by Gayle Wilson
Nick raised his right hand, locking it, too, around the wrist he was already holding high in the air. He knew that would free up the intruder’s left hand, but it didn’t seem that he had many choices here. Whatever damage the intruder would do with the gun if he got it free would be a lot more permanent than what he could do with his fist.
When the blow crashed into his temple, however, he almost forgot that conclusion The instinct to throw his right forearm up between them to ward off another hit was strong, and he fought it. He tried to lift his elbow a little anyway, still maintaining his two-handed hold on the guy’s gun hand, and at the same time trying to put something between his face and the battering left fist.
It didn’t seem to have much effect The next blow came in over his raised arm and impacted on the side of his nose. Nick not only felt it break, he heard it.
And the pain was much worse, of course, than it had been from the first blow. So intense it caused his eyes to water and the air around his head to thin. Suddenly, against the onslaught of agony, it was hard to draw any of that toothin air into his lungs.
The third blow struck his ear. The resultant ringing took away one of the few weapons he had gone into this hopeless fight in possession of—his hearing.
He couldn’t afford to take many more blows to the head, he knew. Not with his history Every head injury leaves its calling card on the brain, and he was probably more susceptible to this kind of trauma than the average Joe.
Pushing the intruder backward, Nick started slamming the hand he held backward also, knowing they couldn’t be too far away from the door frame. Or the wall. Away from something.
They weren’t. He connected on the third motion, the impact so hard it numbed his fingers, tingling all the way down to the nerves in his elbows. Hard enough that the guy’s left wasn’t pounding his face any more. It was pulling on his right wrist instead, fingers digging into his skin like talons.
But the adrenaline was roaring through Nick’s body now, fueled by his small success and by the knowledge that Abby was lying hurt in the adjoining room. Nick again jerked the gun hand forward and then slammed it back against the wall.
His ears had cleared enough that this time he heard the man’s knuckles strike something hard. And then strike again and again as Nick repeatedly pounded the wall with the hand holding the gun.
Finally it worked. The gun hit him on the shoulder as it fell. He heard it land on the wooden floor and skitter off somewhere. He dismissed it from his mind. He would never be able to find it. What he had to do now was make sure that the other guy couldn’t, either. And the only way he could do that was to hold on to him, no matter what.
He should have been expecting the knee that slammed into his groin Maybe instinctively he had, because he had managed to turn his body slightly so that the blow was glancing rather than disabling. It was enough, of course. It turned his knees to water and his fingers into spaghetti. And it nauseated him. The wrist he’d been holding was pulled from his suddenly limp fingers, and he almost didn’t care. Almost.
He fought a mental battle to keep from giving in to the pain. To keep from bending over to protect himself So far he was getting the worst of the one-sided battle. He didn’t know why he had thought he could do this. Fight somebody he couldn’t see. A stupid, blindly flailing, one-sided…
Because I don’t have any choice, Nick reminded himself fiercely, denying both the self-pity and the fear. He forced his damaged body to lunge forward instead of retreating into the fetal position it wanted to assume. He pushed his assailant through the bedroom doorway, both of them hitting the frame on the right-hand side as they fell through the opening.
Despite his agony, Nick lowered his shoulder, trying to shove it into his opponent’s gut. That must have had some success too, because the guy’s breath came out suddenly in a whoosh, and he stumbled backward down the hall. Nick heard him hit the wall, and on sound alone, he followed, slamming into him.
Then he got in a good blow, drawing his right fist back and pumping it straight and hard into the guy’s solar plexus, just as he’d been taught when he was a kid. Taught by a washed-up boxer in some smelly gym in Queens.
A release of breath again, warm and wet against his face. Whooshing out because the guy’s belly was soft. The first sign of weakness—and of hope—that Nick had found in this fight. So he hit him there again. Putting everything he had behind it.
His opponent slumped, bending over Nick’s fist, capturing and impeding its movement. Nick used his left hand on the man’s shoulder to push him upright, at the same time again drawing his elbow straight back, keeping the motion controlled. Then something exploded against the side of his head. The same side where he’d been shot six months ago.
It shattered with the contact. There was a lot of glass, falling all around them both, shards stinging against his face and neck and bare shoulders. With that much noise, it seemed that whatever it was should have hurt more, but it hadn’t. Something light and flat, he knew. Something his opponent had been able to get to, pressed here against the wall. The guy must have grabbed a photograph, Nick realized. Grabbed it right off the wall.
Despite the distraction, his right arm managed to complete the blow it had begun, but it wasn’t as solid as the first. During that second’s hesitation, his opponent had turned, twisting out of Nick’s grasp.
By the time Nick had figured out what was happening, the guy was almost away. He grabbed at him, fingers of his left hand reaching out, desperate to close over something, and they did. Only it was cloth, which he could hear tearing as it was pulled away from him It had slowed the intruder down enough, however, that Nick got his right arm out also, his fingers catching the guy’s shoulder and jerking him around. Trying to.
He swung his left in a wild roundhouse punch and connected with nothing. In the effort of that big swing, he lost his hold on the man’s shoulder. He should never have let him go, Nick knew, because the guy was running now. Down the hall and away from him.
Except that didn’t make sense. This clown had been sent here to kill him. Why the hell would he be running? It wasn’t as if this fight was going all that much Nick’s way. He had barely laid a finger on his opponent. Even as he thought it, Nick threw himself after the intruder.
Back toward the living room? Or the kitchen? He had time to wonder that before he hit something and hit it hard, the jolt banging all along his length. He went down, like a cartoon character bouncing off an object that appeared in his path He didn’t even know what he’d hit. It could have been anything. Frame of the living-room doorway? A piece of furniture?
But he could still hear the guy moving, so he scrambled up and went at him again, this time both hands held out in front of him, feeling his way. And as he did, his bare feet making no sound, he was listening. Trying to locate his opponent. By his breathing. Footsteps. Anything.
He heard movement off to his left a fraction of a second before something else came crashing down against his head. That split second’s warning was enough that he had gotten his left arm up, partially deflecting the blow. Whatever it was had landed mostly on his forearm and elbow.
The object this time, however, had been heavy enough to do some damage, Nick thought, violently straightening his arm to push whatever it was away. And as he did, he made the identification. A table lamp. He had felt the shade with his fingers.
The son of a bitch was persistent. He’d give him that. Only, so was he. Because he didn’t have a choice, he thought again. He swung his right arm, not a blow, but a search, and connected, digging his fingers into whatever he’d touched.
Flesh and cloth. Shirt collar. He had the bastard’s neck, Nick realized, elation surging. This was all he had wanted. Just to get his fingers around his throat and squeeze until he was dead. Until he had squeezed the very life out of him and he couldn’t hurt them anymore. Not Abby. Not the baby.
He brought his left hand up, clawing fingers finding the other side of the guy’s neck. This time he
wouldn’t let go, Nick decided. No matter what. No matter what the guy did—
But again he hadn’t been prepared for the pain, because he hadn’t been able to see it coming. It was another one of the classics, taught in a lot of self-defense schools, because of everyone’s natural fear and vulnerability.
The intruder’s thumbs dug into Nick’s eyes, the pressure against his eyeballs almost unbearable. Despite the fact that he was already blind, the fear of having someone gouge out his eyes was still powerful Sickening in its nightmare force.
He tightened his grip on the guy’s throat, trying to cut off the blood flowing through the big carotid arteries that led to his brain If he could, that would bring on unconsciousness, maybe before he could do some permanent damage to Nick’s eyes. And if not, Nick thought, what the hell did it matter?
While they struggled, fighting for dominance, Nick tried to pull his head back, away from those strong thumbs. His opponent was attempting to do the same thing, twisting and turning, trying to tear his neck away from Nick’s hold. Bodies joined in an obscene waltz, they staggered into pieces of furniture, each determined to succeed. To outlast the other.
The pressure against Nick’s eyes was unbearable, and his fingers ached from the desperate force they were exerting. The whole thing probably lasted less than thirty seconds, but while it was going on, it seemed an eternity.
And then, suddenly, it was over. For a second Nick didn’t understand. Had he held long enough that the guy had blacked out? He didn’t really understand why the man he held had suddenly slumped against him, a dead weight. Off balance, the movement almost threw Nick down. There had been a gunshot, Nick realized, a little dazed from the abruptness of the end. Someone had shot the guy. And the only person who—
“Abby?” he yelled. He released his opponent, letting the big, limp body slump to the floor
“I’m here, Nick,” she said. “Over here.”
“You okay?” he asked
“I think so,” she said. She sounded breathless, but she was talking to him again. Coherent. Making sense.
Reassured by that, he knelt, feeling for the pulse in the guy’s neck. He wasn’t dead, Nick discovered, but he didn’t seem to be moving either. At least the fight had gone out of him. Nick just needed to keep it that way.
He struggled to turn his assailant over enough to get to his necktie and slip it out. When he had, he rolled him back onto his stomach and tied his flaccid hands behind him, operating strictly by feel, hoping that what he was doing would hold.
“You still there, Abby?” he asked. He had begun to wonder why she hadn’t come to help him. It would have been far easier for her to do this than for him, and the fact that she hadn’t was tightening his gut with anxiety.
“I’m here,” she said.
There was something wrong with her voice, he realized, and suddenly the fear in his stomach was alive, an animal, clawing and tearing at him. Leaving the now-trussed intruder, he began to stumble across the room, uncaring of the obstacles that he couldn’t avoid. Uncaring of anything but Abby.
“Talk to me, Abby,” he ordered. “Give me some direction.”
“You’re. .” The word cut off in a gasp. He heard the intake of her breath and launched himself toward it. Low. She was down. He had been right about that. But he couldn’t know how badly hurt she was.
“Abby,” he said again, his voice too harsh, too demanding. But that was fear, and she would recognize it and forgive him.
“I’m okay, Nick. I’m okay,” she said. “To your left.”
“You hit?” he made himself ask.
“No,” she denied quickly, but her voice still seemed thin. He could hear her moving, however. Sitting up?
“Good girl,” he said, feeling panic subside a little.
“I’m not a girl, Deandro.” Her tone was reassuring.
He was down now, bent into a crouch, hands extended because he didn’t want to step on her. He felt his reaching fingers touch hers, and she took his hand, holding on to him. Her fingers were cold, just as they had been on the roof.
“You hurt, Abby? Talk to me, sweetheart.”
“He hit me. I was so stupid, Nick. I went back to get my gun, but I wasn’t really ready to use it. I had let my guard down. I never would have believed…” The words faded on an indrawn breath. Audible.
“Where’d he hit you?” he demanded, his fingers searching, only half listening. He had finally found the knot on her skull, touching it gingerly.
“I don’t think it’s bleeding,” she said, adding her own exploring fingers to his. Then she took his hand, the one that had been carefully examining the bump on her skull, and pressed it against her cheek, holding it there. “It just hurts like hell. And I feel like such a fool. So damn incompetent.”
“Did it knock you out?” Nick asked, beginning to calm down, to be able to think, now that he knew she was really all right.
“For a little while. I think so, anyway. The next thing I remember, you were both in the room and you were fighting. I tried to get off a shot, but you were so damn close and the light was bad. I was terrified I’d hit you.”
“You got him, Abby. It’s all over. We’re still here. We’re okay. A little beat-up, maybe,” he said.
Nick was just beginning to realize how beat-up he really was. He hurt in places he couldn’t remember being hit in. His hands were shaking. Most of that was reaction, he knew. Shock setting in, now that the physical part was over.
Maybe reaction to his fear about Abby. And thankfully that seemed to be all that was wrong with her, too—shock and a bump on the head. They were so lucky. Lucky to be alive.
“I’m going to call for some backup,” he said. “Get us some help. Okay?”
“Okay,” she said.
He felt movement against his fingers, which were still touching her face. Nodding the agreement she’d already spoken.
“Can you remember Rob Andrews’s home number?” he asked.
There was a long pause, and he supposed she was trying. It could be hard to think after a blow to the head. He was having a little difficulty thinking clearly himself.
He’d just dial 911, he had already decided. It would be quicker He didn’t even know why he’d asked for the other number, maybe just that lifelong caution about whom to trust A little worried about which cops might show up out here and recognize him
“Nick,” Abby said softly. “That’s…that’s who it was, Nick That’s who I shot,” she said
Her voice was still low, and there was something in it that hadn’t been there before. Disbelief, maybe, that he hadn’t even known who he was fighting? Disbelief at his inability to have figured any of this out?
“Are you sure?” he asked, his own incredulity at his failure probably revealed in the question.
But he had never had any reason to distrust Rob Andrews. Andrews had been in on the original decision to bring Nick into this operation. On the decision to call in the agency. And he’d been in on all the arrangements to put Nick in protection after he’d been hit. And now Abby was telling him—
“I talked to him,” she said. “I was even relieved to see the bastard.” She laughed a little, full of self-castigation and embarrassment rather than amusement. “And when I turned around to go get you, he must have taken out his gun and hit me. I had time enough to realize what a fool I was before I blacked out. That crooked son of a bitch,” she added.
“They bought him.”
“Maybe a long time ago,” Abby said. “He had too much to lose to let you succeed. For the unit to succeed. He couldn’t take a chance on you finding his connections to the people he was in charge of bringing down. I wish I’d killed him when I had the chance,” she said. She knew as well as he did what would happen.
“They’ll offer him a deal and he’ll sing like a canary,” Nick said. “Then they’ll get them all. The Old Guard’s going down.” That would be some satisfaction, Nick thought. Some small revenge for all that had happened to them.
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“If he does, somebody will kill him.”
“If they can find him”
“Witness protection,” she realized.
“He’s really good at protection,” Nick said bitterly, thinking about Andrews setting him up. About the fire. About the bastard hitting Abby.
But he was beginning to come down from the adrenaline rush of the fight, beginning to realize that this meant they really were safe. The important thing was that it was over, and they were both safe At least he was beginning to think that until Abby’s breath sucked inward again. A long shuddering inhalation.
“You okay?” he asked, brought back by the sound to the important stuff. He pushed up, slipping his hand under her arm, preparing to help her stand. “Think you’re up to making the call? It’ll be quicker than me punching in random numbers until I connect with somebody.”
He had forced the amusement into his voice because in the back of his mind was the remembrance of Abby’s toughness, which belied her apparent fragility It wasn’t like her not to bounce back from something like this. Not like Abby at all, and that scared him. Maybe the lick on the head had been harder than either of them could know, even if it hadn’t broken the skin.
“I don’t think…” she whispered, taking another deep breath
Her voice was so low that Nick squatted down beside her again, cupping his palm around her cheek, reassuring. “It’s all right,” he said. “I’ll make the call. I can find the numbers,” he promised, smiling at her. “If I can just find the phone.”
“Nick, I think there’s something wrong with the baby.”
His heart stopped, but he fought to keep the panic out of his voice. “Wrong?” he repeated.
“I think…” Again she hesitated. “I think I may be in labor. But it’s too early. It’s way too early.”
Her fingers were gripping his again, still cold and now trembling, her voice filled with anxiety. The thought was even scarier to her now, he knew, because she had put it into words, giving it life. Making it real by telling him about it.
