“Oh, he’s well dead. You made sure of that.” June whistled. “That’s quite a talent you have there.”

“You don’t know the half of it.”

“I know you walked into a room with five men sitting round a table playing cards, and when you left, two were ash, one had a bullet in his head, and the other two are saying all kinds of strange things.” June smiled conspiratorially. “Next time, you should probably just kill them all. No good having survivors running their mouths. See, Marcella,” she added, stepping closer, “the problem is, one of those men, the ones you killed that night—he was mine.”

“My condolences,” said Marcella dryly.

June waved her hand. “Mine to kill. And in my line of work, it’s poor form to take a bounty off another.”

Marcella raised a brow. “You’re a hit man?”

“Hey now, no need to be sexist. We come in all shapes. But yeah, sure. And the way I see it, you owe me a death.”

Marcella crossed her arms. “Is that so.”

“It is.”

“Anyone in particular?”

“Matter of fact, I think you know him. Antony Hutch.”

Marcella bristled at the name. A memory of the rooftop party, Hutch’s wet, wandering gaze, his patronizing smile.

June was still talking. “He and I, we’ve got some unfinished business, of a personal nature. He’s a hard man to catch on his ass. But see, I hear that he’s looking for you.”

Marcella wasn’t surprised. After all, she had cut down his numbers. “You want me to kill Antony Hutch?”

June’s expression darkened. “No. I just want you to get me close enough to say hello. And then, as far as I’m concerned, we’re square. What do you say?”

“I could do that,” said Marcella, tapping the gun against her leg. “Or I could just kill you.”

“You could,” countered June with a wry smile, “but it wouldn’t be me you were killing.”

Marcella’s brow furrowed. “How’s that?”

“Hard to explain,” said June. “Easier to show you. This little dress-up game of mine, it’s nothing. But you get me in a room with Tony Hutch, and you’ll see what I can really do.”

Marcella was intrigued. “Deal.”

“Lovely,” said June with a sudden, dazzling smile. She crossed to the window. “In the meantime, we should probably get out of here. Only a matter of time before they send more.”

“I suppose you’re right . . .” Marcella considered the bodies on her floor. “But it would be rude to go without leaving a note.”

* * *

“FUCKING hell,” muttered Stell.

He’d already passed a scene in the lobby, where the concierge—an older man named Richard Ainsley—lay slumped forward in his chair, his throat slit.

The scene on the fourteenth floor told its own story.

Ash streaked across the hall runner, and a fine mist of blood spattered the floor and wall. Stell freed a dart from a neighbor’s door. All the signs of a fight, but no bodies.

“Sir,” called Holtz. “You should see this.”

Stell stepped around the dark stains and through the open door into Marcella’s apartment.

Two techs were securing the scene, bagging and recording everything they could, but as they stepped out of the way, Stell saw why Holtz had called him in.

If you don’t kill her now, you’ll wish you had.

Marcella Riggins hadn’t tried to hide her work. On the contrary, she’d put it on display. The three agents’ bodies—what was left of them—lay on the floor, their limbs arranged in a disturbing tableau.

A macabre version of see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.

The first soldier, missing a part of his skull, had his hands against his ears. The second, with a broken neck, had his own armored gloves over his eyes. And the third, little more than brittle bones inside a tactical suit, had no head at all.

Sitting like a centerpiece on the glass coffee table was a single ruined helmet.

How long do you think it will take her to penetrate whatever armor your men are wearing?

Stell examined the helmet and found a folded piece of paper tucked beneath.

Inside, in elegant, curving letters, there was a single line.

Stay out of my way.

Stell pinched the bridge of his nose. “Where were the rest of the agents?”

He’d assigned six to the mission. Six operatives for a single EO. It should have been enough. More than enough.

“We found one by the transport vehicle,” said Holtz. “Two more in an alley.” He didn’t need to say that they were dead. The ensuing silence said enough.

“Cause of death?” asked Stell quietly.

“None of them were melted, if that’s what you’re asking. One broken neck. Two blades, to the throat and gut. Is it possible,” ventured the young agent, “that Marcella wasn’t acting alone?”

“Anything’s possible,” said Stell. But it did make sense. So far Marcella Riggins seemed to favor her bare hands or a gun, but four of the soldiers he’d sent had been killed in other, more varied ways.

Stell looked around. “Tell me this building has security.”

“Closed circuit, in the public spaces,” offered one of the techs. “Someone deleted the files, but they were clearly in a hurry. We should be able to pull footage from the lobby and hall.”

“Good,” said Stell. “Send it over as soon as you have it.”

“What now?” asked Holtz.

Stell ground his teeth, and walked out.

VIII

THREE WEEKS AGO

EON

ELI turned through Marcella’s file. Across the cell, Victor leaned, hands in his pockets, against the wall.

For so long, he’d thought Victor was haunting him—now that Eli knew that the man was alive, he knew the phantom was nothing but a figment of his own imagination. A touch of madness. He did his best to ignore it.

Footsteps sounded beyond the wall. Eli knew by the tread that it was Stell. And he knew, too, that the director of EON was angry.

The wall went clear, but Eli kept his head bowed over his work.

“I take it,” he said dryly, “that the extraction was a resounding success.”

“You know it wasn’t.”

“How many died?”

There was a long, weighted silence. “All of them.”

“What a waste,” muttered Eli, shutting the file in front of him. “All in the name of policy.”

“No doubt you’re feeling smug.”

Eli rose from his chair. “Believe it or not, Director, I take no pleasure in the loss of innocent life.” He plucked the latest photos from the cubby where Stell had set them. “I only hope you’re ready to do the right thing.”

Eli turned through the shots from the Heights. “She’s not exactly subtle, is she?”

Stell only grunted.

Eli studied the rest of the photos and notes, reconstructing the fight in his mind.

He noticed two things fairly quickly. One—Marcella had a flair for the dramatic.

Two—she wasn’t acting alone.

There was the obvious issue of timing, and the method of the killings, of course—but for Eli, the most damning evidence was subtler—a matter of gesture, aesthetic. The scene up on the fourteenth floor was grand, gruesome, theatrical; the killings near the transport van were simple, brutal, and efficient.

One was an exhibitionist.

The other was a trained killer.

Marcella was clearly the first, but then, who was the second? An ally? A colleague? Or simply someone with a vested interest?

“She’s not alone,” he mused aloud.

“You think so too,” said Stell.

It was only a hypothesis, of course, but one soon confirmed by the arrival of security footage from the Heights. Eli had pulled the files up on his computer, while Stell did the same on his tablet, and together they watched in silence as Marcella executed the first two agents. Eli saw, with grim satisfaction, the appearance of the second figure, a large man who snapped the third agent’s neck.

And then, as Eli watched, the man became a woman.

It happened between frames, the change so sudden it seemed like a glitch. But it wasn’t a glitch at all. It was an EO.

A shapeshifter, by the looks of it. An insidious ability, one of the hardest kinds of EO to find.

“Son of a bitch,” muttered Stell.

“I hope you’re not going to insist on sparing this new one for the sake of policy.”

“No,” Stell answered grimly. “I think we’ve established that neither of them intends to cooperate. We’ll have to plan accordingly.”

“One or two, it makes no difference,” said Eli. “They may not be human, but they’re still mortal. Find them. Kill them. And be done with it.”

“You make it sound simple.”

Eli shrugged. It was, in theory. The task itself would be more challenging. It took all his restraint, but Eli did not suggest his own involvement a second time. That seed was too freshly planted, its roots too fragile. Besides, he knew what Stell’s next course of action would be—he’d suggested it himself. A sniper at a safe distance, a clean-cut execution. If it went well, no more innocents would die. Of course, if it went well, there would be no need to let him out.