Page 29 of Lady and the Hitman

7

We landed just before sunset.

The Miami sky outside the cabin windows burned gold and pink, the city glittering like a promise on the edge of something wicked. Heat pressed against the glass as the plane taxied—thick, heavy, almost intimate. Like it knew what was coming.

He didn’t speak as we descended the stairs. Just walked ahead, his movements deliberate, unrushed. I followed, legs still shaky, the blindfold and velvet pouch tucked deep in my bag. Like evidence. Like sin.

A black SUV was waiting just off the runway. The door opened before we reached it.

Inside, cool air and leather again. Private. Sealed.

Still, he said nothing.

The silence was louder than anything else.

He drove.

I watched him. Hands steady on the wheel. Jaw tight. Eyes forward. There was something coiled beneath his calm, something that hadn’t yet been unleashed.

I wasn’t sure if it belonged to him or me.

When we turned off the highway, I recognized the skyline in the distance. Bayside Marketplace. Tourists. Neon lights. A carnival of overpriced cocktails and chaos.

And yet, I knew this wouldn’t be only that.

He pulled into a private garage beneath one of the towers nearby. Killed the engine. The silence that followed felt loaded, suspended between what we’d just shared and what was coming next.

I reached into my bag and closed my fingers around the velvet pouch he’d given me earlier.

“I assume this is where I use it,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.

He looked over at me, something unreadable flickering in his eyes. “That’s right. It’s an earpiece.”

My breath caught.

“This is where I leave you,” he said quietly.

“What?”

“You’ll walk to the marketplace. Put the earpiece in once you’re on foot. I’ll be watching.”

I stared at the device in my palm like it might bite me.

“And what, exactly, am I supposed to do?”

He looked at me then, slow and deliberate, like he was savoring the question.

“Exactly what I say.”

The words slid down my spine like heat.

I swallowed. Hard.

“And if I don’t?”

He leaned closer, his voice low and lethal.

“Then I’ll find you. But not gently.”