Chapter 3

On Saturday morning Xavier was still hunting down the man he had to kill for the Organization, and of course his conversation through text with Vanessa wasn’t entirely helping. Xavier never really had any trouble with finding the person and getting the job done, but this time he was having issues. He would be lying if he didn’t say he had a distraction, but of course when it came to work he knew how to prioritize.

Xavier was currently sitting in a small cafe in some town in the state of North Carolina. He had been told in the file about the person he was to kill that they regularly came here basically everyday to get his coffee before heading to work. The guy’s name was John Williams, in his thirties. He owed some bad people some money, and he wasn’t paying it back so they hired Xavier to kill him.

In Xavier’s line of work he had seen a lot of these jobs, he didn’t understand why people thought they could get away with something that they knew could end up like this. Oh well though, he didn’t get paid to think he got paid to kill.

He watched the cafe a bit as he texted Vanessa back to her idea on the project they had to do. He would have rather had a conversation about literally anything else besides school, but since that is the reason he got her number he had to comply. Once the project was over though he was definitely going to use the fact that he had her number to have other conversations with her that didn’t include school work.

Xavier looked up from his phone, and drank some of his coffee. He then saw the man he was supposed to kill waiting in line at the counter. He chose to stay where he was at, and wait until the guy left to follow him out. He texted Vanessa back about something that she had said in her last message, all while keeping his eye on John.

John was now up to order, and Xavier drank some more of his coffee as he waited for a response back from Vanessa. She was usually pretty quick with her responses to him, but then again she might have just wanted to get the project all over and done with which he couldn’t blame her there.

Xavier watched out of the corner of his eye as John received his order, and he left. Xavier got up about a minute later, and followed after the guy to the parking lot. Xavier put away his phone into his pocket, and followed the guy to his car. Xavier took a syringe out of his pocket before stabbing the guy in the neck with it. He pushed the plunger, and watched as the guy fell to the ground and slowly stopped breathing.

He picked through the guys pockets and grabbed his wallet. He surveyed the parking lot, and the entirety of the land around him. He was going to take the guy’s wallet with him to make it look like a mugging gone bad.

As soon as Xavier had the wallet, he grabbed the signal jammer he had put on the outside wall of the cafe before heading to his car. He took his phone back out, and called one of the hackers he knew that worked for the Organization. The hacker picked up on the first ring. “Job is done, I used the jammer like usual. I need you to erase any camera footage from anywhere near me of the crime.” Xavier told the man on the other end of the phone as he started up his car.

“Alright that will be done shortly. Should I let your father know that you are done with this job?” The man asked Xavier, he heard typing in the background.

Xavier put his car into gear before answering this question. “If you want to you can. I’ll be home in a few hours depending on traffic so he’ll more than likely know by the end of the night anyways.” Xavier answered the man as he looked up through his tinted windshield.

“Alright, and Mr. King is there anything else I can do for you while I have you on the line?” The man asked him, to which he sighed softly.

“Nope that will be all, thank you,” Xavier said as he hung up the phone call and threw his phone into the passenger seat. He pulled out of the parking lot before sighing. The driver instructions said it would take about ten hours to get back to New Haven, thanks to there not really being any traffic at night he had just made it a little under eight hours. He just hoped that he could make it home in the next eight hours like he had before.

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Vanessa stared at her laptop screen that was open to her and Xavier’s project. They had to make a slideshow presentation about the Salem witch trials. It wasn’t that hard to do. Vanessa knew that if she were working on it by herself that it would already be done, but this was a partner project so she had to do it with Xavier.

She really didn’t mind, although she would rather get it all done and over with. She had to wait for Monday to even work with him on it. All she had done so far for it was choose the layout, and do the title screen.

Vanessa had already finished all of her homework on Friday once school was over, so she didn’t have much to do. She looked down at her dog that was laying down by her feet on the couch. She set her laptop on the coffee table before focusing her attention on her dog. She pet him, and he woke up from his nap.

She smiled a little and continued petting his soft fur. Vanessa loved her dog so much, it was the being in her life she spent the most time with. She looked out the window, and saw that it wasn’t raining for once. She immediately looked back down at her dog, and smiled. “Hey Max, you wanna go for a walk?” She asked her dog, and her dog just barked.

Vanessa laughed at her dog’s response before getting up off the couch. She put on a hoodie, and her shoes before grabbing her dog’s leash. She hooked Max up to the leash, and quickly sent her parents a text telling them that she was going on a walk around town. Once the text was sent she grabbed her keys and left the house with her dog five steps in front of her.

Once she stepped outside she was hit with the brisk air that smelled of fallen leaves and rain. She looked around at her yard to see a lot of fallen leaves laying on the ground, all of different colors ranging from red, orange, yellow, and brown. She stepped down the stairs, and Max went after a leaf that was flying in the air. Max soon caught it, and shook her head at her childish dog.

Max soon forgot about the leaf as Vanessa began to leave the dooryard. Max soon walked in front of her as they left their block, and headed towards Vanessa’s school.

Vanessa hadn’t explored a lot of the town yet, but she was going to with her dog today. She passed by her school, and she saw many houses. Past those houses though were buildings that contained businesses. She saw a coffee shop, and a little restaurant. On the other side of the street she saw the post office and a bookshop, she made a mental note to check it out sometime.

As she continued to walk she saw a lot of other people out and about, doing errands or just hanging out with some friends. She smiled at how peaceful this town was.

As she had been thinking about how peaceful it was she hadn’t watched where she was going, and she ran into someone. As she was about to fall over onto the sidewalk she was quickly caught by a set of arms. She looked up to see a guy around her age that had dirty blonde hair, and blue eyes. She thought she might have recognized him from school, but she wasn’t too sure.

“You alright there? Sorry I didn’t see where I was going.” The strange guy said as he let her go.

“I’m fine, honestly I’m pretty sure that I should be the one that should be saying sorry. I wasn’t paying much attention myself.” Vanessa told him, as she realized that she did recognize him from school but she didn’t remember his name.

“It’s honestly probably my fault more than it is yours, also don’t I know you from somewhere?” The strange guy asked her, and she nodded.

“Yeah, we go to the same school. I actually just started going there as of two days ago.” Vanessa told him.

The guy’s eyes lit up with realization for a second. “Oh yeah, you’re Vanessa right?” The guy asked her to which she was actually a bit shocked.

“Yeah, I didn’t realize anyone knew my name besides one person.” She told him, still sounding a bit shocked.

“Oh yeah, well I didn’t know it until my friend Xavier brought it up. My name is Axel by the way.” He told her, sticking his hand out for a handshake.

Vanessa shook his outstretched hand. “Nice to meet you, and what all has Axel told you about me?” She asked him in a slightly concerned tone.

“Honestly not much, he definitely didn’t tell me about this little guy.” Axel said, looking down at the dog. “May I?” He asked, and she nodded. She watched as Axel started petting Max, and Max looked really happy.

She still wondered what Xavier had told his friend about her. Had he said anything about her life, or anything she had told him about her life so far? She instantly thought that Xavier wasn’t that type of guy, but she really didn’t know him enough to say that he wouldn’t.

Axel pulled her out of her thoughts when he spoke up again. “What type of dog is he?” He asked her, looking up at her from the dog.

“His name is Max and he is a husky german shepherd mix.” She told him to answer his question. She smiled down at her dog as Max turned to look at her instead of Axel.

“Well it was nice to meet you both.” Axel said, putting his hands back into his pockets. He got this look on this face that showed he had forgotten about something. “Before I leave I should probably invite you to the Halloween party we are having at Xavier’s. Of course he would probably invite you himself sometime this week, but just in case he forgets to now you have been invited.” Axel said as he smiled.

“Thanks for the invite Axel, but I probably won’t go.” Vanessa told him, as she smiled herself.

“Oh, but why not?” Axel asked her in a curious tone.

Vanessa thought for a little bit of exactly what she should say, she didn’t want to tell him too much about herself. “I’m not really a party person, sorry.” Vanessa told him, to which he seemed to understand.

“Not everyone is, so that’s okay. Well maybe you’ll change your mind and I’ll see you there after all.” Axel told her, before he walked away down the sidewalk.

Vanessa looked behind her at the man that had just walked away from her strangely. It was really weird that he just left after saying that, and he never even said bye. Vanessa just shrugged it off, and continued on her walk through town.

Vanessa passed by many people on her way into town. She passed by many other shops as well, when she turned a corner she immediately saw a park and walked over to it. She sat down on a bench, and Max sat down in front of her.

While she sat there she watched as the wind suddenly picked up, and moved the leaves in the air. She watched as the leaves through the air before falling back to the ground.

After sitting and watching the leaves for a little while the wind started to pick up, and Vanessa shivered a bit. She stood up and looked down at Max. “Let’s go home boy before it gets too cold.” She told him as they started to walk back home.