Brief
Rain poured relentlessly over the city, turning the streets into shattered mirrors of neon and headlights. Wind tore between the high-rise buildings, sharp and unforgiving. It was the kind of night that made people lock their doors twice.
Lucien Moreau preferred nights like this.
Another job.
He stood on the very edge of the rooftop, twenty floors above the ground, coat soaked, dark hair plastered to his forehead. Below him — traffic, distant sirens, life moving unaware. In front of him — a single lit window on the eighth floor. The target.
He felt nothing.
No anger. No excitement. Just the familiar cold steadiness settling deep in his chest. Focus. Precision. Control.
He secured the rope with practiced efficiency and stepped backward off the edge of the building without hesitation.
The world dropped.
Rain lashed against his face as he descended smoothly along the wall, boots braced against concrete, movements calculated and controlled. Every breath measured. The storm tried to shake him — but he remained perfectly balanced.
Eighth floor.
Apartment 84.
At least, that’s what the file had said. He stopped just beside the window, suspended in the dark. The faint light from inside illuminated his sharp features for a brief second. Calm. Detached. Professional.
With careful precision, he slid the window open and stepped inside as if he belonged there. Just another assignment. In and out. No trace.
And really Lucien… would enter the wrong room?
Rain slammed against the glass in a relentless rhythm, each drop fracturing the glow of distant streetlights into thousands of trembling reflections. The wind tore violently between the skyscrapers, rattling window frames, tugging at his coat. On the rooftop of the 20-story building, Lucien Moreau stood poised, wet hair plastered to his forehead, dark coat heavy from the storm. Below him, eight floors, glowed the apartment of his target — a rich forty-year-old man
He checked the rope once more, the tension in it precise and taut. Control was everything. Slowly, deliberately, he let himself descend. One… two… three… counting silently, feeling the rope slide through gloved fingers, boots braced against the slick concrete. Twelve. He stopped, hovering just above the eighth floor balcony. Rain stung his face, plastered his coat to his body, but he didn’t flinch. Focus was absolute.
Lucien assessed the façade quickly. Two identical windows framed the balcony. According to his plan, the left window was the entry. The right one would lead to the wrong apartment. And yet, in the wet darkness, shadowed by sheets of rain, he had misjudged. His hand reached for the right window. Smooth. Controlled. Professional. Yet wrong.
He slipped inside. Silence. Only the hiss of rain and distant thunder. Gloves removed, he slid his hands into his pockets, moving with the careful precision of a predator.
And then he saw her.
A thin, dark dress. A young woman, standing near the bed, startled but composed. Not the forty-year-old man he was supposed to find. Not the broad-shouldered target in the file. She froze as his gaze swept over her, calculating, cold.
His jaw tightened. “Where is the man?” he demanded, voice low, tense, carrying authority.
She stepped back slightly. Calm “I’m here alone,” she said.
Lucien’s mind raced. Apartment layout. Balcony positions. Numbers. The file had said 84. He had counted carefully, visualized the building from the rooftop. Left window. Left window. He should have gone through the left window. But the rain, the shadows, the rooftop slick with water — he had entered through the right. Wrong apartment. Wrong window. Yet, his eyes swept the room like a blade. Small apartment. Soft light spilling from the lamp onto books and framed photos. A blanket carelessly thrown over a chair, a jacket draped nearby. No evidence of the intended target. None. Only her.
Lightning split the sky, illuminating his face — cold, sharp, controlled. His mind flicked back to the rooftop, to the plan, to the miscalculation. The left window was the correct entry. The right window, the one he had chosen, had brought him here instead. And yet… she might be his target’s companion, an unexpected variable he hadn’t accounted for.
“Perfect,” he muttered under his breath, more to himself than her. The storm outside roared in agreement.
Twenty floors descended. Entry through the wrong window. Wrong room. Mistake. Yet Lucien remained calm. Focused. Calculating. Even now, in error, he assessed the risk, measured the unknown, adapted. The best assassin in the city had just realized his first mistake of the night: he had misjudged the windows. And with that misstep, the game had changed.
