Villain’s Favorite 229

Chapter 229 Good Night, Sir 

The outline of that case was unmistakable in infrared. 

He was heading up. 

Maya slipped into the fifth-floor stairwell and pressed herself flat behind the wall at the corner. Her movements were soundless, sneakers on concrete, light as a ghost. 

The footsteps grew louder. 

Finished 

The moment his silhouette came into view, Maya’s heart was pounding so hard she thought it might tear free. She slowed her breathing and tightened her grip on the gun. 

The sniper would never have imagine-not until the moment he died-that someone had gotten there first. That someone was crouched in the dark waiting for him. 

The building was empty. He’d confirmed that beforehand. Nobody lived here. 

So he’d let his guard down. 

His foot hit the first step and some animal instinct made him glance up toward the blind spot along the wall. 

Nothing there. 

He frowned slightly and climbed two more stairs, a little faster this time, as if speed could shake the unease crawling up his spine. 

His left foot landed on the third step. His right hadn’t followed. 

He looked up again. 

Standing on the landing between the fifth and sixth floors was a small girl in a black jacket. She was a full story above him. A perfect firing position. 

“Good night, sir.” 

The man flinched at the ghost-child’s appearance, and by the time he realized something was wrong and reached for his weapon, it was already too late. 

The girl’s face was bone-white. From her elevated angle, the barrel pointed down at him. 

Right between the eyebrows, just slightly above center. Dead center of the forehead. 

She’d hit that spot hundreds of times on the range at the Clark estate. 

But this was real. A living, breathing person standing under her gun. 

Maya locked her arms straight, wrists rigid, the muzzle trained on the space between his eyes. If her hands shook, if her grip was weak, the recoil would numb her arms and ruin the shot. 

Her hands didn’t shake. She pulled the trigger. 

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Chapter 229 Good Night, Sir 

The bang exploded through the enclosed stairwell, deafening. 

Finched 

She saw the hole appear between his eyebrows. Blood seeped out slowly, trickling down the bridge of his 

nose. 

The sight made her teeth chatter. Tears streamed down her face, completely beyond her control. Crying and furious at herself for crying, terrified he wasn’t dead, she fired three more times. 

She heard the body hit the ground, the heavy, final sound of it tumbling down the steps. She didn’t look back. She turned and ran. 

Halfway down, she stopped. 

Her blank, overloaded brain finally caught up. 

Oh. Right. She couldn’t leave yet. 

She still had things to do. 

Maya forced herself back on trembling legs. She crouched beside the body and, hands shaking, searched through his clothes until she found his phone. 

Within minutes, a call came in. Maya wiped her eyes, made sure her voice was steady and clear of any tremor, then hit the answer and switched on the voice modulator. 

“How’d it go? Need me to send backup?” A man’s voice, casual and confident. 

“No. One shot’s enough.” 

She said it with tears still clinging to her lashes, her tone perfectly level. “Don’t worry. I’m already in position. Just waiting for the target to come out.” 

The man laughed, satisfied, and hung up. “Good. I’ll wait for your update.” 

Maya ended the call and tore through the sniper’s phone. A burner. No messages, no leads, not a single trace. Even the employer’s number was a disposable line. 

Once she was sure she hadn’t missed anything, she tossed the phone aside and turned to the man’s bag. Inside the rifle case was a sniper rifle, broken down into components. 

Maya picked up the pieces one by one and started fitting them together. Barrel to receiver, align, push, rotate. The sharp click of metal locking into place echoed through the empty stairwell. 

She flinched at the sound, froze, and listened hard for several seconds. Nothing else stirred. She moved to the next piece. 

Thank you, Philbert, and your brutal training regimen. 

Months of drills at the Clark estate. At the time, she’d thought it was all tedious and pointless and her hands had ached constantly. She’d called Wendy more than once to cry about it. 

But now, at four in the morning in an abandoned building, kneeling beside a dead body, she needed to dredge every last scrap of that training out of her memory and put it to use. 

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Chapter 229 Good Night, Sir 

Fished 

The final component clicked into place. Maya hauled the assembled rifle up to the sixth floor. She’d already scouted it. The sixth floor had the best sightlines, wide and open. 

She wrestled the gun onto the windowsill, dropped into position behind it, and took a deep breath. Test shot. Scope adjustment. She couldn’t afford a miss. 

By the time the sky began to lighten, George was pushing open a door in a run-down rental on the outskirts of the area. 

The place was remote, the hallway damp and smelling of mildew. 

Liam was already inside, two drinks on the table, one pushed to the opposite seat. 

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