Next Time We Meet, I’ll Let You Kill Me - Chapter 1

“Hugo Schwartz. Male, twenty-eight.”

In the black-and-white photo, the man was wearing a three-piece suit. He stood in front of a building along a main road, and judging by the ornate door handle he held, it looked like he was just about to enter a jazz bar.

“He’s the main dish.”

Sitting with her legs crossed, Liselotte flipped through the papers.

‘Schwartz?’ Was the name she’d just heard really that Schwartz she knew? More important than the handsome, polished face in the photo was his family background.

He had no parents and one older brother. But the name of that brother was….

“Aaron? Senator Aaron Schwartz?”

Her boss, Doug Hozan, let out a low sigh when he noticed the deep frown forming between her brows.

“That’s right. He’s the troublemaker of House Schwartz.”

“Troublemaker? That’s the issue here?”

Liselotte scowled fiercely.

Hugo Schwartz’s half-brother was none other than the current Senator, Aaron Schwartz. Was he really asking her to kill the younger brother of the most powerful man in the country?

Seeing her expression, Doug quickly waved his hands. “No, this mission isn’t an assassination. You just need to retrieve an item.”

“What item?”

Her suspicious gaze didn’t waver. Doug reached for the cord attached to the blackout curtain and pulled. As the fabric drew aside, a large board was revealed.

At the center was a blown-up photo of Hugo Schwartz’s face, with lines branching out like a spiderweb.

At the ends were the places he frequented, the blueprints of a massive mansion, and information on the people around him.

“What is all this?”

The sheer amount of information made Liselotte rise from her seat without realizing it.

“Alright, I’ll explain briefly.”

Doug took out a thin pointer from inside his coat. He extended it and tapped the picture of the target.

“As you know, Hugo Schwartz is Aaron Schwartz’s half-brother. He’s the child their father had outside marriage, and he’s caused every kind of trouble imaginable. So he’s not exactly a beloved younger brother.”

There wasn’t a soul who didn’t know that the only stain on Aaron Schwartz, praised and adored by the public, was his brother.

His face wasn’t widely known because the media had been controlled, but the name ‘Hugo Schwartz’ was already famous on its own.

Hugo, born in the slums, suddenly inherited wealth from his father when he turned eighteen. Because of that, the world found out that the former senator had an illegitimate child.

She remembered vaguely that Aaron, who’d just entered politics at the time, had done an interview insisting he’d known nothing about it.

The pointer traced a line to an enormous, extravagant mansion that was imposing even at a glance. This was where Hugo Schwartz currently lived.

Doug pointed to a large room on the mansion’s blueprint and continued, “We bribed one of the employees working there. According to her testimony, there’s a safe here, in the bedroom.”

Doug finally presented the objective, “Confirm what’s inside Hugo’s safe and bring it back. That’s your mission.”

Her red-painted nails clicked against her teeth. It was a habit that surfaced whenever she was deep in thought.

“Who’s the client?”

She knew asking about the client went against protocol, but the question slipped out anyway. As expected, Doug simply looked at her silently.

“Fine. Got it.”

Giving up quickly, Liselotte dropped onto the sofa.

Her head throbbed. She finally understood why Doug had come to her instead of the elite assassins the company was known for.

The Senator’s brother. Of all the people….

“So Doug, are you telling me to go in and out of Hugo Schwartz’s bedroom? To steal the key naturally and check the safe when I get the chance?”

“Exactly.”

“If it’s just checking the safe, you could’ve had the bribed employee do it.”

She was about to add, ‘Why me of all people,’ when Doug cut her off.

“He always keeps the key on him. Even when he showers, he takes it into the bathroom.”

“Then you could aim for when he’s asleep.”

“If they got caught, they’d be killed on the spot. They refused, saying they didn’t have the guts for it.”

“What about disguising someone as a thief?”

Doug shook his head firmly. “Security’s too tight. There are over a hundred armed private guards inside and outside the mansion, rotating shifts twenty‑four hours a day.”

“Then what about setting a fire….”

“And risk burning whatever’s inside the safe? If the contents are destroyed, even by accident, the request fails immediately.”

He went on and on about how they’d even tried disguising people as mail carriers or electricians to infiltrate, but all of those attempts had failed.

In short, there was only one method left. Becoming Hugo Schwartz’s lover.

With firm conviction, Doug said, “Liselotte Botany. This is a ‘dish’ only you can pull off.”

***

The towering iron gate that seemed to reach the sky always opened late in the afternoon. Every day, he rode in a luxury car driven by his chauffeur and clocked in at the card club.

There, Hugo enjoyed card games with other members of the idle rich, then moved on to the boxing gym or the racetrack to gamble again.

When evening came, he separated from his group and headed alone to his favorite jazz bar or a tavern. Naturally, he’d drink himself senseless until dawn.

Some days, the corner of his lip would be split, probably because he’d picked a fight with someone. Completely drunk, Hugo hurled rough curses at the closed door, ignoring the chauffeur’s attempts to stop him.

‘He really does everything.’

Liselotte turned the steering wheel with a bored expression. She planned to end this repetitive surveillance today.

Home. Card club. Racetrack. Bar.

She’d followed his painfully predictable schedule for a full week already. She didn’t know whether to call it diligent or pathetic.

He’d probably go to the same jazz bar today. If she wanted a natural encounter, that was the place to aim for.

“Hmm. I still don’t know what type of woman he likes.”

Liselotte scratched her temple as she muttered.

Most of the rumors surrounding him were true, but strangely enough, the rumors involving women were quiet.

Hugo Schwartz didn’t seem like the womanizer people claimed he was. It made sense, since he always hung around only with men.

He never took women home, and he never went in and out of hotels. At the club, he only played games. At the bar, he only drank. Then he simply went home.

She was starting to think the rumors about women were exaggerated when the red car ahead suddenly changed direction.

What? That wasn’t the way he usually went.

Snapping to attention, Liselotte followed closely, but soon her expression grew as dark as the scenery around her.

The car ahead slipped into a side road, then eventually turned into a narrow alley.

“Tsk. What a hassle.”

There were no other cars around. If she followed any farther, she’d be spotted. With no choice, she parked nearby, tightened her coat, and got out.

After walking for some time, she arrived at a shady street lined with low, run‑down buildings packed tightly together.

Trash and empty liquor bottles rolled across the ground. Men who looked like vagrants wandered aimlessly.

A strange sense of wrongness washed over Liselotte.

Even though the sun had already set, it wasn’t that late. Yet she was the only woman walking down the street.

Her trench coat draped down to her ankles and her fedora was pulled low, but that wasn’t nearly enough to hide her gender. The gazes of the passing men started latching onto her one by one.

“Looks delicious.”

At the offhand remark someone tossed out, the blood drained from her face. Liselotte grabbed the man’s arm without thinking.

“Were you talking to me?”

She asked for confirmation. The bearded man flinched, then clicked his tongue as he pried her hand off.

“I don’t have the cash for someone like you. If you’re looking for customers with thick wallets, try the next neighborhood over. Guys here only want washed-up women.”

He said that, yet he smacked his lips as though it was a shame. After raking his eyes up and down her stunned figure, the man staggered off.

‘Ah. Now I get it.’

A cold smile crept across her lips.

“So he didn’t meet women outside. He came to places like this?”

It wasn’t a discreet bar used by upper‑class men. Out of all places, he’d come to a cheap entertainment district for the lower classes.

Was it because he was a nouveau riche? Did he not want to spend real money on a single night, or did he simply have strange tastes?

After laughing hollowly in place for a moment, Liselotte started walking.

Finding Hugo wasn’t difficult. There probably weren’t many people who drove around in such a noticeable red sedan.

The car was parked in front of a row of identical houses. The door opened and he stepped out. Maintaining some distance, Liselotte observed him.

The suit he’d worn so neatly earlier now had a shirt tail sticking out. His hair, slicked back with wax, had come undone. Between his fingers was a long cigarette he hadn’t lit.

Already fairly drunk, his loosened steps climbed the stairs. As if he’d been here countless times, he walked straight to one spot without looking around.

Soon, a middle‑aged woman came out from inside. Her outfit left no room for doubt about her profession.

She welcomed the drunken Hugo Schwartz with practised familiarity and ushered him inside. Seeing that much, Liselotte slammed her forehead against the wall.

“Doug, you bastard.”

If the target she’d been watching so far barely scraped two points out of a hundred in terms of looks, then right now he was a flat zero. It was truly the worst.

What was she supposed to do with a filthy guy like that? Date him?

Liselotte let out a miserable groan. The main dish should’ve been Doug Hozan instead.

So she could kill him.

Even in her irritation, her trained mind quietly recalled the appearance of the woman she’d just seen. It couldn’t be helped. It was a kind of occupational reflex.

Well, there was no helping it. If she wanted to maintain her 99% mission‑completion rate, she’d just have to grit her teeth and endure.

“So he likes older women….”

If she wanted to look more mature than she did now, she’d need to put her hair up and tone down her makeup. Her clothes should reveal her figure without looking cheap.

She was planning out how to approach him disguised as a refined lady who enjoyed jazz when someone tapped her shoulder.

Before she could even turn around, a heavy scent of whiskey mixed with cologne hit her nose. Liselotte raised her head as if bewitched.

“Hello?”

A gentle voice cut through the silence.

The main dish, who’d disappeared inside the building, suddenly spoke to her.