He was humming, then he stopped, squinting into the darkness. Had he heard something? No, it was his imagination. He was hyper-alert, and he would have been able to hear the rustle of dead leaves underfoot, the snapping of a twig, whether it was caused by man or forest animal. There was nothing.
He’d cut the girl’s throat, make it look like a crime of passion. It was a shame he hadn’t brought one of his men with him. If the girl was found raped as well as murdered it would look like a crazy person had gotten to them. But he’d lived a celibate life and not even for the good of a mission could he endanger his immortal soul. And he hadn’t had the operatives he’d once had. They’d retired, or been killed, or reassigned. He?
??d been lucky to scrape together the help he’d gotten so far, which was why he’d had to turn to soldiers for hire.
You get what you paid for. The Gargonne brothers had been well-recommended and cheap, the job had been simple, and he’d had to use his own money. But they’d failed, and Barringer couldn’t wait. He should have come himself at that point, but he still had been hoping he could use MacGowan to lure Killian out of hiding. Now all he wanted to do was kill the bastard.
He caught himself. Those were words he didn’t use. Ever. Clearly the stress had been too much for him, to make a slip like that. He wouldn’t let it happen again.
He sat back on the hillside, tucking his hands inside his jacket. His shoes were muddy – have to buy new ones before he took the plane home, and get rid of these. It wasn’t as if anyone was going to go to a great deal of trouble to solve these particular executions. MacGowan and all the Committee kept deep cover, but even the French would be able to identify the bodies, including the two newcomers. Once they knew MacGowan’s past they would have a good enough answer and they would drop things. One thing about the French, much as he disliked them. They were practical.
The lights were off down at the farmhouse, but that made little difference, not with the infra-red. He’d never used the device before, but it worked well. He couldn’t rid himself of the notion that it was cheating. All this technology took the challenge out of the mission.
Then again, he’d missed his first shot. He wouldn’t miss his second.
There was no sign of movement down there. It had taken him a minute or two to figure out how to turn the infra-red on, and by that time he’d seen two heat sources at one end of the room and one in the middle. He couldn’t find anyone else, and he had the uneasy feeling that there had been others. Where were they?
He didn’t want to wait for daylight, when he could get a clear shot once more. He was cold, and he wanted to get the hell out of … he wanted to get out of France and back home. He was too old for this shit.
He stopped in confusion. Where had that word come from? He was getting disoriented, probably from stress and lack of sleep. He’d always done his best to maintain a stress-free life in a high-stress job. He valued his health too much to be prey to all the diseases stress could dump on you.
He slid his hands inside his coat, touching the small pistol tucked into his belt. It was an old favorite of his. Maybe he’d been wrong to try for a sniper’s shot. Maybe he could lure MacGowan out, finish him, then go in and take care of the others. A double tap to the back of the neck took care of things neatly and thoroughly.
Damn, he was cold. He shook himself, distressed. Darn. He wasn’t a man who cursed, ever. He was a good man, a temperate man.
He felt the muzzle of the gun up against the back of his head, cold and deadly.
“Fuck,” he said.
MacGowan moved around to face the man who had been trying to kill him, keeping the gun trained on his head. It was a cloudless night, and he could see the man quite clearly, and he stared at him in surprise.
“Jesus, you’re old,” he said.
The man frowned. His face was a network of wrinkles, his bushy eyebrows white over his unreadable eyes. MacGowan knew those eyes. He saw them in the mirror, in his friends. The blank eyes of a man who kills for a living.
“Don’t swear,” the old man said automatically.
MacGowan laughed, sinking down onto the earth in front of him. “You’re the one who said ‘fuck.’ Who are you, old man?”
“Vincent Barringer.” He was waiting for recognition to sink in. It didn’t.
“Who’s Vincent Barringer, then?”
He’d pissed the old guy off. “CIA,” he snapped.
“And they send senior citizens out on hits nowadays? You’ll have to come up with a better answer than that. Or is it simply that I’m only worth the dregs of the profession.”
“How dare you!” The old man was seething. “I’ll have you know I made this business. The CIA wouldn’t exist in its current state without me.”
“I wouldn’t be bragging about it if I were you.” MacGowan kept his eye on the rifle. Vincent Barringer would have a hard time swinging that around to reach him, but he needed to watch for any fast move. He could see no sign of another weapon, but he wasn’t fool enough to take that for granted. He shouldn’t underestimate the man because of his age. Even old cobras were deadly.
“Show some respect, young man.”
“Why?” he taunted. He was getting beneath the man’s skin. “Never mind. Just tell me who sent you to kill me, and why? What have I ever done to the fucking CIA?”
Barringer’s expression was disapproving. “No one sent me. I sent the others. When they failed so miserably I decided to finish it up myself. If you hadn’t moved at the last minute you’d be dead, your brains splattered on the walls.”
All over Beth, he thought, keeping his anger at bay. He’d learned to be icy cold in situations like this, when his rage wanted to blaze white hot. “Ah, but isn’t that always the case, old man? Death is always just around the corner, but as long as you move a fraction of an inch at the right time, you survive. So why is it you want me dead?”