There was a young woman on the other side. Pale, skinny hands, long dark hair. She waited behind a glass wall, holding out something to me—a small figurine, the kind you buy at drugstores, cheap resin painted gold. The figurine had wings. Angel wings. She pressed her face to the glass, lips moving.
I heard her voice, soft and quiet. "It'll be okay, Mi?—"
And then it cut off, and the wings shuddered in her grip.
I reached for the figure, but the glass grew a second layer, then a third, until she was distorted—just a blur of flesh, and no matter how hard I tried to see her face, I couldn't.
The darkness behind her shifted, became fire. The woman's hair caught flame. For a second, I was certain her voice would break through. It never did. The flames roared, devouring the resin, melting the wings into a single black smear.
I kicked at the glass. It shattered. Shards opened my palms, hot blood spilling from the wounds. The world flipped—down was up, up was down. I surfaced into a room filled with screaming.
My own.
I snappedawake, shooting up from the thin pillow and swinging my legs over the edge of the bed. My elbows were on my knees. It was still night. My pulse jackhammered. The nightmare, so vivid, clung to my skin, ten times worse than the usual breed.
I sat there for a while, staring at the floor, and trying to erase the visual, but the taste of the dream lingered—smoke, salt, wood, paint, blood.
Every part of me felt wired to the point of collapse.
I forced myself up, paced the room, then peeled the damn sheet from the bed, bunched it up, and threw it against the wall. For a long minute, I stood in my shorts in the cold, letting the sweat freeze me down.
I caught my reflection in the mirror over the bathroom sink when I went there to wash my face. And even though I was in good physical shape, the silhouette in the glass looked like a skeleton in training. Hollowed out. The canvas of ink on my pec ached. A nagging feeling. I traced the line of my burn scar above the waistband with my index finger, half-expecting it to hurt. It didn't. But it nagged just like my tattoo.
I didn't remember the young woman. Or the real angel. Or even what it was supposed to mean. I just knew there were fragments of my life, perhaps distorted, before Father. But I thought that if I had the wings with me at all times, one day my memories would come back, even though I wasn't sure I wanted it. The nightmares always left me with a strange feeling of being empty and lost. Each time after waking up, I had this nagging sensation that something was missing.
I turned on the tap and splashed my face, then braced both hands on the edge of the sink and tried to calm down my breathing.
A beep from the earpiece back in the room broke the silence. Three rapid blips, just below hearing if you didn't know to listen for it.
I wiped the water from my face with a towel, and with it, whatever feeling still lingered. I couldn't afford to think about things that didn't matter too much. They skewed my focus. Then I walked back to the bed and grabbed the device from the crate. I jammed the earpiece in. "Operative Seven."
Viper's voice hit at once. "Glad you're awake, boss."
"I'm here. Go."
"I've got something weird. Thought you'd want to know before you started your day." He cleared his throat. "The client may not be delusional after all."
"Explain."
"Our first target has hired a PI right after he was released on bail. He's also in touch with target two. Which is shady since the two of them haven'tbeen in contact these past twelve months. I also picked up chatter on the dark web. Someone's trying to dig up info on the client. Dirt and all."
The feeling in my gut changed, became hunger. "Target three is either aware of what's going on or will be aware soon," I said out loud.
"Sounds about right. These assholes could be catching on. Or at least the first two since they haven't made contact with the last target yet according to my records."
"And the PI?"
"I pulled all the security footage of the client I could. Someone is definitely following her. I haven't been able to verify his identity yet. This guy is almost as good at avoiding cameras as you. I need more time." Viper paused. "It's getting messy fast, boss. You need to be careful. Last target won't be easy to crack. He has connections and resources."
"Copy," I said. "Keep following whomever is following the client. I want to know who he is."
"You got it, boss."
"Any bugs on her phone?"
"Someone did try to remotely hack it, but it was a failed attempt. I don't think we should be concerned about it. She's got the burner anyway to talk to us if needed."
"Okay."
