Flashback by Justine Davis (classic reads .txt) 📕

get any closer than he had to, not to a target that might shoot back.

She pocketed the small gun, wondering in passing what crimes she might be able to link it to back in the lab. But that was for later.

She found a small cell phone, with the logo of one of the pay-as-you-go companies. That could yield some interesting information, she thought, and shoved it in her pocket, as well.

Then she grabbed a handful of mousy-brown hair. Yanked his head back. Slowly she moved her knife past the man’s eyes, tilting it so it glinted in the desert sun on its way to his exposed throat.

“Son of a bitch,” he repeated.

“Daughter, actually. Although I’m sure mumsy wouldn’t care for the expression, I won’t argue with you. You want to say anything else while you still have vocal cords?” she asked, making her tone purposely breezy.

He clearly was afraid to move too much with that blade against his jugular. “Fuck you.”

“Well, that’s helpful. Okay, then.”

She tightened her grip on his hair and pulled his head back farther, digging her knee harder into his kidneys. She shifted the hilt of the knife in her hand, as if to get a better grip before slicing his throat.

He yelped. “Hey! No, wait!”

“Why?” She knew she sounded only vaguely curious.

“Because…” He gulped, she could feel the strain of his muscles as she held him in the uncomfortable position. “You can’t just kill me.”

“Why not? You were going to kill me, after all. I mean, I could just leave you for the desert to kill, but where’s the fun in that?”

“Son of a bitch,” he said again, apparently in a rut at the moment. “What kind of woman are you?”

She gave his head a yank. And for the first time, she let some of the fury she was feeling into her voice. “I’m an Athena,” she hissed. “The kind of woman punks like you don’t want to admit exists. The kind of woman who makes you look like the cowardly, pathetic, impotent vermin you are.”

He was angry enough to risk the blade and gave a furious jerk. The movement made her nick his throat. He twisted to get away. She let him, for an instant, just enough for him to roll over onto his back so she could see his face, read his eyes. And confirm what she’d already seen: whoever he was, he wasn’t the gardener. Which meant she could make no assumptions about how many people were involved in this.

She saw him think he had her, that he could get free, for a split second before she brought her knee down again, this time hard into his gut. Air whistled out of him and he gasped. She settled the knife against his throat again, schooling her expression to dispassionate coolness.

“I’m also,” she added, her voice even again, “the woman who knows this desert well enough to make sure you’re never found. Someday decades from now a flash flood may wash your bones down to the highway, but until then, nobody will know. And by then, nobody will care. Assuming anybody cares now, of course.”

She moved again, letting him breathe as she settled the knife in her palm, making him yelp anew. “Don’t you want to know who sent me?”

She’d already decided how to play this. She laughed. “Do you really think I don’t already know?”

Confusion flickered across his face. “You do? He said you wouldn’t. That you couldn’t know.”

“He underestimated. Just like he overestimated you.”

“But…he said you were FBI. That if anything went wrong you’d just arrest me.”

So, he knew who and what she was. And was willing to risk the murder of a federal agent. He must be getting paid a lot.

While she still didn’t know who was footing the bill, she did know something about him now: he had lousy taste in henchmen. And this attempt on her life spoke volumes about the size and value of the secret he was so desperate to keep.

“I’m off duty,” she said. “And nobody’s ever going to know.”

“He’ll guess,” the man insisted. “I’m supposed to call him when it’s over. He gave me that phone you took, so he could call for a report. He’ll get suspicious if I don’t answer.”

“Don’t worry about it,” she said, in the tone of a parent soothing a worried child. “I’ll answer for you and let him know you failed. Completely.”

The man twisted, his face contorting in anger. She ignored him.

“Hmm,” she murmured, making her voice studiedly casual, as if she were thinking something over. “Maybe I should let you live, and let him take care of you for me. Shouldn’t take him too long to find somebody else who’s more…efficient.”

The man swore as his face reddened. She could see he’d had a bellyful of her insults, but still didn’t have the nerve to go up against that knife. There was something up close and personal about a blade as a weapon, and for cowards it was one of the most intimidating, if for no other reason than it told you the person you were up against wasn’t afraid to do just that—get up close and personal.

And nothing scared a coward more than a lack of fear in someone else. They didn’t teach human psychology at Athena for nothing.

“Where did he find you, anyway?” She took a chance with a guess. “He’s not the type to hang out where your kind does.”

He gave her a look that was filled with nothing less than hatred. But he answered. “His kid is.”

“Ah. I’d heard rumors,” she said, trying to lead him on, to get anything she could out of him that might provide another piece to the puzzle. “But you know, people talk, it might not be true.”

The man snorted. “Kid’s a coke-head who fried his brain years ago.”

Well, that adds another layer, she thought. I wonder whose kid? The gardener’s, maybe?

“And how good it must make Dad feel, to know somebody like you feels superior to his doper kid.”

“He