The jagged edges in his brain softened.
Don’t fall asleep.
Keep your eyes open.
You’re falling asleep.
At some point later, which could have been ten seconds or ten hours, a hand shook his shoulder and brought him out of a deep sleep.
He frantically fumbled for consciousness.
“Someone’s in the house,” London said.
Wilde felt around for the gun in the dark but couldn’t find it.
Then he had it.
The steel was cold and heavy.
“Where?”
“Downstairs.”
Wilde focused with a pounding heart.
He heard nothing.
Suddenly a heavy silhouette bounded into the room. An arm raised and a knife stabbed down at London’s head. Wilde jerked the woman to the side with one hand and pulled the trigger with the other.
71
The dark silhouette of a man emerged from the shadows of Su-Moon’s building. He pulled a black hood over his head, hunched his shoulders against the storm and headed up the street at a brisk walk.
He was coming their way.
Waverly and Su-Moon wedged into the shadows.
That’s how long they had, twenty seconds, then he’d be on them. He almost certainly had a gun, that or a knife, not to mention his fists. He hadn’t seen them yet but he would. He’d catch strange shapes in his peripheral vision.
He’d turn.
He’d focus.
He’d see two women.
He’d focus harder.
“He found the photos,” Su-Moon whispered.
Waverly’s veins pounded.
It was too late to run.
It was too late to do anything.
She closed her eyes and held her breath. The storm was too loud to hear footsteps.
Any second, that’s when he’d be on them.
She pressed her back against the building and kept her body motionless.
A swift menacing figure emerged in her peripheral vision. She fought to not turn her head towards it but her muscles didn’t listen.
Her eyes focused.
Her face twisted.
A dark hood turned in her direction. Inside that hood, Waverly could see no face, only an empty blackness. Suddenly the man stopped. The hood turned directly towards her.
A beat passed.
Then a hand grabbed her neck.
Python-strong fingers wrapped around her throat, squeezing and lifting at the same time.
Her oxygen stopped.
Her lungs froze.
No air went out.
No air came in.
She let her legs fall out from under her and twisted her body wildly in an effort to break free.
It did no good.
The grip tightened even harder.
Suddenly glass shattered and Su-Moon had the broken edge of a bottle pressed against the man’s face.
“Don’t move!”
The fingers around Waverly’s neck stayed in place but loosened.
“Let her go!”
The fingers loosed even more.
Waverly punched them off and choked out stale air, then sucked in oxygen, sweet sweet oxygen. The man’s face came into focus, at first no more than a shadowy blur, then more pronounced.
It wasn’t Bristol.
It was someone she’d never seen before.
His eyes drilled into hers.
They were predator eyes.
“Search him,” Su-Moon said. “Get the envelope.”
Waverly heard the words.
She understood them.
She didn’t move though.
She couldn’t.
“Damn it woman, do it!”
72
Get to cover, get to cover, get to cover-that was the one thought and the only thought that River allowed his brain as he hit the dirt. There was no time to worry about losing the gun. There was no time to feel the gravel cuts in his face. He rolled, took a long leap and rolled again, waiting for an explosion of gunfire
