When outnumbered or outgunned and retreat is not an option, the only thing left to do is attack. And the best defence against a long weapon like a baton is to get in close, to negate the effect and hamper them with the one thing they thought was going to put them ahead.
I launched straight in, timing it between the swipes like the kind of skipping game we used to play as kids. I knew I had to get under Eamonn’s guard and disable the arm holding the baton as fast as possible. Before it disabled me. But getting from safe distance to engagement meant passing through Eamonn’s kill zone and that was never going to be easy.
I feinted a short right to his throat. He jerked his head back automatically and I grabbed the arm holding the baton with my left hand. I ignored the baton itself, aiming to get my thumb jabbed in hard to the radial nerve that sits on top of the forearm, a couple of inches below the elbow. I nearly made it, too.
Eamonn hadn’t been expecting me to go for him there and it took him a fraction longer to react than it might have done otherwise. But not long enough. He wrenched his arm free and danced back. The baton swept round in a slashing arc and cracked against the outside of my left knee.
If I hadn’t loosened his grip slightly, or been dressed for the possibility of falling off a motorbike, at speed onto tarmac, the blow would have put me on the ground and probably in the hospital. As it was, the lessened impact was partially absorbed by the closed-cell foam padding in my leathers. It stung like hell but it didn’t do anything permanent and I didn’t go down. With barely a break in stride I slapped Eamonn’s wrist out sideways and brought the outside of my right forearm round and up hard into the side of his face.
Instinctively, he threw his head back again so I caught him on his cheekbone rather than his temple. Nevertheless, I’d put plenty into it, enough to stagger him back a pace or two. But he was tough and he’d done this kind of work before. He shook his head to clear it. His smile grew colder and wider.
“Oh ho, so you’ve got some fire in your belly, have you?” he murmured. “Well, OK then, if you insist. Both ankles . . .”
He darted forwards then, letting off another whistling blow towards my upper body this time. I went forwards to meet him, blocking so the baton cannoned off the protective padding in the sleeve of my jacket. It jarred me to the bone without severe damage, but I was on the defensive and I knew it was only a matter of time before he got lucky.
And then the drive alarm went off. Jacob had an old fire alarm bell attached to the outside of the house so he could hear it if he was in the workshop and it was loud enough to make both of us jump.
We whipped round. Eamonn reversed the baton and twisted it shut in one flowing move. He dropped the weapon back into his inside pocket like a magician’s sleight of hand. He was barely out of breath.
A black Mitsubishi Shogun rumbled quickly onto the forecourt and pulled up facing us, sharply enough to set its soft suspension rocking.
Isobel hurried out of the house with Jamie tailing along behind her. She glanced at me briefly, her eyebrows raised as though she was surprised to see me still on my feet.
Sean Meyer came out of the Shogun without seeming in any particular rush but that cool flat gaze was everywhere. He took in Eamonn’s apparently relaxed stance and wasn’t fooled for a moment by the thin veneer of civility he presented. His eyes swept over me and narrowed in much the same way that Isobel’s had done. Except when she did it I wasn’t quite so afraid of what she had in mind.
“You OK?” he asked.
I shrugged, feeling the protest in my muscles where the baton had bitten me. “More or less,” I said.
He turned slowly towards Eamonn and made a slight sideways movement with his head, loosening the muscles in his neck. Eamonn smiled at him, reaching into his coat and bringing the baton back out into view.
“Knight in shining fucking armour, are we?” he said, extending the weapon again with a practised flick of his hand.
Suddenly he sniffed loudly, pulled a face of almost delicate distaste. “Now that wouldn’t be a bastard squaddie I can smell, would it? Seen plenty of your type. Think you’re a hard man, do you? Think you can take me on?”
He made a couple of showy slashes with the baton, making the air whine as it sliced through.
“Maybe not,” Sean said calmly. He inclined his head in my direction. “But between us we can.”
Just for a second Eamonn faltered, then he grinned fiercely. “Oh, you think so?” And he beckoned us on.
Sean didn’t respond to that, but something had died behind his eyes, like a light had gone out. He began to circle, clockwise, moving slowly. I circled in the opposite direction. Whether Eamonn liked it or not, we were moving in and out of his blind spots. He couldn’t cover us both at once.
But the Irishman continued to smile. He knew that two against one were not good odds in his favour. He also knew, as we did, that if he could get a couple of decent blows in with the baton, he might yet stand a chance of coming out on top.
His eyes went to Sean’s unprotected arms, then to my leather jacket and I saw he’d picked his first target. I wasn’t about to give him a chance to act on that decision. And I wasn’t about to let Sean take a hit to protect me, either.
We continued to circle. I waited until Eamonn had flicked his eyes away from me again, then jumped him. He caught the flash of my attack and spun round, uncoiling the baton at shoulder height, aiming for my head. A killing blow. I ducked underneath it and crashed through his defence, getting in close to his body.
I managed to snake my left hand round and get my fingers pinched hard into the pressure points at the back of his neck, controlling his upper body as I brought my knee up hard, once, twice, into his gut.
Sean moved in smooth and fast, landing a massive uppercut to the other man’s face as he began to fold. The stinging blow broke Eamonn’s nose and sent blood flying.
I let go and jumped back, getting out of Sean’s way. He twisted the baton out of the Irishman’s hand and into his own with almost negligent ease, turning the tables. His first slash took Eamonn’s legs out from under him, then he went for his upper arms just above each elbow. Hit the nerves there hard enough and they shut down like circuit breakers, disconnecting each limb.
