The room smelled like sweat, cheap booze, and the kind of regret that sticks to your skin long after you leave. Flickering neon light from the motel sign outside cast sickly red and blue stripes across the sheets, turning the place into a crime scene before the crime even happened.

Viv lit a cigarette with one bloodstained hand and nudged the body on the floor with the toe of her boot. "You still breathing, asshole?"

The guy groaned. That was unfortunate for him.

"Didn't think so." She exhaled smoke through her nose and turned to the mirror, wiping a streak of blood off her cheek with the back of her hand. Her knuckles were raw, split open from where she'd rearranged the bastard's face. Should've known better than to grab her like that. Should've known better than to try and get rough without asking first. He'd paid for an hour. She gave him ten minutes before turning his nose into a Picasso painting.

A low chuckle from the bed. "Jesus, Viv. You always gotta be this extra?"

She glanced over her shoulder at Colt, stretched out naked with one arm tucked behind his head and the other holding a half-empty bottle of whiskey. Scars crisscrossed his chest, each one a story he didn't tell.

"Extra?" She raised an eyebrow. "I let him keep his dick. That's mercy."

Colt took a slow sip, watching her. "Remind me never to piss you off."

"Oh, honey," she smirked. "You're already on the list."

A knock at the door. Three sharp raps, like someone with authority. Viv and Colt exchanged a glance, then he slid off the bed and grabbed his gun from the nightstand. Viv plucked her switchblade from the dresser and approached the door with the lazy confidence of someone who'd done this a hundred times before.

"Who is it?" she called, resting one hand on her hip, the other gripping the handle of her knife.

A voice from the other side. Male. Calm. "Open the door, Viv. Let's talk."

She rolled her eyes. "See, that's where you lost me. Talking ain't really my thing."

Colt moved beside her, gun raised. She cracked the door an inch, just enough to see a familiar face. Luka. Expensive suit, slicked-back hair, the kind of guy who never got his hands dirty but always had blood on his shoes.

"You killed the wrong guy, sweetheart," Luka said, smiling like a snake. "And now we got a problem."

Viv grinned, baring teeth. "I love problems." Then she drove the blade straight through the crack in the door.