The room was a hollow box of stale perfume and mildew, lit only by the bruised Wroclaw city glow leaking in through the curtains. Anders sat on the edge of the mattress, the bedsprings creaking beneath his weight. He had a bandage wrapped around his thigh where Kazou’s bullet had torn through. It throbbed with a dull, angry heat.

  He dragged a hand down his face.

  Everything was going wrong.

  He reached for the cheap rotary phone on the nightstand and dialed.

  Nothing. No answer.

  He exhaled sharply and leaned back, head thumping against the wall. The plaster behind him felt damp.

  He fished out another cigarette, struck a match, and inhaled. The nicotine burned through his lungs in a way that steadied him.

  Then—

  His thoughts shifted.

  To a few weeks earlier.

  ***

  The room had been nearly identical, different hotel, same rot. Same cheap carpet that whispered mold. Same television swallowing the darkness in blue static light.

  Anders had sat there in his undershirt, smoking, the wound still fresh in his memory though not yet in his flesh. The TV buzzed with a late-night broadcast, the anchor’s monotone buzzing through cigarette haze.

  And then—

  Rose appeared on screen.

  Her hair tied back; her hands gripping the podium; her expression fractured with anguish. She was speaking to reporters, voice trembling.

  “Kazou Kuroda… If you see this… please—turn yourself in. You didn’t mean for things to happen this way—”

  Anders’s lips curled, a slow, predatory smirk.

  He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, cigarette dangling between two fingers.

  “Rose Brook…” he drawled. “So brave. So righteous.”

  He laughed softly—a cracked, humorless sound.

  “Thanks for giving me your name and your face.”

  He stubbed the cigarette out, grinding it into the ceramic ashtray with unnecessary force.

  “You’ll have to die too, darling. You’ll have to. Because sooner or later you’ll realize he’s innocent—and then…” His smile widened, corrupted and hollow. “You’ll start asking questions you shouldn’t.”

  He muttered almost lovingly:

  “And you’ll try to find Casimir. And you’ll find the truth. And the truth is going to drown all of you.”

  His gaze snapped back to the screen as the anchor continued:

  “As a precaution, students at the Wroc?aw Philosophy School will be located and questioned—”

  The smirk died.

  Anders’s jaw clenched. His breathing sharpened.

  A tremor of rage rippled through him.

  “No,” he said quietly.

  Then louder.

  “No. No. No. NO!”

  He grabbed the remote and hurled it. The TV erupted in shards of broken glass and fizzled sparks. The room plunged into silence.

  “You will NOT catch Casimir!” he shouted at the blank screen. “You CAN’T! You don’t even DESERVE to!”

  His voice echoed off the walls, raw and ragged.

  Then, breathing like he had run miles, he collapsed back onto the bed. His eyes darted to the phone. His fingers reached for the dial.

  CLICK. CLICK. CLICK.

  “Leon…” he whispered as he turned the dial. “Leon… It’s been a while.”

  A slow smile crept across his face.

  ***

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Anders blinked, pulled sharply back into present reality as a car honked somewhere outside. His cigarette had burned to the filter. He crushed it out with shaking fingers.

  He exhaled and dialed again, this time with the impatience of a man who felt time closing in around him.

  The line clicked.

  Someone answered.

  A voice, groggy and annoyed, mumbled through static:

  “Alright. What the hell did you call me for, Anders?”

  Anders leaned back, letting his head rest against the stained headboard.

  “Leon,” he said, voice gravelly. “Do you remember our last call? From a few weeks ago?”

  “Yeah. And why the hell didn’t you call back? You were supposed to give me instructions.”

  “Because—” Anders pointed at his bandaged leg even though Leon couldn’t see him. “—some dumb fucking scientist shot me.”

  Silence.

  Then Leon burst out laughing. A genuine laugh.

  “You? Shot by a scientist? Oh, that’s rich!”

  “Shut the fuck up,” Anders snarled.

  Leon’s laughter slowly died down. “Alright, alright. So what’s the favor this time?”

  Anders’s fingers drummed against the nightstand.

  “I need you to kill someone.”

  Leon didn’t gasp. Didn’t hesitate. Didn’t even pause.

  He just said, conversationally:

  “Who?”

  A smile pulled at Anders’s lips, cold and poisonous.

  “Rose Brook.”

  Leon sighed through his nose like this was mildly inconvenient.

  “Why?”

  Anders’s eye twitched.

  “Because sooner or later she’ll realize Kazou Kuroda is innocent. And then she’ll start asking questions she shouldn’t.”

  “Alright. Reasonable enough. What’s the pay?” Leon replied.

  Anders smirked.

  “A lot.”

  “How much is ‘a lot’, Anders?” Leon yawned loudly. “You know I don’t move for pennies.”

  Anders lowered his voice.

  “Forty thousand euros.”

  There was a pause.

  Then:

  “…Yeah, okay,” Leon said casually. “I’ll take it.”

  Anders nodded, satisfied.

  “You’ll meet her in Amsterdam, Netherlands. That’s where she’s headed. Where Kuroda fled. Where the detectives are going.”

  “Right,” Leon said flatly. “I'm already in Amsterdam remember? I live there.”

  Anders’s eyebrows lifted. “Good. Then find her when she arrives. And kill her quickly. No theatrics.”

  Leon clicked his tongue. “You’re no fun. But fine. Quick. Clean.”

  “And Leon?” Anders added.

  “Yeah?”

  “Don’t underestimate her.”

  Leon laughed again, low and dismissive.

  “I don’t underestimate anyone. Especially not women who get mixed up with murderous ass men.”

  "Amsterdam. The Winston Hotel. I was able to fake being a news anchor to get that location."

  The line clicked dead.

  Anders stared at the silent phone for a long moment.

  Then he whispered, to no one:

  “Casimir… this had better be worth it.”

  ***

  Rain slid down the windows in light drops, blurring the neon signs of Amsterdam into smeared streaks of red and gold. The taxi rattled over the wet cobblestones as if it were held together by rust and prayer. In the back seat, Leon lounged like he owned the place.

  A cigarette hung from the corner of his mouth, the ember glowing each time he took a lazy drag. In his hand was a freshly printed photo of Rose Brook, clipped from a news article. The picture showed her mid-sentence, emotional, raw, beautiful in a way that irritated him. Leon snorted softly in somewhat of a disbelief.

  “God damn,” he muttered around the cigarette, tapping ash onto the floor. “Why do you gotta be so pretty? Makes this job ten times more annoying.”

  He flipped the photo, glanced out the window, then leaned back again, exhaling smoke toward the ceiling.

  “Hey,” he said suddenly, lifting his gaze to the driver. “I told you the Winston Hotel, didn’t I? I’m pretty sure you drove past it.”

  The driver, a skinny man in his fifties with sweat already pooling under his collar, jolted in his seat.

  “E-eh? …W-what?” the driver stammered, forcing a bizarre giggle. “Hehehehe… n-n-no?! Why would we drive p-past it? Hehehehe!”

  Leon stared at him. A long, unimpressed stare.

  Then he sighed deeply — the kind of sigh that came from years of dealing with idiots — and rolled his eyes.

  Without shifting his relaxed posture, he lifted one leg and slammed his dark loafer onto the center console. The whole taxi shook. The driver choked on his breath.

  Leon’s other hand reached into his blazer with the elegance of a man pulling out a pen, not a gun.

  But it was definitely a gun.

  He flicked the safety off with his thumb, pressing the barrel lightly against the driver’s neck.

  “Alright, pal,” Leon said conversationally, sounding more bored than angry, “why don’t you tell me the truth? Or else things are gonna get really messy in here. And trust me…” His voice dropped to a whisper. “I hate cleaning.”

  The driver let out a jittery, panicked laugh.

  “I-I-I don’t… hahah… I don’t know anything!”

  Leon blinked slowly.

  Then he let out a single, dry, sarcastic laugh.

  “…Cute.”

  He leaned in a bit closer.

  “I said,” he repeated, “where are you taking me?”

  The driver’s mask shattered instantly. He began shaking so hard the steering wheel wobbled.

  “O-okay! OKAY!!” he cried. “It w-w-was Anders! He told me— he told me to take you — then later pick up the lady, R-Rose... Was it? — and then—and then—”

  “And then what?” Leon asked, annoyed.

  “—and drive the car off!!”

  Leon froze for half a second.

  He blinked.

  Then muttered:

  “…Damn. That bastard’s trying to kill me too.” He scoffed. “Fuck him…”

  It wasn’t fear in his voice, just irritation, like someone had stolen something from him.

  The driver sobbed.

  Leon patted him on the shoulder with the muzzle of the gun.

  “Relax man,” Leon said. “If I wanted you dead, you’d already be choking on that shitty pine-scented air freshener.”

  The driver whimpered.

  Leon straightened his back, flicked his cigarette out the half-open window, and said calmly:

  “Now. Stop the car.”

  The taxi immediately screeched to a halt.

  Leon holstered the gun, popped the door open, stepped out into the light drizzle, and casually brushed off his darl blazer as if dusting off crumbs after lunch.

  He turned to the driver.

  “Next time,” Leon said, pointing at him with two fingers, “pick a better employer.”

  Then he turned and walked down the slick nighttime street, hands in his pockets, cigarette smoke trailing behind him like fog.

  He didn’t look back.

  The Winston Hotel neon sign glowed ahead in the distance, flickering blue and white.

  Leon smirked to himself.

  “Alright, Rose Brook…” he muttered under his breath. “Let’s see what makes you worth forty thousand euros.”

  He shoved his hands deeper into his pockets and strolled toward the hotel, rain pattering onto his shoulders, looking for all the world like a man simply out for a midnight walk, instead of a hired hit man hunting a woman he couldn’t decide if he wanted to kill or take out for drinks.