Assassins Anonymous - Hardcover

Buch 1 von 3: Assassins Anonymous

Hart, Rob

 
9780593717394: Assassins Anonymous
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0593717392 ISBN 13: 9780593717394
Verlag: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2024

Inhaltsangabe

“The best kind of thriller. . . . Suspenseful, sentimental, and ultimately redemptive, Assassins Anonymous is a can’t-miss novel.” — S. A. Cosby,  author of All the Sinners Bleed

In this clever, surprising, page-turner, the world’s most lethal assassin gives up the violent life only to find himself under siege by mysterious assailants. It’s a kill-or-be-killed situation, but the first option is off the table. What’s a reformed hit man to do?

Mark was the most dangerous killer-for-hire in the world. But after learning the hard way that his life’s work made him more monster than man, he left all of that behind, and joined a twelve-step group for reformed killers.

When Mark is viciously attacked by an unknown assailant, he is forced on the run. From New York to Singapore to London, he chases after clues while dodging attacks and trying to solve the puzzle of who’s after him. All without killing anyone. Or getting killed himself. For an assassin, Mark learns, nonviolence is a real hassle.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Rob Hart is the author of The Paradox Hotel, The Warehouse, and the Ash McKenna crime series, and the co-author of Scott Free with James Patterson. He’s worked as a book publisher, a reporter, a political communications director, and a commissioner for the city of New York. Hart lives on Staten Island.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

1

Why is a caterpillar wrapped in silk while it changes into a butterfly? So the other caterpillar can't hear the screams. Change hurts.

                -Rory Miller, Meditations on Violence

Lower East Side, Manhattan

Now

Adrenaline is the ultimate painkiller. It doesn't last very long. But in those white-hot moments when your gut gets pierced by a bullet, or a knife cleaves your skin, you would be amazed at how little you feel it.

It screws with your perception of time, too. For most people, when pain is screaming for attention like a starving toddler, everything is a senseless jumble of limbs and grunts. The world moves at twice the speed, while you hover above your body watching the mayhem unfold.

But when you've been at this long enough-and I've been at this long enough-time turns into a thing you can hold in your hand. You can rotate it and examine the angles. You end up confronting things about yourself.

Like why you're sprawled on a cold linoleum floor, amid the shattered remains of a flimsy folding table, covered in cheap coffee and leftover donuts. You wonder which of your sins summoned the man who put his boot to your chest and sent you flying.

When I woke up this morning, I thought I didn't need a meeting. Those are the days when I need a meeting. So I dragged myself to the basement of St. Dymphna's on the Lower East Side. A tiny church, so forgotten it might as well be forsaken, tucked away in the wilds underneath the Williamsburg Bridge.

The details of the meeting aren't important.

What's important is stopping this guy from killing me.

He's that kind of tall where you wonder if he has to duck through doorways. He's right-handed. Not bulky, but the veins on his forearms are raised like ridges on a topography map. On his left forearm is a tattoo: a single black dot, surrounded by four more, like five on a die. His dark hair is buzzed to his skull, except for a narrow strip of black Mohawk. He's wearing cargo pants, black boots, and a navy thermal. I recognize the glassy deadness in his eyes because I see it in the mirror every morning. He might be Russian. He hasn't spoken yet, but the kick, his stance, and the smug confidence read as Systema.

I push myself to standing, careful not to slip on the spilled food. He's about ten feet from me. He should have tried to overwhelm me while I was down, but he hasn't done that. Instead he's sizing me up with a look of recognition and excitement.

I think he knows who I am.

Which means he's either insane or very confident.

"We can still talk this out," I tell him, glancing down at the floor. "I'd offer you a donut but we're past the five-second rule."

He smiles with the left corner of his mouth and mutters, "Kozyol."

Russian it is.

As soon as the insult leaves his lips, he comes at me, fast.

Too fast.

He's so excited about proving something, he's not paying attention to the floor. Three steps and he lands on a chocolate-frosted donut that causes him to slide forward. It interrupts his flow, which is all the opening I need.

In one movement I bend down, pick up the shattered coffeepot by the black plastic handle, and swing the jagged edge of glass at his leg. I'm hoping to hook it behind his knee and sever something important, incapacitate him, because I need to know who sent him. But also, it's not like I can kill him.

In this place, of all places.

He jerks back and I miss him by a hair. Same thing on the next three swings. I'm hunting for nonlethal cuts, but he's that kind of Bruce Lee fast where you see where he starts and finishes but not all those parts in the middle.

Already I'm feeling gassed. My muscles are covered in dust and cobwebs. It's been a while since I pushed myself. I go for the leg again but swing too wide and lose my balance. He uses his momentum to come back around and put his boot into the side of my head. I move with the blow and combat roll into a standing position.

The adrenaline is doing its job. The pain is outside, knocking at the door, but the disorientation is inside pouring a cup of tea.

I set my feet, ready for him to charge. The glass on the coffeepot is too fragile for it to be an effective weapon, but it's something. So of course, he reaches into his belt and pulls out a short black switchblade. It looks sharp enough to cut through the hull of a tank.

Another sign of his confidence. He could have knifed me at the start. I didn't hear him until he was right behind me, which is not the kind of thing most people could brag about.

He's here to test himself.

He holds the knife behind him, away from where I could effectively counter or knock it from his hand. He puts that veiny left forearm out like a shield. Knives are dangerous in the hands of idiots, but there's nothing worse than someone who knows how to use one.

He takes small steps toward me now, gauging the distance. Hopping forward a little before stepping back, daring me to swing. I'm matching his stance, forearm out, wrist facing me so he can't get at the tender part on the inside.

But I'm desperately outmatched.

What this guy doesn't know is that I will do anything within my power to avoid killing him, even as the most savage part of me roars with hunger to do just that.

While he puts on a show, I take a moment to breathe. Inhale for four seconds, hold for four, breathe out for four, hold my lungs empty for four. It calms my nervous system enough that I can focus.

The coffeepot is useless, so when he decides to strike I throw it at his face. He turns and staggers slightly to protect his eyes, which lets me come around low on his dead side and go for the knife. If I can control it, I might be able to walk away from this with a few cuts, maybe some light puncture wounds, without taking it handle-deep in my chest.

I get one hand over his wrist, and the other over his hand, then shove my shoulder into him, creating distance and pushing the blade away from me. From here it's chess at a hundred miles an hour. If I can throw my knee into the back of his, I can fold him to the ground and gain control. Get the knife arm down, use my leverage to keep it there.

But he's strong. He yanks back hard, creating an opening, and then the two of us are struggling for the weapon.

My fingers slip on something wet and it's harder to maintain a grip.

That's when my experience with adrenaline betrays me, and time gets fuzzy.

A jumble of limbs and grunts, an eternity in an instant.

He pulls away, a look of shock on his face.

His hands are empty. So are mine. I know the knife didn't land on the ground because I would have heard it. My heart is flooded with an acidic sense of regret.

Almost made it to a year.

I search him for the knife's handle, hoping it's a nonfatal wound. I can apply pressure, call an ambulance, tie off a tourniquet-whatever it takes to save this guy's life.

Except I don't see the knife anywhere.

And he's looking down at my stomach.

I follow his gaze to where the knife is sticking out of my left side.

"Oh, thank god," I say, gently touching the edges of the wound.

That's when the pain sets in, crashing into me like a wave, sending me to the ground. I roll onto my side, so as not to push the knife in deeper. Every nerve in my body flares to life and screams directly in my ears.

That's the thing about adrenaline-it's the ultimate painkiller, but it doesn't last very long.

He stalks toward me, and I think, This is it. I wonder what brought him here, how he found me, why he's doing this. It'd be nice if he would monologue a bit, but he doesn't seem the talkative type. I guess it doesn't matter....

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Verlag
G.P. Putnam's Sons
Erscheinungsdatum
2024
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0593717392
ISBN 13 
9780593717394
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Anzahl der Seiten
320
Kontakt zum Hersteller
G.P. Putnam's Sons
https://www.penguin.com/putnam/

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USA
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