Page 67 of Iron Rose

“Da!” I knew enough Russian to know another man was sayingyes.

“We’re the luckiest fuckers around.” There was a third voice. “We’re gonna be rich.”

Before a boot could come down again, my forearm came protectively over my ribs, and my free hand pulled the heel. I rolled with the foot tucked into me until the man fell forward with my momentum. His hands splayed before him to protect his face from hitting the ground. A rookie move if ever I saw one.

I shrimped to create space between us and brought my knee up to the outside of his elbow and it fell inward, dislocating beautifully with his howl of pain.

These men should have brought more than brass knuckles to take me down. I kicked my way from under the man, now whining about his hurt arm. He’d let his defenses go completely, his round face red and contorted in disbelief at the limp appendage at his side. He looked at me and his eyes burned with impotent fury.

I couldn’t help but smile as my fists came up in front of me, ready for the one thing I was good at– hand to hand combat.

“Igor,” the whimpering man said, his voice heavily accented with his mother tongue, “Get her!”

“Aw,” Itsked, “Gotta get your boyfriend to defend your honor? I get it.”

Igor, tall and skinny with a hooked nose, came lunging at me, his right hand with the brass knuckles tucked to his side, aiming for a punch. I stepped to the side, allowing his momentum to carry him forward, grabbed the offending brass-knuckled hand and, like a dance, twirled him around me until my foot hooked his leg and swept it from under him. I felt an errant fist hit my shoulder blade.

The third man was trying to join the party.

Number three’s punches were oddly placed, his elbows tucked outward. It was such an odd fighting stance that I froze, tilted my head, and studied him. He wasn’t a fighter. He had no idea what he was doing. A closer look at his face, and I knew he was just a child. Probably a highschool dropout, pushed on the wrong side of the tracks. He still had the acne of a hormonal adolescent, and there was fear in his eyes.

“Kiddo,” I said, adopting Brett’s word, and I soothingly crooned. “You don’t want to take me on, I promise you.”

He seemed to hesitate. To prove my point, I lifted my booted heel and brought it down to the cheek of Igor, who was still struggling to get up. He fell, face first, to the ground.

“Konstantin,” the one with the broken arm hollered, “Shoot her.”

This was where I made a mistake. I had never been one to account for guns. Underground fights required going through metal detectors, guns were kept well away since the heat of sweat and blood brought out animal instincts that often lay dormant in people who wore suits and ties.

Weighed down by this thing that kept happening between me and Alastair, I couldn’t find room in my heart to feel fear.

When the pipsqueak pointed the barrel of a 9mm beretta in my direction, his hand shaking from the weight and fear of it, I no longer cared if I lived or died.

I saw his finger tighten, but his poor control of the weapon tilted the barrel down. I lunged to my left, feeling the graze of the bullet on my shirt. It didn’t feel like much. Just a little moisture on the skin.

But what was it that Brett had said? A bullet wound rarely hurts at first. It chars your skin and nerves, and you feel heat. Then it’ll hurt like a bitch later.

I needed to take advantage of this pain-free moment. I lunged into his personal space, my hand gripping his trachea, and he gurgled. Choking.

I could feel his pulse in my fingers. It was fast, weak. Probably just like him. He was so shocked that I pulled the gun out of his hand and brought the butt down on the side of his head. The blow, plus the air and blood cut off by my hand, made him fall like a rag doll.

“You fucking bitch,” said the man, still nursing his dislocated arm. I didn’t hesitate with him.

If I was going to die, then this bastard would go down with me. And he’d go down with more agony than me.

I took the knife—Alastair’s knife—from behind my back and embedded it into his pupil with an upward thrust. It went through his eye socket and into his brain. He wouldn’t live if I pulled it out. And I wanted him to live. Slow, miserable, painful last minutes, his last view of the handle of my blade as it tickled his brain.

The moment Brett warned me about hit all at once. I was lightheaded. The danger was over. I fell to my knees. I looked down at my body and saw a moisture on my shirt that made it stick to my torso. I touched it with my palm and pulled my hand away.

My palm was soaked in wine red blood.

I looked up at the sky and had the strangest thought. It was so unexpected that it probably delayed my dying few extra seconds.

Did my father feel like this, before they put a bullet through his head?

Chapter 28

Alastair

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