Chapter 1
Darkness edged into her vision as his fingers clamped around her throat, squeezing the remaining oxygen from her lungs. She couldn't breathe, but her mind remained cold, calculating.
Her gaze swept across the filthy pavement of the alley, locking onto a jagged shard of a broken glass bottle.
With a final, desperate burst of adrenaline, she snatched the glass and sliced it hard across his forearm. He hissed, the sudden slice of pain forcing him to release his grip as he instinctively recoiled to nurse the deep gash.
That was all the opening she needed.
In one fluid, practiced motion, Val dropped, slipped her hand down to the hidden holster in her boot, and drew her weapon. Bang. A single bullet tore through the air, punching a clean hole right between his eyebrows.
The man collapsed like stone, a pool of crimson slowly expanding around his head.
Val stood up, brushing the alley grit from her knees, her breathing already returning to a steady rhythm. She taps her earpiece.
"Agent Val to base. Threat neutralized. Returning to HQ."
HQ was a blur of high-stakes motion. Every department was firing on all cylinders, analysts tracking global threats while tech-ops scrambled over glowing monitors. Val moved through the chaos like a ghost.
Her full name was Valerie, but honestly, in this line of work, you needed a name that sounded like a weapon. Valerie sounded like a girl who did ballet; Val sounded like the person you called when a mission went sideways and someone not to mess with.
She made her way up the steel staircase to the director’s office.
Marcus was the commander-in-chief of the entire agency. He was a mountain of a man, carrying a stern, unyielding masculine frame despite his age, and a thick, busy gray beard that made him look like a tired Viking in a tailored suit.
"Come in," Marcus barked after her second knock.
Val strode inside, the heavy glass door clicking shut behind her, and claimed the leather seat opposite his desk. She didn’t wait to be asked.
Marcus didn't look up from his tablet immediately.
"I hear the alleyway in Prague requires a cleanup crew."
"He wouldn't cooperate," Val said smoothly, crossing her legs.
"But his phone did. I downloaded the encrypted drive before he choked me with my own collar."
Marcus finally looked up, his sharp eyes scanning her for injuries.
"Good. Because the data on that drive just moved our timeline up. The ghost operative we've been hunting—The Alchemist—just surfaced in Switzerland. They are targeting a high-yield neural weapon, and I need my best operative on it."
Val shifted forward, a rare spark of anticipation in her chest
"Give me the coordinates. I can leave tonight."
"You aren't going alone," Marcus said flatly.
Val's jaw tightened. "Marcus, we’ve talked about this. I work alone. Partners slow me down, they get distracted, they—"
"They keep you from getting strangled in alleys, Valerie," Marcus interrupted, using her full name to let her know it wasn't a debate.
"This is a two-person undercover op at an elite tech gala. You need someone who can charm the high-society targets while you handle the tactical tech. And unfortunately, the best man for the job is already assigned."
Right on cue, the office door slid open without a knock.
"Did someone say 'the best man for the job'?" a smooth, frustratingly familiar voice chimed in.
Val’s entire body went rigid.
Standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame with a devastatingly confident smirk and a cup of agency coffee, was Leo Vance. Her ex-fiancé.
"Tell me I'm dreaming," Val muttered, staring at Marcus with pure betrayal.
"Hi, Val," Leo smiled, stepping into the room and flashing those dimples that used to make her heart melt, but now just made her want to reach for her boot-knife. "Miss me?
Val turned her head slowly, leveling a glare at him that could have liquefied steel. If looks could kill, Leo would have been a pile of ash on Marcus’s pristine hardwood floor.
Leo didn’t even flinch. Instead, he took a slow sip of his coffee, his eyes crinkling at the corners.
"Careful, Val," he purred, taking a step closer to her chair. "If you stare at me any harder, you’re gonna recreate that hole you just put between that guy's eyebrows. And frankly, this is my favorite face."
"You're late, Vance," Val said, her voice dropping into a dangerous, icy register. "And you're breathing my oxygen. Fix both."
"I was delayed by administrative duties," Leo replied smoothly, leaning against the edge of Marcus’s desk, entirely too close to her. He bent down slightly, dropping his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
"By which I mean I spent twenty minutes trying to convince the tech lab that a tuxedo with a built-in parachute is a reasonable request. They said no. Ruined my whole morning."
A sudden, treacherous twitch pulled at the corner of Val’s mouth.
No.
She clamped her jaw shut, burying the laugh deep in her chest. She absolutely refused to give him the satisfaction. She forced her expression back into a stony mask, but her eyes betrayed her, flashing with a brief, reluctant amusement. He always knew exactly how to dismantle her defenses, and she hated how effortlessly he did it.
Marcus let out a heavy, long-suffering sigh, resting his elbows on his desk. "If you two are quite finished flirting over my paperwork, we have a global crisis to avert."
"We weren't flirting, Director," Val snapped, her posture going rigidly upright.
"We definitely were," Leo corrected cheerfully, winking at her. "It’s our love language."
