The Poison Apples

Decades of war and the end of it weren't in sight. Most people lived in poverty while the rich held balls and parties every night. It was a struggle to survive between countless diseases and hunger. Work was scarce unless you knew magic or you were a call girl. But every war brought hunger, poverty, and revolution. Every war meant buying the right people out, a strategy they called it, and there was only one group of people who knew strategy like their own hands. We all knew war meant death, but it also meant wealth.
Cassandra was sneaky. She could get her hands on everything and anything. Information, food, and weapons you name it, and she would have it. The girl was a shadow in the night, and if she played her cards right-it was hers. Many people tried to hire her, and many times, she refused. Unless the money was right. So most of the time, you find Cass in her antique shop with favors to collect. But because of this, Cass had a bounty for her head.
Dean was a shadow, a tank if the situation called for it. He had been in the shadows for decades, being hired to kill or to swindle information for his group. He got a good share of money and, most of the time, a bed with a naked woman. It was a win-win for him. But Dean was not the hard, cold man everyone saw him as. Deep down, he was shattered beyond repair. But he kept quiet, obeyed his leader, and did as was needed of him. Until he was asked to talk to a little merchant girl.
When Cassandra is pulled into the rip-tides of war because of Dean, she is utterly confused. It wasn't soldiers paying her for money anymore. Instead, it was death. Dean doesn't know how to feel about the girl unless something pushes him over the edge.
She was a lost girl he had to protect.
He was a soldier she had to heal.