ONE
Jezebel
MY FIRST THOUGHT AFTERsitting down next to my target at the posh hotel bar was that it would be a whole lot easier to murder this asshole if he didn’t smell so damned good.
“Hi,” I said, sipping my glass of Coca Cola disguised as something alcoholic. “Is it okay if I sit here?”
Seriously, this was one of the many, many downsides of being an omega. There was no freaking universe where my gut reaction to Mr. Sex Trafficker should have been, ‘Holy crap... this six-and-a-half-foot-tall alpha in his slick designer suit smells like home.’
I didn’t mean that in some kind of woo-woo emotional way, either. The cloud of cedar-and-campfire pheromones surrounding my latest mark literally took my mind back to the Ontario forests of my childhood, where I’d spent camping trips with my mother and brothers before everything in my life went so terribly wrong.
The alpha glanced at me, then did a double-take as his nostrils flared, taking in my sweet caramel latte scent. In an instant, his regard sharpened until he was looking at me properly.
“Go right ahead,” he said. “Can I get you another drink?”
I smiled my sweetest good-girl smile, taking in the subtle dilation of his pupils in the bar’s warm lighting. “Sure, that would be great. Rum and Coke, please. My name’s Kit, by the way.”
It was for tonight, at least. Jezebel waswaytoo memorable for a job like this.
“Nice to meet you. My friends call me Knox.” Mr. Sex Trafficker dragged his gaze away from me with what appeared to be some difficulty, flagging down the bartender. “A Rum and Coke for the lady. Put it on my tab.”
I berated myself silently when I found I was staring at him as avidly as he’d been staring at me a moment ago. As far as I was concerned, this guy was a walking corpse—nothing more. He might have soulful, deep-set brown eyes and tawny golden skin, with a sharp, well-defined jaw and expressive lips, but he was still going to be worm-food before the night was done.
I pasted on a wider smile. Death was the only fitting punishment for his crimes.
If you asked a random person on the street whether omega assassins existed, they’d probably respond with a nervous laugh and say of course not. Omegas were soft. Physically weak. Frightened of their own shadows. They didn’tkill people for money.
And, okay—to be fair, I was pretty crap at the ‘for money’ part. Yes, there was usually some kind of payment involved, simply because transforming from a dirty street rat to someone who wouldn’t get thrown out of a nice hotel bar like this one wasn’t cheap. Fake IDs weren’t free. Nice dresses and makeup and pretty shoes weren’t free.
But after all the trappings were paid for, I wasn’t exactly pulling in the big bucks. For me, killing alpha assholes—and getting away with it—was a passion project rather than a business.
I finished my non-alcoholic drink and accepted the Rum and Coke with murmured thanks, grasping it with satin-gloved fingers. Fingers that wouldn’t leave prints.
“So, what brings you to Chicago?” I asked, playing dumb. I knew perfectly well that Matthew Knockley—Knox to his friends—was a Chi-town native who’d inherited a sprawling trade logistics empire from his old-money family. As far as what he got up to on the side...
“Oh, I was born here,” he said, his arresting gaze once more focused on me. “As for why I’m in this hotel... I’m afraid it’s for an incredibly boring business convention.”
“Oh?” I asked, feigning interest in information I already knew about. “What kind of business convention?”
He gave a short, self-deprecating laugh. “The tedious kind. Imports and exports.”
“’Imports and exports’? Seriously? Or, is that some kind of code for being in the mafia?” I joked, because I was constitutionally incapable of not pushing boundaries.
“I’m not so sure the mafia would have me.” He gestured at himself, indicating the clear influence of his mother—who according to the dossier provided by my client, had been Black. Combined with his very un-Italian last name, he was probably right about his prospects with that particular branch of organized crime.
“Unfortunately,” he went on, “I’m stuck with the tiresome parts of business, like paying taxes and not being able to murder your competitors.”
Ah. Irony.
That was irony, wasn’t it?
“Hmm... too bad,” I told him. “That must complicate things terribly for you.”
His eyes sparkled with hidden humor. “Oh, you’ve no idea.”
Actually, I had a pretty good idea.
He glanced up at the ornate clock hanging on one wall of the bar area, and frowned. “Look... it’s getting late—”
