44

Billy got home from the office; his wife drove herself, and she was still working, so he had the house to himself. He went into his workroom and picked up an electronic box that was connected to a phone line. The box was connected to a tape recorder, and it had a green light on its front, which was blinking. He opened the box and rewound the tape inside, and what he overheard was a conversation in the kitchen between Boris Tirov and his two minions, Ivan and Sergei. Billy did not like what he heard.

—

Tirov was in his home office when Sergei returned with the silenced gun and handed it to him. “This is a fucking .22!” Tirov yelled.

“Boss, it’s the best thing for the job.”

“A .22 is too light, it won’t kill him outright.”

“It will, if you shoot him twice in the head from close up.”

“I could kill him with a baseball bat from close up. Why would I want to get close up?”

Sergei sighed. “Boss, I think we need to go do some target practice, okay?”

“Okay,” Tirov said.

Sergei drove them through the hills to Mullholland Drive, then took a left and drove until the road became unpaved. They passed an illegal garbage dump, then he turned off the rough road onto something that was little more than a track. When he had put a hill between them and Mullholland, Sergei stopped the car and pressed the trunk button.

He came out with two plastic bags, one filled with small melons and one with guns. “Okay, boss,” Sergei said, “what kind of gun you feel comfortable that will kill the guy?”

“A nine-millimeter or a .45,” Tirov replied.

Sergei went and set up a row of half a dozen melons. He took a .45 from the plastic bag, checked to be sure it was loaded, then handed it to Tirov. “Okay, one in the chamber, safety is on. We’re about twenty feet from the first melon, the one on the left. Put a round in that melon. Take your time.”

“I haven’t fired a pistol since I was in the KGB,” Tirov said, adopting a combat stance and aiming the weapon. He fired, and the round kicked up the dirt well behind the melon, a foot high.

“Again,” Sergei said. “Keep shooting until you hit it.”

Tirov fired until the gun was empty. All the rounds missed, except the last one, which hit the melon next to the one he was aiming at.

Sergei handed him another gun. “Okay, try it with the nine-millimeter.”

Tirov fired another magazine and missed every time.

“My point is, hardly anybody but an expert can hit anything the size of a head from twenty feet. I mean, I’m very good, and I might hit two out of three.” He took the pistol from Tirov and handed him the .22. “Now walk over there to three feet and fire two into a melon, any melon.”

Tirov walked over and fired two rounds into the melon.

“See? You either get close or you get yourself a rifle with a scope and practice a lot. The easy way is to get close.”

“I get it,” Tirov said. “I don’t mind getting close. I’d like to look him in the eye while I’m killing him.”

“If you look him in the eye, he’ll duck or run or fight you. A pro doesn’t look the mark in the eye—he walks up behind him and shoots the guy before he knows anybody’s there.”

“That may not be easy,” Tirov said.

“This is why so few people are professional hit men for a living,” Sergei explained. “It’s hard. People don’t want hard, they want easy. This is why they hire hit men. Handing over cash to a pro is easy. Do-it-yourself is hard.”

Tirov handed the .22 to Sergei. “Reload this. I want to see how far away I can hit him.”

Sergei popped in a loaded magazine and stood back.

Tirov began firing, getting closer and closer. He was at five feet before he hit a melon, and he missed the next two. “Okay, it looks like three feet,” he said, half to himself.

“Good,” Sergei said. “Now where do you see this happening?”

“Where do you suggest?” Tirov asked.

“I like parking garages,” Sergei replied. “My favorite is a parking garage outside a movie theater, because everybody arrives and leaves at the same time.”

“But I have to wait for him to go to the movies,” Tirov complained.

“There is that. Okay, a parking garage anywhere except at a shopping mall. People are coming and going all the time in a shopping mall. A parking garage at an office building is good—people come to work, later they go home. And the acoustics are good—you can hear somebody coming fifty yards away.”

“Forget about fucking parking garages, Sergei, I’m not going to sit around waiting for him to go to a parking garage.”

“In that case, you gotta catch him going somewhere. You drive up beside him, shoot him through the window and scram. You need a good driver for that one.”

“I can’t wait for him to drive somewhere.”

“Okay, then you invite him. Ask him to lunch, and shoot him when he’s on the way.”

“He’s not going to accept an invitation to lunch from me.”

“Because you haven’t been nice to him?”

“Exactly.”

“Then get somebody who’s been nice to him to give him the invite.”

“I’ll think about it,” Tirov said.