Dangerous Affairs

Trey Bennett walked down the lit, crowded streets alone. It was the weekend before Christmas, and the sidewalks swarmed with couples and families doing their Christmas shopping. Different tunes of Christmas carols played on cheerfully in the different shops, forming almost a discordant song. Once in a while, Trey would stop in front of a display window, as though the items inside had caught his attention. The people parted around him, slightly annoyed. He would then cast a quick glance at his watch, before continuing on his walk. He kept at this pattern for the next three streets.

At the fourth street, the crowd was more intense. The entire front of the White & Smith's shopping mall was packed with people, so that it was almost impossible to move. A platform stage had been set up in the quadrangle near the front of the mall. The Moon Rockets, an upstart jazz band was playing to the tune of "The Twelve Days of Christmas." The hosts for the road show were the famous radio shows hosts Greg and Brad. The road show was called "Charity Lights," thrown in an effort to remind the good people of Chicago to remember the poor orphans even during the year's festive seasons. After every performance, the hosts would remind the people to dial the hotline to donate to the orphans. An anonymous person had offered the funds to pay for the entire show, where all proceeds raised were to go to the orphans.

Trey was amongst the crowd, but unlike the others who'd tried to move towards the front to catch the show and its celebrities, he walked his way carefully through the throng of people so that he now stood only ten feet away from a glass side door of the White and Smith's mall, leading to the offices above. As the next band was introduced, this time a more famous Irish band, loud applause and cheers went through the crowd. Trey didn't join the applause, his right hand engaged in the black leather jacket he wore. The band began to sing to the carol "Let There Be Peace On Earth," promising the shouting crowd to perform their famous hit after.

Trey's gaze moved as he saw three men behind the glass doors begin to walk towards the doors to exit. The meeting had ended. The three were all dressed in coats and ties. But it was impossible to mistake which man was the boss of the three. Reagan Dominick White, multi-million business extraordinaire, walked with the manner of a man in power. The other two men walked behind. Bodyguards. Trey walked closer. He was now on the edge of the screaming, wild crowd, six feet from the doors. Carefully, he pulled out the revolver from his pocket, a black, slim handgun, that when rested against his black pants, camouflaged easily. The men had arrived at the doors. One of the bodyguards reached for the door, and swung it open. Reagan White stepped out.

Swiftly, Trey turned, his gun arm up. He fired. Once. Twice. The shots hit White directly in the middle of his forehead. White's body fell backwards through the still open glass door. The bodyguard, who had held the door, quickly loosened his grip to reach for his own gun, leaving Whites body jammed between the closed doors.

By the time the bodyguards had their guns out, and had finally made it out of the building, Trey had disappeared. The crowd was oblivious to the shooting, the shots muffled by their loudness. Now, they cheered ecstatically as the ending words of 'Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me!' faded.

--

Two hours and twenty-five miles later, Trey was sipping hot cocoa from a mug in a hotel room. The room was dark, except for the light from a table lamp and a soft glow from the screen of a laptop in front of him. His fingers moved quickly across the board as he typed:

W.T,

Watch the news tonight, and have the rest of the money checked into my account by morning.

He pressed ENTER and the mail was sent. He shut down the laptop, and reached for the papers on the desk. In the papers were photographs of Reagan White, outlined surveillance maps of the White & Smith mall and the surrounding shops, and a sealed envelope. Carefully, he lit a lighter and began the slow process of burning every single paper to ash, with the exception of the sealed envelope. He stuffed the envelope into his back pocket, and then carried the bin of ashes to the toilet and flushed it down the toilet bowl thoroughly. Finally, he returned to the desk, inserted the laptop into a small suitcase on his bed, which he had packed much earlier.

He exited from the room with the suitcase in hand.

Once out of the hotel building, he whisked by the post office, took the letter from his back pocket and dropped it into the mailbox.

"Charity Lights" would soon receive the entire funds for the show.

--