The man found Max alone in his study two nights later, slipping through a window Max hadn't realized was unlocked, and by the time Max noticed him standing in the shadows near the bookshelf, it was already far too late to reach for anything resembling a weapon.
"Don't move," the man said quietly, though there was something strange in his voice not the flat, professional calm Max would have expected from someone sent to kill him, but hesitation, thick and unmistakable.
Max went very still, mind already racing through every enemy he'd made in the last year, trying to place the face half-hidden in shadow. And then the man shifted slightly into the lamplight, and something in Max's chest lurched with recognition.
"I know you," Max said slowly.
