by Cap Daniels
Gwynn looked up from her stretch. “I thought it was time for another fighting lesson. The teakettle isn’t the only thing in this apartment that needs to blow off a little steam.”
Anya poured the scalding water across a teabag. “I did not get much sleep. I think this is not best time for lesson.”
Gwynn hopped to her feet. “I’m sorry to hear that, but I wasn’t making a request. I was giving instructions. Now, get out here, and let’s fight.”
The first sip of tea warmed its way into Anya’s stomach, and she stepped from the kitchen in her T-shirt and shorts. “This is terrible plan, Gwynn. You will not feel better after trying to hurt me.”
Gwynn rolled her head, feeling the muscles in her neck and upper back loosen with every rotation. “Who says I’m trying to hurt you? I just want to learn everything I can before you disappear.”
“I am not going to disappear. I told you . . .”
Before the remainder of the sentence left her tongue, Gwynn lunged toward her with the speed and agility of a cat, sending a right jab toward Anya’s chin. She deflected the blow and stepped aside as Gwynn’s momentum carried her past. Raising her right foot in a side kick, Anya tapped Gwynn’s kidney with little more than enough pressure to feel it. Gwynn turned, planted one foot, and thrust toward the Russian again. This time, she lowered her head and sent her shoulder crashing into Anya’s stomach with the intention of leaving the former SVR officer flat on her back and fighting out of her guard. Instead of allowing the force of the charge to propel her backward, though, Anya leaned forward and lifted her feet, placing all of her weight on Gwynn’s back and shoulder. The DOJ agent couldn’t support the weight in her precarious position and fell-face first with Anya pinning her to the floor.
Gwynn’s breath came hard and deep, but her foe’s heart rate hadn’t risen above eighty beats per minute. Undeterred, she scampered and twisted her body in a wasted attempt to escape. Anya easily retained her superior position, keeping Gwynn pressed to the floor.
As the muscles in Gwynn’s body relaxed in exhaustion, Anya said, “Are you finished?”
Gwynn let out a sigh of submission, and Anya planted a knee on the carpet. The Russian’s mistake sparked Gwynn’s resolve to thrust her hips skyward, sending her foe forward, leaving Anya on her side and Gwynn standing in the perfect fighter’s stance three feet away.
“Get up,” Gwynn demanded.
Anya slowly stood. “This is only going to get one of us hurt. We should stop.”
Gwynn sighed. “Of course you’re right.” She lowered her head and stepped toward her teacher with arms outstretched.
Anya reached out to accept the coming embrace and apology, but the instant the Russian relaxed, Gwynn exploded upward with a powerful knee strike to her abdomen, followed by a pair of elbow strikes to the base of Anya’s neck. The unexpected attack left Anya with almost no air in her lungs, but the elbow strikes were little more than annoyances as she regathered herself and wrapped both arms around Gwynn’s legs. With a powerful thrust from Anya, the special agent landed flat on her back with a burst of air exploding from her lungs. Anya pressed her body against Gwynn’s supine form, pinning her arms to the floor.
With her lips only inches from Gwynn’s ear, she whispered, “I am starting to think you enjoy rolling around on floor with me.”
Gwynn’s resolve finally cracked, and she let out a hint of laughter. The chuckle quickly grew into full-blown belly laughter from both women until Anya rolled off her victim and leaned back against the displaced sofa. “Do you feel better now?”
When Gwynn caught her breath, she said, “Yeah . . . a little. Please tell me the knee strike hurt at least a little bit.”
Anya glanced down, examining every inch of her body and frowned. “Did you land a knee strike? I did not feel it if you did.”
“Next time, I’ll just shoot you in your sleep.”
Anya rolled her eyes. “What fun would that be? At least wake me up so I do not have to go into afterlife never knowing who killed me.”
“You’ve got it,” she said, offering Anya her hand. “I promise to let you know I was your personal assassin.”
Anya took the offered hand, and the two pulled each other to their feet.
“I made for you English breakfast tea with honey, but is probably cold now.”
“You Russians think tea makes everything better, don’t you?”
“Not everything, but most things. You are no longer angry with me?”
Gwynn brushed the hair out of her face. “Oh, I’m still angry, but some retail therapy will take care of that. We have to find our little Russian Cinderella-ovna a dress for the ball tonight. You have to look good for your Eastern Bloc jeweler.”
14
SOBYTIYE CHERNOGO GALSTUKA
(I’M NO HERO)
After morning rituals, the doorman called to announce the arrival of the car service. Anya adjusted her long ponytail as she lifted the receiver. “We’ll be right down.”
“Did you hear that?” she asked as Gwynn shouldered her bag.
“Did I hear what?”
Anya threw her hands onto her hips. “I used the contraction we’ll, and I used it correctly on telephone.”
Gwynn pulled open the door. “Don’t get so excited. You may have used a contraction, but you left off the article the before telephone.”
“English is hard.”
A man, clad in a driver’s cap, held the door as they slid onto the back seat. Once behind the wheel, the driver asked, “Where to, ladies?”
Gwynn wasted no time. “Let’s start at Barney’s on Seventh Avenue at Sixteenth Street.”
“As you wish,” he said as he pulled into the midmorning traffic of Times Square.
After battling the Manhattan mayhem, the driver finally pulled to a stop in front of Barney’s and turned to face his customers. “I’ll be nearby. Here’s my card, so just call when you’re ready, and I’ll pick you up right here.”
Gwynn slid the card from his hand and dropped it into her bag. “Let’s go. Somebody might be buying your dress right now. What would you do then?”
Anya cocked her head. “I would choose another one.”
“You’re missing the point. Just get out.”
Ninety minutes later, Anya emerged from the dressing room and onto the mirrored platform.
Gwynn tugged at the waistline and made tiny adjustments to the fabric of the eleventh dress. She stood back and twitched her nose. “You look amazing in it, but you’re perfect, so you make every dress look terrific. I really hate you.”
Anya sighed. “I really hate trying on dress after dress. Please choose one so we can go home.”
Gwynn ignored her. “No, this one isn’t exactly right. Let’s go to Bergdorf’s.”
The saleslady rolled her eyes. “We have a much more expansive selection than Bergdorf’s. I think I have just the dress for your friend. I’ll be back in a flash.”
Anya laid a hand on the lady’s shoulder. “If you have perfect dress for me, why did you waste all of this time showing me the first eleven dresses?”
She pulled away from Anya’s grasp. “I was developing an eye for your style.”
Anya turned, and Gwynn unzipped the latest dress. She stepped from the gown, leaving it piled on the floor behind her. Curious eyes glared as she stood barely clothed before the mirrors, but Anya ignored their stares as she stepped into her jeans and pulled on her shirt. As the Russian stepped from the raised platform, the saleslady returned with yet another gown.
Anya brushed past her. “I cannot try on another dress. Can’t you please just pick one?”
Gwynn pulled her friend toward the door as she dialed the driver’s number from memory. “We’re ready to go.”
The driver stammered. “Uh, wait. You must stay inside. The police are . . . I mean, there’s a . . . just stay inside! I’ll call you when it’s safe to come out.”
Noticing the look on Gwynn’s face, Anya asked, “What is it?”
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br /> “The driver says there’s some sort of disturbance on the street outside, and the police are involved.”
Without a word, Anya sprinted toward the Sixteenth Street exit. The same instinct sent Special Agent, albeit undercover, Davis charging for the exit only steps behind her partner. A uniformed guard at least a hundred pounds overweight stood between a bevy of curious onlookers and the locked exit doors.
Gwynn parted the crowd and stopped inches in front of the shocked guard. “I’m a federal agent. What’s going on out there?”
“I don’t know, ma’am, but the doors are locked, and you’ll have to stay inside until NYPD says it’s safe.”
“You’re not listening. I said I’m a federal agent. Now, get out of my way.”
The guard held up both hands. “Until you show me some ID, you’re nobody, so calm down and let’s see your badge . . . federal agent.”
Gwynn drove her hand into her bag where her credential pack should’ve been but felt only an empty interior compartment—just as it should’ve been for any undercover officer. The realization hit her at the same instant she saw her favorite Russian slip behind the guard and twist the lock on the door.
A collective gasp rose from the bewildered crowd, and the guard spun to see the previously locked door swinging closed. He gave Gwynn a shove. “Get back, lady. I don’t care who you are.”
He propelled his formidable heft toward the door, pulled on the handle, and resecured the locking bolt.
Gwynn’s heart raced, and her mind exploded as thoughts of what Anya might do on the street rushed through her head. As much as she didn’t want to lose a cooperating participant, which would end Operation Avenging Angel, her greatest fear was having video of the beautiful Russian on every cable news show as she sliced off the head of some unsuspecting criminal in Downtown Manhattan.
Growing more desperate to see the action outside the doors, Gwynn ran from the crowd and pressed her face to the heavy glass of a nearby floor-to-ceiling window. The vantage point gave her a terribly obstructed view of the scene unfolding outside. Four NYPD police cars blocked the intersection of Seventh Avenue and Sixteenth Street while a collection of unmarked cars rested at various positions around the scene. A pair of ambulances awaited the outcome, their crew standing by with gloved hands and gurneys poised. Whatever was happening, Gwynn knew all too well the outcome had little chance of ending peacefully. Every fiber of her being screamed for her to be on that street with her sidearm in one hand and a bullhorn in the other.
Well out of Gwynn’s line of sight, Anya took cover behind a stone pillar and leaned outward, inch by inch, taking in the scene on the street. A boy of perhaps three dangled from a man’s left arm, tears streaming from his terrified face. The man’s right hand trembled, and his knuckles turned white from gripping the handle of a chef’s knife.
The ubiquitous roar of the New York City street was hushed, leaving an eerie silence hanging in the air, punctuated only by the cries of the child and the frantic yelling of his captor.
“Na im vordin e! Na im vordin e!”
Anya scanned the crowd of mortified bystanders and the faces of the police officers peering across their pistols. No one, except her, knew the man holding the screaming child was speaking Armenian and declaring the child to be his son. A wave of conflicting thoughts and emotions poured through her head as she tried to develop a strategy to end the standoff without the child being hurt. Fearing the dozens of cameras and cell phones trained on the scene, she pulled her shirt over her head, leaving only her eyes exposed to the lenses. In confident, calm Armenian, as she approached from the sidewalk, she repeated, “Give the boy to me. I promise no one will hurt him.”
The man locked eyes with her as she continued her approach. The indecision in his face mirrored the emotion she felt about inserting herself into a situation that was never hers. Her calm tone continued as she repeated the phrase with every step until the man let the boy slide from his arm. Simultaneously, with the boy’s feet striking the ground, Anya’s fist struck the knifeman’s bicep. The blow shocked the man and left his arm incapable of raising the blade. A second and third hammering blow from the Russian’s well-trained fist sent the knife clanging to the filthy asphalt between the two parked cars that had served as the man’s cover.
Instinctually, the man glared down at his only weapon as it bounced across the pavement. As he leaned forward to reclaim the weapon with his left hand, Anya fired a side kick to his knee, folding the leg backward and sending the sickening sound of bone, ligaments, and muscle tearing and separating. The agony of the kick sent the boy’s kidnapper to the ground in a fog of Armenian profanity.
Anya sensed, more than saw, the police officers closing on her with pistols raised. The terrified boy trembled in shock and disbelief as one of the officers scooped him up and continued sprinting, putting distance between the boy and the scene. Anya leapt over the man and picked up speed as she crossed Sixteenth Street and turned east. Reaching full stride, she dared a glance over her shoulder to discover two uniformed police officers in pursuit. The larger of the two wouldn’t have the stamina to continue more than another minute, but the leaner, younger officer was slowly closing the distance. He would be an issue if Anya couldn’t find an alternative route before reaching Sixth Avenue.
Still running as fast as her legs would carry her, the exit she so desperately needed appeared as if God Himself had placed it just for her. A massive stone church stood on her right, but the church wasn’t her escape. It was the alley beside the church that called to her. She had a mere fraction of a second to make the decision to turn down the alley or continue east on Sixteenth. Many of New York City’s alleys ended with the brick backside of a building. If the alley beside the church was a dead end, she’d be caught with no possibility of escape, short of fighting and potentially killing the pursuing NYPD officer. By her estimation, Sixth Avenue was another five hundred feet away—more than enough ground for the cop to chew up the distance between them. Fighting a police officer in the open streets of Manhattan was an immeasurably worse option than standing toe to toe with him in the back of an alley with no witnesses.
With her feet pounding the sidewalk, she slowed just enough to make the turn into the alley. Two dumpsters, piles of garbage, and wooden pallets greeted her as she accelerated into the shaded corridor. She passed the pallets and sacrificed two seconds to scatter them across the greasy alley, hopefully creating enough of an obstacle to build a few more second’s separation between her and the sprinter in blue behind her. Just as she’d feared, the alley ended fifty feet ahead against a block wall extending into the sky.
With her heart pounding and her lungs chugging as much air as she could take in, Anya focused her attention between the pallets behind her and the two doorways to her left and right. The silhouette of the officer filled the opening of the alley, diminishing what little lead she had, but where others would’ve panicked and possibly surrendered, Anya’s years of training and survival gave her the fortitude to focus on the options and make a decision. She sidestepped and grabbed the handle of a door on her right, but it resisted as she rattled the heavy steel against its bolt. Abandoning door number one, she shot to a second one across the alley. Her hand met the handle simultaneously with the officer leaping across the pallets like a hurdler. He was only seconds away when Anya gave the door a yank. To her delight, it gave way, and she stumbled backward into the center of the alley with the broken handle still in her fist. An instant glance told her the door hadn’t opened; instead, the handle had separated from its base. With precious seconds wasted, Anya mentally measured the distance to the sprinting cop.
Why hasn’t he drawn his gun yet?
A quick examination of the broken handle revealed a rusty, jagged edge. It wasn’t the perfect weapon but certainly an option. Anya stepped back into a fighter’s stance and surveyed her environment one final time. Seizing the only remaining option, she bolted forward toward the oncoming officer and launched the brok
en handle toward him. Her aim was better than she’d dared to hope. The spinning missile arced through the air directly toward the officer’s head, startling New York’s finest and causing him to change stride and brush off the weapon. This gave Anya part of a second—exactly the time she needed—to leap into the air, plant her left foot on the rim of a filthy dumpster, and propel herself skyward toward an open window on the second floor of the church.
She caught the sill with her fingertips and scampered up the hundred-year-old wall, sending debris pouring from beneath each of her feet as she begged for purchase on the decaying surface.
The officer yelled from below. “Hey! Stop! I’m not going to arrest you. I just want to talk to you. You’re not in trouble. You’re a hero.”
The last thing Anya wanted was to be a hero, and the second to last thing she wanted to be was someone having a conversation with a New York City police officer.
Finally, the toe of her left shoe found the hold she’d wanted so badly, and her long, toned body shot through the open window like an arrow from an archer’s bow. She hit the floor in a shoulder roll and came up on the balls of her feet, her eyes scanning every inch of the room. A woman in an apron with a broom in one hand and a dustpan in the other screamed as if she’d seen the devil himself. The woman belted out a prayer in Spanish and crossed herself as the broom she’d been holding fell to the floor.
Anya searched the depths of her mind for any Spanish phrase she could create to calm the woman. With nothing else coming to mind, she calmly said, “Dios te bendiga,” hoping God’s blessing would keep the woman from panicking any further.
With no time to stay and catch the woman if she passed out, Anya pressed through the door, glancing both directions down the long corridor. She turned right, away from Sixteenth Street, and picked up speed as she sprinted the length of the hallway. A ninety-degree turn to the left told Anya she’d reached the rear of the building, and the time had come to find an exit. As massive as the church was, she would be a trapped animal if the NYPD dispatched a team to search the building. Getting back outside was her best chance of escape.