MARIEL

5~ Imərjənsē! Agent 4! ~

Due to the level of traffic and the time it took to find a reasonable space to observe the bookstore, Tira only arrived in time to see Esther fleeing the bookstore. It was enough to give her justification to kill Mariel Nadier, and this wouldn't be an ordinary, business procedure.

Tira was looking forward to it.

That is, if he did not resurrect again, but Agent 4 still had her doubts about his ability to do such a thing in the first place. She still had no clue who he was, for whom he worked, and what Aleksey's interest in him happened to be. Tira did know that he was knowledgeable about the kill chip, and that fact intrigued her. However, if he was a physical threat to the subject, it was her duty to find a way to neutralize the threat. Regardless, a little voice in the back of her mind knew that she might be going against Aleksey's wishes if the two of them were somehow involved. It didn't matter.

Fuck the little voice. Fuck Aleksey Petrov.

Agent 4 had a duty to complete.

But, despite her desire to complete the job in Caravan's Books, to smash the slithering threat to smithereens inside the store, she had to do this properly. Who would miss him? Mariel Nadier was already dead.

It had taken her fifteen minutes to reach the closest parking lot to the bookstore, a Bank of America lot near the intersection. Wildly, her heart had pounded, more due to the fear that she might see or hear Esther and Mariel having sex... not that it mattered to her. Despite telling herself this multiple times, nausea swarmed in her belly.

After parking and placing a cap low over her eyes, Tira stepped from the car and thrust her hands into the pockets of her leather jacket. Briskly, she powered through the parking lot, keeping her head low, chewing her lip, darting her eyes around the parking lot to ensure that no else lurked about the area. A few individuals wandered through the parking lot, but none of them remained in the area. They had no desire to loiter near a bank at night, especially with the Chicago Police cruising the area.

What were Esther and Mariel doing?

It didn't matter.

Tira's steps were light as she approached the corner of the brick building near the intersection. The warm wind gusted, threatened to tip her baseball cap from her head.

Was she safe? Was he a threat?

Breathing deeply, Tira adjusted her cap and stopped near the building corner that gave her an angled view of the bookstore. As usual, traffic congested the streets. A semi-truck moved up and blocked her view of the windows.

Could he die if necessary?

Cursing the truck, Tira shifted away from the building.

'Off-duty cop kills male attempting to rape ex-girlfriend'.

She didn't want her picture on the news, all over the media. Hell, if anything was happening in that bookstore, it was consensual. Esther Caravan still wanted him, was infatuated with him, wasn't she? Of course she was. Why else would she have pushed Tira away so quickly?

Very slowly, the truck moved. The end of the trailer steadily revealed the bookstore windows, and Tira could tell that it was still fairly dark inside of the store. Holding her breath, she shifted back to the corner of the building and waited. In reality, Agent 4 knew that she might see nothing, and she'd have to approach the building to hear something. After all, Esther's Jeep still remained in the reserved space for the bookstore. So, unless they had left -

The trailer revealed the entire window. Quickly, Tira Arcelin's eyes widened.

Staggering backwards, Mariel's large frame rocked against the counter, as if he'd been violently struck. Seconds later, Tira saw Esther bolt into the alleyway, heard a man's distant screaming from the bookstore. As Esther ran towards the sidewalk, the city lights reflected onto her face for a brief flash of time.