ONE

❛ Who am I fucking assassinating? ❜

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VANESSA'S MANAGED TO HIDE HER REAL JOB FROM HER HUSBAND even though they met years ago on one of his missions and she was forced to act like she wasn't sent their to kill him and his brother; he still believes she is a bartender at a pub in London.

Surprisingly even Lemon isn't able to read Vanessa and claims she's a Percy from Thomas the Tank engine. He'll ramble on about the subject for what feels like hours, and Vanessa sits and listen to every last second. Tangerine, on the other hand, wasn't as content with enduring his brother's antics.

"Lemon, if you fucking grill my wife one more time about how she's a fucking Percy, I'm gonna grab my gun and shove it right up your fucking arse," Tangerine will spit in anger, "Shut your fucking cakehole."

Vanessa will always laugh, or sometimes even roll her eyes at how worked up Tangerine gets, but Lemon will stop and realise that maybe he has rambled for a bit too long.

A few days earlier and at the crack of dawn, Tangerine had slipped out of bed as quietly and gently as possible in an attempt not to awake his wife. He got ready like usual, using the cufflinks Vanessa had given him years ago before eventually muttering a quiet goodbye to her and pressing a kiss on her temple before slipping out of the apartment to meet with Lemon.

What he hadn't known was that Vanessa had been wide awake for at least an hour before him and was ready to get the exact same flights to Japan as him. She didn't have to follow his every movement, and could've got her own form of transport, but there was something fun about sneaking around right in front of his face.

There had been several times where Tangerine had believed he'd seen his wife's face, and he grumbled at himself under his breath and claimed he was just being a stupid twat.

"It's just 'cause you miss her," Lemon said, pulling open a packet of free crisps, "You always fucking do when we have missions."

Tangerine had glared at his brother, but for once kept his mouth closed.

Arriving in Tokyo wasn't Vanessa's most ideal holiday. She had to squeeze herself into a public bathroom and change in there before heading to the bustling train station. To say the building is packed, would be an understatement.

In her small handbag hung over her shoulder, her phone begins to ring. She curses lowly, bringing out the device and sighing in relief at the contact name, thankful that it isn't Tangerine messaging.

"James, thank fuck you called me," She mutters quietly as she holds her phone against her ear, "I have no fucking clue what I'm supposed to be doing. What is my job exactly?"

James is Vanessa's brother, who moved away from home at a very young age to a posh boarding school in Yorkshire. The only family member he had every stayed close to was Vanessa, and now he's her handler.

"You're an assassin, Nessa," He grumbles in annoyance, "What do you think you're doing?"

She bites back an angry retort, and instead runs her tongue over her teeth before smoothly stepping onto the bullet train.

"Let me rephrase," She spits, looking back and forth between the two carriages to decide on which direction to head, "Who am I fucking assassinating?" She hisses quietly, taking the route that seems more like first class.

"A man," He answers, slightly preoccupied while his fingers type relentlessly on a computer, "Do you have your comm? I'd rather not have you walking around on the phone the whole train journey."

She hums, digging a hand into her bag while she mutters an apology to a woman as she shuffles down the isle towards another door. She brings her comm out and squishes her phone between her shoulder and cheek as she pushes the small device into her ear.

She hears her brother mutters quietly to himself for a few moments before he says to her, "We okay?"

"Yes," She replies, "I can hear two of you now. How fucking lucky am I?"

"End the call on your phone," He snaps, and she does as told, dropping her phone back into her handbag, "Right. Thank you for listening."

"The man, James," She says calmly, smiling down at a young Japenese girl who beams back at her as she makes her way through the carriage, "Who is he? And what does he fucking look like?"

"I really do hope you're bad mouthing me where no one else is present," He mutters.

She smiles, shaking her head, "Wow. You really have gone posh. I cannot believe we're related."

He ignores her completely; already being used to the amount of teasing she does for his new accent and vocabulary.

"The man you want was seen getting on the train you're on right now a few moments ago," He informs her, "He has a stupid looking hat on, big black framed glasses, and a long ugly trench coat. He's American, which may explain his strange fashion."

Vanessa takes in the information, showing the conductor her ticket before slipping down into a seat in the first class carriage beside the bar, "And why am I killing him?"

"He's standing in for a snatch and grab mission. You need to kill him so the briefcase he is snatching doesn't make it off the train in his hands," He explains carefully.

Crossing her legs and pushing her body against the window, Vanessa's brows furrow, "Right, so I'm basically here for a briefcase and I have to kill him to get it."

James purses his lips, "Yes. I mean, in a way," She hears him typing on his keyboard again, "You do know that your husband is on that train with you, right?"

Vanessa laughs, "I am aware. That is what makes this whole thing so much more fun."

"Nessa— I— lord have mercy on me," He mutters to himself, "He is going to be the complete opposite of happy to see you when you cross paths, which is inevitable, by the way. You are going to have to explain to him why you're there."

"I thought you didn't like Tan. Why are you so bothered about his reaction?" Nessa smirks, running a hand through her hair as she surveys every person who strolls past her seat.

She hears him grumble incoherently in annoyance before saying, "It's not that I don't like him. It's that he gets on my nerves."

"Same thing. Just please tell me where my husband is," She says, "I want to keep our meeting until the very last minute. Because the last thing I need is his fucking gibberish in my ear."

"Awh. You're marriage truly is so genuine," James sighs, "But, he bought a ticket for economy, so I'm guessing he's in one of the thirty carriages. Good luck avoiding him."

Vanessa hums in agreement, lifting up her dress slightly to reveal her thigh and the holster wrapped around it. The holster holds an automatic pistol and a single throwing knife.

"James, please tell me this job isn't going to be messy," She bites her lip, lowering the fabric of her dress again, "I didn't exactly wear the most suitable thing ever."

She hears as brother drops his forehead on his wooden desk with a thud, "You're wearing a dress and bloody heels again, aren't you?"

"I have shorts on this time," She licks her lips.

"You're an idiot. A real bloody idiot," He grunts, wiping his hands over his eyes.

A loud crash causes Vanessa's head to snap towards the door leading into the bar carriage. Tilting her head in confusion, she shifts onto the seat beside her so she's able to peer around the corner and down the isle, but there's nothing to be seen.

"James, you went to a posh private boarding school for the whole of your academic life, studying primarily I.T and you're telling me you can't connect to the cameras on this fucking train," She snarls angrily.

"You have no idea how much hassle I went through just to hack the station's cameras, okay?" He retorts, "So stop grilling me and do your job."

"Stop being so fucking bossy. You're here to tell me the information, that's fucking it," She snaps, slipping out of her seat and deciding to investigate the crash she heard a few moments previous.

A man slips past her happily, as she steps through the door he just exited. She enters the decorated bar slowly only to realise it's mostly empty, apart from a slumped man in a corner seat with a blanket covering his body and a bottle of tequila wrapped in his arms. Vanessa stares at him for a moment, her eyes narrowed.

"Oh, fucking christ," She clicks her fingers in realisation, "The Wolf."

"What?" James asks, "Where are you now?"

"The bar," She answers, stepping closer to the limp man and ripping the blanket from his body, "And someone else on this train has murdered the Wolf," She squeezes her eyes shut for a brief moment before recovering his body with the thin fabric, "And I swear to fuck it wasn't me."

"For once I believe you, as seen as all you've achieved since you stepped foot on the train is ramble at me," He mumbles quietly, "Look, stop bothering about the Wolf, or whatever his name is, and go find the man you are supposed to be killing."

"You don't get it, James," She spits, peering behind the bar carefully, "The Wolf is a very dangerous and talented man, well, kind of. I got into an altercation with him on a mission a few years ago. The one where I got stabbed."

"You've been stabbed a lot," He sighs, "But yeah, I think I know what you're talking about. You're point being?"

"My point being," She steps out of the bar once more, returning to her previous first class carriage, "That who ever killed him is extremely skilled, or just incredibly lucky. And they are on the same fucking train as me right now. This was supposed to be an easy mission. I thought you said this man was fucking standing in for someone, therefore he isn't as good as the original," She whispers quietly, slipping past a crowd of giggling children.

"I did say that he was standing in for someone, but how on earth does that mean that he isn't as good?" James groans, "Just find the man, okay? And stop worrying about everything else. Think about it like this, maybe it was your husband who killed the Wolf, or his. . . brother."

Vanessa shakes her head, "He would've walked past me."

"Okay, whatever," He grits his teeth, "Either way, find your bloody guy and get rid of him!"

Biting her lip anxiously, Vanessa rushes past her husband while he faces the window and shouts into his phone angrily with his eyes squeezed shut and his finger pinching the bridge of his nose.

Quickening her pace down the aisle of the carriages, Vanessa's brows furrow as she passes a table with Lemon laying limp against it, and another younger man slouched against the window. Deciding against awakening her husband's brother, she continues, noticing a blonde man stood in the section between carriages, searching the luggage decks.

"Found him," She smirks.

"Oh, lord, please don't mess up."

She slips through the sliding door, looking down as the man crouches and stacks up boxed against the door quickly, not even bothering to look at her as she watches him fill the space she just slipped through.

"Hey," She smiles, resting her handbag on the luggage rack before leaning against the wall.

After stabbing a golf club through the natal of the door, he stops his movements and stares ahead for a second before slowly standing and turning to meet her gaze, "Oh, hey, lady. This—" He points down the luggage piled against the door, "I— this— I— yeah, I can't explain it."

"Didn't think so," She hums, advancing forward while nodding her head.

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WORD COUNT: 1970

slow first chap like usual