The Last Assassin Read Free Page A

it. Also, after all those hours of lovemaking, I was just too confused, not only about what I was going to do, but even about what I wanted.
    So we stayed with familiar subjects instead, mostly work and travel. She told me she was still on administrative leave, pending her organization's completion of an inquiry into what had happened in Hong Kong, where Delilah had defied orders and helped me. They'd lost a good man there, and there were people who thought Delilah was to blame. I knew better, of course, but it wasn't as though she could call on me as a character witness.
    'I don't mind,' she said. 'I'm happy to have the time off.'
    I nodded. 'I was wondering how you managed to get away for this.'
    She raised her glass. 'I'd say it worked out well.'
    We touched glasses and drank. I said, 'How do you expect it's going to turn out?'
    'I'm not even thinking about it.'
    I knew her better than that and smiled sympathetically. Delilah didn't like to take shit from her supposed superiors, or from anyone.
    After a moment, she shrugged. 'I'm a little worried. Not so much about whether I'm going to be reinstated or reprimanded or whatever. It's more… I just hate the way they use me and then judge me for doing the jobs they send me on. You'd think Al-Jib dead would trump everything else, but no.'
    Al-Jib had been a terrorist, part of the A. Q. Khan network, who'd been trying to buy nuclear materiel so he could assemble a bomb. Delilah had killed him in Hong Kong, a target of opportunity, and right now that victory was probably the only thing holding the line against her organizational detractors.
    'Well, they've got their priorities,' I said.
    'Yeah, their little tsk tsk meetings, that's the priority. I swear, sometimes I feel like I should just tell them to go to hell.'
    'I've dealt with that type, too,' I said, reaching over and taking her hand. 'Don't let them get you down.'
    She smiled and squeezed my hand. 'I haven't even thought about it since I saw you. Not until we started talking about it, anyway.'
    'Well, you'll have to see me more often, then,' I said, before I could think better of it.
    She squeezed again and said, 'I'd like that.'
    I didn't answer.
    We finished after midnight and walked northwest into La Ribera. It was a weeknight, but even so El Born, one of the most ancient streets in the city and the heart of La Ribera, was hopping, with crowds spilling out from the bars lining the street and from the surrounding clubs and restaurants. We managed to get a table at a bar called La Palma. It was a beautiful old place, unpretentious, with wine barrels in the corners and sausages hanging from the ceiling. I ordered us each a shot of a 1958 Highland Park, one of the finest single malts on earth — ridiculous at 150 Euros the measure, but life is so short.
    Afterward we strolled more. Delilah hooked an arm through mine and snuggled close in the chill night air. It felt so natural it almost worried me. I wondered what it would feel like to be this way all the time. Then I thought of Midori again.
    We drifted south, into the Barri Gòtic, where the maze of stone streets narrowed and the crowds thinned. Soon the echoes of our footfalls, the shadowed walls of dark cathedrals and shuttered apartments, were our only companions.
    A few blocks west of Via Laietana, I heard loud voices speaking in English, and as we turned a corner I saw four young men coming in our direction. From the clothes and accents, I guessed working-class British, probably football hooligans; from the volume and aggressive tone, I guessed drunk. My immediate sense was that they had struck out with the local girls in La Ribera, hadn't found any prostitutes to their liking along Las Ramblas, and were now heading back to La Ribera for another pass. My alertness ticked up a notch. I felt Delilah's hand on my arm stiffen just slightly. She was telling me she had noted the potential problem, too.
    The street was narrow, almost an alley, and there wasn't much room