The assailant glared at Stephen, inches from his face. Stephen saw nothing in his opponent's countenance but animal fury. Then the killer twisted his lips into what might pass as a smile in certain demonic circles and nodded. The gesture said
"We don't have to do this," Stephen said through clenched teeth. He knew they did, but deep inside, he remembered the last time he had battled; his conscience didn't want to be here.
The assailant pulled down fiercely on Stephen's arm, bringing his knee up at the same time, calculated to shatter the radius and ulna.
Anticipating the motion, Stephen swiveled his hips. The blow struck him hard on the thigh. Turning his defensive movement into an offensive one, Stephen swung his leg between them, then around his opponent's side. He yanked his leg back. It collided with the killer's leg, on which all his weight rested. His mind jumped ahead, working through the motions he'd make as his opponent hit the ground.
Which he never did.
Normally, a man will protect himself in a fall by swinging his arms toward the ground; but the killer never released Stephen's right wrist. Instead, he used it to hold himself up and pivot around with the force of Stephen's kick. Before Stephen realized what was happening, the killer's back was to him, and he felt himself pulled by his arm over the killer's head. He collided with the sidewalk. He sensed movement over him and rolled. The gauntlet smashed into the pavement where his face had been, kicking up rock chips and a quick plume of concrete dust.
If he'd kept rolling away, as his mind screamed at him to do, he knew his opponent would jump ahead, pin him, and kill him. Instead, he rolled back, grabbing hold of the killer's arm with both hands. Before the killer had a chance to kick, Stephen hoisted his lower body into the air and planted a stunning blow with the tip of his boot into the top of the man's head. Anchored by Stephen's grip on his arm, the killer staggered . . .
Then dropped his knee onto Stephen's forehead.
forty-two
Light swam back into his mind, forming itself into images: the building on his left, blue sky, white clouds, a flash of leg, and the killer standing over him, poised to bring his spiked fist into Stephen's head.
Stephen swung his arm straight up, aiming for the clouds high above. He struck the killer between the legs.
The gauntleted warrior tumbled away.
Stephen rolled and pushed himself up. He kicked out, catching the man in the side. As the killer staggered back, Stephen lowered his torso and kicked his booted heel into his opponent's sternum.
The killer flew backward into the bank's display window, crashing through and disappearing behind a waterfall of shattering glass. A huge pane sliced down like a guillotine. An instant later, Stephen caught the full force of a roundhouse kick to the side of his head as the killer leaped over the glass-toothed sill. Stephen's head snapped back painfully. He wanted to fall, to let the black cloud hovering at the edge of his consciousness engulf him and just. . . fall. Instead, he jerked his head upright and raged the black cloud away—just in time to see a saber-sized sheet of glass arcing on a horizontal plane toward his neck, blurring with speed.
He ducked.
The glass, clasped in the killer's hands, disappeared in a screaming, dissolving collision with the brick that flanked the bank's windows.
Stephen drove his head into the killer's stomach and felt the pain of a fist gripping the hair on the back of his head. Rather than pull back, he pushed forward, knocking his opponent off balance. They both went down. As the killer hit concrete, Stephen somersaulted over him, using the momentum to tear his head away from the fist.
He felt like he'd been cracked on the back of the head with a lead pipe. He blocked out the pain; it was something he was getting used to.
He rolled away, tumbling out of the killer's reach. On his feet, down for mere seconds.
The killer too—standing ten feet away, bent at the knees, arms out like an attacking wrestler. He rocked slightly on the balls of his feet, ready. The man was tall, only slightly shorter than he was, maybe six foot four. At roughly 260 muscular pounds, the man's proportions were similar to a body builder's; he possessed none of the lankiness common among tall men. Through the unzipped opening of the black Windbreaker, a dark green pullover clung to bulging pectorals. Quick eyes watched Stephen's every move.
Stephen sucked in a deep breath, then another. Sweat stung his eye. He tasted blood: a lot of it. A chill trickled down his spine as he realized the killer was breathing in the unhurried rhythm of a body at rest, barely perceptible in the shallow rise and fall of his massive chest. No perspiration at all. Just blood. Cuts and gashes and scrapes freckled the killer's face and one visible hand . . . a hand that still clutched a clump of brown, bloody hair and what looked like—a piece of
