Chapter 11: The Ghost on the Roof

Emma stared blankly at the black cell phone resting next to the poisoned coffee.

“What?” she breathed, her finger tightening dangerously on the trigger beneath the table.

“Call Donovan,” Cassian ordered, his dark eyes utterly devoid of fear. “Tell your sniper to take the shot right now.”

Emma’s breathing hitched violently in her chest. She stared at Cassian’s unblinking eyes, then down at the burner phone, terror finally bleeding into her veins.

She slowly, hesitantly reached up with her trembling left hand. She pushed her messy auburn hair aside, pressing two fingers aggressively against her ear. It revealed a tiny, nearly invisible flesh-colored earpiece tucked deeply into her ear canal.

“Donovan,” she commanded, her voice wavering terribly for the very first time. “Do you have a clear visual on the target?”

Static.

The only response was the soft, crackling hiss of dead air.

“Donovan, respond immediately!” Emma barked, panic heavily lacing her words. “Status report!”

Nothing but the faint, mocking hiss of radio silence in her ear.

Cassian calmly pulled back the sleeve of his jacket and checked his heavy, brushed-steel Rolex watch.

“Donovan isn’t going to answer you, Emma,” Cassian stated, his voice a low, terrifying purr. “Because about twenty minutes ago, my underboss, Leo, went up the back fire escape of the dry cleaners.”

Emma’s eyes widened in sheer, unadulterated horror.

“Donovan is currently deeply unconscious, heavily bleeding, and duct-taped to a cast-iron radiator in the basement,” Cassian informed her casually.

Panic, raw and completely unfiltered, finally shattered Emma’s icy, aristocratic demeanor. She gripped the hidden revolver under the table with desperate, white-knuckled strength.

“You’re lying to me!” she shouted, her voice breaking. “You couldn’t have possibly known! You drank the coffee before! You completely thought I was just a waitress!”

“I did,” Cassian admitted, his voice miraculously softening with a strange, dark affection. “You entirely fooled me, Emma. You really, truly did.”

He leaned over the table, entirely ignoring the loaded gun pointed at his gut.

“But you severely underestimated my baseline paranoia,” Cassian whispered. “I don’t just own this greasy diner, princess. I own the dry cleaners. I own the vacant storefront. I own the entire apartment building down the block.”

Emma stopped breathing.

“When a strange, unmarked surveillance van parked in my private alley tonight during a Category 4 blizzard, my security detail didn’t ask me for permission,” Cassian explained with lethal calm. “They aggressively cleared the threat.”

He leaned his face just inches from the poisoned cup of coffee, his breath fogging the air.

“You’re entirely alone in here, Emma,” Cassian stated softly. “And your father’s armed men moving into the South End right now? They’re walking completely blind into a massive, heavily armed ambush. My soldiers have been waiting in the shadows for them since sunset.”

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