My finger had been on the trigger, resting with purpose, my eye sharp.

It would've been an easy shot.

She was a creature of habit and liked her vanilla chai tea latte from the tiny coffee shop on 34th street. She usually spent a good hour enjoying her tea while reading a book, soaking up the sunshine on the patio. Then, when she was finished, she took her camera and went searching for interesting things to photograph.

Currently, she wasn’t on assignment, which gave her time to be idle.

And apparently, idle time for her meant over-priced teas and reading historical romance novels, the kind with Fabio on the cover. Bodice-rippers, I guess that’s what they’re called.

And she didn’t read on a Kindle —she actually packed around a tattered, used copy of the book that she probably picked up at a thrift store. I could tell she liked the feel of an actual book in her hand. A throwback to when books were more than bits and bytes on a machine.

I could relate. I liked to read.

When I had time.

When I was a kid, reading had been my escape from my chaotic, shitastic childhood.

So, yeah, I got it.

But big deal. Lots of people read. Plenty of my targets had probably been readers.

Hadn’t mattered before.

But with her...it suddenly had mattered.

My moral ambiguity evaporated in an instant, leaving me with a distressing case of conscience.

Why?

Why her?

It could’ve been so simple.

Bam! Gone.

Mission completed.

Payment wired to my off-shore account.

Beer in my hand by evening.

But fuck no, that's not what happened.

I skewed my gaze to the knocked out woman slumped in the passenger seat, her dark hair falling over her delicate features, her mouth slack, her fingers curled slightly.

Fuck, I couldn’t explain it.

I'd just tanked everything for this chick.

Why?

Maybe I was losing my mind.

Yeah, that was it. Too many assignments. Too many souls ripped from their bodies at the end of my bullet.

Maybe this was God's way of saying, “Hey fucker, time to pay up.”

Men like me didn't have the option of going anywhere but down when we kicked it. I didn't expect nor hope for miracles.

I did my job, got paid, and moved on.

I didn’t have attachments, no family I’d ever claim, and found my pleasure in the simple things: cold beer, good pizza, and a fine-ass woman on the nights my hand just wouldn’t do.

Until her.

Breezy Grace.

The minute I saw her, something growled MINE.

My finger had stilled on the trigger.

Something reached inside my gut and yanked hard.

Holy fuck, I'd never felt anything so raw, so visceral.

From high ground, I watched her through my crosshairs, a silent threat, the Grim Reaper in jeans and a T-shirt, a ball cap turned backward.

The muscles in my forearms clenched, as if working against my brain, refusing to follow through.

My finger lifted from the trigger as I tracked her through the busy street.

Her long, dark hair, pulled into a messy pony tail seemed an afterthought. Her jeans had holes — not because it was fashionable — but because she couldn't care less about appearances. She liked to blend in, to move through the crowds without drawing attention.

The dark-rimmed glasses perched on her nose nearly swallowed her face.

She wasn't a beauty. Eyes too big, mouth too small...like one of those dolls with exaggerated features and too much eye-liner.

But there was something...something about her that I couldn't shake.

She disappeared from view and I lowered my rifle.

I'd lost my shot.

And I knew.

There was no way I was going to kill her.

No matter what I was being paid — no matter the reason.

I never asked questions. I didn’t know why her file had ended up in my hands and before this moment, I’d never cared.

The person on the other end of my crosshairs was just a job.

Hell, a bullet had knocked my Jiminy Cricket off my shoulder long ago so an abundance of scruples had never been a problem.

Thank you, U.S. government.

And yes, that was truth sprinkled with just enough sarcasm to give it flavor.

Until her.

Breezy. What the hell kind of name was that?

That was a hippie, flower-child name.

But Breezy Grace was her legal name — I’d checked.

A photographer who spent most of her time shooting landscapes and wild animals for magazines I’d never heard of, which judging by her beater car and her worn clothing, didn’t pay much more than an intern’s salary.

And in New York, that was practically impossible to make work.

I wondered if it would floor her to know that the bounty on her head was more than she’d ever see in a year. Or two?

That begged the question...why?

What had little Miss Breezy done to deserve the bullet with her name on it?

Why did I care?

I didn’t, I tried to tell myself.

So why hadn’t I pulled the trigger?

I didn’t have a ready answer.

But I did have one legit fact: if I didn't do it...someone else would.

My peers, if you could call them that, wouldn’t hesitate to scoop up that bounty for a relatively easy day of work.

I sat back on my haunches. Damn, was I actually thinking what I was thinking?

Just walk away.

Forget it.

Return the half sitting in your bank account and wash your hands of whatever mystery Miss Breezy was at the epicenter of.

Sound advice.

But I knew I wasn’t going to do that.

I knew it as well as I knew my name.

I just didn’t know why.

...In hindsight...my decision was just as fucked as it remained in the present tense.

I allowed my gaze to drift to the passenger sprawled like a lanky baby giraffe — all legs and arms — across from me.

Yeah, it’s exactly what it looked like: I fucking drugged and kidnapped the woman to save her life.

Why? We already covered that — how the fuck should I know? Did a person losing their mind, actually know when their hinges snapped?

Something tells me, no.

Maybe it was karma coming to collect on my ass for taking all those lives.

Maybe it was the cost of fighting a politician’s war when I’d been too young to understand what giving the government a blank check meant to my life.

Fuck it, what did it matter, anyway?

The deed was done.

And now...I had to deal with the fall-out.