Page 21 of Operation: Sharp Angel

She thought about what was in the closet to defend herself with. She doubted she could keep the door closed. His last body slam against the door moved her nearly a foot. There was a large golf umbrella in the corner behind the door, within reach, she remembered. Her hand reached out and grabbed it. On the shelf a foot or two down from where she was, were several pairs of Nicole’s shoes with narrow heels, what many would call stilettoes. There was one pair in particular she believed could do some real damage if she could get it in her hand and hit this man just right with it.

The door hit her harder as the man threw all his weight against it. An arm poked in, the hand grabbing the wire shelf unit on the other side of the door. His foot also invaded the room, both she saw by the light from the bedroom now penetrating into the closet. It reflected from the large, full-length mirror leaning against the far corner of the closet.

The door pressed in on her as the man pushed the door farther open and stepped into the closet. Becca met his gaze in their reflections in the mirror. She also saw the pistol he held in his hand that didn’t grip the wire shelf. She swung the umbrella with all her strength, striking him in the neck. Then she hit the lever, opening it wide and she dove for the shoe box with the heels she wanted.

He deflected the umbrella, wrestling with it for a costly moment to get it out of his way. While he did this, she grabbed the silver sequenced stilettos, one in each hand. She dropped to her bottom and as he rushed towards her, she lifted her right leg and kicked him in the groin with every ounce of strength she had. He collapsed in on himself, shrieking in pain. She was grunting in a strangled scream, the only sound she could currently force out.

That was when she sprang up and hit him in the temple with one of the shoes. It didn’t go in as far as she anticipated, and the heel broke from the bottom of the shoe when it made contact with his head. She knew that the weakest part of the skull was the pterion, which was where the frontal, parietal, temporal, and sphenoid bones met. It was located on the side of the skull, just behind the temple. She’d hit too far forward. His head was turned, so that she didn’t have a clear shot at that weak place. So, instead, she followed up with a second blow to the head as close as she could get with the now heelless shoe, and her other hand swung the second stiletto at his neck.

He deflected her blows, both of them, and pushed her back, farther into the closet. She landed on the floor beside the large mirror and let out a scream. She noticed he bled from the head and the neck. He lumbered towards her like an unsteady drunk man. She tried to stand, but he grabbed her by the front of her shirt and pushed her more violently against the wall. She hit it hard. A second startled scream came out of her.

Beside her on the ground were hand weights. She picked each of them up and lobbed them at the man’s face. He backed up as he tried to deflect each of them. Once they were expended, and he was several feet back, she turned her attention to the large, heavy mirror. She pulled on it as he recovered from the blows of the weights and took a step towards her. She held onto the mirror and let herself drop, using her body weight to pull it from the wall and set it careening towards her assailant. He ducked, but it hit him in the head beside the head wound she’d caused with the stiletto. He went down, the mirror crashing on top of him.

That’s when she heard the gunshots.

***

Tessman arrived at the DeSoto house, noticing no lights were on, on the first floor. He saw the glow of a light coming through the master bedroom windows on the second floor. He turned the door knob and gave the door the smallest amount of pressure. The seal on the door broke. The front door wasn’t locked. He drew his weapon and turned his comms to transmit. He’d inserted the earpiece as he drove. “At the DeSoto residence, Control. The front door is unlocked,” he broadcast in a whisper.

“I’m still three minutes out,” Jackson transmitted. “Can you wait for me?”

Tessman heard a very faint scream coming from inside. “Negative. I hear screams from inside. Entering.”

“Remain on transmit. And Moe, keep your head on the swivel,” Yvette said, not expecting a reply. She knew he’d already have crossed the threshold. Then, per protocol, she notified Shepherd that Tessman was about to engage an unknown number of Tangos solo and that the local LEOs were en route.

Tessman opened the front door just enough to step onto the entry tile. As seen from outside, the first floor was dark. As he did, his eyes swept the interior of the living room, which he could see well enough due to the outside streetlights casting some light into the room.

He was not able to see the staircase behind the door, but the door itself gave him some protection. He peered around the edge of the front door to catch a glimpse of legs on the staircase near the top. He dropped to one knee and pivoted near the edge of the door; his weapon trained on the legs.

A single shot hit the front door, about a foot higher than his head. The sound of the gunshot was deafening in the otherwise quiet house. He returned fire, striking the figure on his thigh. The man crumpled onto the stair and raised his weapon to fire again. Tessman squeezed off another round. It hit him in the chest. He fell to the side and slid down the stairs, crashing into the pie shaped landing near the foot of the staircase.

Tessman rushed around the door and made sure the man was disarmed, taking his Glock from his hand, which still clutched it. He shoved the man’s weapon into his own holster. Then he checked the man’s chest. It bled, and the man was either unconscious or dead. He didn’t check to see which. He glanced back towards the kitchen, thinking he had heard something. He saw nothing all the way through to the closed sliding glass door. Becca said she was upstairs in the master closet. He hoped she was still there.

“One Tango down on the stairs up,” he whispered, broadcasting the status to Yvette, Jackson, and whoever else may be on comms.

Then Tessman mounted the steps, not knowing how many Tangos there might be in the house. She’d heard two men, so he had at least one more man to find. But there could be more. He crept up the stairs. He could see the light spilling out from the bedroom as he neared the top of the stairs.

He soundlessly stepped into the bedroom, noting that all the other doors on the second floor were closed. He’d still check the master bedroom and closet first. The closet door was open about a foot. He didn’t like the placement of the rooms. The master bathroom door, which was open, was adjacent to the door to the closet. He couldn’t search them both at the same time. And they were set up that if someone was within either of the spaces, they could get the drop on him as he checked out the other. He listened intently, but heard nothing.

Becca had grabbed the pistol belonging to her assailant from the closet floor. She sat with her back against the back of the closet, the weapon clasped in both of her hands in the correct position to fire, her index finger resting on the outside of the trigger guard as she was taught. The man lay motionless beneath the downed mirror.

She knew that with all the noise, someone would eventually come through the door. There was another man in the house that she knew of, and she’d already heard several gunshots. Was Carter Tessman or the police already there too? And who fired at who? She prayed it wouldn’t be the other intruder who would find her in the closet. And for a split second, she envisioned Carter Tessman getting shot as he entered the house. She shook that thought from her mind. No, he hadn’t been shot.

Tessman passed by the door to the closet and quickly checked out the master bathroom space while keeping an eye behindhim. No one was going to sneak up on him. The bathroom was empty.

“On scene, entering the house through the front now,” Jackson’s voice came through comms.

Tessman positioned himself outside of the closet, so the door blocked his detection from within. He was able to see into the front corner of the closet through the cracked open door. Nothing in that corner looked amiss. Then, all at once, he lifted his right leg and kicked the door open. It exploded in and wedged open against the bottom half of a man’s torso, which lay on the floor beneath a large frame with a solid wood backing. Behind it, along the back wall of the closet, was Becca, pointing a pistol at him.

“Easy, lower the weapon,” he said. He turned to view the bedroom. “Jax, I’ve got Becca and a second downed Tango, master bedroom.”

Becca saw the earbud in his ear and knew he was talking to someone other than her. She assumed Jax was Jackson.

“Roger that,” Jackson whispered. “First floor is clear, besides the wounded Tango on the stairs. Back slider is open.”

“It was shut when I got here,” Tessman said. “This second level needs to be checked, as well as the basement.”

“And garage,” Jackson added. “If you can clear the second floor, we’ll let Louisa and Kegger handle the rest when they arrive.”

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