Chapter 20

VICTORIA

The backroom is exactly as I left it last time. The same faint smell of old wood and disinfectant. The same flickering fluorescent light overhead that Darius refuses to fix. He says it keeps people from lingering too long, and he’s probably right. A man with his resources chooses discomfort on purpose – that’s why I’ve always trusted him.

He’s already waiting, seated at the scarred wooden table, a folder spread open in front of him. He barely glances up as I enter.

“Thought you’d be here sooner,” he says, his voice low and graveled from decades of cigarettes and quiet conversations in rooms like this one.

“I had company,” I reply, my tone neutral as I pull off my leather gloves, finger by finger.

That makes him look up. His eyes, sharp and assessing, scan my face. There’s no judgment in his gaze – we’re both long past that. But there is a sudden, keen recognition. He knows me. He made me. And he sees the difference. He sees it in the way I’m holding my shoulders, not quite as rigid as usual. He sees it in the fact that I didn’t immediately demand the operational details or check my weapon. I haven’t even looked at the file yet.

“You good?” he asks. The question sounds casual, but from him, it’s loaded.

“Of course,” I answer, my voice flat.

He gives a slow nod, but I see the flicker of doubt in the way his thick fingers tap rhythmlessly on the corner of the folder.

“You sure this one doesn’t need finesse?” he probes, his eyes still fixed on me. “Could send Jason. He’s clean. He’s quick.”

“I want it,” I say, the words coming out sharper, more defensive, than I intended.

He raises his eyebrows slightly but doesn’t challenge me further. He just slides the folder across the table.

I open it. The face of Warren Slate stares back at me – a man in his early fifties, with the bland, confident features of someone who believes he’s untouchable. Political fixer. Power broker. The file details his particular brand of evil: a long, silent list of women, all left bruised and broken in his shadow. None of them loud enough to ever reach a courtroom. The most recent is a girl named Layla, eighteen, still unconscious in the ICU. The official report, already drafted, will say she fell down a flight of stairs.

I close the file. The information is seared into my mind.

“Location?” I ask, my voice all business now.

Darius watches me for a beat longer, as if waiting for another crack in my armor. “Midtown. He’s leaving a dinner fundraiser at eight. We’ll have eyes on him. You’ll have a three-minute window.”

“Clean?”

“Should be.” He pauses, and his next words are deliberate. “Unless you’re distracted.”

I go very still. The air in the small room tightens.

“I’m not distracted.”

Another long moment passes. Darius leans back in his creaking chair, his expression unreadable, his arms crossed loosely over his chest. He doesn’t press me. He doesn’t ask why there’s something softer around my edges tonight, why I’m slower to speak, why my eyes keep flicking to the phone in my pocket as if I’m expecting a message.

He just gives a single, slow nod.

And that’s enough.

“Three minutes,” he repeats. “No more.”

“I’ll be done in two.”

I turn, my gloves in hand, already moving toward the door, my mind shifting into the familiar, cold calculus of the hunt.

Just before I cross the threshold, his voice stops me, spoken almost too casually to the room at large.

“She yours, or are you just hoping she will be?”

I stop. Just for a fraction of a second, my step hitches.

Then I walk out without answering.

Because the truth is, I’m not sure I know. Yet.

×××

The fundraiser’s back exit is a perfect choke point – a narrow alley shadowed from the street, the only light a single, flickering bulb above a steel door. It’s exactly as Darius’s file promised. I am a ghost in the darkness, my breathing slow, my body coiled. Warren Slate steps out, alone, fumbling for a cigarette He is exactly where he is supposed to be.

I hold a garrote my hands, a whisper of deadly wire. Two minutes. That’s all I need.

My approach is silent. But as I close in, the gravel under his heel crunches. He turns. It’s not the startled jump of a man surprised. It’s calculated. His eyes, clear and sober, lock onto me in the gloom. There is no fear.

Only a cold, smug recognition.

“Well,” he says, a nasty smile twisting his lips. “If it isn’t the angel of death.” He narrows his eyes before he speaks again. “They said you’d come.”

My blood runs cold. They said you’d come.

The garrote freezes in my hands. This isn’t a clean hit. It’s a reception.

He doesn’t try to run. He stands his ground, puffing on his cigarette as if he’s been waiting. “Thought you’d be… more tactful.” He continues, eyeing the garrote in my hands.

In that split second of stunned hesitation, the calculus of the hunt shatters. I’m not the predator here. I’m the one who’s been led.

A trash can clatters to my left. I spin, the garrote forgotten, my hand going to the pistol at my back. But it’s not just one. Two figures detach themselves from the deeper shadows of the alley. They’re not security. They’re hunters. Their stance, their silence – they’re like me.

Slate laughs, a wet, ugly sound. “Told you she was predictable.”

The first one lunges. I fire. The shot is deafening in the confined space, catching him in the shoulder. He grunts and stumbles but doesn’t go down. The second is on me before I can re-aim. I block his strike, driving my elbow into his throat, hearing the satisfying crunch of cartilage. He stumbles back, gagging, and I put a bullet in his chest for good measure. He drops dead at my feet and the first one is on me before I realise.

I block his strike, but he’s faster than I expected. His other fist connects with my face in a blinding explosion of pain. My head snaps back, my vision swimming, the metallic taste of blood flooding my mouth.

Before I can recover, his arm hooks around my neck from behind, squeezing, cutting off my air. The pressure is immense, crushing my windpipe. Black spots dance at the edges of my sight. I can hear Slate’s low, satisfied chuckle.

My free hand claws at his arm, but his grip is a vise. My other hand, still holding the pistol, is trapped against my own body. I can’t aim. I can’t breathe.

With the last of my air, I force my arm to bend, twisting my wrist at a brutal angle. I point the barrel straight up, jamming it hard under the man’s chin, and pull the trigger.

The report is muffled by flesh and bone. His head jerks violently. The chokehold vanishes as he collapses behind me, his dead weight pulling me down for a second before I shove him off.

I stagger, gasping, one hand braced on my knee, blood dripping from my split lip onto the wet pavement. I look up.

Slate’s smug smile has vanished, replaced by pure, unadulterated terror. He fumbles for the door handle, but it’s locked. He’s trapped.

Then, he runs. Scrambles down the alley, his expensive shoes slipping. I push off the wall, my breath still ragged in my raw throat, and give chase. My long, powerful strides close the distance in seconds. He glances back, his eyes wide, and makes a desperate turn into a dead-end corridor.

There is nowhere left to go.

He turns to face me, his back pressed against the grimy brick, hands raised. “Wait! Please – “

I don’t use the wire. I don’t make it clean. I lift the pistol, my arm steady despite the fire in my throat and the throbbing in my face.

I don’t waiste time either, just pull the trigger and put a bullet through the centre of his forehead.

The back of his skull paints the brick wall behind him. He slumps to the ground, a ruined puppet.

I stand over him, chest heaving, the gun still smoking in my hand. The alley is silent again, save for the ragged sound of my own breathing. The kill is done. But the message is received.

They said you’d come.

Someone knew. Someone talked. And for the first time, I hadn’t been a ghost. I’d been a brawler. I’d been bloodied. I’d left a signature of violence that was anything but discreet.

***

AVERY –

Juno purrs against my thigh, a steady, rumbling vibration that’s usually a comfort. Right now, it feels like the only stable thing in a room that’s tilting. I’m curled on the couch, a glass of red wine in my hand that I barely remember pouring. The soft, ambient music from my speakers is supposed to be calming, but it’s just making me hyper-aware of everything – the sound of my own breathing, the rustle of my clothes, the heavy, waiting silence in my apartment.

I haven’t heard from Victoria since she left this morning. The memory of last night – the weight of her in my bed, the quiet promise in the dark – feels like a dream I might have invented. She stayed. She didn’t run. But now, in the stark quiet of the evening, the old doubts creep back in.

She’d been calm when she left, focused, her movements efficient as she dressed. I know what that focus means. There was a side job to be done. I understand the why of it. I’ve made my peace with the dark balance she maintains. But the understanding does nothing to calm the frantic rhythm of my heart. It doesn’t answer the only question that matters right now: is she safe?

The silence from her phone is a taunt. It screams that last night changed nothing in the brutal reality of her world. That I am still on the outside, waiting, with no right to know if the woman I let see me completely is lying bleeding in an alley somewhere.

I try to anchor myself in the present. This is my home. That’s my cat. This is the weight of a normal day settling around me.

But beneath it all, there’s a constant, low hum. A pulse.

Her.

A sharp, sudden knock at the door jolts me out of my thoughts. Juno leaps from my lap with an indignant flick of her tail. My heart hammers against my ribs as I stand and cross the room.

I pull the door open, but the hallway is empty.

But on the mat, cantered perfectly, sits a box.

It’s clean, rectangular, and matte black. Almost the same one I received the first time. My name is written on the top in a sharp, elegant script.

I know with absolute certainty who sent it.

My fingers tremble slightly as I pick it up and bring it inside, setting it down on the kitchen counter. The ribbon is sleek and black. I pull the end, and it falls away.

Inside, nestled in layers of whisper-soft black tissue paper, is a dress.

And not just any dress.

This is a statement. It’s bold, daring, cut to embrace every curve without a hint of modesty. The fabric is a deep, fathomless blue, so dark it’s almost black. The neckline plunges dramatically, and a long, severe slit runs up the leg. It’s exquisite. It’s intimidating.

It’s nothing like the first suit she sent me. That one made me feel beautiful. Desired.

This one makes me feel dangerous. It makes me feel like sin. “What are you planning, Victoria…” I murmur to the empty room, my fingers tracing the luxurious, cool fabric.

My phone buzzes in my pocket. I fumble for it as my heart is doing a stupid little flip-flop in my chest.

Victoria:

I’m sorry I couldn’t deliver it myself. But I hope you’re open for some distraction tonight.

A wave of relief so potent it almost buckles my knees washes over me. She’s safe. She’s not bleeding out in a ditch. And she’s thinking about me. A shy, genuine smile tugs at my lips. The tight knot of anxiety in my chest finally loosens its grip.

Then my phone buzzes again.

Victoria:

My driver will be picking you up at ten. Wear the dress, leave the rest.

I read the last line three times. Wear the dress, leave the rest.

My brain short-circuits. Is she implying what I think she’s implying? That I should wear this dangerously thin, sinfully blue dress with… nothing underneath? My cheeks flush with a heat that has nothing to do with the room temperature. I mean, sure, I’ve gone braless before — it’s a personal choice, a small act of everyday rebellion. But nothing? Under this? The thought alone sends a jolt straight to my core.

My eyes dart to the clock on the stove.

8:46 p.m.

A fresh jolt of adrenaline, this one laced with pure, unadulterated anticipation, shoots through me.

Shit.

I’m moving before I’ve fully processed the thought, heading to the bathroom and turning the shower on hot. Steam begins to billow, clouding the mirror, filling the air with a damp heat.

The water beats down on my skin, washing away the day, loosening the tension in my shoulders. But it does nothing for the tight, coiling anticipation deep in my stomach.

Because whatever is waiting for me tonight, whatever game she is playing, whatever version of herself she will be… I want it.

***

VICTORIA –

Warren Slate died seeing it coming. He saw the blood on my face, the wild look in my eyes, the gun rising. He had a final, terrifying moment to understand that the angel of death he’d been warned about was real, and she was furious.

He didn’t deserve a clean ending. Just a violent one.

The car hums beneath me, a low thrum that does nothing to quiet the pounding in my head. I peel one leather glove off with my teeth, then the other. I’ll burn them later. The shake in my hand is a traitorous thing. I curl them into fists until the tremors still.

They said you’d come.

The words are a shiv in my brain, twisting.

The ambush was planned. Someone knew I was coming.

I force the thought down. I shove it into a locked box in my mind. Not now.

The thoughts that break through aren’t of Warren, or Darius, or the dead man whose brains are on my jacket. They’re of her.

I catch my reflection in the rearview mirror. A dark bruise is already blooming high on my cheekbone, a violent splash of purple against pale skin. My lip is split, swollen. The sight is a stark, ugly reminder. No matter how much power you wield, you are never untouchable. Flesh still bruises. Bone still breaks.

But then I remember the look on her face this morning, curled in my sheets, her hair a mess on the pillow. The trust in her eyes when I handed her a coffee. The sound of her laugh in the quiet of my apartment. Last night was about surrender. My surrender.

Tonight was supposed to be about my power. My control. But the bruise on my face tells a different story.

I push the thought away. Hard.

Not now.

The night does not belong to the men who tried to kill me. It does not belong to the fear or the questions. It belongs to her. To us.

A glance at my watch confirms the timeline. She will be preparing now, slipping into the dress I chose for her.

Which gives me just enough time. Time to scrub the scent of blood and gunpowder from my skin. Time to change into the persona she needs tonight—the one of unshakable control, even if I have to wear it like a mask over my fresh wounds. Time to bury the shaken woman in the rearview mirror and become Victoria Vale again.