“Do not move another inch to that edge,” ordered Pine as she moved forward.
The man halted. And so did Pine.
The sirens were growing closer. But if Pine didn’t finish this soon, things might escalate when the uniforms did arrive.
“I’m running out of patience here,” the man barked.
“I gave you an option. The only one I can give. Prison’s not great, but it’s a lot better than a grave. You don’t get released or paroled from six feet under.”
The man started toward the edge again, dragging the girl with him.
“Stop!” bellowed Pine, trying to line up her target through the tritium night sight installed on her Glock. Her rear sight ring held twin glowing tritium inserts, while her front post held a tritium insert surrounded by nonluminous white paint. It was very accurate, but she couldn’t fire. She might hit the girl. Or the guy’s trigger finger might jerk when Pine’s round struck him.
The man smiled triumphantly as he read Pine’s dilemma in her features. “You won’t shoot. Now that’s leverage, lady.”
Pine glanced at the girl. Okay, it’s do-or-die time. “I played soccer. Only goal I ever scored was on a back kick. Hit it right between the goalie’s legs. Bet you’re a much better player than I was.” Pine held the girl’s gaze, communicating with her eyes what she couldn’t do with her words.
The man barked: “Shut the hell up about soccer. Now, for the last time, put down—”
The girl’s foot kicked backward and up and struck the squatting man right in the crotch. He let her go and doubled over, his face scrunched in pain, and the Sig fell out of his hand. “Y-you l-little b-bit—” he moaned, his face turning beet red. He dropped to his knees, gasping for air.
Pine raced forward, kicked the man’s weapon behind her, grabbed the girl’s arm, and pulled her to safety.
That should have been the end of it. Pine had her gun, and he didn’t have his. Or his hostage. She was home free. It was over.
But it wasn’t over. Because when the man finally stood and straightened, he looked at Pine and spat out, “You think you got me? I got nine lives!” He glanced ferociously at the girl, who was staring back at him with revulsion. “I can’t remember how many like her I’ve done and then cut up and left for the animals. And I’ll be out again to do more. You hear me, FBI bitch?”
Pine stared at him for a long moment. In the man’s taunting face, she saw someone else.
Pine knew full well she shouldn’t take the bait. But she was going to do it anyway.
She looked to the sky, where the moon burned a dull yellow and red.
The hunter’s moon, she knew, also known as the blood moon.
More accurately the predator’s moon, and right now I’m the predator.
She holstered her gun and stepped forward.
In her mind’s eye the giant Daniel James Tor stared back at her. Pine’s nemesis, the stuff of nightmares. She was about to make it all go away.
The man grinned in triumph. “You just made a damn big mistake.”
“How’s that?” But she already knew what his answer would be.
“In case you hadn’t noticed, lady, I’m a man.” He charged her in a bull rush.
A moment later he staggered backward, dazed, his face bloodied by the devastating blow delivered by the size eleven boot at the end of her long right leg. He bent over, groaning.
“In case you hadn’t noticed,” said Pine. “I’m now going to kick the shit out of you.”
She slammed her foot into his chin, lifting him straight up. A palm-out blow delivered directly to the bridge of the nose made the man howl in pain, and he collapsed on his back like he’d been struck with a sledgehammer.
The battle really should have ended there, but Pine jumped astride him and clamped the muscular legs of her nearly six-foot frame around the man’s arms, easily pinning them to his sides. Then she proceeded to rain blow after blow down on him, fist, elbow, forearm, open palm, using every technique she had learned from years of MMA and close-quarter battle training.
It was as though nearly thirty years of pent-up anger had just been unleashed. She felt cartilage and bone in his face give way at the same time she heard the FBI angel on her shoulder screaming at her that this was against every rule the Bureau had. And still Pine could not stop