Mayor Harry Nash stands at the far end of the alley having what looks like an amicable conversation with the owner of the hardware store two doors down.
They’re far enough away that I can’t hear what they’re saying, but it looks like a perfectly ordinary conversation—probablysomething about the festival or business permits or whatever mayors talk to shop owners about.
The hardware store owner says something that makes Mayor Nash laugh, they shake hands, and then the owner heads back inside through his rear door.
Which leaves Mayor Harry Nash standing alone at the end of the alley with his back to me, scrolling through his phone like a man who has no idea that someone ten yards away is about to make a very permanent decision about his future.
My heart does something weird and complicated in my chest that’s half excitement and half pure unadulterated terror because this is it.
This is the moment Uncle Jimmy has been waiting for.
This is the whole entire reason he sent me to this ridiculous small town to work in a bakery and pretend to be a normal person who cares about buttercream consistency and whether cupcakes should have seasonal sprinkles.
Buttercup is tucked in the waistband holster concealed under my shirt. My hand moves to her automatically, pure muscle memory from months of Uncle Jimmy’s very expensive and very thorough training program.
Mayor Nash is maybe thirty feet away, which is nothing. I could make this shot in my sleep. He’s still got his back turned, still absorbed in whatever’s on his phone, campaign emails or inappropriate texts to some floozy, or Carlotta. On second thought, they might be one and the same.
This is literally the easiest shot I will ever get in my entire assassination career.
I pull Buttercup free and the weight of her in my hand is familiar and comforting and absolutely terrifying all at the same time.
The alley is empty.
No witnesses except maybe some rats and hopefully they won’t testify. No security cameras that I can see, and I’ve been checking every time I take out the trash for the past few months because I’m not an idiot. I know every camera in this town by now.
It’s just me and Mayor Harry Nash and the kind of decision that permanently alters your entire life trajectory.
If this goes as planned, he’ll be my first official kill. And not just any random kill either—a mayor. A real live elected official. Or a real dead one if things go my way.
Uncle Jimmy is going to lose his mind. And I might lose my freedom.
But I try not to think about that. This is huge. This is career-making. This is the kind of thing that gets you promoted from bakery infiltration duty to actual important jobs within the family organization. Not that I want them. In fact, I don’t really want this either.
A quick visual of Cooper reading me my rights goes through my mind—but only because he’s already done it a time or two. We’re trying out this whole role-playing thing at night. It’s a vibe. A verysexyvibe.
Mayor Nash shifts his weight and I watch him pocket his phone, still completely oblivious to the fact that I’m standing here with a loaded weapon pointed at his back.
I raise Buttercup and line up the shot. Sight picture is clean and perfect. My finger rests on the trigger guard, not the trigger itself, because I’m not some amateur who’s going to accidentally shoot before I’m ready.
Okay, so I had to learn that the hard way, but still. Here we are.
Safety protocols matter even when you’re committing premeditated murder.
I shake my head as my entire body revolts.
This is genuinely insane. I’m about to shoot a mayor in an alley behind the bakery where I spend my days frosting flag cakes and pretending to care about customer satisfaction scores. This is not what normal, almost thirty-something women do with their evenings.
But normal women don’t have Uncle Jimmy tossing large sums of cash at them. Normal women don’t have the kind of protection and resources that come with being part of his organization. Normal women have boring lives and student loan debt and don’t know how to load a Glock blindfolded.
My hand is perfectly steady and I’m weirdly calm about the whole thing, which is either a sign that I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be in life or that I’m a genuine sociopath. I’m leaning toward the latter.
Mayor Nash coughs. He starts to turn in my direction and my brain screams NOW OR NEVER. I take a breath and steady my aim and move my finger to the trigger and?—
“EFFIE!” Suze’s voice explodes from the bakery’s back door like a verbal grenade. “Would you finish locking up?”
I nearly shoot myself in the foot from pure shock.
Mayor Nash spins around with his eyes wide because apparently, he’s also startled by sudden shouting, which honestly, the man has great hearing.
