Case 0128: Train Ride

Case Number: 0128
Type: Assassination
Clients: *********
Status: Closed

Kill them, and make it look like an accident... for once I'd like them to say that I could just kill them outright, no conditions. The service wouldn't hurt the hip-pocket quite as much as an "accidental death"; and rightly so, it's much easier to just put 3 bullets in someone's head (although the get-away is always much harder).
We'd been scoping this one out for weeks... the target was a small-timer but the pay was good and it was going to pay out double if the coroner found it to be "death by misadventure". He was a shift-worker at a nearby state-run industries and had been fingered by a spy who'd recently been brought in by Internal Security. Trouble was they knew he was stealing state secrets but they couldn't prove it, so they'd come to me and put a juicy proposition on the table. Now it was my job to liquidate an asset that had become a liability.
Tonight was our best chance, he was working the graveyard shift and was catching the train into work. This kind of job required two heads to set up properly so I had brought Bella along for the ride. While I rode the only train this hour down the line Bella was waiting for the mark at his usual station, I was waiting for her call to confirm that he'd be on the train. That way if he didn't make it I could jump off at the station before and wait until he poked his head out.

It was a gloomy night; raining, but not heavy enough to warrant the excitement that came with a storm. Bella was pacing the train platform, her red trench-coat the only splash of colour against the gray night. Heels, fish-nets and a stripe of crimson lip-stick completed the look... the original femme fatale, an unlit cigarette between the red lips, waiting for some man to come along and light it for her; and when he did he'd light the fire in her eyes as well.
A man trudged wearily up the stairs to the platform, clutching a ticket and hot coffee in a feeble attempt to ward off the cold and tiredness. Bella turned with a come-hither glint in her eyes and the slightest of girlish pouts, I never did work out how she did that and still held onto the cigarette.
"You got a light?" He shoved the ticket into his top pocket and patted himself down, searching for some matches. Turning up nothing he shrugged. "Shame..." Bella responded, a hint of what he was missing out on creeping into her voice. Now she was positive that this was the mark; she turned and whispered into her radio.

On the train I opened my briefcase and took out a silk-scarf, the perfect tool for a job like this. I folded it as if to wear it as a guard against the cold evening. A quick twist and I was ready. I looked up and down the carriage for witnesses, the only other person was sleeping at the other end; not much of a threat, probably too drunk to remember anything in the morning anyway. The station was coming up and I was hoping that Bella was in position... ready to overload the fuses and plunge the station into darkness, if she hadn't this was going to be a train-ride to hard time.
The train slowed and I got into position, waiting at the door... we pulled up to the platform, the doors opened, the mark stepped on and the platform was plunged into darkness. The carriage was still lit but the drunk was still asleep. Quick as a flash I hooked the scarf around the marks neck and stepped off the train. As the doors closed behind me I pulled the scarf tight, trapping it in the door...
With any luck they'd find him at the end of the line, hung by his own scarf which had become caught in the door... a tragic accident. Anyone who knew him would want the surveillance tapes checked... he hadn't been wearing a scarf when he stepped onto the train... but he was a solitary man and the only people who knew him were the ones who had hired us to kill him.
I fumbled in my pockets for a Camel and my Zippo. The rush of nicotine to my brain released the pent-up tension. I felt warm breath in my ear.
"Got a light?"
I turned and held out the flickering Zippo's flame to her, the warm light accentuating her lips and cheek bones.
"You know there's better ways to unwind after a job..."
The proposition hung in the air, tantalising, the words written against the clouds and the things to come flashing through her eyes... I never did learn how to resist a woman in fishnets...