Hitman vs Hitman - L.A. Witt Page 0,23

there. “You give us the money, and we’ll go.”

“Great!” August let out a huge sigh of relief. “That’s great, okay. I’m going to throw it over the bannister up here, okay?”

“Stop! How do we know you won’t throw a grenade?”

You don’t. “Hey, this is my house!” August shouted back, brimming with indignation. “You think I want to damage my own house? Do you know what this place cost me to build? It’s full of heirlooms!”

Ricardo snorted. No doubt he’d noticed the ultramodern design of the place—there wasn’t an antique to be seen outside of the garage, and August had no interest in collecting fine art. His suits were art enough.

“Fine. On my count,” the guy on the ground floor shouted up. His two companions were already moving toward the stairs. “One—”

August tossed the briefcase over the banister, and a second later there was a satisfying explosion, followed by three very enjoyable thuds. He checked his phone to make sure none of the guys were moving, then looked over the edge himself.

“Oh, nice,” he said. All three men were down, and the one nearest the briefcase was missing part of his head. Bills were still falling through the air, some of them even intact, while a shower of the world’s most expensive confetti was concentrated around the center of the blast. “Shit, that worked great!”

He looked back at Ricardo and found the other man pinching the bridge of his nose. “You just…blew up…two million dollars.”

“Two-point-five. And yes.”

“Are you fucking insane?”

“No,” August replied cheekily. “I’m just rich, it’s not quite the same thing. I didn’t need it and I didn’t want whoever the fucker is who’s coming after us to get it back. And—” A bullet hit the side of the stairs. “Whoops! Back up, back up. Damn, the guys coming in through the kitchen moved fast,” he complained. “Back into the bedroom, we’ll exit from there.” Once they were inside his suite, August shut the door and enacted his next level of emergency procedures.

Metal slats descended over the windows at a steady pace, and another one lowered itself over the door. “Do you like them?” he asked Ricardo. “I got the idea the last time I worked in Berlin. Rouladen window shades are the absolute best thing for ensuring the sun doesn’t get you before your hangover wears off.”

Ricardo didn’t look anything like impressed, though. He looked pissed. “Did you just lock us in a safe?” he demanded. “We’re sitting ducks like this.”

“The police are on their way,” August soothed, picking up his go-bag and heading for the bathroom.

“Yeah, and I don’t want to deal with them either. For the love of—”

“Oh my God, how has your blood pressure not killed you yet?” Honestly, the lack of faith was becoming a little insulting. “I have absolutely no interest in sitting through a siege. This is just to make people think I’m prepared for a siege.” August would rather lose another body part than live in a place with only one—or two, or three—exits. “That way they worry about breaking in, while we use this.” He walked over to his immense hot tub/jacuzzi bath, the incredibly indulgent one that he’d never used, and pulled back the control panel. Beneath it was another biometric palm reader.

Ricardo rolled his eyes when he saw it. “What on earth would you do if you lost power?”

“And if both my generators blew up, or something like that?” It was a valid question. “I would grab one of the hammers I keep in the toolbox in the back of my closet and break the seal around this thing the old-fashioned way.” He pressed his palm to the reader, and a moment later the tub broke away from the floor, rolling aside on silent, well-oiled wheels and revealing a slender vertical tunnel beneath it.

“Nice, right?” August slung his bag’s strap onto his shoulder before holstering his gun. He was pretty sure at this point that Ricardo wasn’t going to kill him. Not when he said they needed to work together. In bed, August added with a snicker in his own mind.

Christ, maybe he was just a big child.

Someone started banging on the door of his bedroom. Shots were fired, leaving small dents in the metal on this side. “Time to go,” August said, stepping next to the hole and reaching for the ladder inside of it. “Where did you park?”

“Templeton,” Ricardo replied. “Out of curiosity, did you play a lot of Mouse Trap as a kid? Chutes and Ladders,