Rising Tiger: A Thriller (66)

Asha paused and looked at her tablet. Headed slowly up the stairs was a lone and somewhat larger figure than the others. “Is that who I think it is?” she asked.

“Yes, it’s me,” Gupta replied over his radio. “These fucking stairs are killing me, but I’m almost there. I can’t see any of what you’re seeing, so just tell me when, and I’ll take out the two men at the top.”

This was not at all how she had expected things to go down, but she appreciated the help and would take it however she could get it. Quickly she moved back to where she had been positioned at the front door of apartment number two.

Shifting her attention back to the tablet and the men coming down the hall, she gauged their timing and marked Gupta’s location. “Are you in position?” she asked.

“Affirmative,” he whispered.

“On my mark, then,” she replied. “In five… four… three… two… one… now.”

The north stairwell erupted in gunfire as Asha kicked open the door with her boot.

She caught both men, who were armed only with pistols, completely by surprise and couldn’t have timed her attack any more perfectly. Just as they were beginning to spin to address the shooting behind them, she leaned out of the doorway and lit them up with her suppressed submachine gun, dropping them where they stood.

Before the men in the south stairwell could return fire, she had ducked back inside the apartment and had taken cover.

Bullets tore up the doorframe, but the shots were being fired one at a time; semiautomatic. Most likely, these guys were also using pistols.

Glancing at the tablet, she saw that Gupta had succeeded in ambushing the men at the top of the north stairs and had taken both of them out. That meant that this fight was now two versus two.

Her biggest question was what to do with Gupta. Have him hold and cover the north stairs, or have him drop down a floor, cross over to the south stairs, and attack those two shooters from below while she engaged them from where she was—essentially creating a pincer movement?

Unfortunately, she never got the chance to answer her own question. The two remaining shooters made up her mind for her.

Charging into the hallway, one fired toward Gupta’s position in the opposite stairwell, while the other focused his fire on her door.

Asha risked breaking cover and ran for the closet and the opening to the other apartment. If these assholes were going to storm her position, the only thing they were going to get was practice.

As she ran, two rounds penetrated the door and slammed into her chest, hitting the ceramic plate. A couple of inches more to the side and they would have gone straight through her chest wall, puncturing her lung and maybe even piercing her heart—killing her on the spot.

The rounds were big and loud—.45 caliber, if she had to guess. It felt like being hit by a gorilla with a tire iron. The twin strikes had almost knocked the wind out of her. Nevertheless, her pace never slowed.

Charging through the closet and the hole in the drywall, she entered the spotter’s apartment, weapon up, ready to engage. She paused only long enough to make sure the man on the floor was still tightly restrained and then headed for the door. The two shooters coming down the hallway were in for a surprise.

She told Gupta to stay where he was. He had already been more than helpful and she didn’t want to put his life any further at risk.

Just as she had when leaving the spotter’s apartment, she had closed the closet door of the second apartment on her way back. It wouldn’t take them long to search the adjacent dwelling and find the hole, but she didn’t need a lot of time.

Watching on her tablet, she waited until they entered the unit next door and then slipped into the hall and, avoiding the bodies, rapidly headed toward them.

She had one flashbang left. Letting her weapon hang, she retrieved the device from her chest rig and noticed the two holes where the bullets had penetrated the nylon plate carrier. One of them had nearly hit the flashbang.

Pulling the pin, she held the device in her left hand while securing the H&K in her right. Then, after ascertaining where the two shooters were via her tablet, she used the toe of her boot to nudge the door open and tossed the flashbang into the apartment.

It exploded with a loud bang and a blinding flash of light. As it did, she kicked the door the rest of the way open and rushed inside.

She double-tapped the man nearest to her and then swung her weapon and double-tapped his accomplice. Both fell to the floor, dead, just as their comrades had out in the hall.

Asha kicked their guns away and then checked each man for a pulse, making sure that they were dead.

Though she had been able to avoid being seen by any of the building’s residents, there was no way that the gunshots had gone unnoticed. The police were likely on their way and would be arriving at any moment.

She radioed Raj an update and told Gupta to get out of the building now, while he still could.

She had just one last thing to do—interrogate the spotter.

Transitioning back through the closet, she entered the other apartment and found the man right where she had left him. Rolling him onto his side, she unsheathed the knife attached to her chest rig and sliced the gag from around his mouth.

“I know you’re G-Company,” she stated. “I want the name of who sent you after me.”

The man shot her an angry glare.

Asha didn’t wait, she couldn’t afford to. Taking the tip of her knife, she placed it against the man’s groin and pushed. She heard the rip of the fabric and then the man’s panicked cry of pain as the blade sliced through flesh.