Slade had always preferred working at night.

Long before the world had teeth like his, before contracts started specifying no witnesses left breathing, before the jobs started coming from clients who didn’t bother asking what he was anymore.

Night was quieter.

Safer.

Full of things that didn’t belong to the daylight.

The city stretched below the rooftop in a wash of neon and shadow, humans moving through their lives unaware of what watched from above. Slade stood near the edge, coat shifting slightly in the cold wind that didn’t bother him anymore.

Across from him, she stood just out of reach of the streetlight glow.

Still.

Patient.

Predatory in the same controlled way he was.

Two mercenaries.

Just a different kind of hunger now.

Slade’s eye tracked the movement of people far below, listening to the distant rhythm of heartbeats that carried farther than they should have, the sound separating in his head like a map of moving targets.

“You ever notice,” he said, voice low in the dark, “how clients don’t ask questions anymore?”

He glanced at her briefly, then back to the street.

“They don’t ask how we get in.”

A pause.

“They don’t ask how we get out.”

His head tilted slightly, listening to something only he could hear.

“They just ask how long it’ll take before the problem stops breathing.”

The corner of his mouth pulled faintly, something sharp behind it.

“Funny thing is…”

His gaze settled on the building across the street, already spotting the floor they needed.

“We don’t even need that long.”