“It isn’t fair,” Billie says quietly. “I was the one who screwed up. The others—”
“The others were assigned the mission with you and they failed to remove the target. They also failed to harness your impulsiveness. Next time, one hopes they will try a little harder. Now, to work.”
Billie swallows down her feelings and collects her pram, following Constance around the corner and through a small gate. If Isabel Tizón de Rivas’s security detail had been present, Billie and Constance would never have passed without credentials. As it is, the junior gardener tasked with keeping out gate-crashers looks up from his meticulous clipping of a box hedge, sees the Pemberton blue uniforms, and immediately waves them in.
They have memorized the map of the house and grounds and there is no discussion of where to go. They deliver their wrapped present to the heaving gift table on the lawn and Billie parks the pram behind a rosebush. Anyone who sees them walking around the party will assume they belong, the advantage of a uniform.A uniform, Constance reminded them during their initial briefing,purchases acceptance, and—if one is lucky—invisibility. People who wear uniforms for a living are forgettable and largely anonymous, two qualities essential in our work. And they are underestimated. Use that to your advantage.
Billie expects to make a quick circuit of the party before finding their target, but almost as soon as they park the pram, they see her, ladling punch for shrieking children. This is where she is often found at parties, dispensing food or beverages since it gives her a chance to see and be seen, to talk toeveryone, to preside. She is pouring punch into small glasses, smiling benevolently, aware of being watched, but completely unalive to the fact that she is being hunted. From this moment on, Billie will cease to think of her as Isabel Tizón de Rivas, as the child in the school uniform stained with her father’s blood, as the architect of misery to so many in her country. For Billie, she is now only an objective, the reason for the mission. The target.
Her goddaughter, the hostess Cassandra, is moving like a pinball, levered from garden to house and back again as she puts out fires and finesses the finishing touches. Natalie, with her gift for sleight of hand, has been tasked with creating a reason for the target to go inside where Billie and Constance will be waiting. She hovers behind the punch table like a ghost, waiting for her moment.
Constance and Billie slip into the house to find a dozen nannies on the floor, bouncing toddlers in time to music on a videocassette recorded specially for the occasion by the Wombles. Assorted mothers who have desperately dieted themselves back into pre-baby shape circle the buffet tables with eyes like hungry sharks. They do not eat, preferring to sip kirs and smoke in the conservatory. The nannies are too busy to eat, so the only food being consumed is by the children, whose faces are smeared with chocolate sauce, ketchup, and custard. Billie has never been happier to be child-free than she is at that minute.
The space under the main staircase has been fitted with a slab of marble to serve as a counter. Tucked below it are mini-fridges, each set at a different temperature, perfectly selectedfor the white wines and champagnes inside. Above are racks of reds and crystal glasses in assorted shapes. Laid out on the counter with the precision of a surgeon’s tray are accessories—vacuum corks, foil cutters, and corkscrews of various shapes and dimensions, some with novelty handles. Billie trails her fingers along the tray as they pass.
The downstairs powder room has been set aside for partygoers, but Helen has locked herself inside, feigning digestive trouble. Mary Alice has taken care of the maid’s bathroom behind the kitchen, stuffing a hand towel down the pipe and flushing several times until water cascades over the rim and floods the floor. In the ensuing confusion, Constance and Billie make their way upstairs to the guest suite. Under Constance’s direction, Billie does a quick sweep of the bedroom, but it is empty. The windows overlook the back garden and Billie glances out just in time to see Natalie tip the punch bowl onto the target.
In fact, Billie sees nothing of the kind. Natalie manages to give the impression that she is feet away during the disturbance, only turning when the target gives an exclamation of surprise and annoyance. Natalie attempts to daub at the punch stains on the white pantsuit, but the target waves her off impatiently. She stomps quickly towards the house, her heels making stabbing motions in the grass.
“Target is en route,” Billie tells Constance.
Constance does not reply. Her gaze is fixed on the wall, intent upon nothing more interesting than a few square inches of toile wallpaper.
“Shepherdess?” Billie ventures. It is Constance’s codename, the only one permitted during missions, and one she has answered to for more than forty years.
Constance’s mouth opens and closes without sound. She moves nothing except her jaw, open and closed again and again, struggling to find her voice. When it does not come, she swivels her eyes towards Billie, eyes full of an emotion Billie never expected to see in her mentor. Panic.
They have thirty seconds, maybe a minute before the target reaches them. Billie helps Constance to a chair, guiding her to sit, as they hear the target approaching. They do not hear footsteps, the house is too thickly carpeted for that. But her voice is raised as she calls downstairs in irritation and as soon as the target enters, she marks their presence with a look of annoyance.
“Did you not realize this guest room was in use?” she demands.
“I do apologize,” Billie says. “My friend needed a little air and the WC downstairs was flooded.”
The target flaps an impatient hand and moves straight past them into the bathroom. “If your friend needs air, take her outside,” the target calls. She half closes the door as she strips off her jacket.
For an agonizing minute, the target runs the tap, sponging cold water on her ruined jacket as Billie stares at Constance, willing her mentor to move. But Constance simply sits, motionless. She might have been a statue except for the eyes, imploring as they rest on Billie.
Billie’s hand slips to her pocket and her fingers curl around the corkscrew she lifted from the wine bar. It had been animpulse, one she would never be able to explain. She takes the corkscrew from her pocket and twists it, ensuring the worm is fully extended. Half a dozen quick, silent steps take her into the bathroom where the target turns, her hands still plunged in the pink-tinged water.
“What—”
Before she can finish the question, Billie plunges the corkscrew into the base of her throat, careful to seat it in the little notch where the clavicles join the sternum. The target’s hands rise to Billie’s wrists, but she has no strength in them. The shock of what is happening to her paralyzes her reactions, and Billie hooks a foot behind her knee, buckling the joint and causing her to collapse. Billie holds her close as the target falls on her back, landing on a fluffy pink bath mat. She looks up at Billie with imploring eyes. She cannot scream—there is no air to reach her larynx—and her death is almost entirely silent. The only sound is the metallic ratcheting of the corkscrew as Billie turns the worm, securing it in the trachea. Then the terrible gasping suck as she pushes down on the arms of the corkscrew, forcing the trachea up through the hole. The target lies gulping and immobile as a frog ready for dissection as Billie removes the corkscrew. With one deft motion, Billie flicks open the foil blade and plunges it into the subclavian artery. She twists it and pulls it out again. Blood begins to pour over the floor, rivers of it, flooding the pink rug and the channels between the tiles. The flow moves on, spreading outwards as Billie retreats from it, careful to keep her shoes out of the gore.
It will take the target less than three minutes to die, butBillie does not wait to watch. A rupture of the subclavian artery cannot be mended by first aid. It cannot be reached for compression. Only immediate surgery can save her, and there is no time even for an ambulance to arrive, much less for her to be taken to hospital. Whatever happens, the target is doomed and Billie is looking at a woman who is just barely alive and only on a technicality.
So Billie turns to Constance, who still sits, eyes wide with fear.
“Shepherdess? Can you hear me?”
Something flickers in Constance’s gaze, and Billie knows she is in there.
“You’ve had a turn of some kind. Probably a small stroke. I have to get you out of here.”
Constance blinks rapidly and Billie removes a handkerchief from her pocket. She returns to the bathroom where she dabs it daintily in the blood. She holds it to Constance’s nose as she helps her to her feet. Constance is able to stand with her help, and Billie guides her to the door. There is a rumbling in Constance’s throat, a protest, Billie knows.
Museum protocol states that any member of the Exhibitions team unable to get out of a mission under their own power should be left behind. Other agents must not be compromised.
Billie tightens her grip on her mentor. “I know what you’re trying to say. Forget it. I’m not big on rules, remember?”