Tesato's Code: Hell Hare House Short Reads, #4

By Karen Bayly

A reluctant corporate assassin who is losing her edge, discovers fellow assassins are dying after killing high-value targets.

 

When she botches a hit, her employers assign her such a target—a top scientist.

 

Love and loss cloud her judgment, and only following her code will help her survive.

 

Futuristic thriller from Karen Bayly

• Language: English
• Publisher: Black Hare Press
• Release date: Jul 23, 2022
• ISBN: 9798223461142

Book preview

Tesato's Code

Karen Bayly

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Black Hare Press

TESATO’S CODE is Copyright © 2022 Karen Bayly

First published in Australia in July 2022 by Black Hare Press

The author retains the copyright of the works featured in this publication.

All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this production may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright owner.

Edited by D. Kershaw

Formatting by Ben Thomas

Cover design by Dawn Burdett

Connect: https://linktr.ee/blackharepress

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Available from Black Hare Press

BLACK HARE PRESS SHORT READS

WARDENCLYFFE by GREGG CUNNINGHAM

HADES 11 by PAUL WARMERDAM

BLOOD AND SILK by ZOEY XOLTON

AS ABOVE, SO BENEATH by JOSHUA D. TAYLOR

THE RISE OF THE GREAT OLD ONE by JASMINE JARVIS

CHRYSALIS by KIMBERLY REI

MOUNT TERROR by E.L. GILES

THE RECKONING by STEPHANIE SCISSOM

THE SPIRIT OF RODEO by BETH W. PATTERSON

CARPE DETRITUS by TIM MENDEES

THE BOOKWORM by L.T. EMERY & ANDREAS HORT

THE SALAMANDRION by MIKE ADAMSON

THIS HIDEOUS JOY by JONATHAN INBODY

THE CORONER by J. MOTOKI

FINGERPRINT FORENSICS SHORT READS

DEAD MAN WALKING by DAVID GREEN

MR HANGMAN by SCOTT MCGREGOR

HELL HARE HOUSE SHORT READS

SEEING by PATRICK WINTERS

RAINMAKER by BILL HUGHES

TESATO’S CODE by KAREN BAYLY

THE PUB AT CROKERS CROSSING by KRIS ASHTON

SANCTUARY by MICHAEL J. STIEHL

THE DEVIL AND THE LOCH ARD GORGE by LEANBH PEARSON

Contents

1.Chapter One

2.Chapter Two

3.Chapter Three

4.Chapter Four

5.Chapter Five

6.Chapter Six

7.Chapter Seven

8.Chapter Eight

9.Chapter Nine

10.Chapter Ten

11.Chapter Eleven

12.Chapter Twelve

13.Chapter Thirteen

14.Chapter Fourteen

15.Chapter Fifteen

16.Chapter Sixteen

17.Chapter Seventeen

18.Chapter Eighteen

19.Chapter Nineteen

20.Chapter Twenty

21.Chapter Twenty-One

22.Chapter Twenty-Two

23.Chapter Twenty-Three

24.Chapter Twenty-Four

25. Karen Bayly

26. Black Hare Press

Coming Soon from Black Hare Press

The Pub at Crokers Crossing By Kris Ashton

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Chapter One

The CorpAssassin owned the night. HiveCorp owned her.

Clad head to foot in black, she slipped through the city streets, sleek as a panther of yore and several degrees deadlier. She wore the shadows like a cloak, drifting past the denizens of Pancifica unnoticed. This ability to deflect attention from herself was an essential tool of her trade. It was one of many she’d learned. The rest were implanted in her head.

On reaching her destination, she placed her eye in line with the retinal scanner to open the front door. Through the lobby to the elevators. Wait quietly. Avert eyes. Stay invisible in plain sight.

A gaggle of FreeWillers celebrating an evening dedicated to drugs and revelry spilled out of an elevator. Head down, she slunk by them, closing the doors before anyone joined her.

She entered the apartment. A vase of lilies, her namesake, occupied the coffee table. Underneath the blooms lay a card with the words Happy 10th Workaversary, Irina! Thanks for your outstanding service. From MedCorp.

And yet MedCorp wanted this employee dead. Their duplicity both appalled and astounded Lily. Still, she was thankful. Keeping the victim ignorant of HiveCorp’s intentions made her job so much easier.

Despite her certainty that no one was home, she tiptoed down the hall. Upstairs, a neighbour played dance music, the steady thump of it anathema to her finely tuned sensibilities. The noise could prove useful, though, covering any sound her prey might make. She tuned it out and slipped into the bathroom.

Her reflection in the mirror showed a female of indeterminate heritage wearing a killer’s face. Her face. She crouched, then fingered the talisman around her neck, remembering who she was, what she’d become. The girl whose laughter shook her body like wind through leaves. An introspective teen with a heart full of yearning. The young woman captured and stripped of hope.

And now this. The assassin—biding her time until her target arrived home.

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Chapter Two

The countdown on Irina Cijutu’s life began the moment she instigated her act of rebellion. At night, its relentless silent ticking kept her awake. In her fight against insomnia, she resorted to counting her heartbeats, for sheep were now but creatures of legend. She wondered how long before the rhythmic thud in her chest would also succumb to extinction.

Irina worked as a nurse in Medical Precinct 2, helping basic status FreeWillers, too old or sick to continue working, to navigate their end-of-life protocol. As was the norm in FreeWiller society, her position on the 7th floor of an eighty-floor FreeWiller apartment block reflected her lowly status in the medical hierarchy.

Top specialists lived in the upper floors where the air, and therefore the view, was more amenable. The bottom six floors included three supermarkets—a basic mart where those like Irina shopped, an upmarket mart frequented by nurse specialists and GPs, and a luxury mart restricted to specialists and other medical elite. Gyms, massage parlours, and saunas followed the same pattern: basic, upmarket, luxury.

Once, she had been ambitious, planning to improve her status and move up several floors. Her career aspirations had not spelled her doom. Neither did her