He steaddied the rifle against the window ledge and, gazing along the barrel saw the target, on the beach far below.

Just another hit, he thought, as he watched the living dead hand in hand with a petite blonde. She was not his wife, he knew as much. That did not, of course bother him in the slightest. Other people’s sex lives where a matter of complete indifference to him. What was of concern to the hitman was the £20,000 he would receive once the target was neutralised.

She was pretty that blonde. He wouldn’t mind having her between his sheets, he thought as he lined up the rifle on the target.

The sea, far below roared and a gull walked, casually along the crumbling cliff edge.

It had been a stroke of luck finding this house abandoned at the top of the cliff path, he thought as his finger tightened on the trigger.

The man below bent to kiss the blonde, just as the finger of the hitman squeezed tight on the Trigger.

The report of the gun was, as he knew it would be, lost in the roar of the sea and the crying of the gulls.

As lips touched below, the bullet sailed high above the target’s head. Then the roar of the sea and the crying of the gulls was joined by another louder roar as the cliff, long the subject of erosion by wind and sea gave way, taking the house so precariously balanced at the cliff edge with it. The report had been the final straw that had broken the camel’s back, bringing house and hitman crashing down to the unforgiving waves below.

“Christ”, that was a near thing, the target said, as he gazed at the fallen rocks only some hundred yards from where he and his petite mistress stood, horror struck on the beach below.

The end