Ares Patience

1: Money Troubles

I was growing tired of waiting for my target to show his face. My contact told me he was supposed to be here almost an hour ago. I've been here for two.

I was hiding out on the rooftop of an abandoned apartment building that was standing on its last legs. Three times as I climbed the stairs had, I narrowly avoided falling through the floors. The wood was rotted, and with the softest amount of pressure from all of the water damage, a part of the floor I stepped on collapsed down onto the tenth story. If not for my quick reflexes, I would have broken both ankles and had to crawl the rest of the way up to the roof.

I was annoyed and questioned if this job was even worth risking certain death.

Of course, it was; I had no choice in the matter. It was either watch as my already fading mother die in her favorite maroon-colored recliner or see my daughter starve. Neither one of them was an option, so right now, I had to be here to kill this target and collect my dues.

This kill was a thirty-thousand-dollar hit, and I needed the money to survive the overwhelming amount of bills stacked on my coffee table. Most of the cash would go to my mother's medical bills, and they were piling up faster than I could make a payment. Some would be put away for emergencies, and the rest would go to the bills for the apartment my family was staying in.

It wasn't worth shit with its leaky faucets, constant cold showers, and peeling wallpaper. It always had a horrible musky scent, and often times it forced me to burn candles to at least flush out the permeating stench. The place was hell, but my mother thought it was a perfect hiding place.

No one would look for us two countries down in the slums of São Paulo, Brazil. We were safe here, and that's all that mattered.

I sigh for the umpteenth time today and roll the sour apple-flavored blow pop around my tongue, enjoying its sweet diabetic taste. Squinting my right eye, I look down the scope of my gun aimlessly watching the stale surroundings. Businessmen and women bustle the streets while couples and families take their afternoon walk to a park a few blocks down the road.

The families are so carefree, and it makes my chest fill with that ugly shade of green.

I look away from them, hating how I haven't been able to give Boo that kind of life. Wishing that if I had been born in a loving home, then maybe my child would have had a good life, but then again... she wouldn't even be born if that was the case.

I shift the crosshairs to a different spot, growing irritated by the second. If this dick head didn't show up in the next ten minutes, I knew I'd have to search the city for the bastard. I wanted to go home and see my daughter, and even though I was with her most of the time, I always wanted to be around her. I hated being away from my baby.

Millicent was my everything, and I was all she knew in this dog-eats-dog world.

Just as my scope moves again, three black SUVs pull up to the front of the building. He was finally here, a man nearing his fifties. Balding in all the wrong places while fitted in a suit that could easily help me get ahead of all of those monthly bills. I purse my lips, the sucker rolling between my lips as my crosshairs follow him and his entourage of bodyguards into the doors of the building.

He was the CEO of the largest pharmaceutical companies here in Brazil. The man had dough, lots of it, and was living in the lap of luxury while stealing from the pockets of the poor. From what I read in his file, he was a well-liked businessman and was the reason his fathers' company was on the rise to becoming a trillion-dollar company. He was good at what he did. Some would say he was even ruthless in getting what he wanted.

Unfortunately for him, Mr. Soares had made himself the target of an enemy, and now?

They wanted him dead.