Diary of an Assassin by Victor Methos Page B

religion outside under the apple trees when it was warm, and inside by the fire when the snow was pouring down.
    The most vivid memory he had of his grandfather was after Rhett had gotten into a fistfight with some of the local boys. He came home bloodied and bruised , and as his grandmother got some ice and aspirin out of the kitchen, his grandfather, a hulking man from a lifetime of physical labor, sat him down in the front room and looked him in the eyes.
    “Why did you fight those boys?”
    “They were calling me names and one of them took my hat.”
    “Isaac, I used to fight too. I used to be under Satan’s influence. I would get drunk and I would fight and I would womanize. And you know what it brought me? Nothing. Nothing but unhappiness. Every action you make affects your happiness. I’m not saying not to fight. Sometimes you have to show the world that you’re not playing around. But do you really want to lose your life over a hat? Let it go, son. You just let some things go.”
    Rhett had never forgotten that. It gave him perspective and an even temperament. Life was too short to worry about petty insults.
    The grocery store, a small family-owned place called Mark’s Mart, was empty except for a single elderly woman shopping for fruit. Rhett took a cart and began filling it with food and toiletries. He stood in front of the magazine rack and wondered what Stephanie would read. He ended up choosing Cosmo and The Economist and put them in the cart as well.
    As he was checking out, the old man behind the counter saw him and smiled.
    “Isaac, how have you been?”
    “Hi , Mr. Fielding.”
    “You don’t have to call me Mr. Fielding anymore but I appreciate that. Wow, look at you. You know , I haven’t seen you since you were eighteen years old. You got your granddad’s good looks.”
    “Thanks.”
    “So what have you been up to?”
    “Just work.”
    “You married? Any kids?”
    “No.”
    “You gotta have kids, Isaac. They’re the meaning of life.”
    “I’ve heard. How’s the grocery business?”
    “Ah, that damn Wal-Mart got built up the road a little ago and they’re killing us. I’m gonna be closing up shop soon. I just can’t sell as cheap ’cause my produce is fresh from the ground that day. You’d figure people would want better quality. But who the hell knows? Maybe things’ll swing back the other way.” He began bagging the groceries. “Boy I miss your granddad. He was a good man. Anybody around here had any problems, he was there like lightning to help out. People ain’t really like that no more.”
    “I miss him too.”
    “So your grandma told me all them years ago, you got into the CIA? Is that right?”
    Rhett blushed. He had told his grandparents not to say anything to anyone. He could picture his grandmother, gushing with pride, unable to control bragging to someone about her only grandson.
    “That was a different lifetime ago.”
    “So what d’ya do now?”
    “Government work.”
    “Well you need anything you come ask me, okay?”
    “I will. Thanks.”
    As Rhett pulled away, he glanced into the store and saw Mark Fielding helping the old woman choose her fruit. That kind of life, his grandparents’ life, didn’t exist anymore. Rhett was mature enough now that he felt old age creeping on him and he longed for simpler times and simpler people.
    He began driving back to the house, and turned on the radio to a classical station.
     

 
    CHAPTER 21
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Vanessa Hailstorm sat outside the terminals at JFK and waited for an attendant to grab her car. She had been traveling now for thirty-six hours straight with no sleep other than a quick nap she could grab here and there.
    She was glad to be out of Paris. Though she enjoyed Europe’s old architecture, as she would enjoy a museum, she didn’t feel France had much else to offer. The United States was where she felt most at home. She didn’t understand the French insistency on