Los Angeles looked cleaner from eight hundred yards up.

Rain blurred the streets into streaks of red and white. Sirens drifted somewhere downtown. A helicopter crossed low over Wilshire, then disappeared behind glass towers.

Cassian stayed flat behind the rifle.

Breathing slow.

Below him, Senator Holloway’s convoy rolled through traffic exactly on schedule.

Black SUVs.

Motorcycle escorts.

Two chase vehicles behind them.

Cassian adjusted the scope half a click to the left.

Wind changed.

In his ear, Kane sighed dramatically.

“You ever think maybe we should get a less dramatic job?”

Cassian kept watching the convoy.

“Like accounting,” Kane went on. “Nobody gets shot in accounting.”

A beat.

“Actually, never mind. My cousin worked in accounting. Dude got stabbed with a pen over tax fraud.”

Nothing from Cassian.

Kane clicked his tongue.

“One day I’m gonna get real insecure about this relationship.”

“Thirty seconds.”

“See?” Kane sounded offended. “Emotionally unavailable.”

The convoy slowed at the intersection.

Red light.

Traffic backing up.

Cassian settled the crosshairs on the rear passenger window.

One clean shot.

One breath—

Heavy metal exploded through the street below.

Cassian paused.

A pink ice cream truck tore through the red light hard enough to bounce over the lane marker.

“What the hell is that?”

The truck cut directly between the convoy vehicles.

Brakes screamed.

One motorcycle swerved sideways.

Music blasted from roof speakers loud enough to shake nearby windows.

Not ice cream music.

Metallica.

Very loud Metallica.

Kane started laughing already.

“No. No way.”

The driver-side window rolled down.

A woman leaned halfway out holding three tacos.

“YOU CAN’T PARK THERE, ASSHOLE.”

Cassian stayed behind the scope.

Dark curls under a crooked baseball cap.

Grease stains on her sleeve.

One taco hanging out of her mouth.

Below her, security reacted instantly.

Doors opened.

Weapons came up.

Traffic started honking behind them.

The woman slapped the steering wheel.

“Oh my God, move your billionaire funeral convoy already.”

One guard stormed toward the truck.

She pointed a taco at him immediately.

“Sir, respectfully? Your haircut tells me you make terrible decisions.”

Kane folded into hysterics.

Cassian adjusted the rifle slightly.

Target moving.

Angle shrinking.

The senator disappeared behind the truck again.

The woman leaned farther out the window.

“You people always this annoying or is this, like, a seasonal thing?”

One guard grabbed the truck door.

She slapped his hand away.

“Whoa. Boundaries.”

Kane wheezed in Cassian’s ear.

“I love her.”

Cassian ignored him.

Crosshairs shifted again.

No clear line.

The woman looked around the intersection for the first time.

Her eyes landed on the rifles.

Then the armored SUVs.

Then the screaming guards.

“…Okay,” she said slowly. “This feels super illegal.”

One motorcycle escort reached for his weapon.

The woman stared at him.

Then slowly held up the taco.

“Don’t make this weird.”

Cassian’s finger eased slightly off the trigger.

Below, the convoy started accelerating through the intersection.

Too fast now.

Wrong angle.

The woman suddenly threw the taco.

Straight at the SUV.

Silence hit the comms.

Sour cream slid down black armored paint.

Kane made a noise like he was dying.

“She just assaulted federal security with Mexican food.”

The woman pointed furiously at the windshield.

“That was carne asada, you fascist!”

One guard shouted something back.

She shouted louder.

“YOU DRIVE LIKE DIVORCED ENERGY.”

Kane completely lost it.

Cassian stayed motionless behind the rifle.

The convoy pushed through traffic.

Gone now.

Shot window dead.

Rain tapped softly against the rooftop gravel.

Below, the woman cut across two lanes while yelling at another driver through the open window.

Someone honked.

She flipped them off instantly.

Then the truck disappeared into downtown traffic.

Just gone.

Kane finally caught his breath.

“…So.”

Cassian lowered the rifle.

“So,” Kane continued carefully, “we gonna talk about the fact that Dora the Street Racer just destroyed a six-million-dollar contract?”

Cassian ejected the magazine.

Click.

No answer.

“You stopped tracking the target.”

Cassian packed the rifle into its case.

Zip.

Latch.

Silence.

Far below, the intersection filled with traffic again.

No pink truck.

No screaming.

Nothing.

Kane’s voice softened slightly.

“You lost focus.”

Cassian picked up the rifle case.

His eyes stayed on the empty street a second longer.

Then—

“Yeah.”