Introduction

The dim, yellow glow of a streetlamp illuminates just a small section of Valley Avenue, the little side street a few blocks away from the main road leading into Mistral City. The pavement was cracked open in parts, the road covered in pot holes. The pale glow of the moon did nothing to light the small, secluded street below, and it remained shrouded in darkness.

Shielding herself from the shadows surrounding her, she leans casually against the long metal pole, crossing her cold bare arms in front of her chest, misty grey eyes darting about her environment warily.

Those rat bastards were late again.

At the very end of the avenue, barely visible from where she was standing, was an old abandoned church, the cracked stone bricks crumbling off the walls. Well, to everyone else it looked abandoned. But behind those walls were a pair of sly, sneaky rats that should have been there, at the streetlamp, the only one on Valley Avenue so it was hard to miss, by 11 O'clock at night.

It was now 11:02pm and she was getting impatient.

Extending one arm out, her hand met the cold metal pole, and she began to tap a random tinny tune on it impatiently. Flicking brown hair from her eyes, she curled it round her ear. She needed to keep the rat's den in sight. Which, to her relief, was beginning to stir as the door in the front opened.

She didn't need to look to know who it was-she could tell by their footsteps. The heavy footed careless ones and the lighter, more sure steps came to a stop about five metres from where she was stood. Behind the jagged crack in the pavement that marked the boundary line.

"Sips. Sjin" she says coolly, her voice disturbing the otherwise perfect night. She finally looked up, taking in the paler man's fancy ass suit, his short black hair gelled back and his shoes just as shiny-typical Sips. Always the business man.

Sjin, on the other hand, was dressed a little more casually, in tight blue jeans, a smooth dark grey jacket and brown shoes, old and more worn out than the new pair Sips wore. Sjin was always the one getting his hands dirty-Sips was, to quote, "too important to be worrying about things like that."

"Tia" Sips replies briskly, his Canadian accent thick in his tone. The girl in the black attire doesn't react to her name-though in the back of her mind, she wondered if her name was too intellectual for rats like these to handle.

"So? Why have you called us out here in this bloody freezing night?" Sips snaps. For a Canadian, he sure did hate the cold...

"You know why. Duncan is interested in doing business with you" she reminds him, resisting the urge to roll her eyes. Duh. Like she hadn't told them five times, three times by text, once by call and once in person.

"I have no idea what you're talking about" Sips smirks, folding his arms. Tia glared heavily at the two men. They were the troublemakers in the city. And she hated them for playing dumb. She was Duncan's partner-they knew that.

They also knew who had a soft spot for her.

They seemed to have read her mind and both stood up straight, two pairs of eyes flickering warily to the shadows of the dark alleyways nearby, waiting for an ambush.

"Tell your master they will be with him on Thursday" Sjin says quietly, speaking at last. Tia was getting angry very quickly, one, because they called Duncan her master-no one owned her. And two, because Sjin's voice was soft and gentle, which didn't match his occupation-Sips's personal assassin. He lured people in with his gentle voice and trustworthy personality then slaughtered them without mercy. She had fallen for his trap once.

Once. Never again.

Her hand instinctively reached up to the long trailing scar on her right arm, starting from the crook of her elbow right down to her wrist. Sjin's eyes followed and he shuffled awkwardly. She would always remember that night, the sudden gleam in his usually soft oak brown eyes, the hiss of a knife being drawn from a sheath. She hadn't reacted, a beginner's mistake, and he had clunked her on the head with the hilt of his knife.

In the haze, she had lifted her arm up weakly to stop the oncoming attack. The knife had plunged into her arm, raking a deep trench-like wound on her arm. If...if HE hadn't interfered, she would have died.

"My partner," she said through gritted teeth, emphasising on the partner part, "has specifically requested that it had to be with him today." She shook her head slightly to get rid of the flashbacks and looked expectantly to the duo.

"Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but we don't have what you came for" Sjin smirks.

That little smirk did it for her. Who did they think she was?

She drew out her gun from her belt, watching in slight amusement as the men stepped back, as if taking an extra step from her would stop a bullet. "Listen to me carefully" she hisses, stepping forward and nudging a toe over the boundary line. Sips narrows his eyes, glaring down the barrel of her gun. That asshole-he always had to be defiant about everything, even death.

"You will give Duncan the things he needs by tomorrow midday. If I find that you haven't, I will slaughter you. Do you understand?" she snaps. 

"You don't command us, girl" Sjin sneers.

"And you don't command me and play me for a fool. I guess we are even" she snaps back, and turns around, disappearing into the shadows.

Well that was a cold night wasted.

She disappeared down the back of an alleyway, slipping the gun back into the holster. She was confident Sips and Sjin would not follow her. But she was also confident she was not alone.

"Can you leave me alone for ten minutes?" she huffs out loud, keeping her pace brisk and steady. Stopping would mean he would stop with her and she would be stood there in the freezing night for another half an hour.

"No" came the dark chuckle back, and the familiar figure slipped out of the shadows.

Note: Yep, I'm doing another book-might as well give it a go! This book will be a bit more...mature than the other ones, so it will contain swears and may include some graphic content...just a heads up! And, for anyone who has read my other books, yes Tia and Liam will be making lots of appearances in here!