No Rest for the Wicked ✎

CHAPTER THREE

Kevin Sanders was the type of man that no one truly liked, but everyone pretended to.

He was middle-aged, balding, and had a terrible potbelly. When he talked to someone, they would see either one of his two sides. The first side was pretentiousness and arrogance, and the second would be anxiety and self-doubt.

Lilith, obviously, had been seeing his second side. But she killed people for a living, so could one really blame him? The majority of the people, however, saw Sanders as a brilliant, if haughty, director. His creative genius had earned him three Academy nominations and one win. The public either loved him or hated him, there was no in-between.

Yet, both his fans and his haters had never seen the side of him that Lilith saw now. The quivering, shivering, nail-biting mess of a man wrecked so harshly by his jealousy of a co-star that he wanted him dead.

It was a beautiful paradox.

"This way," despite his visible fear, his voice didn't shake. Lilith had to give him props for that. "Ulwich should be arriving in, I don't know, ten minutes? Maybe?" The guards barely glanced at her as Sanders waved his pass at them, guiding her through the crowd. "I got the rope you wanted. Strong rope too, like you said. The best of the best."

"That's good." She hated conversing on assignments. It distracted her.

"Everything's going to be fine, right?" Sanders looked nervously at her as they strode down one hallway after another. "You know what you're doing?"

This time, she couldn't keep the exasperation out of her voice. "Sanders, shut up." Oh, how she wished she'd brought cigarettes.

Sanders swallowed hard, his adam's apple bobbing in his throat. "Right. Okay. Sorry."

The rest of their walk was conducted in silence, something that Lilith was grateful for. When they finally came to Ulwich's dressing room, Lilith wasted no time. "Ten minutes, you said?"

"Yes," Sanders looked more terrified than usual. "That's okay...right?"

"Where's the rope?" If she had to reassure the man one more time...

"Oh!" Sanders scurried away to the side of a room like a cockroach away from light. He grabbed a bundle of thick, nylon rope and practically shoved it into her arms roughly. "That's okay, right? See? Strong. Very strong."

Lilith watched him in silence. Her expression was passive, neutral - but her eyes were brimming, smoldering, boiling. She inhaled deeply, missing the smell of smoke and burn of tobacco in her throat.

"Kevin," her voice was soft as velvet. "If you touch me again, I'll kill you."

She didn't stop to savor his reaction, although she desperately wanted to. To see the cold sweat breaking out on his forehead, the quivering of his hands. But she was a professional. Instead, Lilith untangled the rope and yanked hard on it twice, feeling every single thread and fibre groan and stretch in her palms. It was just what she needed.

"Go, Kevin." It was a command.

Kevin went.

Lilith set her purse down and kicked off her heels. Her feet sank gracefully into the fur carpet. Barefoot, she crept to the side of the door, the rope curled around her fingers. They had stopped twitching after being given something to hold. Her body was tense, alert, firm. Ready. Waiting.

The minutes ticked by.

Voices came and went outside the door. Waves in an ocean.

And then.

And then.

The door opened.