Free The Judas Line by Mark Everett Stone

Elite. Once in, never out.
    “You’d join the—” Julian II began.
    “Dagger Men?” Philip finished.
    Once again I gave them a grin well lubricated with nasty. “Why not?” It was a calculated risk, going from near Wordless half-brother to potential top assassin in their eyes, but sometimes you have to roll the dice and hope it doesn’t come up snake eyes.
    The Professor’s slow tread preceded him down the steps. “Olivier, you father wishes to speak to you,” he intoned gravely, a customary frown on his worn features. “He has sent an automobile, which will be here shortly.”
    Very much aware of the daggers glared at my back, I mounted the stairs to take a last look at Lac Léman before the car arrived.
    The Grand Château du Lac Léman on the shore of Lake Geneva (aka Lac Léman) boasts the most expensive rates and the highest standards of luxury in all of Switzerland. It is also Family owned and operated.
    The Sicarii, besides being a brotherhood of assassins, is also one of the world’s largest multi-national conglomerates, ranking just behind the monster Hyundai for billions earned. Mining, bio-tech, computer chips, arms manufacturing, fossil fuels, construction and on and on and on … all with Sicarii fingers in the pie, all run by one man who lived in the Grand Château.
    If you asked anyone who worked there, they would tell you that the finest room available would be the Presidential Suite. The finest available. What was not available in the small, but enormously opulent hotel, was my father’s personal suite.
    Not large by the standards of luxury hotels, only twelve hundred square feet, it had but one use … to cater to the whims of Julian Deschamps. Accessed by a private elevator, any visitor (especially Family) would be screened for weapons not only by the Elevator Operator (a top Dagger Man), but also the most advanced technology available, all hidden in the elevator’s mirrored walls and gold ornamentation.
    Should you pass inspection (if not … well, you can well imagine), the doors would open into the suite where Julian would greet you personally. Some might think that would be an unnecessarily high-risk situation for him, but you must realize he had been through the same training as all Sicarii and was seldom left alone without protection.
    When I arrived and the doors opened, it was to the sight of Boris standing in front of the elevator. Dressed impeccably in a coffee-colored Saville Row suit, Boris was more a force of nature contained in cloth than a human being.
    In 1971 Julian recruited Boris from the Soviet Union, where he was reputed to be the most feared, most vicious Spetsnaz (Special Forces) commando that had ever served that repressive regime. A master with a knife, pistol and rifle, as well as Sambo, their own peculiar brand of martial arts, he had all the qualities you could ask for in the perfect bodyguard.
    Recruitment had been simplicity itself; all Julian did was dangle an obscene amount of money and offer to relocate Boris’ immediate family to Switzerland. With that accomplished, Julian then paid a handsome amount to various officials in the Soviet government and records were conveniently destroyed and/or misplaced, erasing Boris from the annals of Russian history.
    So there he stood, all six-six two-hundred-fifty pounds of chiseled, grizzled nasty, with a long face, shaven head, cauliflower left ear and flinty eyes deep-set beneath jutting brows. With a barely perceptible nod to the Elevator Operator, he moved to the side and ushered me into the suite.
    “You look good, Boris,” I remarked in passing. Actually, with his thick potato nose and scarred cheeks, he looked anything but.
    “Thank you, Master Olivier,” rumbled the behemoth in impeccable German, his voice so deep I could feel it vibrating the bones of my inner ear.
    “Hello, son,” came a cultured voice from across the room.
    There, silhouetted before a large window looking out on the lake, behind a heavy,