"Hello, my name is Russell. Here's my police ID."
Russell greeted him with a smile, opened his jacket, and pulled out a cigarette to offer Leon. Because his movement was a little too broad, he inadvertently revealed the holster under his arm, with an M9 clearly tucked inside.
"Want one, buddy?"
"No, I don't smoke. Thanks!"
A bead of cold sweat rolled down Leon's forehead as he shook his head and declined.
As the old saying went: When you had a guilty conscience, every guest seemed suspicious!
As an assassin, Leon felt extraordinarily guilty in front of Russell. Even Russell's casual movements made him read deeply into them, convinced they carried hidden meaning.
For example, Russell's inadvertent display of his holster immediately put Leon on high alert. He imagined countless possibilities and suspected that his identity had been exposed.
Leon's instincts were accurate. Someone had indeed done it deliberately, though whether it was a warning was another matter.
"You really don't smoke?"
"I don't!"
"All right. Actually, I don't smoke either. Pulling out cigarettes is just an occupational habit."
Russell smiled and crushed the cigarette in his hand against the wall. "You know, I'm a cop. When I'm facing strangers—especially someone who might be an assassin—I tend to make a motion like I'm pulling something out. If he draws a gun, I take him down immediately. If he doesn't react, I pull out a cigarette."
"..."
Leon kept a blank expression, but inwardly he was panicking like crazy. He felt that he might have been exposed.
No, scratch "might." He really had been exposed.
"But it seems I was overthinking it. You give me the impression of a top-tier assassin, and you might even have a Beretta 92 series pistol in your jacket, but clearly, you aren't one."
"Ha, ha,