38

            Using the van for cover, Anthony dashed across the street, splashing through puddles, and ran into the front yard of a darkened home, where a maple provided shelter from the rain and the gunman.  He pressed his back against the slick trunk, a drift of mud sucking at his shoes.

            Across the street, the .45 lay in the rain-battered grass.  He had the Beretta as a back-up—keeping a back-up piece had been hard-wired into his brain since boot camp—but was thinking that if the shooter’s aim had been adjusted upward, he might have been lying on that grass.  Lisa would have been left to fend for herself, and his vow to get justice for his family would have been forever unfulfilled.

            But luck had been on his side again.  This was the second brush with death he’d experienced that night, the first being when the sniper had sent a smoking round through the windows of their SUV.  He didn’t want to give the guy a third crack at him.  The fanatic seemed to be a skilled marksman, and he probably would not miss again. 

            He slipped the Beretta from the holster and racked the slide to chamber a round. 

            He took off into the backyard of the property.  A slide-and-swing set stood in the middle of the lawn, swings rocking in the rain.  Pulses of lightning threw the playground apparatus into such stark relief that it resembled the animated bones of some ancient, lumbering dinosaur.

            He looked to the right, where Mike’s place stood, four houses away.  None of the properties were separated by fences, and he didn’t see any dog kennels.  He saw only a couple of utility sheds, a flower garden, and an old pick-up on cement blocks.  Every house had patio furniture and barbecue grills. 

            He ran across a couple of back lawns, weaving around patios, keeping close to the homes.  He didn’t see the rifle-toting zealot.  But that didn’t mean he wasn’t prowling the night. 

            And where was his partner, the Latina woman?  She had to be in the proximity, too.  Had to watch for her.

            He crept alongside the attached garage of the next home, angling toward the street again.  He worried the guy was anticipating him making a rear approach, because that was what he would have thought if their roles had been reversed.  The man was crazy, but he had keen instincts.

            He reached the front of the house and surveyed Mike’s place next door.  Clear. 

            He ran to the row of shrubs along the front.  Examining the holly ferns, he found snapped branches and tamped down leaves.  The guy had been concealed there with his rifle.

            He glanced at the front door, and, on a hunch, approached it.  The door opened when he twisted the knob.

            He waited for a bellow of thunder, to give covering noise if the hinges creaked, and went inside.     

            The house was quiet.  The interior was dark but for a dim light above the range in the kitchen.  It had not been on during his prior visit.

            Cloaked in shadow, a slim, feminine figure stood posted at a kitchen window that overlooked the back yard.  The partner. 

            She did not give any indication that she had detected his entrance.                  

            Grateful for the carpeting to mute the sound of his wet shoes, he tipped across the living room.

            Thunder shook the walls.  Rain beat a frenzied tune on the roof.

            His clothes were completely soaked through, but inside, he was on fire.  Adrenaline had burned away the night’s fatigue, superheated his muscles, ignited his fighting instincts.     

            He paused at the edge of the kitchen, which was floored in linoleum that would squeak underneath his rubber soles and give him away. 

            When thunder grumbled again, he charged forward.

            The woman began to whirl around, but he had the pistol pressed to the back of her head before she could complete her turn.  She let out a thin squeal of surprise, and froze.

            “Don’t scream,” he said quietly.  “Put your hands in the air.”

            Silently, she did as he commanded. 

            “Move against the wall, to the left,” he said.  “Keep your hands up, and spread your legs.”     

            Hands in the air, she pivoted to face the wall near the oven, and widened her stance.  She glanced at him over her shoulder.  Her dark eyes were as placid as a pond, completely submissive.

            “Okay?” she asked, in heavily accented English.

            “Yeah, okay,” he said.  “I’ve gotta ask you—how the hell did someone like you get tied up with a bunch of religious maniacs?  You don’t look crazy.”

            She blinked at his question, and steel surfaced in her eyes.  He saw that same steel in his own gaze when he looked in the mirror—steel forged from experience with death and other terrible things.  

            Although he aimed the gun at her back, now that her attitude was on display, she didn’t appear to be afraid of him.  Her lips curved in a faint smile, as if she possessed some damning secret.  

            “What’s so funny?” he asked.

            “Eh?”

            He looked her over.  She wore a hooded rain jacket, and underneath, a black tracksuit.  He patted down her jacket, discovered that she had a belt holster hiding a Smith & Wesson .38. 

            “I’ll be taking this.”  He took the revolver and stashed it in his waistband.  “Where’s your partner?”

            “Is outside, he look for you.  Please, do not hurt me.”

            “Listen, answer my questions and you’ll be fine.  What’s your name?”

            “Maria Valdez,” she said slowly. 

            “What’s your partner’s name?”

            “Is Noah Cutty.  Si.”

Cutty and Valdez.  Finally, he had names to attach to these people.  Although the names might’ve been aliases, they lent an extra weight of plausibility to the night’s surreal events. 

            “What organization sent you to kill me and my wife?” he asked.

            She frowned, gaze bewildered.  Either she truly did not understand him, or she was playing dumb.

            “Which church are you from?” he asked. 

            “We are loyal servants of the kingdom.”  She spoke in a flat monotone, as if she’d been programmed to speak the words. 

            “That sounds like the same nonsense your partner was telling me.”      

            “Is no nonsense.”

            He scanned her up and down again.  He remembered that her partner also wore a solid black tracksuit.

            “You and your partner, you’re dressed alike,” he said.  “Is that some kind of uniform?”

            “Eh?”

            “Just turn around,” he said.  “Slowly.”

            She did as he asked.  Holding the gun on her, he peeled away part of the rain jacket, to reveal the tracksuit top.  There was a small golden emblem embroidered on the breast pocket. 

            “I’ve seen that badge before,” he said. 

            Releasing a sharp cry, the woman seized his wrist, brought it to her mouth, and bit down savagely.

            He shouted—the pain was so intense that he almost dropped the gun.  As he tore his arm away from her teeth, blood spraying, she delivered a slashing chop to his throat. 

            Gasping, he lurched backward, throat feeling as if he’d swallowed a hot coal. 

            With the fluid speed of a trained martial artist, she dipped, took hold of the front of his shirt, and slammed her foot hard enough into his abdomen to knock the breath out of him.  Screeching, she jerked him forward, leveraging his own momentum to catapult him through the air over her.  He crashed onto the floor on the other side of the kitchen, inadvertently biting his tongue and tasting salty blood, his pistol clattering out of his fingers and spinning under a table, out of reach.

            He coughed, spluttered, shook his head as if clearing away dust.  He felt blood seeping from his bitten wrist, pain burning around the wound.  His stomach ached from when she plunged her foot into it, even though he was wearing the body armor vest under his shirt.

            He’d gotten basic martial arts training in the Corps, but it had been years since he’d used the techniques.  Unfortunately, this woman moved like she lived in a dojo. 

            Behind him, she bounded to her feet as agilely as a cat. 

Better remember your lessons fast, or she’s gonna finish you off, man.

            Breathing raggedly, he spat out a mouthful of blood and began to rise.  As he got up, she stalked toward him.  She was grinning maniacally.  Enjoying this.

No way I’m going down, not here, not now.

            He lunged at her.  Evading him easily, she kicked him in the ribs, her foot a dark, deadly blur.  He grunted, knees wobbly.  He turned back to face her.

            Just in time to catch another slashing kick, this one to his midsection.  The blow sent him reeling drunkenly against a table, chairs toppling to the floor. 

            His eyes watered.  Jesus.  She kicked with such velocity and power that in spite of the body armor he wore, he was sure she was leaving behind nasty bruises.   

Maybe trying to fight this girl head up was a bad idea, he thought, dimly.

            Spinning like a ballerina, she kicked him again, a perfectly placed blow against his chest that made his heart clutch.  He stumbled against the refrigerator, knocking it backward.  He groped for the handle to keep from losing his balance and spilling onto the floor. 

            Dancing around him, light on her feet, she kicked him in the ribs yet again, drawing a hiss of pain from him and hurtling him back against the table. 

            He bent over, groaned.  His body ached in what felt like a hundred places.  He wasn’t cut out for this kind of combat, and was clearly overmatched against this female Bruce Lee. 

            As she circled him, the woman’s dark eyes were amused.  She was toying with him, he realized, as if he were little more than a lame sparring partner that she could put down at her leisure whenever she got bored with knocking him around the room.

            That idea pissed him off more than anything else, and he felt a fresh surge of adrenaline coming on.

            She whirled to kick him again.  He anticipated this one, blocked the kick, but she was so damn fast, she spun like a dervish and punched him in the face, a sharp snapping blow to his jaw, and his legs bowed, almost gave way.  She hammered him twice more with that machine-gun fist, and he felt himself going down then, all of the fight gone out of him, chopped down by one of the most unlikely opponents . . .

No . . .

            A reserve of strength came from somewhere.  He got his legs under him before he toppled over.  Then he seized her by that tracksuit, lifted, and swung her with all his might.

            She flew across the room, screaming with what sounded like surprise.

            She slammed against a bank of cabinets.  Groaning, she sank to the floor.  She curled into fetal position, her body a dusky shape in the dimness.

            “Didn’t want to do that . . . senorita,” he said, throat raw and aching.  “I was taught . . . never to raise my hand to a woman.  But you had that shit coming.”

            She unfolded her body and rose into a crouch.  She pointed a silver-plated pistol at him, the gun glinting in the faint light. 

            While she had been contorted into a ball, legs drawn to her chest, she must have retrieved the weapon from a concealed spot, probably an ankle holster.  It looked like a .22—a smaller caliber, but it could nonetheless do some damage if you hit the right spot.

            Although he had the .38 stashed against his waist and wore the vest, he raised his hands in the air.  No point in pushing his luck a third time in one night.  The look in her eyes dared him to go for it.

            “Only wanted to . . . talk,” he said, and took a step backward.  He lowered his hands, and one of them brushed across the back of a chair.  “You were . . . one who drew first blood—literally.”

            “I do not want to kill you, senor Thorne.”

            “Good, ‘cause I don’t want to die.” 

            The door at the front of the house banged open.  A man yelled: “Valdez!” 

            That would be her partner, Cutty.

            Valdez moved forward, gun honed on him.           He backed up another step.  Clutched the wooden back of the chair.

            Cutty stormed around the corner.  He was short, perhaps five-two, but as stout as a bull, and looked about as angry as one.

            He had already drawn his gun, a large semi-automatic glistening with raindrops. 

            Anthony heaved the chair at him, and fled down the hallway.