Lilith led Liam through a narrow side hallway, her heels clicking lightly against the floor as the pair exited the main building and approached the back compound. The morning air hit Liam’s face as they stepped outside, but he barely noticed it—he was too busy wondering what kind of "lowkey" car she had tucked away that needed its own private entrance.
After another minute of walking in silence, they reached it: a single, heavy-looking steel door embedded into the concrete wall at the far end of the lot. No markings. No signs. Just a thick chain across the handle and a rusted old padlock.
Lilith reached into her back pocket and pulled out the plain black key she had grabbed earlier. With a soft click, the padlock dropped open.
She unhooked the chain, pushed open the door, and stepped aside.
"After you," she said dryly.
Liam blinked as he stepped into what looked like a pitch-black, empty garage. The air inside slled musty—like old oil, dust, and forgotten tal.
"Uh..." Liam glanced around, then turned to her with raised brows. "This is a garage, right? Not an empty prison cell?"
Lilith didn’t respond imdiately. She simply stepped in behind him and reached toward the wall, flipping a switch.
With a heavy clunk, the lights overhead flickered to life, one by one.
Thud... click. Thud... click.
And there it was—sitting at the far end of the garage, hidden in the shadows until now.
A car. Or... what remained of one.
Its once-red paint was now faded and chipped away in massive patches, revealing dull gray tal underneath. One of the side mirrors was missing, the front bumper was cracked like it had been bitten by a giant, and the windshield had a spiderweb fracture that reached from one corner to the other like a starburst. The front tires looked bald, the hubcaps long gone, and the exhaust pipe hung loosely from underneath like it was ready to fall off with a sneeze.
A thin layer of dust blanketed the entire thing, and a faint sll of rust and mold lingered in the air around it.
Liam stared at the vehicle, stunned. "Lilith..."
She folded her arms, raising one eyebrow.
"...How am I supposed to be seen in this? I asked for less flashy, not less functional. This is disgraceful. I’m trying to hunt soone, not get infected."
Lilith remained unmoved. "Are you taking it or not?"
Liam let out a groan and stretched his hand toward her. "Fine. Just give the key."
She smirked. "There is no key."
"...What?"
"You’ll have to hotwire it."
Liam stared at her in disbelief, then slowly facepald. "You’ve got to be kidding ."
"Do I look like I’m kidding?"
Grumbling under his breath, Liam walked toward the car with the air of a man heading toward his own funeral. The door let out a painful screech as he pulled it open, and a cloud of dust imdiately poofed out from the seat like a small explosion. He coughed as he slid in, wiping the steering wheel with his sleeve.
The interior was worse than the outside.
The seats were torn, with yellow foam poking out like the car had been attacked by wild animals. The dashboard was cracked, and several wires hung loosely under it like tangled veins. A family of spiders might have been squatting in the cupholder.
"How the hell did she even get this?" he muttered to himself as he began hotwiring it.
After a minute of fumbling with the wires, he finally got it to spark. The engine coughed, then hacked, then gave a sound like it was about to die—and then, sohow, roared to life.
Well, "roared" might’ve been generous.
The noise it made was horrendous. A choked, sputtering combination of grinding tal, groaning pistons, and sothing that sounded suspiciously like an old man in pain. It was loud—really loud.
Liam physically recoiled. "Dear God, what is that sound?!"
He looked over, and of course, Lilith was laughing silently as she walked up to the open window, her voice raised to be heard over the clatter.
"This car fits you so much, Carter!" she shouted. "You shouldn’t even bother returning it!"
Liam closed his eyes. He could feel his soul leaving his body.
He held back every insult that ca to mind, gave her a tight, forced smile, and then—without saying another word—put the car in gear.
With a painful clunk, the gearshift engaged.
The car sputtered again, coughed, then began to move.
He rolled away from the garage, raising a hand in a mock wave as he passed her. She simply waved back with an amused smile.
And then he hit the road.
Within seconds, the car was making such an unholy racket that people on the street actually stopped what they were doing to look.
One man leaned out of his window, yelling in frustration, "Who the fuck owns this slly car?!"
Another passerby shouted, "Get this shit off my fucking front!"
A third voice added, "Bro, sell the fucking car and get a new engine!!"
Liam clenched the steering wheel with a death grip. His face was blank, but internally, he was dying.
he was drawing every eye within three blocks, like a circus act rolling through the city on four mismatched tires.
"Perfect," he muttered. "Just perfect."
But even as the humiliation burned, his eyes stayed focused ahead. The embarrassnt would pass. The mission wouldn’t.
---
The day dragged on slowly for most of the city—vendors yelled over each other in the market, cars honked down crowded streets, people lived in a buzz of routine. But for two groups, ti felt different. The Crimson Hand was still licking its wounds from the chaos brought on by a mysterious woman the night before. Their base was barely functional, leadership in panic, and rumors spreading like wildfire about magic and ghosts.
And then... there was Liam.
Unlike the Crimson Hand, Liam’s day wasn’t slow at all. It was thodical. Focused. Every second had purpose.
The sun dipped into the horizon now, casting a golden glow over the city skyline. Evening had arrived. As Liam drove down the street, the amber sunlight filtered through the dirty windshield and onto his face—but it wasn’t his real face.
No.
The man behind the wheel was an old janitor. A frail man with thinning gray hair, leathery skin, liver spots, and wrinkled hands that gripped the wheel with steady slowness. At least, that’s what anyone would see.
But underneath the convincing skin-tight disguise was Liam. Deadly. And focused.
He’d spent the entire day perfecting this infiltration—a full-body latex mask ordered months ago for a different plan he never needed. But now, it was finally paying off. Every fold of his face, every visible wrinkle on his hands, even the old brown janitor uniform he wore—each detail was calculated. He was no longer the infamous Liam Carter. Not tonight.
"Old man, ditch that garbage can!"
Liam smiled from inside the smoke-filled rust bucket of a car.
"Get that engine checked before soone files a noise complaint!"
"Slls like death in there, Jesus!"
"Bro! That car’s older than my grandpa!"
The insults didn’t faze him. If anything, they amused him.
The car was a perfect distraction.
Its coughing, wheezing engine made him look exactly like what he needed to be—invisible. No one would suspect a grumpy old janitor in a broken-down car. Certainly not the Director of Public Exposure and Brand Curation at Novalight Models—Colton Virelli.
Liam’s smile faded slightly as he drove past a glowing Novalight billboard featuring a dozen beautiful won posing in skimpy outfits.
He wasn’t doing this for attention.
He wasn’t doing it for the mission.
He was doing it for Lana.
That bastard, Colton, had tried to coerce her into sex. Then, when she stood her ground, he sent n to kill her. Kill her, just for saying no.
Liam’s hands tightened around the steering wheel.
"Not tonight," he whispered to himself. "Tonight... you pay."
He pulled off the main road, his eyes landing on the glistening white building of Novalight. It stood like a palace, pretentious and tall, covered in LED lights and expensive glass panels. A crowd of people lingered outside—photographers, assistants, models coming and going in tight dresses, high heels, and artificial smiles.
None of them looked twice at the old janitor pulling into the back alley.
That’s exactly how Liam wanted it.
He parked the coughing car in the shadows and killed the engine—after its final groan of resistance. Smoke hissed from the exhaust. He stepped out, bent slightly forward, limping with purpose as he adjusted his janitor’s cap and wheeled a battered cleaning trolley out from the trunk.
He had spent hours today building the perfect backstory. A fake maintenance request was already logged into Novalight’s system. The staff would be expecting an old man nad Harold Milton, a temp worker from a contracted service.
But what they were getting...
Was sothing else entirely.
Liam tilted his head back, cracking his neck softly.
He was ready.
Tonight, Colton Virelli was going to understand that trying to break a woman like Lana...
ant inviting hell into his life.
And hell had just walked through the back door.
****
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