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CHAPTER 2
The gala was held at Gavin Crude’s mansion, which was the kind of idiotic security maneuver I didn’t understand. Who would want hundreds of strangers in their house? I had mixed feelings about living with eight of my best friends.
Wearing a sleek black dress that would allow me to blend in with the catering staff—until I needed to blend in with the guests—I carried yet another tray of champagne flutes toward the party.
I turned back to make sure no one else was in the hallway that led from the commercial kitchen to the ballroom, then I leaned my back against the locked door that led to a closet. I pressed my ‘Apple’ watch—I’d ripped its guts out and retooled it—against the digital lockpad, and a second later, the door’s latch released. I leaned my butt into it just as a flicker of movement down the hallway caught my attention; another of the servers was turning from the kitchen down the hallway.
But the door was already clicking shut between us. I turned to face the closet, which contained miscellaneous stuff for parties, and dumped my tray of champagne on top of a stack of bins.
This would be home base while I scoped out a good place to take Gavin out. I wasn’t sure if an opportunity to place the hit would come while I was here at the gala tonight, but I would be ready.
So I pulled off my dress and flipped it inside out, revealing the golden satin lining. The skirt fell out with a quick pull of my fingers, and suddenly the skirt brushed the floor. I slipped the dress back on, then carefully pulled out my hairpins. As my hair fell heavily across my shoulders, I shook it back.
We’d all been wanded by the security thugs as part of the check-in for this catering job. I’d been hired thanks to my connections; how Man had so many friends when the man barely spoke amazed me. He wasn’t exactly the life of the party. But security didn’t matter, since I’d gotten someone who was legitimately on the guest list to bring my rifle in, hidden in his trunk.
Everything was digital these days. Cars unlocked remotely. Doors opened by keypad.
Which meant everything wasmine.
I plugged my device into the router and started my code running.
And away we went.
But it would take time to do its work, and in the meantime, I needed to circulate.
I picked up a glass of champagne and swept out of the closet.
By the time I reached the music rising from the ballroom, I faked the walk: the smooth sashay of a rich girl who was already a little drunk, but used to being drunk in stilettos. As I swayed into the bubbling noise of the party, I fixed a smile on my face.
I knew what I looked like, because that was part of my job. Along with learning how to assemble and disassemble weapons, how to fight hand-to-hand, how to hack into virtually any system, I’d also learned how to do my makeup. Practiced my faces in the mirror. Taken improv classes.
I could fit in anywhere, even though I felt like I fit in nowhere.
So I knew that I looked conventionally pretty, with long, shiny brown hair that fell in a thick wave across my dress.
Gavin Crude circulated his party. He was even more handsome in person, with dark hair touched with silver at the temples and a magnetic smile. He seemed to talk easily to everyone, laughing and smiling.
It was almost hard to believe the man was responsible for hundreds of deaths when he was so very jovial. But I’d seen enough murderers to know people could do terrible things and still smile like a saint.
Plus, I was a killer, and I was fixing a smile on my face right now. I inserted myself into the corner of a conversation, nodding and listening but not quite inside the conversation. No one spoke to me, but the person speaking included me as she looked around the circle. Most people don’t mind more of an audience.
Gavin stopped to talk to another man, and as the crowd cleared around them, I got a good look at the second man. Tall, twenty-something, dark-haired, green-eyed, handsome in a tux.
His oldest son. Aiden. I was prepared for Aiden.
Then Aiden looked up, still smiling from his father’s joke, and his gaze happened to catch mine. That smile was white and charming and he looked at me as if he knew me, just for a second. I wasn’t prepared for the way my stomach flip-flopped.
Then his gaze was gone, back to his father.
It had left me feeling strangely exposed. I gave myself a pep talk as I moved toward the appetizer table, soothing my unsettled feelings with canapes while I blended into the crowd. Aiden didn’t know who I was. He hadn’t really been looking at me. It was time to consider whether to abort or stay. Man always encouraged us to follow our instincts.
But there wasn’t any real warning sign here. I simply wasn’t used to finding men attractive. There was something unexpected about Aiden Crude.
I was turning away from the table when one of the catering staff offered me a canape. As I politely passed, another man stopped across from me and did a double take. “Didn’t I see you passing champagne earlier tonight?”
“Mm? I think you’ve mistaken me for someone else.” I groaned internally even as I turned my smile up to a thousand kilowatts. Usually the changes to my hair, dress, posture and how I carried myself was enough that I could go from staff to guest without anyone noticing in the slightest.
But the guy facing me had been paying too much attention to me earlier, trying to flirt with me even though I was obviously working. The attention was annoying to begin with, but also it had clearly caused me to lodge in his brain.
