The Hitman

                                                                        Chapter 1

He was just finishing up his workout when the phone rang. Ignoring it, he sat on the bench where he was and continued his sets in front of the mirror with the dumbbell. Keeping his breathing even, he inhaled through his nose and exhaled through his mouth as he did arm curls. He’d worked up a light sheen of sweat and it glistened in the light off his biceps as he worked his arm carefully, methodically. The muscles in his arm rippled with the effort as he finally finished up the last set and rose to place the dumbbell back where it belonged.

He heard the answering machine kick on the automated message as it played its standard greeting and then sounded a long beep. Next he heard the voice of his cousin, George.

“Hey man, you there? Pick up.”

Grabbing a towel off the bench, Gabriel Monteleone wiped the sweat from his face, walked over to the phone and picked up the cordless receiver. “Yeah, what’s up?”

“Got a job for you,” George answered, purposely not using Gabriel’s name. Using names over the phone was a major no-no even on a secure line. Gabriel could hear loud music and a steady roar, which usually indicated people trying to talk above the music in the background.

“Are we secure?”

“Would I call you from here if it wasn’t?” came the reply.

“That’s not what I asked, damn it,” Gabriel growled slightly irritated. “Now answer the damn question!”

“I’m on a payphone at Charlie’s,” George sighed, not wanting to put his cousin in a foul mood. Charlie’s was a local bar that George loved to hang out at. They served stale beer and even staler chips, but George was fond of the place, not to mention that Charlie was his brother.

“Alright, so what do you have?” Gabriel walked into the kitchen and pulled a bottle of papaya juice out and twisted the cap off while balancing the cordless between his shoulder and ear.

George hesitated for a moment. “Man wants his wife gone.”

“Son of a bitch!” he hissed angrily. “You know damn well I don’t do women. Why are you wasting my time?” Gabriel grabbed the cordless from its precarious position on his shoulder and slammed the bottle of juice down on the counter. He hated it when his cousin tried to get him to break his own rules.

“Just listen for a sec, will ya? He’s willing to pay, and I do mean pay!” George tried to sooth his cousin’s temper. “He will pay your standard fee up front, and then another five mil when the job’s done.”

Gabriel raised an eyebrow at the amount, but answered, “I still don’t do women.”

“Awe, come on man, it’s just a stupid housewife. It’s $5.5 mil, Cousin, and with the money we already have in the Swiss account, we can finally retire. You know you’ve been wanting out. Just do this last job, and then we’ll head down to Cancun like we always planned. The beach, beer and lots and lots of women,” George replied, trying to sway his cousin.

Gabriel didn’t answer. He couldn’t believe he was actually considering this. He did want out. Badly. He’d been doing this for way too long and he wanted to retire. So far he’d been able to avoid the Feds for the past fifteen years, but he was getting tired. They still had no clue as to who he was or what he looked like, but Gabriel knew that his luck would eventually run out. Besides, killing was no way to earn a living.

“Come on, man. Just let me meet with the guy. Find out the particulars.” George could tell his cousin was considering it.

“Alright,” he sighed. “Meet with the guy. Make sure he understands that if I agree to this, it will be quick and clean. She won’t know what hit her.” Gabriel had been known to torture his victims if paid the right amount of money, but not this time. No amount of money would be enough to get him to torture a woman; it was bad enough that he was considering taking a hit on one.

“Cool! Alright, I’ll lay down the rules to him,” George said excitedly. “I’ll call you in a few days.”

Gabriel punched the disconnect button on the cordless and tossed it onto the counter. Picking up the bottle of juice, he took several long swallows before moving back into the living room. As he headed past the area where his weights were set up, he caught his reflection in the floor length mirror set up there and paused, frowning.

He’d come a long way from the skinny Italian kid who had to flee his hometown of Naples, Italy. He’d been fifteen years old and he had come to America to escape prison for murder. He’d been thin and scrawny then, but now at thirty-five, Gabriel was tall and lean. He worked out regularly with weights and he was all hard muscle.

Reaching his hand up behind his head, he tugged at the band that held his hair back in a ponytail and the long dark curls fell down past his shoulders. His neatly trimmed beard framed full lips and a strong jaw. He was a dangerously handsome man and completely masculine. His confidence and the way he carried himself caused people to rarely mess with him simply because of the intensity of his looks. His once expressive dark brown eyes showed little emotion anymore. He had stopped caring long ago.

To his family, he was known as Gabriel or Gabe. To the Feds and the people who hired him, he was “The Hawk.” A mysterious stranger who swept in and snatched the lives of the unsuspecting. He actually performed what he considered his first hit when he was fifteen years old. That was why had to leave his home and come to America.

                                                                   ~*~*~*~*~

Naples was no longer home because a snot-nosed rich kid from “uptown” had raped his sister. Afterwards, the police said that it was the kid’s word against his sister’s and that the kid’s parents were upstanding citizens. They said they could do nothing. The next day, Gabriel had gotten his dad’s old .45 Colt and walked down to the kid’s house and shot him in his front yard. He fled after that, leaving behind his family and friends.

He stowed away on a ship and once he was discovered, they allowed him to do odd jobs around the ship until they reached the U.S. Then he was on his own. He tried odd jobs here and there, but because of his temper, he couldn’t keep anything for long. Then one day his luck changed and he met up with a mob boss named Nickolas Giovanni. After discovering that Gabriel was good with a gun, he trained Gabriel as a hitman. Gabriel worked for Giovanni for seven years before Giovanni was finally busted and thrown in jail.

Gabriel decided to go independent after that. He was good, really good, and very expensive, but he never failed to get his target and he never ever left a trail. Everything was arranged through his cousin, George, who along with his brother Charlie had joined Gabriel in America a few years after he had fled Italy. Gabriel never met the clients and until a few minutes ago, he’d had a rule that he didn’t take hits on women.

“You’re sinking really low now, old man,” he spoke softly to his reflection. Shaking his head, he thought about the money. This had to be some kind of bitch for a husband to pay that much to get rid of her. Pushing any further thoughts of the possible new job from his mind, he headed for the bathroom to take a shower.

                                                                  ~*~*~*~*~

A week later, Gabriel sat in a dark booth in the far corner of Charlie’s, sipping on a glass of mineral water. He sat facing the door so he could observe who came and went. Another important rule: never sit with your back to the door. George walked in holding a large yellow envelope. He went to the bar, got a beer and headed over to Gabriel.

Sliding in to the booth opposite of Gabriel, he smiled. “Hey, Cousin.”

Not much on small talk, Gabriel simply nodded and asked, “Is it set up?”

“Yeah. It’s all right here.” George slid the large, over-stuffed envelope to Gabriel.

Opening the envelope, Gabriel pulled out the contents, leaving the money inside. The top page was typed. It had the name and other information of the woman he was to kill. Gabriel glanced through it quickly. He would study it all closer later at home.

Her name was Rachel Stone. A 33-year-old housewife with dark auburn hair and green eyes. She was born and raised in Charleston, South Carolina, and she was a first grade school teacher until she married Martin Stone. They had been married ten years and had one daughter named Abigail, who was five years old. Rachel did volunteer work at the local hospital and volunteered at the library twice a week, reading books to the kids.

Gabriel found an old picture of Rachel among the papers and frowned. He expected a classy woman with attitude and many plastic surgeries. Rachel was not what Gabriel would have considered beautiful, but she was not an ugly woman either. She was pretty in a rather old fashioned sort of way. Gabriel doubted he would have given her a second look had he passed her on the street. His tastes ran more to the exotic, not the old fashioned, homebody type.

Putting the papers back in the envelope, he shook his head. “I don’t get it. Why does this Martin Stone want his wife dead?”

George leaned back and sipped his beer. “Stone is worth a fortune. Get this… he’s CEO of Stone Enterprises in Atlanta. It’s a big time software company worth millions. They actually live in Connecticut, and he commutes by private plane. To divorce her, he’d lose half his fortune, plus what he’d pay in alimony and child support. When they got married, he took out a $10 million life insurance policy on his wife. She’s worth more dead than alive. Anyways, he’s hardly ever home anymore, spends most of his time in Atlanta screwing his secretary. So he shouldn’t be in your way.”

Gabriel shook his head, disgusted. “So he figures he could kill two birds with one stone, huh? Why the hell does he want me to do his dirty work?”

George smiled. “Because you’re the best, Cousin, you’re the best.”

“Shit, I ought to take him out afterwards just for the hell of it.” He sighed as he leaned back. “Guys like this Stone fellow make me sick.”

George started to get up. “Well if you do, make sure you wait until after he pays us the five mil.” He turned back to Gabriel. “I gotta go. I’ve got a date at eight and don’t want to be late.” George walked away, laughing at his own rhyming joke, leaving Gabriel to wonder if his cousin had finally gone off the deep end.

                                                                    ~*~*~*~*~

Later that evening, Gabriel packed for his trip to Connecticut. He would drive this one. He could be in Connecticut in two days. He had already arranged for his mail to be held for him, and an answering service would pick up his calls. No one but family knew his number anyway. Finishing up, he closed up the suitcase and set it by the door. He made himself a quick bite to eat, showered and settled into bed with the file on Rachel Stone. After learning all he could from it, he set it on the nightstand, turned out the light and fell into an uneasy sleep.

                                       ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

                                                     The Hitman - Chapter 2