Dying for Revenge Read Online Free

there?”
    “I’m leaving the U.K. in the morning.”
    “Anything I can do?”
    “Get me some work if you can.”
    “Short on cash?”
    “Not short. Just have a few obligations, bills like the rest of the squares.”
    “Where you headed? In case something pops up in the direction you’re going.”
    “Heading where they need to change the president.”
    “God bless America.”
    “North America.”
    “I stand corrected. You’re heading home.”
    I didn’t have a home. I didn’t have a country. I’d been told I was born in North America, but I was a man without a country. Sometimes I felt more European than American, other times more Canadian than European. I didn’t know who I was, where I had come from, only that I existed, my life one big lie. I wanted better for the kid. I wanted the kid to be safe and get what I never had, the truth.
    I told Konstantin, “Find out what you can.”
    “Strawberry blond. About five-five.”
    “Nice curves and pretty face.”
    “And a six-foot redhead, military haircut.”
    “I know it’s not much.”
    He asked, “You hear them speak?”
    “Just saw their guns.”
    “No idea what nationality.”
    “No fucking idea. But I don’t think they were locals.”
    “Why not?”
    “The woman. She wasn’t aware of the CCTV cameras.”
    “Maybe she didn’t care.”
    “Maybe.”
    “I’ll make some calls. Hit up some other handlers. We outsource jobs to each other off and on. And nowadays a lot of people in the wetwork business are getting business right off the Internet, finding jobs on Craigslist, so I’ll have somebody search that avenue.”
    “Craigslist. I heard. Advert for hits on the Internet. Those jobs were mostly in Mexico.”
    “You never know. Anyway, you being off grid so long had me sending work to other handlers. You know how it goes. If you get a reputation for talking you’re out of the biz, so most of those sons of bitches won’t tell shit. But I’ll see who has loose lips. If they have you on a kill list, will hit you back.”
    I nodded, took a breath, tried to regroup. “How’s your health?”
    “I am fine.”
    “I mean . . . got sidetracked with my bullshit . . . the chemo?”
    “I’m still doing chemo.”
    Again I paused. “And you are in Suriname working?”
    “Have to keep working. Costs a lot to stay alive in America.”
    He paused, sounded hopeful. The cancer in his body not making him sound weak.
    Konstantin said, “I have to put people in the dirt so I can stay unburied. Costs me a hundred dollars a day to live. A barrel of oil a day to remain amongst the living. Close to three large a month to stay on top of soil. That means I pay thirty-six thousand a year to stay alive.”
    “That’s a lot.”
    “Food, mortgage, electric bill, and my wife’s hair, nails, and car note not included.”
    He chuckled, so I chuckled along with him.
    He said, “I’m still on top of soil, that’s all that matters.”
    “Sorry to dump my shit on you right now.”
    “Like I said, I’m on top of soil. And you try to stay the same way.”
    We disconnected.
    My heartbeat refused to slow down.
    My paranoia refused to let me breathe.
    I had nightmares about the man who had killed me. Still got that horrifying sensation I owned as Death claimed me and I suffocated. A man I hadn’t been able to kill and get my own revenge, that moment of my life never getting the closure it needed for me to relax, for me to rest, for me to not feel hunted. That had left me uneasy, feeling incompetent, more vulnerable than I’d ever admit to anyone breathing.
    I was a man who did wetwork; admitting that I had cracks in my armor didn’t work in this business. I had to remain as professional and removed as the rest of the people in my trade.
    I was a gun for hire trying not to get killed. A man trying to stay on top of the ground.
    Because of the kid.
    Still, I searched the landscape, that foreboding sensation refusing to wane and let me go.
    The kid; had to make sure