Requiem for an Assassin

foreigner, a big blond dude, was pacing in front of the building near where Dox had parked the Honda, a mobile phone to his ear. He was wearing shades and speaking a language Dox didn’t recognize—not German, not French, Dutch, maybe? When he looked up and saw Dox, he closed the phone and smiled.
    “Hello, maybe you can help me,” he said, with a slight, indeterminate accent. “Do you speak English?”
    “Depends on who you ask,” Dox said. The guy seemed like your typical lost European tourist—not exactly an unknown species in the area—but still, Dox immediately glanced left and right. The perimeter check was a learned reflex, triggered whenever a stranger tried to engage him. The danger is that the person asking for directions, or the time, or a light, or whatever, is there to distract you from his cohorts, who are flanking you from your blind side, and Dox wasn’t about to get caught that way.
    To Dox’s left, a guy in a full-face motorcycle helmet was leaning against the wall under the awning, doing nothing in particular. On the right—another guy in a full-face helmet, moving leisurely in Dox’s direction.
    Later, his conscious mind would articulate all the factors that his unconscious had just instantly, wordlessly spotted and assessed. He would be able to describe what was wrong with this picture: the positions of the guys in the helmets relative to the blond dude; the way they were waiting in places in which they had no ostensible reason to wait; that they were wearing helmets in the heat even though they were off their bikes; how smoothly and deliberately the one on the right was closing the distance.
    But for now, his understanding took the form only of a sudden heat in his gut. He knew the feeling. He especially knew not to doubt it. A single word— fuck !—blaring in his mind like a klaxon, he braced and reached for the Civilian.
    The blond guy moved—much faster than Dox thought he’d be able to, given his size. He took a long step forward and pivoted, and then his right foot crashed into Dox’s midsection like a freight train.
    Dox had just enough time to react by tightening his stomach, and that saved him from having the wind knocked out of him entirely. But the kick still blasted him backward and cost him his grip on the knife. The Civilian clattered to the ground, and Dox struggled to regain his balance. A part of him understood that he was already far behind, that whatever this was, it was going very badly.
    One of the guys in helmets latched onto his right wrist. Dox found his footing, pivoted, and smashed his free elbow into the guy’s head. If he had connected with the guy’s skull the blow might have killed him, or at least knocked him off, but the helmet kept the guy in the game, and now he was dragging on Dox’s arm, trying to pull him off balance. Dox spun clockwise, getting behind the guy, sucking him in close with his giant forearm, and reached under the tee-shirt with his left hand. He pulled free the La Griffe, its ring handle encircling his first two fingers and its razor-sharp blade protruding from his fist like a claw. But before he could get it under helmet boy’s chin and rip out his throat, the blond guy had wrapped himself around Dox’s left arm, both hands securing the wrist. Something stung Dox in the neck from behind and he knew with a sickening lurch what it was. He struggled against the men on his arms. They felt heavier, and his vision blurred. He staggered and thought, John, fuck, I’m sorry. And then he was gone.

3
    I SHOULD HAVE known they’d get to me through Dox. He was no soft target, true, but he was easier than I am, and a little easier is sometimes all it takes.
    I was living with Delilah in Paris at the time. Or living with her separately, you could say. Her job was such that security required different apartments, and various other minor inconveniences. Although I suppose that when half the romance is a retired contract killer and the other half a committed Mossad agent, separate dwellings can be the least of your troubles.
    I liked Paris, liked almost everything about it. Along with Barcelona, where I’d spent a month with Delilah a year earlier, it was as beautiful a city as I’ve ever seen, the architecture and the open spaces and the endlessly walkable streets. I loved the coffee culture, and relished a place where I could indulge my enthusiasm for the bean in an endless profusion of sidewalk cafés. I wondered at little