accompanying the coffee. The guests talked, laughed, and sang, but the hour was approaching twelve and Irene felt that she couldn’t stay awake much longer. It had been a long, eventful day. She went up to Donna, thanking her for the fun party and all the good food. Donna pulled her face down and gave her a smacking kiss on each cheek. “Promise now that you’ll send me a retired police officer! A tall one!” Donna chirped.
Irene promised to do her best.
THE COOL night air felt pleasant against Irene’s flushed cheeks. She took a few deep breaths in order to vent the smoke-and-alcohol-tinged air from her lungs. Glen had offered to follow her back to the hotel, but she declined when she saw that he was trying to corral the overtired twins. A taxi slowly crept toward her but continued past when she didn’t hail it. It wasn’t far to walk, and she could find her way.
The street was quiet and deserted. So when a car came up behind her, she heard it. She also heard it stop and a car door open, but she thought it was dropping off a passenger. She was completely unprepared when a pair of hands grabbed her upper arms from behind and thrust her through the open rear door of the taxi. She hit her forehead on the door frame so hard that she saw stars. She was roughly pushed into the car.
“Drive, damn it!” a hoarse voice muttered at her side in a London dialect. He had nauseating breath that stank from alcohol and rotten teeth.
For a second, Irene’s brain was paralyzed from surprise and fear. She didn’t have time to scream before he closed the car door. They had landed in a heap on the floor of the passenger compartment. She couldn’t see her attacker, who was still behind and on top of her. She twisted her head using all her strength, but all she saw of the driver through the window between the rear and the driver’s seat was a thick, shaved neck with a large black tattoo.
What did these men want? Who were they? The man who’d grabbed her started groping her breasts, and she was convinced that he was going to rape her, but when he tried to grab her golden pendant, she realized he was trying to rob her.
Then she became completely calm. He had released his grasp on her upper arms; his left arm was around her neck in a chokehold. Irene tensed her neck muscles and seized that arm with one hand. With all her strength, she rammed the elbow of her other arm into his stomach. The air was completely knocked out of him, and his chokehold loosened immediately. In a split second, Irene twisted out of his grip and struggled to his side. She was grateful that London taxis have generous legroom for passengers. Irene kept a steel grip on the man’s arm, twisted it up behind his back, and forced him down onto his stomach. She locked his other hand by sitting on his back, driving her knee below his shoulder blades and holding his arm against the car floor with her free hand. The slightest move would increase the pressure on his back and inflict terrible pain. He lay completely still.
Everything had happened in a matter of seconds. The fat-necked guy in the front seat hardly had time to figure out what had happened, but something had: That much he understood. “What the hell are you doing?” he screamed.
He tried to turn his head and look down behind him at the floor of the taxi as he drove. Irene heard a half- suppressed curse, and then the car began to skid. It lurched and the tires screamed. Irene had a hard time keeping her hold on the man underneath her. The car came to a dead stop with a dull thud. The driver wasn’t wearing a seat belt. His head struck the windshield, and he lay draped over the steering wheel.
The man under Irene didn’t move either, and she was afraid that he had stopped breathing. Maybe she had unintentionally pushed too hard on his back when the car had stopped suddenly. It was a dangerous hold, and people had died previously after it was used on them. Irene leaned over, and to her relief, she heard the man breathing, but he appeared to be unconscious.
She managed to get the car door open and was helped out by a man who was hurrying toward her. He used one hand to steady her, and in the other he held a cell phone. “. . crashed at the corner of Westbourne and Lancaster Gate. . single-car accident … ran into a pole. . a woman is uninjured but the men seem badly off. . ambulance is probably best. . ”
When the man turned around to find out what had caused the accident, the woman was no longer there.
Chapter 13
EVEN THOUGH IRENE HAD made up her mind not to awaken with a headache, that was exactly what happened anyway. It wasn’t the fault of the alcohol she’d drunk, but that of the large bump on her head, which pounded and ached and was starting to turn blue. It was proof that last night’s attack had really happened and wasn’t a horrible nightmare. The bump, with a little scrape, was located right at her hairline and wasn’t very visible when she brushed her bangs forward, although then the bangs stuck out oddly.
She had sneaked away from the scene of the accident. Feeling that she didn’t have the energy for a night- long police interrogation, she had managed to find her way to the hotel and climb up the stairs to her room. Despite being shaken by the happenings of the previous hour, she had managed to fall into a deep and dreamless sleep. Maybe she had passed out?
Irene tottered down to the dark breakfast room in the hotel’s cellar level and downed several cups of instant coffee. She was still full after Donna’s birthday dinner. Half a cheese sandwich was all she had room for. Her headache eased and she could start thinking.
She had to tell the police what had happened. The only sensible thing to do was to try to reach Glen Thompson. They had decided that he would pick her up outside the hotel at twenty minutes to eleven, but now it would be better if he arrived earlier.
In her room, Irene took out Glen’s card and dialed his work number. She was in luck; he answered right away. Irene tried to explain that something serious had happened the night before, but he interrupted her. “I’ll come as soon as possible.”
Irene went down to the lobby to wait. Estelle hurried past, chirped “Good morning,” and disappeared quickly into the hotel’s inner environs. She couldn’t have slept too many hours, but you wouldn’t have been able to tell by looking at her. Irene didn’t fool herself; her reflection in the mirror had shown that her night had been difficult, but Estelle probably assumed that it was because of too much wine.
A black Rover turned in at the hotel entrance. Glen’s sunny smile faded immediately when he saw Irene’s face.
“Let’s go up to your room,” he said.
IRENE EXPLAINED exactly what had happened. Glen didn’t interrupt her. When she was done, he shook his head.
“Unbelievable! The question is, who had the worse luck: you, who were attacked your first night in London, or the attackers, who went up against an ex-master of jujitsu!”
He smiled but immediately became serious again. “I’m going to notify the police in this district.”
Glen called from the telephone in Irene’s room. He spoke a long time with different people. He was quiet for long periods, nodding and listening. Sometimes he glanced in Irene’s direction and she thought that something flickered in his eyes; he almost looked frightened.
“Come on. It’s time to go. I’ll tell you all I learned in the car,” Glen said, finally.
HE DIDN’T start the car directly when they had gotten in, but looked at Irene gravely.
“You had incredible luck. Thanks to your knowledge of jujitsu, you avoided a terrible fate.”
He turned on the ignition. The car started with a soft rumble, and he pulled away from the curb. “The taxi was stolen. The driver was found, with critical stab wounds having been robbed, on a small back street where they are in the process of tearing down some houses, just a few blocks from Vitoria. He was gagged and his hands were bound with tape. He’s in pretty bad shape and is in the hospital. The only consolation is that now both culprits are, as well.”
Glen stopped to let an older woman with a walker cross the street at a crosswalk. When she had managed to make her way to the other side, he gunned the accelerator and continued. “The man in the back seat who attacked
