Chapter 2
The moon is entirely too pleased with itself tonight.
Full, bright, and shining directly on me like it’s judging my life choices while I dig a grave with a shovel better suited for a kindergarten sandbox.
Sweat rolls down the back of my neck despite the cool night air, and the dirt here is packed so tight it feels like I’m trying to carve through concrete with a salad spoon.
“This is what I get,” I mutter, levering out another miserable scoop of earth. “One week. One damn week of vacation, and I couldn’t keep my homicidal little hands to myself.”
The corpse lying a few feet away doesn’t answer, naturally.
He just stares up at the moon with those glassy dark eyes, looking far too peaceful for a man who’d been stupid enough to land himself on the Guild’s hit list. Stupid enough that I said yes even with a suitcase half-packed and a beach reservation already paid for.
A low rush of movement whispers across the landscape—the distant thunder of one of Japan’s high-speed trains slicing through the night. It rises, swells, then fades again, leaving the silence thicker than before.
No witnesses.
No civilians.
Just me, this body, and my terminal inability to take a damn break.
“Easy job,” I grumble to the grave that still isn’t deep enough. “In the middle of nowhere. Quick in, quick out. Doesn’t even interfere with my flight. Genius move, Saint.”
I jam the shovel back down. The handle vibrates in my palms. My shoulders ache. The moon slides out from behind a drifting cloud, brighter now, throwing silver across the clearing…and straight across the corpse’s face.
His eyes catch the light.
Staring.
Silent.
Judgy.
I stop digging, sweat stinging my eyes as I glare back at him.
“What are you looking at, anyways?”
I grab another fistful of dirt and throw it out of the hole just to make a point.
He still doesn’t answer.
Which somehow annoys me even more.
I should’ve stayed my ass in the hotel.
One night. Just one night to relax before my flight to Hong Kong in two days.
Then Singapore. Then Bali. A whole string of places where no one expects me to kill anyone, and I fully intended to keep it that way.
But no—apparently I can’t be trusted alone with a hotel bathrobe and a minibar without sniffing out a contract and convincing myself it’s “just one quick job.”
I blame the renovations happening in my apartment.
The noise. The dust. The lack of hot water.
I’ve been cooped up for weeks, and I haven’t taken a real vacation in years.
I travel constantly, but it’s always recon over ramen, assassinations between espresso shots, one neat little murder followed by a red-eye home.
That is not vacation. That is homicide with extra steps.
So this time, I treated myself. Booked flights. Packed outfits that don’t double as tactical gear. And my first stop had to be Japan.
I lived here for years—back when the ink on my Guild initiation papers was still drying and I was the clueless little New Yorker dropped into a world that felt bigger, brighter, sharper.
Everything about Japan cracked me open. The food.
The language. The impossible quiet of rural nights. Even the discipline.
Especially the discipline.
Master Kenji—Takahashi Kenji, legend of the Guild—took me in when I was barely more than a street rat with a decent punch and terrible impulse control.
His training was strict. Brutal. No distractions.
No indulgences. No softness. For months, I wasn’t allowed off his property.
Just drills, meditation, sparring, more drills. A life carved down to bone.
But as I proved myself, he let me explore farther. First the nearby villages. Then the small towns. Then the cities, neon and alive, teeming with people and noise and possibility. I fell in love with all of it.
It’s been too long since I came back.
I make a mental note—call Master Kenji. If he’s still here, he’d get a kick out of seeing me again. The old man always did have a soft spot for his most stubborn student. And I feel like an ungrateful brat for not visiting sooner.
A rush of a bullet train cuts through the night again, pulling me out of my wandering thoughts. The sound fades as the quiet settles back over the clearing, and with it comes the reminder that I’m not alone.
I look at the body.
Still sprawled where I dropped him. Still staring at the sky like he’s contemplating the moon. Still dead as the dirt I’m shoveling.
I study his face, squinting as if that might tell me what crime got him a slot on the Guild’s list. Embezzler? No—he has soft-office-hands. Maybe a smuggler. Or a trafficker. Or someone who pissed off the wrong executive in the wrong backroom.
I shake my head. None of it fits.
“Well, it doesn’t really matter now, does it?” I mutter.
Another shovel-full of dirt hits the pile.
The hole is finally taking shape. Not pretty, not deep enough for Guild standards, but I’m sweaty, my tiny shovel is an insult to Earth-moving tools everywhere, and he isn’t in a position to file a complaint.
“Good enough,” I say, brushing the hair out of my face with the back of my wrist.
I jab the shovel into the earth one last time and lean on it, breathing hard under the moon’s bright, nosy glare. My heartbeat is steady. My muscles ache in the good way. For a fleeting second, it actually feels peaceful.
Me, a grave, and a mark that better not be more trouble than he’s worth.
I climb out of the grave and straighten, brushing dirt from my hands until my palms sting. The night air is cooler up here, untouched by sweat and exertion, and for a moment I just breathe it in before circling the body.
Time to make it official.
I pull out my phone, tap the Guild’s secure app, and the kill-log interface opens with its usual cold efficiency. I crouch, grab his wrist, and press his thumb to the screen. The scanner flashes once, blinks red, and throws an error.
Of course.
I try again, angling his thumb differently, wiping away the smear of blood with the edge of my sleeve. Another red flash. No signature. No print. Nothing.
A low groan escapes me. “You have got to be kidding.”
I lift both his hands and finally see the problem: shredded palms, skin torn open from when I hurled him through the third-floor window of that empty office building. Clean kill. Minimal noise. No witnesses, no security, no alarms.
Convenient then.
Infuriating now.
“Couldn’t have just landed on your back, huh?” I mutter. Fine. If the thumbprint’s useless, there’s always the backup.
I tilt his head, pull his eyelid open, and bring my phone close. The retinal scanner hums softly. One beat, two—then the app flashes bright green.
Kill confirmed.
Funds transferred.
Vacation back on track.
“About damn time.”
I stand and nudge him lightly with the toe of my boot. The body rolls into the grave, landing on its back with a soft thud. Moonlight hits his face just right, and that crooked little smirk he died wearing seems even more obnoxious now. It’ll probably still be there when he starts to rot.
“Enjoy your new home,” I tell him, voice low. “No neighbors. No noise complaints. Perfect retirement plan.”
I kneel at the edge of the hole, mini-shovel dangling from one hand while I rest my forearms on my knees.
My breath eases. My pulse slows. The night settles again, empty and wide, the wind carrying only distant train noise and the faint hum of insects.
No one is going to wander out here. No one is going to find him.
The job is done.
The promise of real rest is finally within reach.
I take one last look at him and sigh. “Goodbye, unlucky bastard. And I swear—no more kills. At least not until my vacation is over.”
With the solemnity of someone who doesn’t have much faith in that statement, I scoop the first shovel-full of dirt and toss it onto his chest.
The first layer of dirt settles over him, soft as dust. The night is still again, save for the faint hum of a train far in the distance. For a moment, it almost feels peaceful.
Almost.
As much peace as a woman can get while standing over a half-dug grave with a dead man staring up at her.
I set my jaw, raise the shovel, and get back to work.