as swiftly. Lee, however, was tightly on guard. The guy knew karate;
Lee had felt it in the kick at the top of the stairs; he was seeing it
in the defensive posture the man now assumed, making himself into a
little ball, leaving no angles, nothing of much width to hit. His
brain working faster than conscious thought, Lee figured he had about
four inches and fifty pounds on the guy, but if the man nailed him with
a lethal foot to the head, Lee would go down. And then he and Faith
and Buchanan were all dead. But if he didn’t finish the guy within the
next minute, Faith and Buchanan would be dead anyway.
The man aimed a crushing side kick to Lee’s torso; however, his having
to slosh through water to deliver the kick gave Lee the little extra
time he needed. Lee had to get in close, grab what he could and not
give Chuck Norris Jr. enough space to do his martial arts magic. Lee
was a boxer; in-close fighting, where whipping legs couldn’t do much
damage, was where he could be absolutely devastating. Lee braced
himself and absorbed the rib-rattling leg shot to the body but then
held on to the limb with his bloodied arm, clinching it to his side in
a viselike grip. With his free hand, he landed a cartilage-shattering
blow to the guy’s knee, driving it backward to a degree knees were not
designed to go. The man screamed. Then Lee delivered a crunching
straight jab to the guy’s face, feeling the nose flatten under the
impact. Finally, in a flash of almost choreographed movement, Lee
dropped the leg, curled low and then erupted out of that position with
a cannonball left hook that carried all two hundred and twenty pounds
of his bulk plus whatever multiplying factor pure fury brought to the
battle. When his fist hit facial bone, which promptly yielded under
the terrible impact, Lee knew he had won. Nobody short of a
professional heavyweight had a jaw that hard.
The man went down as though shot through the head. Lee instantly
flipped him on his stomach and pushed his head under the water. He
didn’t have time to actually drown the guy, so he brought his elbow
down with all his might dead center on the back of the man’s neck. The
resulting sound was unmistakable, even with the water lapping all over
them, as though God wanted Lee to damn well know what he’d done, and
didn’t want him to ever forget it.
The body went limp and Lee rose over the dead man. Lee had been in
more than his share of fights both in and out of the boxing ring, but
he had never killed anyone before. As he looked down at the body, he
knew it was nothing to be proud of. Lee was just grateful it wasn’t
him lying dead.
Sick to his stomach and suddenly feeling the full force of the pain in
his wounded arm, Lee looked up the steps leading to the beach houses.
He had only two other beasts to conquer and then he could call it a
day. And it was clear they weren’t the Feds. FBI agents didn’t run
around trying to kill people with fancy knives and karate kicks; they
pulled their shields and guns and told you to stop right in your
tracks. And if you were smart, you did.
No, they were the other guys. The CIA robokillers. He raced up the
steps, found his pistol and hustled as fast as he could to the beach
house, hoping with every labored breath that he was not too late.
CHAPTER 52
FAITH HAD CHANGED INTO JEANS AND A SWEATSHIRT and now sat on her bed
staring at her bare feet. The sounds of the motorcycle had disappeared
as though into an enormous vacuum. As she looked around the room, it
was as though Lee Adams had never even been here, had never been real.
She had spent so much time and energy trying to lose the man, and now
that he was gone, all of her spirit seemed to have been swept into the