Two assassins. One little problem...
Finding dirt on politicians is usually easy, but Congressman Clements is more careful than most. Never one to back away from a challenge, devious Diamond enlists her old friend Snow in a scheme to catch their tar...
An hour and a half later, I'd taken a Silkwood shower, got dressed in a comfortable pair of sweats, and curled up next to my husband on the sofa. The whole team had come back to our place, and yes, we had a Chinese feast, albeit from the cheap place that stayed open until the early hours rather than the fancy restaurant that served the tastiest satay chicken. Bradley had done his best to make it more palatable by handing out bottles of soy sauce and getting out the fancy chopsticks I'd brought back from a visit to Beijing last year.
The news played on the TV in the corner of the room, and while the anchor's words were sombre, his face said holy hell, I can't believe this is happening.
"Sources say the man found dead in an empty apartment earlier this evening was none other than Congressman Paul Clements, a man who's proven no stranger to controversy over the past year with his efforts to free the financial sector from regulation and those shocking comments he was caught making at the children's hospital last Christmas."
Ah yes, that moment he got taped moaning to his assistant about having to hand out gifts instead of playing golf, and the touching suggestion that it would be cheaper to let most of the kids die anyway. It had been him arriving at the hospital earlier as we left, but I doubted the medical staff had put too much effort into trying to revive him.
"So what happened?" Dan waved her chopsticks at Snow. "Come on, I want all the juicy details."
"There's really not much to tell. He just kinda...faded. Lights out."
"Has that ever happened before?"
"Nuh-uh. Usually, I have to give them a little helping hand. Potassium chloride or succinylcholine. Or sometimes an air embolism. Him just dying like that was creepy."
"Creepy?" I choked out a laugh, and Snow glared at me. "Sorry. But creepy is that guy I shot in Houston whose feet kept moving for a full five minutes after he breathed his last. Spring roll?"
"Thanks. Can somebody pass the sweet chilli sauce?"
"What're you gonna tell the widow?" Nate asked.
Dan shrugged. "Thought I'd play it by ear. See how happy she seems before I start on the details. If she's upset, I'll give her the sanitised pictures and tell her he was fine when we left. If she breaks out the champagne, I might mention he popped his clogs in flagrante delicto."
My money was on the champagne. "Reckon she'll need more 'therapy'?"
"A hundred bucks says she'll need full-time help."
"Babe, I'm not taking that bet."
The news anchor was still talking. "According to Edwin Perkins, Representative Clements's assistant, the apartment building downtown where Mr. Clements was found was one of many in his investment portfolio, and this evening's visit was a regular, pre-scheduled inspection. Nobody reports hearing anything untoward, and right now, there's no indication of foul play. We'll go over to Marcia, who's on the scene at the moment. Marcia, what can you tell us?"
Marcia couldn't tell anybody anything, because Marcia was a vapid blonde who could barely read an autocue. Still, she looked pretty, and that was all that mattered on TV nowadays. I tuned her out and dug into my prawn crackers again. Lucky my nutritionist went to bed at nine p.m. every night, because he'd have thrown a fit if he'd seen what I was eating. As well as the deep-fried crackers, the crispy shredded beef was swimming in grease, but it tasted good so I didn't care.
My husband stuck with sweet-and-sour chicken and steamed rice, and worse, he'd put on clothes now. No socks, no shoes. The casual look, even though he was anything but relaxed. He'd taken a couple of Advil earlier, and though he'd never admit to being in pain, the way he sat with his weight shifted to one side told me the truth.
"Are you okay?" I whispered.
He didn't answer, just put his half-empty carton of food back on the coffee table and stood up.
"I've got an early meeting."
Liar. I'd seen his schedule. But I stood with him anyway.
"And Alex is coming for me at six thirty, so I'm gonna turn in too."
Bradley gasped. "But we have Maotai and fortune cookies."
"Maotai?" The number-one brand of baijiu, China's favourite alcohol, which ranged from kinda spicy to pure fucking fire. Drink a shot of that at full strength, and the initial numbness was followed by panic and a desperate search for something, anything, that might help in removing it from your system. They didn't call it the white devil for nothing. "Then I'm definitely going to bed."
"Spoilsport." Bradley tossed a handful of fortune cookies in our direction. "At least eat these before you go."
I really didn't want to, but my husband unwrapped one, so I had little choice but to follow suit.
"Well?" Bradley asked.
I unfurled the tiny piece of paper. "Big changes lie ahead."
"And yours?" he asked my husband.
"The same."
"Well, that's boring." Bradley came over to check we weren't fibbing. "What kind of cheap-ass cookies are these? Here, have another one."
"We're going to bed."
Bradley's protests continued, but we ignored him as we headed for the stairs. Even with stitches, my husband refused to use the elevator.
"You didn't answer my question," I said.
"What question?"
"Are you okay?"
He stayed silent the whole way to the second floor where our bedrooms were. He still hadn't answered when I followed him into his.
"You're not okay?"
Still nothing, but he tugged off his shirt and threw it into the laundry hamper. "Just had a taste of my own mortality today, that's all."
"But earlier, you said—"
"I know what I said." He stepped closer, so close I had to tip my head back to meet his gaze. Heat rushed through me, and I couldn't even blame it on the baijiu. "But what I said and how I feel are two different things."
"So how do you feel?"
"There are so many things left I want to do, and I don't want to run out of time to do them."
"Like what?"
He cupped my cheek in his palm, and I leaned into his touch.
"I'll keep that to myself for now. Get some sleep, Diamond. You're not skipping a session with Alex just because you took a door off its hinges."
"Asshole."
The man I loved laughed and turned away. "Yes. Yes, I am."
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