Old habits die hard. That was something he had been warned about when he made that decision to disappear and start anew, and the habits he had built were those of a man bordering on evil. As he sat back on his sofa, dinner going cold on the coffee table and vodka going warm in his hand, his attention focused in on the late-night news. They had found that man frozen stiff in river water, hung up on debris miles from where he crossed paths with Anatoly months ago, covered in evidence of their final exchange. How he ended up in the river water was the dead man's own business. Anatoly didn't do that. He'd only beaten the sense out of him the night he went "missing."

Missing was a strong word. No one had been looking for the guy. There wasn't some theoretical wife and kids at home waiting for Daddy to come back from a late night of being someone else's boogeyman- not that Anatoly would have cared about the theoretical circumstances. He cared about what this would look like to his comrades.

His actions were justified, though. They had to be. Bad men met bad fates. Hell, there was probably a bad fate waiting for him, too, it just happened to find the other guy faster. End of story.

He leaned back, taking a sip of his vodka- the good stuff, a comforting splurge he had allowed himself like a bad dog hiding under its favorite couch. Things would be fine. He was a smart man, he knew what he was doing and when, and this was going to blow over.

He changed the channel.