“I told them you’re connected. I told them your position had to be somewhere near the top.”
His smile looked carnivorous. He licked his teeth before whispering, “Bad, bad girl.”
Despite her pounding heart, she arched an eyebrow and let her lips curve into a smile she’d used to disarm more powerful men than him.
She traced one fingertip along his gloved hand where it lay open atop the table. “And what did you have in mind for my punishment, sir?”
She’d always used her sexuality as a tool, a weapon. She used it now even as she curled her finger around the trigger on the real weapon in her pocket.
His stare was flat. His tone even more so when he said, “Your death.”
Her heart stopped for half a beat, then slammed into motion. She began to draw the gun, but he clicked his tongue and gave a small shake of his head.
“Don’t bother. It’s already done.”
“What is?” Why did she suddenly sound so breathless?
“You’re already dead.”
The words crawled up her spine like a cluster of spiders.
He flicked a gaze to the fork beside her plate. The tines glinted in the soft, gray light filtering in through the window. On her plate, only crumbs from her cinnamon bun remained.
“Poison?” she rasped, though she wasn’t sure if the tightness in her throat was fear or something much more sinister.
“Curare,” he said casually, like he was ordering a coffee. “New formula. More potent than the previous incarnations. No injection required. Just ingestion. I sprayed it on your fork.”
Curare.
She knew of it, of course. Had used it herself once. It started with muscle paralysis and ended with suffocation.
She yanked out the gun, determined to take him with her. But her arm refused to move. And that’s when she realized her heart was stuttering, its beat erratic.
She tried to suck in a breath, but her lungs refused to work.
Bishop smiled again. Not happily. Not smugly. Just…satisfied.
Her watering eyes locked onto his. She poured every ounce of venom she had inside her into that one final glare.
“BKI’s…coming…” She forced the words past a tongue that felt carved from stone.
Then, her head fell forward on a neck that no longer supported it. Her heart struggled to beat once…twice. It forgot what came next.
“Sweet dreams, Vivian.” Bishop’s politician’s voice reached her ears, and she remembered saying those exact words to Hummer. Had he heard her on the other end of the call? Was he mocking her now?
It was the last thought she ever had.
Epilogue
Bishop handed paper cups to the two men in his security detail. Both accepted with murmured thanks, their fingers curling around the heat.
“Did anyone inside recognize you?” the dark-haired agent asked as the younger agent strode toward the black government sedan idling by the curb.
“No one.” Bishop feigned a sigh. “My pride is well and truly pricked, if you must know.”
Richard Jarvis had spent the past five years on Bishop’s detail, and he shook his head affectionately. “You and your sojourns, sir. I’ve never had a protectee who loves to ditch us more than you do.”
“A man needs his privacy, Agent Jarvis.” Bishop clapped a hand on the agent’s shoulder and felt the strap of the man’s body armor beneath his overcoat. “Even if it’s just to sit in a café and enjoy a quick hit of caffeine in solitude.”
