Page 4 of The Hitman’s Final Job

“That’s not our business,” he says, his voice unchanged. Not a degree warmer or colder. Just the same flat tone. “They weren’t the target.”

“I know they weren’t the target. I’m asking what happens to them.”

“Silas—”

“He has two daughters. They don’t know what their father does. They probably think he’s a good man.” I pause. “He probably is, to them.”

Another silence. Longer this time.

“That’s not relevant to the job,” Draven says finally.

He’s right, but tonight I don’t let the silence or his lack of emotion pressure me.

“I’m retiring.”

The words come out quieter than I expected, but they feel truer than anything I’ve said in the last ten years.

There’s no audible reaction from the other side of the line.

Finally, “That’s not how this works,” he says, and now there’s something in his voice. Not quite a threat, but a shadow of one.

“Then tell me how it works. Because from where I’m sitting, I’m a trigger finger with a memory. That’s all. I pull the trigger and then I don’t get to know what happens next.”

“The world becomes a better place. That’s what happens next, Silas.”

For ten years that was enough for me. The guilt of wanting more than this has stopped me from uttering those words. It’s no longer enough knowing that my job serves a purpose, that it saves hundreds if not thousands of lives with each single person I remove from existence.

“One more job,” Draven says, cutting through my thoughts.

“In case you don’t realize this, the concept of retiring from one’s job is that there are no further jobs.”

“In case you don’t realize this, Silas, you don’t work as a checkout assistant at your local grocery store. You can’t just quit. You’re an asset.”

He’s not wrong, but fuck, I signed up for this because I had no choice, but I didn’t commit a crime, so why do I feel like I’m in a prison?

“One more,” I say.

“One more,” he confirms. “And then we talk.”

I hang up.

I don’t go into a new job unprepared, but I just announced to my handler of ten years that I want to quit like I’m just asking for some personal time off for a couple of days.

Big mistake. One I won’t make again.

I open the phone app that shows the live stream of my apartment in Atlanta. Cathy proudly sits on my kitchen windowsill. A little pink bud is starting to open, and I’m glad to be heading home so I can see it bloom.

Cathy doesn’t need me. She’s survived every job, every absence, every broken promise to come home sooner.

I think about the vegetable garden I want to have some day. The small house. The quiet life.

And maybe, the version of me that has the courage to make a decision for himself for once.

One more job.

I lie back on the bed, my food probably cold now, and stare at the ceiling, trying not to think of Viktor’s daughters and all the people whose lives were changed because a twenty-five-year-old with nothing to lose said yes to being a hit man for a living ten years ago.

I’m not very successful.