Damn, I love her. No hesitation. No flinch. Just fire.
And yeah, I said it, even if it was only in my head. Love. I’ve tried to play it cool, keep the word locked behind my teeth, but after the mirror room? After her looking me dead in the eye and saying it first? That word isn’t a secret anymore. I’ll let it flow like the wind from now on.
I close my eyes, and I’m right back there. The mirrors glowing with that moody lighting, her skin against mine, her voice breaking when she told me she was ready. The way she looked at herself when I told her to—that she wasn’t shame, she wasn’t ruined, she wasbeautiful.I thought my chest might split open watching her finally see herself the way I do. I’ve pulled off plenty of illusions in my life, but that? That was real magic.
Now I can’t stop picturing it. Her hands gripping me like I’m the only solid thing in the world. The way she said myname... I’ll never hear it the same again.
“Are you even paying attention?” Willow’s voice cuts through, snapping me back. “I’m finishing his routine here. You know, so I can kill him without dying in the process.”
“I’m paying attention,” I say, though my eyes are on her, not the laptop. “Just thinking how you’re the hottest hitwoman I’ve ever met.”
Her mouth twitches, trying not to smile. “You’ve only met one.”
“Exactly. You’re one of one.”
She rolls her eyes, but I see the corner of her lip curl, the way she softens just a fraction. That’s enough.
But she’s focused right now. She takes the address her tracker gives away and plugs it into Google Earth. In just two seconds, we’ve got a detailed overview of the property. There’s a gated drive, sculpted hedges, stone columns that look like they belong on a Grecian nightmare. There’s a garage big enough to hide a freight truck, and a fountain that probably cost more than a decent apartment.
“I’m sure there are security cameras around these areas. Main entrance from the south. Service gate on the west—less camera coverage, looks like there could be a blind spot by the AC units.” Her voice is razor-calm. This is the part I love and fear: how quickly her brain turns obsession into an operational plan.
I lean over her shoulder, my brows furrowing at the screen. “You sure you don’t want to torch the whole place and be done?” I joke because humor keeps my edges dull enough to pass for normal.
“Tempting,” she says as she arches one brow. “But he doesn’t face justice that way. And a fire draws direct attention. Better if he just goes ‘missing,’ like all my other targets. And now that I have his address, we can get this party started.”
I look at the satellite view again, tracing routes, finding lines of approach. “We scope it. Tonight. Quiet. We make a plan. Phones off so we don’t get caught via incoming text.” My voice is shallow with adrenaline and an absurd kind of excitement. I feel it all coming back. This was my old element, where I thrived—planning, angles, timing. It’s the part of me that learned to be careful. The part that kept me alive.
She reaches over and squeezes my hand, brief and fierce. “You do know we’re both lunatics, right?”
“And the world is lucky to have us,” I say with a smirk. “Let’s go.”
We drive in my car because it blends in better. It might be expensive, but it’s black and looks like little more than an unremarkable shadow on the road at night. We don’t say much as I drive, Willow’s eyes flick from the blip on her laptop to the street before us. Phoenix hasn’t moved.
When we pull up, I park across the street and down three houses. There are half a dozen other cars parked at the curb along this stretch. I just pray we blend in. The properties aren’t huge; none of them are in Las Vegas. But they’re meticulously kept, and the houses are more McMansions than cozy family homes.
We kill the phones without ceremony. No buzzing, no accidental glow. I pocket mine, and there’s a strange thrill in the silence that follows, like we’re thieves who just put the world on mute.
Then we’re on the move. We slip along the hedges, using the nighttime shadows to our advantage. Willow is lithe and small beside me; she fits into the dark the way I fit into a performance. We communicate in quiet nudges and the angled motion of our heads. I point out the first two cameras. They’re set on two pillars at the entry of the driveway. But as we round the desert landscaping, I don’t see any signs of others. Willow nods at my signals, and the choreography of surveillance makes my skin hum.
The place is huge. It has two wings, a north and a south, and obviously, the main heart of the house. Out back, we find a huge swimming pool with a fucking waterfall worked intothe landscaping. Nothing screams money like wasting massive amounts of water in the desert.
“Camera at the back door,” Willow observes.
“How about the garage side door?” I ask as I slink through the shadows. We’re silent, which is an accomplishment considering the gravel at our feet. My lips curl with devilish intent when the door comes into view, and there is no camera.
“That’s our entry point,” Willow says, and damn, I love her all the harder when her smile is even more wicked than mine. “He’s alone in there. No kids. No significant others. From the windows, it looked like the garage might let into a mudroom that’s just off the dining room.”
“So we get in, knock him out, and drag him back to your shop,” I say as I note the windows, take in the layout of the house. “Got your daggers sharpened?”
“Always,” she answers with a plotting smile. “You’re always so calm about the violent bits.”
“I call it focus.” I can’t help but tease her. “Besides, you make me brave. Or stupid. One of the two.”
She punches my shoulder with a smirk. “Either way, don’t die. Not tonight. I’m not ready to be a widow.”
While making a widow is the very last thing I want, the implication widow has towifemakes my entire nervous system light up. Instead of teasing her about it though, I go with honesty. “I’m not going anywhere without you.”
We find a spot in the bushes with a sliver of a view and settle in. The mansion glows like a beast tamed only by electricity.
