Troubleshooter

Chapter 22 - Domestic Dispute

THE ASIAN Man had sent the surveillance operative home. Better not have too many witnesses around. He had told him to continue the job in the morning.

The house was still, but the little surveillance amplifier he had attached to the kitchen window told him that someone was still in the house. Time to get to work. He made sure that his .22 was ready and the silencer attached properly. As he still had the keys to Mr. Kendall's house, he could enter it through the kitchen door with no delay at all.

Judging from the type of noise, the intruder had gone up to the quarters or down into the cellar. So he just had to wait for him to return. The Asian Man positioned himself in the living room, overseeing the corridor leading to the stairs and the kitchen. And there he came!

Brady was listening to the still, empty house before he climbed up the cellar stairs. He had heard nothing but thought he had detected air moving. That could have been the cellar itself. All clear. He walked up and carefully opened the cellar door, out of habit peeking through the door-crack before opening it completely. Should he take the fake passport with him? Or should he leave everything as it was and have Paul decide what to do with the information? He closed the cellar door behind him. In that moment, he noticed a shadow moving in the living room, the shape of a longish pistol clearly visible. Before his mind started analyzing the situation, he reacted as quickly as he could. His right hand was close to the sideboard with the mail that also held a crystal key-tray. Brady's hand grabbed the tray and flung it into the direction of the shadow as he jumped forward towards the kitchen to get out of the immediate gun range.

The Asian Man had just pulled the trigger as something flew in his direction and the intruder leapt forward. Shit, he had been spotted. The object made contact with the glass lamp shade right beside him. It exploded in shards as his own first shot hit the wooden staircase opposite. A miss! Hopefully the intruder was not armed, but he had to take the risk—otherwise the intruder was on his way out the kitchen door. He took two brief steps into the corridor and saw the running intruder entering the kitchen. A .22 caliber pistol does not have much kinetic stopping power but could do sufficient tissue damage if it hit the right organs. The Asian Man held the gun in his outstretched right arm, stood sideways and aimed two shots at the upper body of the fleeing shape.

Almost through the kitchen! Brady grunted as he felt two shots hitting his upper torso and doing immediate damage. His body had too much momentum to stop and not enough coordination left to steer. So he half-ran, half-fell into the island in the middle of the kitchen, his knees buckling under his weight. Then he met the cold white tiles of the kitchen floor. 'What a stupid way to die!' was his last coherent thought. He saw a man step up to him, silenced pistol aiming at his face. Then nothing.