Page 91 of Bought By Sin

Waiting.

And waiting.

I licked my lips, desperate to ask her why I needed to stop. What was going on. And if she needed help or⁠—

“He’s not there,” she whispered.

Wherever she was in the house, she was still under the pressure to hide.

I furrowed my brow, still not moving.

“Not here,” Eli reported from the other building, also speaking quietly.

We hadn’t planned to check in. It was supposed to be a rush in here, sneak up on that fucker while he slept, and blow his brains out. One, two, three and leave.

Already, there were too many deviations. Mila wasn’t with me, scoping out and serving as a lookout. She was on the floor below us. And now the target wasn’t where he was supposed to be?

I resisted that familiar aggravation that I felt whenever things spiraled out of my control. Every mission could get botched with the unexpected. But I wanted tonight to go smoothly, dammit. I needed it to. Because as soon as this was over and we regrouped to find Gregori after taking out his lieutenant, I intended to clarify some critical facts with Mila.

Like how I loved her.

How I needed her to want to be with me and not only stay because she thought she had to.

“He’s not there. On the move,” she whispered.

Footsteps sounded behind us, and I braced myself to spin and shoot him. The soldier reacted, placing his feet silently so he could turn and protect me on this corner of the stairwell.

Closer and closer, more steps.

Then a run.

“Four!” Mila whisper-shouted it, her voice louder with the urgency as she kept as quiet as possible.

I spun, gun at the ready, according to which room she’d directed me to focus on. According to the blueprints, all the rooms on the second and third floors had connector doors. If he was on the run, dashing through the building, there were too many open passageways to account for.

Fuck.

I hadn’t imagined he would be up and mobile. That was what we’d planned for since the spies had marked down his routine, which was almost like clockwork at this location for the last week.

He was supposed to be in bed, the room two doors down on my left.

Clearly, he wasn’t.

He was on the move and potentially armed.

I made eye contact with the soldier and mouthed at him to go find Mila and cover for her. That taser wouldn’t save her life if our target was armed. If guards showed up in here.

He eased away from me, following my orders.

“Two.”

Mila kept reporting in, her voice quiet and barely there. She had to be moving behind us and tracking our location on the app that showed where we were. But to know where to tell us to go, she had to be within sight of Yusef.

The thought of her stalking the target, of following him, was more dangerous.

Instead of freaking out about her risking herself, though, I was reminded of how stealthy she could be. She was so short and petite, easily slipping into shadowy corners. She was fast and agile on her feet, like a cat in the night.

When she didn’t check in for what felt like a long minute but was probably only several seconds, I swallowed and tried not to panic all over again.