stomach.
Donatello was too quick, twisting out of the way. He braced himself as Eddie collided with him, then with a rapid movement freed the nunchaku from the sword and turned to strangle his adversary with its chain …
Eddie headbutted him in the face.
The dark blue of the ninja’s balaclava suddenly blossomed with a damp purple patch around his mouth and nose. Even with his eyes screwed shut, he still tried to attack again. The nunchaku swished through the air—
Hitting nothing. Eddie had ducked.
Now it was his turn again—and with a roar he thrust the imperial sword with his full strength, transfixing the ninja through the stomach all the way to the hilt. Donatello gasped, mumbling in Japanese before collapsing face-first into the broken glass of Kusanagi’s shattered display case.
“Cowa-fucking-bunga,” Eddie rasped, forehead throbbing from its impact with the ninja’s nose. He straightened and looked around. Michelangelo was still alive, on all fours and clutching his truncated staff. But the way to the door was now clear—and his gun was just outside.
He ran. The last ninja scrambled up, but Eddie was already past him. The Makarov had landed about ten feet beyond the door. He crossed the threshold, bending to snatch up the weapon—
Something shot past him just before he reached it. The bo staff, hurled like a javelin—not at him, but at the gun. It hit the Makarov and sent it skidding through a set of open doors into an adjoining room.
Eddie looked back at Michelangelo, who was now searching for something on the ground …
Leonardo’s katana. Michelangelo seized the sword and pointed it angrily at Eddie—then sprinted toward him with a howling battle cry.
“Oh, fuck!” Eddie himself ran, racing after the gun. The doors had been closed when he dropped down from the vent; the ninjas must have entered through them. Beyond was a traditional Japanese dining room, rows of low tables with tatami mats on which the diners would sit lined up along the polished wooden floor.
Where was the gun? It had skittered over the slick wood—and ended up beneath one of the tables.
But which one?
He reached the first table and flipped it over. No gun. Next table. Still nothing. The ninja’s padding footsteps were rapidly closing. Third table, nothing. He grabbed the next in the row and flung it back toward the door. Still no sign of the Makarov, and from behind came a crack of wood as the katana slashed the little table in two.
He threw another place aside—and saw the glint of steel beneath.
The ninja was almost on him—
He dived for the gun, grabbing it and twisting to bring it to bear. The blade flashed down—and the ninja took two bullets to the chest as Eddie fired at point-blank range. The Englishman rolled to avoid the bloodied corpse as it fell, the katana’s point stabbing into the wood floor to leave the weapon standing beside the body like a tombstone.
“Jesus,” Eddie gasped, regaining his breath as he shakily stood. “Fucking ninjas, they’re like cockroaches!” He checked the room, trying to get his bearings. There were two exits: the one to the gallery and the vault, and another opening onto a windowed hallway. He hadn’t seen the direction Takashi had gone, so a split-second instinctual decision sent him toward the latter.
At the hall’s far end to his left was Takashi’s private elevator, an illuminated indicator showing that it was stationary at the penthouse level. Takashi hadn’t taken Nina and the statues out that way, then. In the other direction was a set of imposing oak doors. The industrialist’s inner sanctum?
He ran toward it, gun at the ready.
The case in her hand, Nina raced into the gallery. “Eddie?” she cried, uncertain—fearful—about what she might find.
She discovered corpses, which in some grim way was hardly a surprise, but to her relief none was her husband. Three in the strongroom, and a fourth in a dining room through another doorway. Eddie must have gone that way. She ran after him.
More doors led into the hallway to Takashi’s office. She went through them. Beyond the windows, Tokyo was now a glittering sea of lights beneath the twilight winter sky. She looked around. The elevator was to the left; to the right—
“Eddie!” she called again, running after him. Her husband slowed, turned, saw her …
And raised his gun.
NINE
Nina froze, shocked—and afraid. Eddie’s expression was one of pure hatred. “What are you …,” she started, but her mouth had gone dry.
Then she realized that he wasn’t looking at her, but something behind