THE man sitting behind the desk oozed greasy arrogance, tapping at the cherrywood top with heavily ringed fingers. Parker hadn’t seen his boss in several months, not since he’d taken the job, and the passing weeks had not been good for the man. Excess ran his pallor to a sickly pale, and a hint of yellow flushed under his skin where the morning sun fell on his face. The buttons on his shirt strained to hold back his barrel chest, wiry graying chest hairs poking out through the gaps, and his chair creaked under his weight when he shifted forward to rest his hands on the desk.
No, Parker thought, the man in front of him was a far cry from the actor hired to play Damien Mitchell’s father.
Surprisingly, he looked like a perfect match for the woman Parker’d slaughtered a few days ago and more than a mirror image of the man he’d been hired to kill after Damien. But it was the woman’s murder he was being called up on the carpet for, because his employer thought it’d been over the top.
Parker would take a great delight in showing the man just how far over the top he could be.
“Do you have a problem with how I do my job?” Parker helped himself to the brandy decanter off of the study’s wet bar. After popping off the crystal stopper, he paused to sniff at the liquor. It wasn’t as cheap a brand as Parker expected, but still, the man could have purchased better. He certainly wasn’t hurting for cash. He poured himself a double shot and swirled the brandy around the glass as he walked to one of the wing chairs in front of the desk.
The chairs were shorter than the one his employer sat in, a psychological domination as cheap as the brandy stocked in his bar, but they were more comfortable than sitting on the edge of the desk, a move Parker’s employer would probably lose his shit over. If anything, the man was consistent. He liked his people to remember they were his subordinates and worked hard to turn the thumbscrews every chance he got.
Just the thought of popping the man’s buttons made him smile, and Parker hid his grin behind his glass.
The large man cleared his throat and trifled with the fringe he’d combed over to hide his bald dome. “Did she suffer?”
That was a question Parker never thought he’d hear the man ask. It was common enough from other people… more ordinary people who’d wanted an annoyance removed from their lives, but his employer wasn’t what Parker would consider ordinary. And coming from his viewpoint, Parker thought that was saying something.
He leaned back in the chair, knocking back another mouthful of brandy as he contemplated how to answer the man. Small beads of sweat were starting to pool over his glistening forehead, the drops grouping together until they were almost heavy enough to trickle down his milk-spotted cheeks. Parker debated lying to draw out the man’s discomfort, but the woman he’d killed deserved better… no matter how much her death stink clung to him after he was done.
After all, it seemed like Parker was the only one who’d marked her passing, even if it was with a celebratory salute of a bourbon bottle and an hour spent with a Thai hooker.
“Nope.” He swished the brandy around in his mouth, enjoying the burn of it against his gums. Swallowing, he regarded the other man with a jaundiced eye. “It was quick. She was passed out. Didn’t feel a thing.”
If anything, the man looked disappointed, and Parker wondered if he’d made the right decision in telling the truth. Shaking his head, his boss slid an envelope across the desk toward Parker. He stopped short of pushing it to the edge, forcing Parker to reach for it.
Parker left it where it was, sipping his brandy slowly, refusing to play the man’s head games.
“That’s a bonus for you.” The heavyset man shifted in his chair. His eyes flicked from the envelope to Parker’s face, seemingly discomfited by its continued presence on his desk. “For taking care of that matter so quickly. Although I would have preferred her discovery to be a little less… grandiose.”
“I wanted to send Mitchell a message.” Parker shrugged off the man’s grumbling displeasure. “It’ll be easier to get a hold of him if he feels like things are out of his control.”
“He’s gone public.” The man’s voice pitched up, rising to a near whine. “Everyone knows he’s alive. He’s going to be impossible to get near, and time’s starting to run out. Once the lawyers get a hold of—”