The Last Option
Chapter Forty-Three: Hunting the Assassin

The information that Gonzo and Don circulated through their friends and contacts in New York was more receptive than they had expected. In just two days, several mob bosses and some of the most dangerous criminals had already learned that a relative of Nathan Hicks was offering a reward for his murderer, but as rumors are always distorted, someone said at some point that the amount of the reward was not two hundred and fifty thousand grand but three hundred and fifty thousand, which motivated more than one to open their eyes to everything was happening around them, and others to organize a hunt for the wanted man. It didn't matter if it was two hundred and fifty or three hundred and fifty, what mattered was to earn that money.

Among the criminals was a cousin of the Benelli brothers who, although a little distant (he was a third cousin of the dead), began to feel before the dazzling of the reward a desire for revenge until that moment he hadn't felt, and together with a friend and thug like him, began to organize the search for the murderer, remembering the old adventures with the relatives and some other work shared with them, to encourage him, because he knew it wouldn't be difficult to locate and subdue a professional killer.

The cousin in question was Rodolfo Bertoni and his friend Joao Fernandes, a mulatto of Brazilian origin who had earned a position of respect at the cost of many fights and revolts due to his great size and physical strength, organizing fights with the best of the criminal underworld, where his Italian friend also served as his representative, earning some money.

They were gathered in a shabby hovel organizing the weapons they would use to hunt down the assassin, when two of his cronies recruited for the dangerous task made an appearance. They were two brothers of Mexican origin who rarely stayed sober because of the amount of drugs they consumed, engaging in petty theft and stealing things to sell them and get money to continue getting high. Everyone who knew them wondered why they weren't dead of an overdose yet, living day after day with the grim expectation that they wouldn't be dead by the next. That was one of the rare moments when they remained barely lucid, and they arrived with the news that they had located the one they were looking for, somewhat excited.

"Are you sure it's him?" Rodolfo asked.

The two nodded like those dolls whose heads only dance with movement.

"We are very sure," said one of them, named Manuel, running his hand over his nose every now and then.

"An acquaintance of ours saw him when he entered his house a few days ago and he hasn't come out," said the other one, named Carlos.

"We cannot trust it, since we only have his description," Joao said, while he put a magazine on an M14 assault rifle. "How will we know it's him?"

"My friend says he's sure and he matches the description we gave him," Manuel said, "besides, the guy hasn't left his house in days, and apparently he has an advanced security system, which no other house around there has."

"Yes," Carlos said, "it's true. My friend said yesterday a dog got into his garden to shit and activated something inside, so he looked out a few seconds later with a gun in his hand and chased him out of the garden. He said he looked nervous." "Do you think it's him?" Rodolfo asked Joao. "Sometimes these drug addicts don't see things well when they are flying."

"It must be him," Joao replied. "They want him alive anyway. If it's him, we'll turn him in and collect the reward. If it's not, we'll let him go with a big apology."

Joao let out a laugh that made his teeth stand out against his dark skin, knowing what he had said was not true; Rodolfo laughed noisily too, and the Mexicans laughed awkwardly, infected by the first two. "Well, we'll go at midnight," Rodolfo said, "we'll wait until he's asleep and surprise him."

"Why don't we go now?" Joao proposed. "It's noon, he must be having lunch and we'll take him by surprise anyway. Besides, we should take advantage of this pair of idiots now they are not so stoned." He pointed to the Mexicans, who were still laughing and half dancing because of their momentary lucidity.

"What did you say?" one of them stopped laughing when he heard that. The other one also paid attention.

"You're going to help us, idiots," Rodolfo said, pointing to the table where they had the weapons.

The brothers saw the table and, apparently by a divine miracle, all traces of drugs were gone from their bodies. They turned pale and livid.

"No, my friend," Manuel said, beginning to feel nervous, "I may be a drug addict, but I'm not a fool. Besides, we don't know how to use those things. We wouldn't be useful to you."

"Yes, amigo," Carlos said in turn, "we'd be a nuisance. Just pay us for the information and that's it."

"Don't you want to earn more money?" Rodolfo asked. "We can split the reward."

"No, brother, we don't want any more," Manuel said, "you keep all that reward. We will be fine."

Rodolfo's mind went through the idea of taking the address from them and then shooting them each, putting them out of their misery, but he regretted it.

"Okay," he took a few hundred dollar bills out of his pocket and handed them to Manuel. "Give me the address and then get out."

Manuel gave it to him and then they ran out of the place, happy to be rid of those two guys and to have money to continue getting high.

"Why did you let them go?" Joao asked. "They would have served perfectly as a distraction against that guy."

"Anyway, tomorrow they might turn up dead from an overdose," Rodolfo said, "and you're right: they would have served to receive the first welcome bullets, but also to get in our way, and we can't afford that luxury. Are you willing to do that? Joao cocked a pistol as he slung a rifle over his shoulder.

"By then it's too late," he said, smiling. "We don't want anyone to get ahead of us, do we?"

"Of course not," Rodolfo laughed. "Let's go get that son of a bitch!"

They left the house and boarded an old Ford Taurus, heading to the address provided by the Mexican brothers. When they arrived, they began looking around the house for security cameras and motion sensors. They located the two sensors in the front on the upper right side of the house, and assumed that in the back there might be another two in the same location. As for the cameras, they could see three at the front, pointing one to the right, one to the left and the last one to the front, towards the street where they were.

"He must have already seen us!" Rodolfo said, taking his rifle and preparing to leave.

"Let's make this quick, my friend!" Joao said.

They got out of the car and started running towards the house, Rodolfo towards the front door and Joao towards the back. Rodolfo jumped over the small gate and ran to the door, knocking it down with the weight of his body and throwing himself to the ground. He aimed in all directions with the rifle at face level but saw no one in the room. With another violent blow, Joao knocked down the back door and also walked with the rifle at face level through the deserted kitchen. He reached the living room and saw his friend on the floor, who signaled he had seen no one. Rodolfo indicated the rooms and Joao nodded his head in the affirmative. He walked to the first one and, just in case, fired a rifle round through the lower part of the door; if the assassin was there, he would have wounded him at the level of the legs. He kicked the door open and took quick aim in all directions. He saw no one; the only thing in the room was a table with a computer and a monitor on it. He left the room, while Rodolfo remained on the floor, seeing no one took them by surprise. In front of the second one, another low burst again and he also kicked it, opening it wide. He entered quickly, aiming everywhere. There was no one there either; there was only a small cot with a mattress at the back and next to the window. There was only the third room left. He signaled from there to his friend and the latter raised his thumb, indicating him to continue. Joao fired the third burst and kicked the door again, entering again and aiming the rifle at face level. There was no one there either. He lowered the rifle, a little disappointed not to replace who they were looking for. Maybe it wasn't the right address, he thought, or those Mexicans had tricked them.

When he left the room, he found his friend's body in the middle of what was beginning to be a pool of blood, with the top of his head split open and part of his brain mass to one side. He had been shot with a gun with a silencer, left in the same place and in the same position as when he entered the house.

Alert, Joao raised the rifle again and pointed it towards the hallway. He began to walk slowly towards the living room, with his heart beating a mile a minute; he looked again at his friend and from the direction in which the shot had scattered his brains, he concluded the assassin shot him from the right. He ducked before stepping out of the hallway into the living room and braced himself, standing by the wall, took a deep breath and went out firing burst after burst toward the right side of the house, where the kitchen and laundry room were. The bullets embedded themselves in the wall and everything on it, knocking down pictures on the wall and utensils on the cabinets. He emptied the magazine and threw the rifle away. When he was about to take the pistol out of the back of his pants, he felt something cold and metallic on the back of his neck.

"Don't move," said a grim, husky voice; Joao felt his blood run cold.

Duncan pulled the gun from the back of his pants.

"You and I are going for a little walk," he said.

He hit him hard on the head with the gun and Joao fell unconscious to the floor.