The job was done. Mister John Doe was eliminated — cleanly, efficiently, without ceremony. Names never mattered to Ocelot. They blurred together after a while, a long procession of John Does and Jane Does who all ended the same way. Remembering them served no purpose. Memory was for things that lasted. Targets didn’t.

The complication came afterward.

The wife.

She wasn’t on the original list. She never was. But she knew things — enough to be useful, enough to be dangerous. Her husband’s death had torn a hole in a much larger web, one woven by men who preferred to stay faceless, who pulled too many strings from too many directions to be dismissed as petty criminals. Secret organizations liked their secrets buried deep. Loose ends made them nervous.

And Ocelot, apparently, had just turned her into one.

Two assassins were dispatched to clean up the loose end. Professionals, not amateurs. They never reached her. Ocelot intercepted them first, shadows meeting shadows, gunfire brief and decisive. He left their bodies where they fell. A message, if anyone bothered to read it.

She stood rigid in the small room, shoulders tight, hands clenched just enough to betray her nerves. Her eyes darted — not wildly, not stupidly — but with calculation. Fear was there, unmistakable, but it hadn’t drowned her. She was thinking. Measuring exits. Timing footsteps. Waiting for something to go wrong.

Smart woman.

She knew.

Not the details, not the full picture—but enough. Enough to understand that her husband’s death wasn’t random, that the walls around her were suddenly very thin, and that whatever came next would be aimed squarely at her.

Ocelot watched her for a heartbeat longer than necessary. Letting people die was easy. Deciding they shouldn’t was harder—and far more dangerous.

He moved before she could bolt.

“Life insurance coming by, madam.”

His grip was firm but controlled as he took her by the arm, steering her away from the doorway with practiced ease. He positioned himself so her line of sight never reached the bodies sprawled on the floor behind her. No need to add shock to panic. Shock made people stupid.

He guided her down the hall, boots silent, posture relaxed as if this were a perfectly normal escort rather than a battlefield evacuation.

“Tell me something,” Ocelot continued, tone turning sharper. “Why come home when you knew they’d be waiting? You don’t strike me as a stupid mob wife.” A pause, eyes narrowing slightly. “So what is it — poor judgment, or a death wish?”

He held her gaze, measuring the answer before she even spoke. Whether she liked it or not, she was already part of the game now. And Ocelot intended to decide whether she’d be a liability or an asset worth keeping alive.