Page 64 of The Sniper

“Bullshit.”

Artemis let out a soft laugh. “Paranoid, are we?” She took a slow step forward. “You should be.”

Reyna’s pulse thrummed. She shifted her aim just slightly, targeting the space right between Artemis’s eyes.

Something was wrong.

This wasn’t an ambush. This wasn’t an assassination. This was something worse.

“Daniels,” Reyna murmured into the comms. “She’s too confident.”

Artemis’s gaze flicked to the rooftops around them, her smile sharpening. “Hello, Reyna.”

Reyna froze.

Artemis wasn’t looking at her. She couldn’t see her. But somehow, she knew.

Daniels didn’t react. Didn’t flinch. “If this is some kind of mind game, it’s boring.”

“Oh, this is more than a game,” Artemis purred. “This is about truth.”

Reyna scanned the rooftops again. She couldn’t see a sniper or any other backup. What was Artemis playing at?

And then she saw it. A small black box near Artemis’s feet, but from this distance, there was no way to tell what it was. It could be a bomb, in which case she’d kill Daniels, or it could be nothing at all. She focused the scope on Artemis’s hands. As she narrowed the focus, she spotted it. Shit.

“She’s got a detonator, most likely with a dead man’s switch.” If Reyna put her down, Artemis would release the switch detonating the explosives.

Daniels took a slow step back. “What are you playing at?”

Artemis’s smile widened. “I have a story to tell. One that will shake your precious Cerberus to its core. The truth about the people you work for, the things they’ve done, the sins they’ve buried.”

Reyna’s blood ran cold. Artemis wasn’t here to kill Daniels. She was here to expose all of Cerberus’s secrets. Cerberus missions. Raids. Ops that were never meant to see the light of day. And not just any ops, but the ones they’d been doing against the human traffickers—specifically the auctions. The same ones Artemis’s sister had been caught in. Reyna’s gut twisted. Taken out of context, they could destroy Cerberus.

The silence stretched across the rooftop like a taut wire, ready to snap. Artemis stood at the edge, silhouetted by the dull glow of the city skyline, her posture relaxed, but Reyna wasn’t fooled. Everything about this was calculated. The way she moved, the way she kept Daniels just a few feet away, watching him like she already knew his next step.

Instantly, the screen of the rooftop billboard across the street flickered to life.

“Kill that feed,” snarled Fitz into the comms.

Daniels took another step back, his body going rigid.

Artemis smiled. “Time’s almost up, Agent Daniels. How much are you willing to lose?”

Reyna’s breathing was sharp and quick. They had seconds—maybe less.

“Fitz,” she whispered. “We need a blackout. Now.”

Fitz was already working. “On it.”

Reyna’s trigger finger twitched.

“Take the shot,” Daniels ordered.

It wasn’t just one billboard, it was all the digital billboards lining the industrial district, the massive LED display on the opposite rooftop, even the goddamn ads playing on the sides of city buses.

Reyna’s stomach dropped.

“Oh, shit,” Fitz muttered in her earpiece.

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