The Coldest Sin

She doesn’t tell him her name the first time they meet; she says it is so he can swear under oath that they have never met. Her eyes are dead when she says it, and the little half smile is so sad it puts a needle in his heart. He calls her the Woman in his mind and does what she asks of him. He doesn’t charge her extra because her dead eyes match his and he figures someone that has seen as much as him needs a break here and there.
The first time she comes to see him he calls himself Chris Anderson, an alias that matches the ID he is currently carrying. She has tanned skin, long black hair, and eyes that are two different colors, ice blue and hazel. She curves in all the right places, and the jeans and tank top she has on flaunt it. She is carrying a motorcycle jacket and the thought of her zipping down the highway, straddling a bike, gives him a hard on. It luckily doesn’t show as he shakes her hand and notices her smile.
She gives him a photo and background information and asks him his price. He tells her and she gives it to him without batting an eye. They sit and talk about inane things that neither of them give half a hump about. Then he gets up and goes to work. She stays at the table, a waiter gives her the gin and tonic that she ordered when she first sat down. He wonders what a woman like her could have seen to make her eyes so dead and shakes the thought out of his head. He thinks about the photo in his bag and thinks he knows.
_____________
Four weeks after he carries out the woman’s hit, another job comes in. He looks at the woman smiling at him from the photograph in his hand. Her eyes are full of laughter and her smile makes his heart ache. He looks at the background information, and finally learns her name. He takes the job.
It takes a week and a half to find her, mainly because he drags his feet about it. She comes home to find him on her sofa. She doesn’t scream, or cry, or beg. She just looks at him with those dead, mismatched eyes and tells him, “I thought I’d be seeing you sooner.” He doesn’t know how to respond, she is so different from anyone he has ever met. He tells her he is sorry and she doesn’t say anything. She just stands there, beautiful even with her dead eyes. They sit there in silence for a while. “If you’re here to kill me can we go outside?” she asks. He nods and a few seconds later they are standing in the grass.
Crickets are singing to the stars and lightning bugs dance around them. She looks at the stars, so glowingly white against the pitch-black sky and says, “I’m so tired.”
He is reminded from a scene in a movie he once saw, a black and white one based off a comic book. He can’t remember the name of it, but he remembers that in the scene the woman had brilliant crimson lipstick. The woman he is looking at isn’t wearing lipstick. He hugs her and tells her it will be okay soon. He will make it okay. He pulls the gun as he kisses her. She kisses him back, softly. A whispered thank you in his ear as she pulls away. Her eyes seem less dead as she smiles at him. He aims the gun and pulls the trigger.