Content Warning: This section references sexual violence and rape, pedophilia and child abuse, graphic violence, and bigotry and racism.

Billy Summers waits in a hotel lobby for a ride. He is reading comics for the sake of appearances but thinking about Émile Zola’s novel Thérèse Raquin (1868). The comics belong to Billy’s “dumb self,” the alter ego he uses so his business associates don’t suspect that he understands as much as he does. Frank “Frankie” Macintosh and Paulie Logan collect Billy and take him to meet Nick Majarian at a shabby house in Midtown. Billy reflects that this is not Nick’s usual style; he is a casino owner in Las Vegas and has a taste for glitz.

Billy is a hired killer and has worked for Nick before. Nick has approached him for a big job. Billy hopes that this will be his “last job.” It will be highly paid, making his retirement, which he has already planned and saved for, easier still. He will receive $500,000 in advance and $1.5 million after the job is done. The target is another hitman—Nick refers to the intended target as “Joe,” though that is not his name. He is in a Los Angeles jail awaiting charges for assault and rape, having mistaken a “lady writer” for a sex worker and attacked her.