Nessa Fleming is a photographer.
Dexter Smith is an assassin.
Everyone wants them dead.
But neither Dexter nor Nessa are what they appear to be and they are both keeping dangerous secrets.
Cover by meha-k
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I was given a name. That was all they were to me.
A name.
After a hire, I do recon. I watch them from afar, noticing their habits and mannerisms. I analyze their strengths and weaknesses, then I decide how to kill them.
I get close but never interact. All they are is a name with a bullet.
The name in my inbox sent me to an old bar in the middle of the city. The bar smelt like musty leather and old bourbon. It had dark walls and a shabby carpet.
Bert's Bar was old and worn, like most of its patrons. A variety of ages drank and danced. A few played pool. Others were on the hunt looking for someone to warm their bed for a night.
I was on my own kind of hunt. I prowled out the back door heading to one specific spot. Determination, humiliation, and anger fuelling me.
In my years of experience, I had never met one of my marks. It was a rookie mistake. One I swore I would never make.
I knew who the target was, but the target did not know who I was. They were only a name.
That's the rule.
The job was supposed to be easy. Quick, over in one night. Just to make some extra cash while I was in the city.
This job had already gone sour. All because a damn klutz couldn't stay on a bloody stool.
Since the moment I had stepped up behind her at the bar I knew she was nothing but a blond klutz. Listening to some stranger's sob story so he could trick her into sleeping with him. Telling everyone that she lived nearby. And on top of that, falling off the bloody stool.
The worst part was, I had no choice but to help her. If I hadn't stopped her from falling, the drunk moron could have seemed like Prince Charming coming to her rescue. She might have taken him home and then I would have had to kill them both.
I was only going to put her back and get out. Then she had to follow me.
I was so out of my element that I responded to her. I should have kept walking. It would have been easy to get away.
Instead, I was thrown into a battle I was not prepared for. I wasn't used to verbal sparring matches. I dealt with problems with fists and guns. In a crowded bar, I didn't have that option.
After our talk, she didn't stay much longer at the bar. Worked for me, the sooner she left, the sooner I finished the job.
