled at the cockiness and looked away.

The steam iron was going to be set to linen-mode for this troublemaker as soon as she figured a way out of this place.

“Can’t say I know him,” Charlotte lied.

“We can get to that in a moment.” The Irishwoman waved her hand. “I thought we could get a little better acquainted first…”

“Is that so?” Charlotte’s breaths became tight and measured as the troublemaker sitting over her lap pushed herself forward slightly.

“It is so nice to meet you, Charlotte. Well… officially meet you, I mean.” The Irishwoman jollily waved her knife at the miswording. “You’re considerably more dressed than the last time we were alone together. Speaking of which, you really shouldn’t use shampoos that contain parabens… absolutely terrible for the environment.” She gravely shook her head. “Also, you should make a habit of checking behind the shower curtain for intruders but I suppose that’s by the by now.” The knife was waved again like a plaything to punctuate her point. “After all, if horror films have taught us one thing it’s that you never know what sort of monster could be lurking behind the shower curtain, do you?” The Irishwoman breathed it out as a confession.

“You were in my bathroom?” Charlotte lifted an impressed brow.

“Oh, and the one in Connecticut too. Nice family pad by the way, was difficult tracking down the money orders and wire transfers with all of the fake names you used but I really do love a challenge.” The Irishwoman prodded, and Charlotte felt her blood run cool. “I didn’t put you down as the bleeding heart type but it was very sweet seeing how cosy you keep your sister and baby niece. They love you a lot, you know.”

“If you hurt them…” Charlotte didn’t need to finish the threat.

“Don’t be silly, Charlotte. Honestly, you make me sound like a sociopath! When your old battle buddy came knocking on the door looking for you, Molly insisted that I came in for a coffee and a sit down. Oh how we laughed as the baby photos came out of the cupboard!” The Irishwoman beamed with delight. “I didn’t have to so much as bend one of her fingers back… she told me everything I needed to know and then some.” The knife was traced gently along her straining neck.

The rage became visceral and embarrassing, humiliating even. Six years of doing this and nobody had so much as known the area code of her cell phone number. Charlotte realised this was an intricate torture in and of itself. The Irishwoman wasn’t gloating for the sake of gloating, she was inflicting a sense of claustrophobia, forcing a state of overwhelming stress, preparing her for an interrogation. Charlotte swallowed as the knife was traced along her jawline.

That was it, Charlotte realised. This was an interrogation, methodical and deliberate.

“I get it now…” Charlotte started to pick at the thread, the cogs turning as she closed her eyes. “You were part of the IRA,” she lengthily exhaled.

“Excuse me?” The Irishwoman laughed. “Suddenly a detective, are we? Sort of xenophobic that you assume I’m a terrorist just because of the accent but I suppose you’re not wrong...”

“That’s what you tell clients when they ask questions,” Charlotte opened her eyes and rolled them slightly. “That you were in the Republican Army. I’m sure you ham it up a little more than that, maybe talk about big jobs and political hits you and your cousins never actually did. It’s part of your cover story so nobody finds out you were a police officer, once upon a time at least.” Charlotte lifted her brows. “I’m getting warm, right?”

The Irishwoman’s smirk barely faltered, but barely was enough for Charlotte to know she was bang on the money.

“You are as formidable as they warned me you would be,” The Irishwoman pushed forward with a whisper and pressed her lips to Charlotte’s ear. “Do you know what a police officer never does, Charlotte?” She asked it so quietly, so hushed, almost flirtatiously.

“Retire with a pension?” Charlotte smirked.

“Funny,” The Irishwoman nodded and smiled too.

There was a flash, a small glint of steel in the air and then white-hot pain in Charlotte’s thigh where the knife was buried. She cried out. The pain reverberated through her extremities, only growing more substantial the more she twisted and twitched the limb. The Irishwoman just hushed and petted her cheek, making silly crooning noises that only made Charlotte want to horribly kill her all the more.

The Irishwoman continued her point, “A police officer knows to never leave witnesses, Charlotte.” It was said with a serious nod. “Now I’m willing to bet you know how this is going to end for you, so how about you give me what I want and I make this mercifully quick?” The Irishwoman talked over the sound of her pained grunts.

“If you really did your research...” Charlotte exhaled and caught her breath, wincing and lifting her chin. “You would know I’m really into this sort of shit.”

“Your sister mentioned you were captured behind enemy lines, there’s no need to harp on about it any more than she did.” The Irishwoman rolled her eyes in boredom, shuffling a bit on Charlotte’s sore and bloody lap.

“Nothing like being tied to a chair with time to kill.” Charlotte did the smug thing with her eyebrows and ignored the pain. “I really enjoy being a pain in the ass in these type of situations, I’d clear your schedule if I were you.”

“I am so glad you said that because I feel exactly the same way.” The Irishwoman leaned back on Charlotte’s lap, twisting the knife in her leg slightly to punctuate her point. “But this is just the warm up… my methods are far more brutal and psychological, love. Please don’t make me show you the hard way.” Her tone became severe and stern.

“If you’re about to threaten to kill my baby sister, go ahead.” Charlotte was prepared to roll the dice. “Honestly? She’s kind of a nag.” She nodded in exasperation.

“Funny.” The Irishwoman jabbed the knife again.

Charlotte hissed, glaring and irritated. “You know, I’m beginning to really not like it when you do that,” she said.

“Do you have a preference as to where I scatter your niece after I’ve chopped her up?” The Irishwoman pouted slightly and narrowed her eyes, as if she were deep in thought. “Anywhere of sentimental value? There’s something about tiny coffins that makes me feel a bit queasy. Unless you play ball with me, Charley-poo, that’s going to be the state of things.”

Charlotte snapped her head up.

“Ah, there we go, got your attention now.” The Irishwoman patted her cheek. “So here’s what I’m thinking, you can tell me what I want to know and I’ll make this as quick or slow as you like… or you can piss me about and I’ll visit that lovely house in Connecticut and put some colour on the walls. Lady’s choice?” She tilted her head, eyes glimmering with playfulness.

Charlotte thought of her niece’s smile and her little chubby fingers, the way she never shares with other children, the glimmer of rage in her babyish stare when things don’t go her way, all of the things that imbued her with a sense of pride, and she felt herself give up instantaneously. There were few things she cared selflessly about in this world—maybe half a thing on a particularly good day—but her niece and her cat were always up there on the list.

It was becoming more certain by the second that her card was finally up and it was equally as exciting as it was terrifying. Many sleepless night had been spent thinking about her perfect death; other people dreamed of passing away in their sleep, old and feeble, but she wanted to leave this world white-knuckled and spitting blood in the eyes of adversaries, taking world-altering secrets to her grave with nothing more than a final ‘fuck you.’

But, the Irishwoman knew about her stupid little perfect baby niece.

All things considered, today was racking up to be a bad day at the office.

“What is it exactly you want to know about Sharma?” Charlotte sighed and craned her neck, willing to play ball.

“You accepted a job to kill my client, a very bad move all things considered.” The Irishwoman wagged her finger disapprovingly. “Who paid for the job?”

“I have no idea.”

“I don’t like that answer.” The knife was yanked free and buried again instantaneously in the same spot. Charlotte gagged with the pain and threw her head back. “Shh, you big baby!” the psychopath crooned. “We can stop as soon as you give me something a bit more substantial, love. Shall we try again?” She offered, softly.

“How am I supposed to know who wanted Sharma dead!?”

“Please don’t make me press this knife in any deeper. I hate it when people spurt blood, it would be very selfish of you.”

“There’s who pays for the job and who orders it along with all the middle management in between! Even if I wanted to I wouldn’t be able to make an educated guess.” Charlotte grew frustrated with the line of questioning. “There’s a lot of people who want Sharma dead, he controls half the counterfeit trade and he’s a terrible driver!” Charlotte shrugged indignantly.

The Irishwoman tutted in disapproval, the knife was buried into the femur bone instantaneously. Charlotte threw her head back and clenched her eyes. Whoever this woman was, she deeply loved her work, and Charlotte was beginning to admire just how much she admired it, a professional approval almost.

“I’m beginning to think you’re just dragging this out because you like me.” The Irishwoman leaned in so close the warmth of her breath was felt on Charlotte’s lips. “It’s one of the more interesting come-ons I’ve had, I’ll give you that.” Her brown eyes twinkled mischievously.

“How many times did you rehearse that line in your head?” Charlotte rolled her eyes.

“Brave, you’re a tough girl.” The knife was pulled out and jammed in again. “It’s a little show-offy.”

“Jesus Christ!” Her tiny world became nothing but pain and the threat of more pain, and it left her more than slightly exhilarated. “What can I say?” Charlotte hissed sarcastically and gathered herself. “Maybe I just want to take you to a bar when all of this is over with?”

“You know the way to my heart. And unfortunately for you, I know the way to yours too.” The small glinting knife was pulled out of her leg and pressed into her breastbone. “I’m getting bored, Charlotte, and I’m starting to wonder what you look like without skin. Don’t make me find out…”

“Mr. Rabbit.”

“Is that your safeword?” A slender eyebrow piqued.

“It’s the name of the man who delivers jobs for the Collective, that’s what he called himself. Mr Rabbit. Codeword for the Hadiq Sharma job is, ‘the carriage clock has been fixed.’ I have a phone number for him and that codeword for when the job is completed but I don’t know how far up this goes and I certainly don’t ask questions. You think I give a shit who orders the jobs or balances the cheque books? I pick up the name, I name my price, I do the job, I take my money, that’s it!” Charlotte reared forward with adrenalin. “I’m telling you the truth.”

The Irishwoman pouted and huffed a long, disappointed sigh. “So you are,” she frowned and put the knife away. “You want to give me the number? It’ll go some way towards me not murdering your family...”

“It’s in the burner phone.” Charlotte nodded to the tray beside them where her things had been laid out. “If you think he’s just going to tell you who his master is just because you asked nicely… well.” Charlotte shook her head gravely and wanted to laugh at the thought, almost.

“You’ve been very helpful, this is the most fun I’ve had on a first date in years.” The Irishwoman smiled and patted Charlotte’s cheek. “Now, do you mind waiting here for a second while I make a phone call?”

“Please, take your time.”

“Gracious of you.” The Irishwoman shuffled and stood up from Charlotte’s lap.

Charlotte felt her body sink with relief as the Irishwoman grabbed the phone and scrolled through the contact list. The chance of her miraculously escaping were slim to none, but she would gladly take a moment’s respite from her current predicament. The phone dialed out and was promptly lifted to the Irishwoman’s ear, she blew out her cheeks and nodded her head side to side, impatient and playful.

“Hello is that Mr. Rabbit?” The Irishwoman chirped, and the noise of a deep voice speaking on the line was just about audible. “Well, that’s because I’m not the Queen. My name is Becky Lynch. Yes, I know it’s not what you were expecting but the Queen can’t come to the phone right now. She’s a little tied up.” The grin was gleaming and pleased. “Now as I understand it, Mr. Rabbit, you had some business with the Queen concerning a man named Hadiq Sharma...” There was a pause. “Yes, that’s the one! Nice fella! Smashing beard! Terrible driver!”

Charlotte closed her eyes and shook her head at the silliness of it.

“Now, Mr. Rabbit, sir, I understand you represent a co-operative of buyers who require the kind of services that I just so happen to offer. I have to tell you, it’s been impossible to get a contact number for you to submit my resume.” The Irishwoman played with her wet knife. “Anyway, I killed Hadiq Sharma last night. I made it look like a mundane accident, needless to say the carriage clock has been well and truly fixed. I was hoping I could collect payment for the job and that you will consider my services next time you go to market?”

Charlotte snapped her eyes open and felt them bulge out of her skull.

The Irishwoman just smiled coyly at her, fingers waving, phone tucked between her chin and shoulder.

Charlotte realised she had just been played like a fiddle.

“Wonderful to hear, I look forward to speaking to you soon.” The Irishwoman hung up the phone and strolled back over to Charlotte. “He was lovely, what a nice man!” She gushed chirpily.

“So let me get this straight...” Charlotte blinked and grinded her jaw. “You just screwed me out of a paycheck and went to all of this trouble…” She looked around at the warehouse, looked at her stabbed thigh, then looked back to her smiling captor. “All to introduce yourself to the Collective?” The fury became palpable.

“I like to think of it as female entrepreneurs helping one another up the corporate ladder.” The Irishwoman plonked herself back down on Charlotte’s lap, her weight awakening the pain in her pin-cushioned thigh. “Think of this as a chamber of commerce meeting.”

“You could have just went with that in the beginning!”

“You would have thought of a way to fuck everything up if you thought I was about to take over your patch. It was easier when you thought this was just a simple job gone wrong, especially with sweet little Emily on the line… as if I would ever kill a child.” The Irishwoman rolled her eyes, and the knife came to a menacing rest on Charlotte’s shoulder. “You know I have to kill you though, right?”

“I had a feeling you were going to say that.”

“It’s a shame, really. I felt like we had a connection, you know?” The Irishwoman whispered with mocking, saddened eyes. “Any last requests?”

“What time is it?” Charlotte narrowed one of her eyes, suddenly remembering.

The Irishwoman stared at her in disbelief, but she humoured Charlotte nonetheless and peered at the screen of the burner phone. “One fifty-eight, to be precise,” she answered. “Why? Are you running late for something?”

“Do you mind if we hold off for two minutes? I have a thing about odd numbers…” Charlotte sighed and was entirely serious. “A round two o'clock feels like a good time, right?”

“If movies have taught me anything it’s that you’re stalling for time before your old platoon buddies burst through the windows with guns—”

“Most of them are dead or married to codependent wives who never let them go anywhere fun, but you already know that.” Charlotte interrupted with a serious look. “Honestly, I just really don’t like odd numbers.”

“Well alright.” The Irishwoman blinked, slightly offset.

“So why did you give up being a police officer?” Charlotte blurted, determined to pass the seconds towards her death with small talk, curiosity getting the better of her a bit as the human conundrum remained precisely that. “You start killing for a living for any particular reason?”

“No. Just money, mainly,” The Irishwoman lied. “What makes a soldier with a gleaming service record and a bronze star to boot turn to this sort of thing?” Her nose wrinkled.

“Money,” Charlotte lied too.

The truth was far simpler; she just really enjoyed killing people. The squelch. The gasp. The last bit of life slipping from someone’s eyes. The way windpipes felt when they were crushed beneath her fingers. The creativity. The sacredness of it. They were such simple pleasures, really. The irony was that she didn’t stumble on her favourite pass-time until after leaving the Army. Her MOS was 35M, human intelligence collection. It was a vocation that made her an expert in picking people apart and getting to the source of secrets. It was interesting, but it wasn’t using an orbital sander at four in the morning to grind off tattoos and other identification markers before dumping a body downstream interesting.

“Do you miss it, being a soldier I mean?” The Irishwoman prodded.

“Do you miss being a police officer?”

“Not really.”

“Me neither.” Charlotte sighed. “What made you do it in the first place?”

The Irishwoman sighed too. “I quite liked the thought of having a gun. I suppose I could have joined the IRA, but I’m not much political. Also, I liked the sirens. Sirens are always fun.”

“Hm,” Charlotte hmph’d at the unravelled mystery. “Well, I think our two minutes are up.”

“Are you rushing me to kill you?” The Irishwoman became befuddled. “Aren’t you going to beg or try… something?”

“Death doesn’t scare me.”

“I would ask what does scare you but some mysteries are worth keeping.” She patted Charlotte’s shoulder and got up from her lap. “For what it’s worth I was a big fan of you work. Johnny the War Dog? Two Teeth Billy? You made artwork out of those jobs. I mean, strychnine in the air vents? Poetic. If there was a Hall of Fame, you would be up there.”

Charlotte nodded and couldn’t help but agree, she was a damn fine soldier and an even better hitwoman. All things said and done, she had certainly lived life with a vengeful sort of passion for her work. It wasn’t a husband and children in the suburbs, but she stood by her life choices which was more than what most people could say.

“Let’s get this over with.” Charlotte lifted her chin and offered her throat. “Nothing too gory or creative.” A serious brow was raised. “Take my wallet, make it look like a mugging gone wrong. It’ll take a while but my sister will eventually put out a missing person’s report and someone will identify my body, you’ll be long gone by then but at least they’ll have something to bury.”

“Are you serious orchestrating your own murder?” The Irishwoman smiled slightly, impressed, her eyes gleaming with what appeared to be an instantaneous sort of fondness.

“You’ll understand, one day.”

“Goodness,” The Irishwoman shook her head and looked away for a moment, she stepped forward and looked at Charlotte again, far more sobered this time. “You really are growing on me.” The knife jabbed shallowly into the side of Charlotte’s throat, the blood spurting a bit.

Funny really, she had watched the process of death up close, an admirer of sorts. But now it was happening to her and it was nothing as she expected. Charlotte imagined the process of dying would feel like she was being forced out of her body, but this wasn’t that. Charlotte closed her eyes and tried to remain calm and dignified, the blood dribbling and pumping and leaving her quickly. She felt heavier. She felt as if she was slipping inwards. The process was… interesting.

“Saint Mary’s is three blocks north,” The Irishwoman whispered close to her ear. “Your Carotid is nicked, I’d give you ten minutes at best. Twelve if you apply hard enough pressure.” The surprise became dumbfounding as her wrists were snipped free from the restraints. “Consider this a one time gift. And if you die? Well... it was a mugging gone wrong.”

Charlotte collapsed forward and pinched the wound with numbed fingers, hissing as she dug inside the cut and forced the source of it closed as best she could. The Irishwoman was long gone by the time she got up and started dragging herself to the door.

She slung herself down the stairs, slung herself across the cement floor, threw herself out onto the street, each movement a gigantic push as her fingers squeezed and pinched the source of the bleed. Charlotte had never felt so alive before, not even a little bit, and it was growing more and more exhilarating by the second.

She got less than twelve steps down the street before passers-by were stopping and hollering and fetching help. Apparently, today, luck was on Charlotte’s side after all; one of the do-gooders was an off-duty EMT. Charlotte sighed in relief as the wounds on her leg and throat were tended to, a car whizzing up and parking along the side of the pavement ready to rush her to the hospital.

Twelve minutes wasn’t even a competitive amount of time at all. Charlotte thought the Irishwoman had definitely tipped the odds in her favour, either that or she was offended by the implication of the alternative.

Charlotte slightly smiled to herself as strangers bundled her into the car. A single name, Becky Lynch, was all she had. But she knew come hell or high-water she would find the Irishwoman again. Charlotte wasn’t sure what this now was. Maybe war. Maybe cat and mouse. Maybe nothing or everything. It was, however, unfinished business, and Charlotte had just the steam iron to make it neat and tidy once her cardiovascular system had been put back together.

…

Seven hours of surgery, two weeks in the hospital, and three new pink scars later, Charlotte had finally made it back home to her apartment. The police report read that she had been the victim of a mugging gone wrong and Charlotte kept the details as vague as possible. This was her mouse to chase, her woman to burn the world down in search of. Now that her sister and most importantly, her niece, were out of Connecticut and somewhere safe, Charlotte felt the urge to stretch out and immediately set to work.

The apartment was exactly how she left it as she opened the door and limped inside, which struck immediate alarm bells. There was no sour, pungent smell from the chicken breasts that had been left to thaw in the sink a fortnight prior. There was no two week accumulation of leaflets that had been shoved underneath the door. The litter tray by the bathroom door had been used which meant Fuzz Aldrin had been coming and going, somehow. The latter was as relieving as it was nerve wracking, she had worried the cat might have gotten himself into trouble over the last fortnight while she was away. His inquisitive happy purrs as he prowled around her ankles indicated he was more than okay.

Charlotte grabbed the loaded 9mm kept inside the hollowed bible on her bookcase before she limped any further inside.

The kitchen and living room were checked barrel first with the breakfast bar used as cover, then the bathroom, the bedroom, the balcony, and the bedroom once again just to be sure. Someone had certainly been in the apartment, Charlotte couldn’t shake the feeling. Things were left so perfectly that it felt out of place. Charlotte lowered her gun with a sigh and trod back to the kitchen, well aware of who exactly had been here.

If she needed a more concrete symptom that her suspicions were correct, the Irishwoman was feeling particularly generous. Charlotte found the post-it note stuck to the refrigerator door. She pulled it off and began to read.

Used your place as a base while you were in the hospital, hope you don’t mind. I replaced your groceries. Your cat is fat and disgusting but I’ve kept him alive and named him Big Bastard, he seems to like it.

P.S: Glad you survived.

P.P.S: Your vibrator needs new batteries.

Love, Becky.

Charlotte screwed the post-it note in her fist and threw it across the room. To add fuel to the fire of her bad mood, she now had to move out of her apartment, ideally today. The workshop out of the city where difficult problems were dealt with still remained a secret. It was an old mechanic shop out in the sticks with no heating, no hot water, and no listening ears for miles around... the perfect location for making bodies more manageable or getting information out of a person before a job could be finished. The owner was long since deceased which Charlotte knew because she was the one who killed him — rule number one of the smart business rule book, never accept a loan from the Hungarian mafia and then object to chopping stolen cars, a lesson the owner learned the hard way. The Hungarians took no issue with her using the abandoned building from time to time after he was dealt with, and in exchange she gave them a more favourable price when work needed to be done.

Charlotte sighed and came to terms with her frustration. For the foreseeable future, until the troublemaker was neutralised, the chop shop would now be her home away from home.

…

When Charlotte had asked on that fateful day what it was that made her join the police force, Becky told the truth and lied simultaneously. It was a little bit for the gun, for the permitted naughtiness of it. Mostly, she joined the Garda because above all things, she liked to hunt.

It had started as a wain when her grandfather would drive out to the Wicklow mountains with her sat on his lap the entire way there in the rickety excuse of a van to hunt the elusive Sika stags. Beautiful creatures. She wanted to weep for every single one them when the bullets rang out and they fell down in a heaped, huffing piles of horn and fur. It was without a doubt the only period of her life that she had ever felt a faint sense of empathy, the desire to weep for the beasts and yet never the gratification of following through with it.

To begin with, uncles and old men that she had to call uncle because they were friends of her grandfather had all disapproved of her presence. Mainly because of her sex, mainly because of her disposition. But with age she grew to understand the addictiveness of wielding power like that, hunting predators, outsmarting wild things, crouching in the warm wet night while the strumming and crooning insects sung the beasts to an unsuspicious state.

By the tender age of eleven, the men would walk quickly and crowd around the van as it returned from Wicklow, eager to see what the wee girl, the little hunter had managed to do. It was an unofficial test that bore more weight than her grandfather ever let her know. Her father had died in the troubles and she was without brothers, the only grandchild of the big man, and with that came expectation.

When he died, she didn’t feel much at all, she had loved him but that was that, she missed him because she was told to miss him, she missed him because the person who snuck her sweets and cleaned her gun when she was feeling too lazy to do it herself was no longer around. If her path had ever been clearly defined it was that she was expected to become a small vestibule of him and take up arms for the cause, one day. The stag hunter would grow up big and strong, take her smarts and put them to use as a leader for their people. Becky didn’t quite grow up big and strong, but she was the best hunter, the keenest strategist, insurmountable in smarts, hungry to hunt things other than stags and deer. There was a darkness in her, an unburdened urge to hunt and kill that was felt and noticed by the others, whispered about.

It was her fifteenth birthday when she watched from a blockade while a Garda shot down a man with a knife in his hands who had been causing trouble… it was love at first sight. By eighteen, her turbulent, passionate streak for strategy and blood had been placed in a uniform. The people called her a traitor, bricked her mother’s windows, did worse than that, but Becky didn’t care. For all intents and purposes, she had a license to hunt. When she entrapped some of the very men who had raised her, who had ate at her table, who had drank and raised arms with her grandfather, convincing them she was only part of the Garda as reconnaissance, the force went so far as to hand her a medal and promote her to the special detective unit after the trial came to a close.

Entrapping her people wasn’t a particularly difficult task to do, her cheerful and chirpy disposition were qualities that enamoured people and convinced them she wasn’t a threat but rather an ally, a constant and faithful friend. They were the beasts, and she was both the crooning insects that kept them unsuspicious and the speeding bullet that would put them down before they knew it was too late.

The job was enough until it wasn’t anymore. Then, she just disappeared into the night and found herself here — hunting for the sake of hunting, hunting at the behest of whoever paid the best money. She had eventually come to learn of the one called the Queen of Shadows, the woman without a name, the woman who made problems disappear, and it niggled her in places that she didn’t know could be niggled; it left her curious and infuriated by the intensity of her curiosity; until eventually she decided that she would have to hunt her too just for the sake of putting an end to it.

The trouble was that every bit of the hunt only left her with more questions. Every tiny piece of information only left her hungry for more. Every step closer towards capturing the woman she had come to learn was Charlotte Flair, decorated war veteran, keeper of secrets, lurker of shadows, mother of one repulsive cat, only made her wish she could take two steps backwards and draw it out a little more… it was infuriating, and it was delicious, and it was too much fun to let come to such an anti-climactic end as a fatal stabbing in a disused warehouse over little more than a paycheck.

After the cheeky post-it note in the kitchen, Becky imagined that the game would be reciprocated, chasing one another would be a fun way to pass the time between jobs but there was no take up on Charlotte’s part. It was offensive. It was maddening. It was above all things clearly a trap… but Becky couldn’t leave it alone.

God, she wished she had left it alone.

The Queen had been gone for some months, those who knew of her said that she must have got spooked and quit while she was ahead. They were wrong. For beasts like her and Charlotte, there was no such thing as quitting while ahead. There was only hunting, climbing, racing, jaunting and galavanting towards the next big thrill.

When the newspapers read that a newly-elected house representative had turned up dead, tragically stabbed in the throat during a mugging gone wrong in one of the only camera dark spots of the parking garage beneath his building, Becky knew the game was back on. Only the Queen would be ballsy enough to take on a job with heat and visibility like that. Only the Queen would be brazen enough to stick a message inside of the hit. And only the Queen would be smart enough to get away with it too.

After a few months of covert nosing, Becky found out through a low-level contact who ran with the Hungarians about the chop shop, conveniently named, where people went when someone wanted them to disappear. It was a lead, one that Becky enthusiastically felt put her at least four steps ahead of Charlotte Flair.

Like an unsuspecting stag beneath the crooning hum of insects singing the warm night to sleep, Becky didn’t realise it was too late until it was too late. She had trekked two miles on foot beneath the cover of early darkness toward the lone building down the road with unmistakable red gas pumps outside just like her contact had described. She was convinced she had the element of surprise… right up until a single barbed dart hit her in the chest from more than a hundred feet out.

The paralysis was almost instantaneous, the warmth and wooziness was coming more than it was going as footsteps from down the road grew closer. She tried to reach for her gun to no use, and so she huffed and kicked and moved like a wounded stag, dragging herself only a tiny distance before the tranquiliser took hold and rendered her completely immobile.

“Thank you for doing the hard part for me,” Charlotte whispered and crouched over her, grinning a bit as she slung the dart gun over her shoulder. “I was getting worried that I might have to come and look for you.” The words were chuckled out victoriously.

Fuck, she wished she had just left this alone.

“Cat got your tongue?” Charlotte prodded her slumped figure with her foot. “It’s alright, I put you down with enough Telazol to stop a lion in its tracks. Stop fighting and go to sleep… there will be plenty of time to catch up once you’re awake.”

Becky was reluctant, fighting the slumber with laboured breaths and everything she had until she couldn’t fight anymore. She faintly felt herself be picked up and thrown over a broad shoulder in a fireman’s lift, carried up the road with her slack head bouncing awkwardly against the dart rifle. Then, there was nothing but darkness.

Hours had passed by the time she came around, groggily, wincing into the bright light of flood lamp pointed directly at her eyes. The pain within her body was unreal, was impressive, was the start of something worth taking notes over. The most palpable points of dull throbbing agony were located on her shoulder blades and the backs of her arms where meat hooks punctured the skin and suspended her off the ground like a car that needed work underneath. Becky closed her eyes, unable to look at the uncontained joyful grin of her captor — which was by far the most agonising part of this whole ordeal.

“So,” Charlotte spoke first after a moment, pleased with herself. “What’s new in your life?”

Becky opened her eyes and watched Charlotte sit down on the chair opposite, folding her long muscular leg over the other with a content look on her face as the accoutrements of her work were lined up on an old, metal roller chest where tools had once been kept.

Whatever this was, the Queen wasn’t in any rush to move things along. It wasn’t surprising. Capital murder was an artform to the Queen. A lengthy creative process if her previous work was anything to go by. Becky just inhaled and tried to ignore her blistering headache.

“You’re awfully quiet today.” Charlotte posed it as a thoughtful acknowledgement.

“Just deep in thought,” Becky whispered through gritted teeth with narrowed eyes, her body swinging slightly from the suspension which only compounded the pain. “Wait.” The coolness of the breeze was felt in deeply private crevices, on stiff cold nipples that she was only now realising were exposed. “Did you…” Her eyebrows craned with absolute shock and the pain was briefly forgotten. “Well that is just completely unchivalrous and shameful!” Becky swung slightly from the ceiling with the outburst.

“You don’t need clothes where you’re going, babe.” Charlotte didn’t even bat an eyelid as she reached over to switch on one of her tools.

“You better be switching that iron on to press my delicates!” Becky hissed, a sudden apprehensive panic rushing through her.

Charlotte smiled and peered at her naked body with fluttering eyes, “I’ll iron your delicates, sure.” She craned a cheeky, unburdened eyebrow and glanced between her legs.

“That is not what I meant and you know that!” Becky flailed a bit more, the agony pulling and tugging at her sore, immobilised limbs. “This is me safewording, Charlotte! I safeword!”

“Well I really did not enjoy being stabbed multiple times, Becky.” Charlotte wagged her manicured finger. “Consequences, consequences.”

Becky became beyond exasperated. “You don’t get to whip out a fucking iron like Marie Kondo when I only used a vegetable knife on you! If I had known this would be the craic I would have at least took a steaming hot piss on you and cut a few fingers off for good measure!”

“Coulda, woulda, shoulda. I could make a joke right now about you not sparking joy, but I’m above that.”

“Get ta fuck.”

Charlotte grinned, her pearly white veneers beaming and on show like a snarling predator from the sheer enthusiasm of her smile. Becky suddenly noticed how strangely overdressed she was for the occasion. Her long blonde hair was coiffed and salon finished, her lipstick carefully applied and touched up, her manicure recent and well kept. It made no sense given that she was staying off the grid. It was as if she had prepared herself for a date, for a deeply important encounter with someone special, and had gone to some lengths to do so too.

Charlotte lowered her voice to a threatening tone, “I am going to hurt you in ways you didn’t know—”

“Why do you look like that?” Becky interrupted, which possibly was not one of her brightest ideas given her current predicament swinging from the rafters by the gristle of her arms and shoulder blades.

“Like what?” Charlotte blinked.

“Pretty, like you’ve done yourself up.”

“What?” Charlotte became defensive and screwed up her brow.

“Do you always get your hair and nails done to torture someone or is it special, just for me?”

“Excuse me—”

“Ah ah,” Becky interrupted again. “It’s polite to return a compliment with a compliment. Shame of my life, anyone would think you were born in a barn.” She rolled her eyes.

The Queen paused and blinked, as if deliberating on whether to hit her with a red-hot burst of steam iron or play along a little bit. Becky hoped it would be the latter.

“Well.” Charlotte cleared her throat, building herself up for it. “I guess you look nice too. I like that little tattoo on your thigh, it’s cute...” Her voice trailed and her eyebrows wiggled as if she hadn’t spent much time thinking about it.

“Thanks,” Becky blushed slightly, surprised by the playfulness. “It’s the coordinates of my first murder, do you have any keepsakes—” Becky stopped mid-sentence as she heard Charlotte grab something heavy. She glanced down as the Queen lunged at her, just as the scalding heat singed the sparse blonde hairs on her thigh. “What the fucking fuck!” The scream was a long bloodcurdling noise as the iron sizzled and bubbled her thrashing leg.

Charlotte pulled it away and sat herself back down, unbothered.

The troublemaker let out the tiniest little whimper, her body slipping into shock to protect her from the horrendous pain. She craned her head forward with a long sob, aware that this was no longer as fun as she had hoped it would be. The skin was seared off completely when she opened her eyes and looked at it, the flesh red and burned in a neat triangular shape where a tattoo used to be.

She had it coming, she knew that, but it didn’t make it any easier to process. For some unknown reason she thought Charlotte wouldn’t follow through, that she had managed to endear herself too much to the Queen for any sort of real damage to be done. It was hopeful. It was silly. It was beyond naive. And Becky suddenly realised just how fucked she actually was. This woman was more like her in all the worst ways possible than she previously accounted for. This wasn’t just a playful battle of equals… it was a war of sociopaths, it was untred territory, it was dealing with a creature that couldn’t be emotionally manipulated with any sort of ease and somehow that only made it all the more tempting to try.

It was, above all things, dangerously exhilarating, and it only added more layers to her profound curiosity.

“I really didn’t like being stabbed, Becky.” Charlotte reiterated her point. “And as for threatening my niece? Well, that’s a curling iron in one orifice of your choosing.” She lifted her brows, unimpressed.

“What is it you want exactly?” Becky asked.

Charlotte shrugged. “What are you offering?”

“To listen very carefully?”

Charlotte inhaled deeply and picked up the steam iron again.

“Wait!” Becky yelped and swung. “Mary Mother of God! Wait, wait, wait!”

Charlotte paused with an expectant look, the iron steaming in her hand.

“I’m just… trying to understand you.” Becky blinked and stared into her cold, unfeeling blue eyes. “I’m not asking what I can do for you. I’m asking what is it that drives you? What is it that you want?”

Charlotte paused, her cold blue eyes twitching ever so slightly. She huffed and put the iron back down for a moment, folding her arms like an exasperated teacher with an unruly, promising pupil.

“The Interlevin AF10, with all the bells and whistles,” Charlotte answered after a moment, entirely serious.

“Ah, of course.” Becky nodded. “And what exactly is an Interlevin AF10?”

“An act of God. Wireless digital temperature control, self cleaning, twelve adjustable shelves, a four compressor walk in industrial refrigerator unit that could survive a nuclear fallout.” Charlotte’s expression became fierce and impressed, as if she were describing an instrument of war. “There’s a two year waiting list.”

“That’s what you want?” Becky blinked. “A walk in fridge?”

“That’s what I want.”

“Seems achievable.”

“And you?”

“And me what?”

“What is it that you want? What brought you up here?” Charlotte inhaled and stared intently, her icy blue eyes carrying a weight of expectation for the truth. She slowly sat herself down in the chair, her fingers locking together over the ball of her knee.

When the dust settled, when the realisation sunk in that they were doing this for the time being instead of the steam iron, tight, taut, her sore and broken body still tensing, Becky licked her lips and sighed, at a complete loss for an answer.

“Well.” The beads of sweat ran the contour of her brow. “You never called me back.”

Charlotte laughed and picked up the steam iron.

“I’m being serious!” Becky hissed and made her stop. “I mean, don’t get me wrong I probably would have stabbed you a bit more once I got here…” She rolled her eyes and Charlotte seemed to appreciate the honesty, her hand lowering the iron ever so slightly. “But I just came for the sake of coming… because I wanted to see you, mostly.”

“Huh,” Charlotte raised her eyebrows.

“Sorry if breaking into your apartment was a bit much.”

“About that, you didn’t replace my eggs.”

“Sorry about that too.”

“I’ll live.” Charlotte smiled, and Becky got the hint that she might not.

“So you’re going to kill me?”

“Probably sooner rather than later,” Charlotte said.

“How boring,” Becky whispered and rolled her eyes.

The Queen got up out of her seat and fetched something off of the metal roller drawer. It was small, was concealed in her hand, was nothing but a green cap poking out of her fist. She stepped closer and Becky realised it was a syringe.

“Oh for fucksake,” she closed her eyes, exhaled sharply, utterly indignant that this was all that would become of the little hunter of Wicklow mountain. “How anti-climatic.”

“You expected more?” Charlotte lifted a brow as she bit the syringe cap off.

“I expected your best work.” Becky chewed furiously. “The hooks? The iron? All horrendous but second to none… this on the other hand?” She nodded at the syringe. “Pathetic.”

“What can I say? You’re annoying to be around.”

“Well I didn’t want to say anything but you don’t have the bone structure to pull off platinum blonde highlights,” Becky lied just to be acidic.

“My bleeding heart…” Charlotte frowned. “Any last requests?”

“Feel free to fuck my corpse before you bury me if you’re into that sort of thing.”

“What?” Charlotte blinked.

“What?” Becky realised it might have been a bit much.

“Did you just—”

“No.”

“Well alright,” Charlotte looked away, embarrassed, unable to move past it. She shook her head and stared at Becky again, “Did you seriously just ask me to—”

“No, you filthy pervert!” Becky lifted her chin.

“Oh, I’m the pervert?” Charlotte nodded mockingly, sticking a hand on her hip. “You need to relax.”

“Well hanging naked girls on meat hooks to torture them doesn’t scream well-adjusted childhood, does it!” Becky stated the obvious.

“Not girls!” Charlotte pinched her brow. “Girl. One. Singular. There is no plural! Stop making this weirder than it is!”

“Oh of course, pardon me, just a couple of girls catching up are we now?” Becky nodded mockingly.

“I can get the steam iron?” Charlotte nodded to the roller cart. “I’m not above burning your face off.”

“But it’s such a pretty face,” Becky whispered, frowning at the thought of being maimed like that. “Alright, sorry, I may have overreacted a little bit. Please, go ahead and murder me with your little syringe of cowardice.”

She watched the Queen look to the ceiling, then look to the floor, exhaling, shaking her head, utterly exasperated and livid by the imposition of the most unruly captive she had ever taken. It was a small thing to be proud of, Becky thought. Death was terrifying, was perhaps the only thing that truly frightened her, but this was a small platitude to take to the grave that made it a bit more bearable.

“Get on with it then, you big lump.” Becky tilted her chin.

The long hypodermic needle was slammed into her chest, the contents pushing inside her pulmonary system, her lungs shuddered, pushed and pulled, hyperventilated slightly and only made the few moments before her death incrementally shorter as a result. Becky held her breath and blinked hard, staring into those icy blue eyes for a symptom of… anything.

Charlotte just pushed a small smile and waited.

“What was it?” Becky felt her swallowing grow harder.

“Something fun.” Charlotte turned around and grabbed her coat off the back of the chair. “It was nice seeing you again, Becky.” She put the coat on and walked out of sight towards the door.

There was no kiss goodbye, no long victorious speech, just footsteps leading further away and then a door being unlocked.

“Wait, you’re not going to stick around?” Becky shouted, panicked slightly as the door opened.

“I want to remember you alive,” it was said almost gently, almost lovingly, lingering slightly before the door finally closed.

She felt drowsy, felt her head become heavier, felt furious that she was being overdosed on opioids and shit ones at that if her lack of high was anything to go by. Becky blinked and tried to stay awake, tried to think of something other than her furious infatuation because Charlotte did not deserve that kind of permanency.

Her grandfather, she remembered him, remembered his cumbersome hands, the smell of rolling tobacco, the flat peaked cap, the chunky knit cardigan. There was no love, no longing, no emotions of any sort really, but she remembered the little girl she once was when he was alive and that was something. She remembered the beasts and how she used to want to cry for them when they fell down. She remembered the way her uncles faces fell and crashed like buildings when the jury returned their guilty verdict. The former brought her more happiness than the later.

And then, slumping forward, she fell asleep.

…

The sound of birds chirping and cars whizzing up and down the street greeted her ears as she stirred like a lazy half-slumbering animal. Once again, she was sore, was bruised, was wincing into the tenderness of her burned leg, but she was alive and that was more than she had anticipated. Her throat was dry with inactivity and the room was too bright for her wincing eyes. She sighed and ouched as her arms and shoulders attempted movement, forgetting and remembering simultaneously the torture they had been subjected to.

“Ah, you’re awake,” a thick European accent greeted jollily.

Becky snapped her eyes open and looked to the man at the door. He was fat, middle-aged, hairy, badly dressed and wearing enough gold jewellery to put a drag queen to shame. He wasn’t just any Hungarian. He was the Hungarian. He was the crime boss, Laszlo Varga. And if the ancient seventies decor of the bedroom she was currently being kept in was anything to go by, she was in his family home.

Becky swallowed and stared at him, unsure of how or why she was here.

“Relax, little bird.” He smiled and came in, dusting the wooden desk with his hand to perch on the edge of it. “You’ve been asleep for more than a few days, take your time.” He smiled a bit.

“I was dead,” Becky blinked and ordered the events in her mind.

“No, little bird.” Laszlo shook his head. “You were sedated.”

“Sedated?” Becky widened her eyes.

“Well, not before you were punished a little bit.” He nodded at the bandaged thigh and the carefully tended shoulders that had been sewn up and seen to. “If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly did you do to piss the Queen off so bad that she… how do you say… ironed you?” He chuckled with gleaming, impressed eyes.

“I think she was just feeling frisky.” Becky craned a brow and winced as she sat up on the bed.

“Hm,” Laszlo nodded slightly. “She doesn’t usually play so well with others, little bird, you got off easy.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Then tell me your name?”

“Becky.”

“Ah.” His lips fidgeted. “No nickname, then?”

“I don’t need one.”

“Me neither,” he agreed and looked to the sunshine beyond the window. “You’re probably wondering why you’re here…”

“The thought did occur, yes.”

“I need a job doing, a difficult one, a hit the Queen herself won’t take. She brought you here three days ago and said you were the woman for the job. At first I wanted to put you out of your misery like a broken little bird, less problems that way.” Laszlo chuckled. “But it would seem your work is impressive. My nephew, Andras, recommended you highly.” His tone became slightly displeased.

“Your nephew is Andras Wojcik?” Becky winced, and it felt like a detail that she should have known about before killing him as violently as she did.

“Yes, my sister’s boy.” He explained, nodding slightly. “Well, he was my sister’s boy. I believe you murdered him and put his balls in his mouth? Please, I don’t need to know which one happened first.” Laszlo raised his hands as Becky’s mouth opened to correct the order of things.

“And you’re not angry about that?”

“I hate my sister.” Laszlo shrugged.

“How lucky for me.” Becky breathed a sigh of relief. “So who is the mark Old Queeny is too scared to whack?” She lifted a curious brow.

“Andre The Cannibal.”

“He died years ago,” Becky chuckled to herself.

She was far from an expert in the field of European gangsters but when it came to Andre The Cannibal she didn’t need to be, he was a myth, an urban legend, a hitman who supposedly ate his victims, a big earner for the downtown morbid tourism scene that the Hungarians had their hands in, and he had died at least thirty years ago if she could just about remember the finer details of his Wikipedia page. Her laughter began to peter slightly as Laszlo’s expression remained fixed and serious.

“You’re not kidding,” Becky blinked in shock.

“Andre… he did a lot of work for us in the early days but he caused a lot of problems, made too much of a stir.” Laszlo shrugged and twiddled his thumbs in thought. “We paid him to disappear and he did just that, the whole thing was very civil.”

“So why now?”

“We made a lot of money with the tourists coming to see the old haunts, the restaurant where he cooked people, the street his burned body was found, these sort of things.” Laszlo mused and clasped his hands. “But… the last few years we’ve been lucky if we’ve filled two buses a week.”

“Wait,” Becky began to laugh in absolute delight. “Not only do you want me to track down a dead man but you want me to make the hit messy and loud so people know he was alive in the first place?” It was as if all her luck had come at once.

“Bingo.” Laszlo grinned and pointed his finger like it was a gun. “Andre lives, Andre dies again, someone writes a book, Netflix makes a documentary, everybody is happy, I get my tourists back. The Queen doesn’t like tracking people down and he’s been gone for a long time so it won’t be easy work. She brought you to me with high recommendation, said you would be the woman to get it done.”

“Well colour me flattered!” Becky singsonged. “How soon can I get to work?”

“Heal first, work later.” Laszlo stood up from the desk. “How much will your work cost?”

“Do what you love and you never work a day in your life, my mother used to say that.” Becky sighed happily and pushed a slackened smile. “Half a million, all of my expenses covered, and your loveliest smile.” She turned back to the Hungarian jokingly, anticipating that negotiations would start and he would work her down to the number she actually wanted.

“Done.” Laszlo smiled so wide his fuzzy red cheeks bunched and bulged. “Rest for now, I’ll call the Queen and tell her you’re off limits for a while.”

“What?”

“You didn’t think it would really be so easy, did you?” He nodded at the bandaged wounds. “She is a cat and you are her little mouse. Just because she let you live this time doesn’t mean she isn’t planning bigger things.”

“Well now that does sound exciting…” Becky felt herself fall in love with that bastard woman a little bit more.

…

Charlotte began to wonder if the little troublemaker was alive or dead, she had anticipated retaliation or maybe even a postcard at the very minimum. Laszlo kept tight lipped on the matter, said he was equally in the dark but that the pre-paid cards were being used and things seemed to be progressing as expected. It should have been easy to let go of, their last meeting had made them more than square by anyone’s standards. But Charlotte just couldn’t put the bitch down, still, now, months after the fact.

It was more than infuriating, and it had began to affect her work too, the preoccupation, the wondering, the slight infatuation of it all. She had barely enjoyed the last three kills and one of them was a Saudi Prince. A real life prince. The son of a king—albeit one of the middle ones with a penchant for bad business deals who weren’t too important in the grand scheme of things—but the son of a king nonetheless. It should have been one for the scrapbook but instead it felt like a chore, like a small way to pass the time until the troublemaker could crop up on her radar again.

Charlotte’s phone buzzed on the table of the airport bar that was now setting up to be home until her delayed flight was ready for departure.

Laszlo Varga, 1 message. ‘Turn on the news,’ it simply read. She exhaled and already knew what was coming. The phone was slung back down and her laptop was opened. She typed in the address of different news outlets in different tabs, all of them loading with similar headlines and gruesome, censored pictures.

Cannibal Hitman Thought To Be Dead FOR THIRTY YEARS Discovered Mutilated In Downtown Street Where His Infamous Slayings Took Place.

Pictured: The City Street Where Andre The Cannibal, Thought To Be Dead For Thirty Years, Was Discovered Dismembered By A GIRL SCOUT.

Reign Of Terror Comes To Final Close As Hungarian Mobster Famed For Eating His Victims Meets A Fitting Fate.

Buzzfeed’s Buzz Of The Day: Ten Reasons Why Trump May Give The Man Responsible For Murdering Andre The Cannibal The Presidential Medal Of Freedom.

Andre The Cannibal: The Failings Of A Police Investigation, And The City Commissioner Who Is Expected To Resign In A Statement This Afternoon.

The Irishwoman had certainly been busy. Charlotte scanned the headlines and chewed the inside of her mouth, infuriated by how impressive it all was. She closed the tabs one by one until a different headline all together caught her attention.

Police Search For Witnesses After Local Restauranter Discovers His Walk In Refrigerator Stolen After Closing The Business For A Period Of Mourning.

It made Charlotte smile and look away, she brought herself back and read the headline again, then once more just to make sure she wasn’t seeing things. She scrolled down the page and looked at the blurry images picked up by the security cameras.

Bingo.

She would recognise that ass anywhere.

…

“Tell me you’re not a little bit impressed!” Becky said chirpily to the shocked, disbelieving face at the door.

“Is that the Interlevin AF10?” Charlotte couldn’t take her eyes off of the bomb shelter in her workshop. “All the bells and whistles?”

“All the bells and whistles.” Becky nodded and clambered down from the workshop table.

Charlotte stood there and blinked, her expression mute, her brow furrowed slightly, her eyes registering reality but her brain disbelieving it, still. It was cute to watch. It was everything Becky had hoped it would be, which was a low bar of expectation to meet considering the only thing Becky had hoped for was the absence of steam irons and other mean things of that nature.

“How did you even...”

“I killed the owner’s mum,” Becky whispered softly, smile slackening, nibbling her bottom lip as if it was the sweetest gesture she could muster. “He closed up shop for a few days so I snuck in when no one was around.”

“You just snuck in and stole a walk in refrigerator?” Charlotte rubbed her chin, nodding as if it was comprehensible, nodded even though she still didn’t understand, completely gliding over the part where someone’s mother had been suffocated with a pillow.

“Well, Laszlo lended me a crane and a flatbed truck.”

“Of course he did.” It compounded Charlotte’s frustration. “You kill Andre The Cannibal, paint the whole of Ninth Street with his body parts, and then you steal a fucking walk in refrigerator all in the same weekend.” She thrusted her hand in the direction of her new fridge. “Of course you did that,” Charlotte quietly rubbed her temples.

“You’re right it is a bit impressive, isn’t it?”

“You’re not armed.” Charlotte suddenly noticed, looking her up and down, weighing up her chances. “Awfully presumptuous of you.”

“I didn’t say I wasn’t,” Becky opened her leather jacket and her gun glinted the light.

“Is this you bringing me a gift or you looking for a mexican standoff?” Charlotte opened her own jacket and lifted an eyebrow, the handle of her pistol sticking out slightly.

“Maybe both?” Becky smirked and closed her jacket.

“I will shoot you.” It wasn’t said with any sort of meaningful conviction.

“I missed you,” Becky said it as though it were the easiest thing in the world to say. “Besides… you could have killed me but you gave me the Andre Sopa job instead, this is just me returning a gift with a gift.”

Charlotte hmph’d and seemed to become stuck. “It’s starting to become unsettling how you just show up like this.” The confession was exhaled earnestly.

“You could hide from me if you wanted to, my guess is that you don’t.”

“You’re easy to become interested with.”

“Ooft,” Becky became pleased. “I’ll take that as a compliment, Charlotte Flair.”

“What is it you want, Becky?”

“I honestly don’t know…” Becky exhaled and swallowed. “At first I wanted to kill you, and I think I still might. Right now I just want to understand you, I suppose?”

Charlotte became quiet and thought about it for a moment.

“Do you want to stay for dinner?”

“I’d like that.”

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