A VOW TO KILL

Chapter 1

October 2019

The temperature outside was extremely hot, scientists were calling it global warming. Cain Nesser called it a good day.

He was walking down Cairo Street in the center of town after parking his car. While everyone around him was sweating buckets and buying iced water from the street vendors. Cain felt the most comfortable and smiled happily. He was as cool as a cucumber; if anyone touched him, his ice-cold skin temperature would have attested to that.

He walked off the sidewalk and crossed the street. His long legs carried him effortlessly to the building where his accountant worked. The building had twenty floors and Benjamin worked on the ninetieth floor. Benjamin always said it was because it had the best view. Cain thought it was more a matter of ‘the higher you go, the cooler it becomes,’ not that, in Benjamin’s case, the theory worked at all. His office still boiled like the oven in a bakery. Not that Cain could tell. He took Benjamin’s word for it.

The elevators in this building were shitty, to put it mildly. But that did not stop people from queuing up to use it. Cain did not fear death by elevator malfunction, but he called a limit at packing himself in a tin box like a tuna surrounded by every foul odor that the human body could expel.

So he took the empty staircase as always. His body was fit and strong and he could have run up those eighteen floors in no time without even breaking a sweat. He, however, took his time. The last thing he wanted was to draw attention to himself.

Almost twenty minutes later, he walked into the offices of B-Accounting. As usual, the receptionist greeted him with a very inviting smile. Her melodic voice, always with a hint of suggestion, repeated the sentence he heard every time he came here.

“Wonderful to see you again, Mr. Nesser. Mr. Benjamin is expecting you.”

And, as always, Cain gave her a small smile and nodded before heading for Benjamin’s office. He could practically smell the arousal of the lady. He had no doubt that if he so much as lingered a second more and asked how she was, the lady would fall all over herself, trying to grab him with both hands.

Cain shook his head in amusement. Year in and year out, the behavior of certain types of women remained the same. And those were the type Cain stayed as far away from as possible. To make matters worse, they had no idea what he was, although he suspected even if they did, they wouldn’t mind. Their only interest was his money and status, and maybe possibly his sexy body, too. He shook his head again before tapping on Benjamin’s door and letting himself in.

Benjamin was quick to jump out of his chair and welcome him. “Cain! I have been expecting you. I was just about to give you a call.” He shook hands with Cain before gesturing him to the open seat.

“Geez, Cain. Do you have an inbuilt cooling system in that jacket? How are your hands so cool at this temperature?” Benjamin’s voice, though joking, had a note of curiosity in them as always.

“Just good genes, Ben.” Cain smiled and made himself comfortable.

“Mmm, could surely use some of those.” Benjamin was now wiping his face with a handkerchief, leaning back in his seat behind the large desk. He rearranged the fan to blow directly into his face, obviously concluding Cain had no use for it.

Cain watched him for a while, waiting for the man to get comfortable. It was the same thing every time he came here during the hot season. He had gotten used to it and he was in no hurry. Benjamin was more than a friend, he was also his accountant.

The young accountant had been more than shocked the first time Cain had approached him over five years before. He could not understand why someone with so much money could not hire some big shot instead of him. Cain had blubbered on about young blood and fresh zeal to do the work, and the man had bought it all, hook, line, and sinker.

Cain did like his enthusiasm, though, and he had developed a sort of friendship with the man over the years. From the young lean twenty-five-year-old graduate to the now thirty-year-old man with a potbelly, Cain had seen all the changes.

Benjamin was taking longer than usual to settle down, so Cain cleared his throat. He may not be in any hurry, but spending the whole day here was not on his agenda. Especially with the smell of Benjamin's sweat slowly saturating the air.

“Right, sorry. Just trying to gather my thoughts here.”

Cain smiled accommodatingly, then said, “Not a problem. You said some paperwork needed my attention…”

Said paper works finally materialized. “Some enormous sums of money were moved around… so, of course, as your accountant, I just wanted to be sure I wasn’t missing something.”

It took Benjamin nearly an hour to go over all the expenses he wanted to be clarified. Cain patiently went through all the processes. He was always impressed by the accountant’s attention to detail, so he wasn’t going to complain.

Finally, by midday, Cain walked back into Cairo Street and started his walk back to his car. Parking space in the center of town was a nightmare, so he always parked at the Shopping Mall ten minutes walk away.

He took his time walking, taking advantage of doing a little window shopping. That was when he saw a lady stepping out of a stationery store. Her head was turned down and away from him. She was looking through her bag and not paying attention to her surroundings.

Cain watched her with interest and smiled to himself. He felt a sudden pull towards the woman he couldn't explain. There was nothing special about her as far as he could see.

She was wearing a pair of blue jeans that had paint smears all over her thighs. He could not tell if that was the design or if the paint had gotten on the trousers by accident, but it looked good and gave them a lot of character.

Her black t-shirt wasn’t any better. She must be an artist, Cain thought to himself. He took a sniff of the air, trying to catch her scent, but there were just too many sweating bodies moving around to get anything. With a frown, he moved closer. His interest was definitely peaked, something about the woman called to him.

He was almost at arm’s length from her and still, her face was buried away from view. Whatever she was looking for, she was not finding it. He could sense her frustration and wished he could help. But he did not want to be so forward.

Cain waited for her to look up. He wanted to see her face. Not sure how, but he was sure it would be a beautiful sight. Her long brown hair, which was tied in a loose ponytail, already mesmerized him. The hair looked shiny, but he could tell it did not see professional care too often, if at all. In fact, he was sure he could see some paint in her hair as well.

Any other day, he would say the woman was a mess. And on any other woman, he would have walked away. But with the woman that stood in front of him, he was frozen to the spot. His eyes ran the length of her body.

She was no small lady, at least five-nine. Cain still had a good three inches on top of her. He looked down and watched her long legs flex as she shifted her weight around while still going through her bag as though she were mining for gold. She had an impressive, firm muscle build. He doubted there was a single layer of fat on her body.

Just then, she abruptly gave up her treasure hunt and started walking. Her face was still turned away, but Cain saw it coming. And he did nothing to stop it. Like a train wreck set in motion, he watched as she walked directly into him.

Cain shot out his hands to steady her on instinct. That’s when he felt it. His hands were on her shoulders, the black t-shirt separating his palms from her skin, but he felt it. The heat of her skin. The temperature was so hot, he immediately dropped his hands and stepped away.