Zoya struggled against the three men.

“Stop resisting!” one man said, clearly with an Israeli accent.

“Calm down and I will!” she screamed back. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

In answer, one of the men punched her in the kidneys, and her gloved hand came loose from the desk.

These boys didn’t fuck around, but neither did Zakharova.

The man had finished frisking her left leg, and then he rose back up and started working his way down her right.

Without thinking about what she was doing, she retaliated for the kidney punch. She used her left heel to find her way between the feet of the man frisking her leg. She wasn’t sure if this was the one who’d hit her, but she didn’t care. With all her might she shot her foot up behind her, between the man’s legs, and she heel-kicked him in the testicles.

She knew from the feel and the sound that she had scored a bull’s-eye, and the groan she heard next, along with the sound of a body impacting with the floor, only served to confirm this.

Another punch to her kidneys brought a loud grunt out of her mouth, and she felt momentarily frozen in agony.

Behind her she heard the man called Fox say, “She’s not to be harmed! Damn you! She’s not to be harmed!”

With both hands behind her now she felt zip ties cinching on her wrists.

* * *

• • •

Court had reached for his rifle bag and brought it closer to him, but he did not unzip it. He kept Brewer updated on what was going on across the street, but it was hard to do so. Every fiber in his being told him he had to get over there and help her.

“Are you fucking listening, Brewer? They are beating the living shit out of her.”

“Sounds like she’s getting her own licks in.”

“Defensively, only. Let me engage.”

“Stand fast. Let it play, Violator. Do not engage.”

“Fuck that. What if they kill her?”

“They aren’t going to kill her. They are just taking her into their custody. For all we know they are the police. Or else she could be working with them, and they just haven’t ID’d her yet. She sure as hell isn’t working for us. Don’t worry about Anthem; get photos of the others in the room.”

But Court didn’t grab his camera. He kept one hand on the binos, while the other hand reached for the zipper on his rifle bag and began to slowly open it while he held the binos to his eyes.

* * *

• • •

Zoya was pulled to her feet by her hair and shoulders; the two Israeli security men next to her strong-armed her around, and as soon as she faced the open, well-lit room, she saw the man she’d dropped with the kick to the junk trying to struggle back to his feet. He looked at her with eyes that told her he was not going to let her attack on his manhood go.

In Russian, she said, “Fox, tell that one to back off!”

Fox said, “He does not work for me directly, Zoya. I am trying.” He switched to English. “Ari . . . let it go.”

“Fuck this bitch!” Ari said. “She donkey-kicked me in the nuts!”

He spun his rifle behind his back, balled his fists, and started moving towards her. Zoya tried to pull away from the two men holding her arms but was not strong enough to free herself.

As the man closed, Fox shouted, “Ari! Don’t you—”

Zoya used the men grasping her tight as leverage, and she brought both legs into the air, then executed a mighty front kick, slamming her instep into the Israeli’s already wounded balls, and dropping him a second time.

He fell to his knees, then went fetal on his side.

Fox couldn’t help but laugh at this. “I told you, Ari. The woman before you is legendary for not putting up with anyone’s shit. She’s more man than you!”

One of the Israelis holding her laughed, while the other just smiled while he punched her in the side of the head, in an attempt to get her to stop her resistance.

* * *

• • •

Court bit the inside of his cheek, then spoke softly. “Suzanne, she’s not going down without a fight. It’s about to get serious over there. I can stop this if you just—”

“Violator, listen to me. Don’t do something you will regret.”

“I’ve been doing something I regret since the day I started taking orders from you.”

“Sit right there and report! That . . . is . . . an . . . order! If you—”

Court closed his eyes and tapped his earpiece, disconnecting the call. He lowered the binos, then yanked the short-barreled rifle with the laser-aiming device out of the bag.

Being a team player had been fun while it lasted, but it was time to go off mission.

CHAPTER 30

   Ari pulled himself to his feet for the second time, using a fallen chair in front of the desk for balance. Upon standing he shouted back to Fox. “More man than me? Let’s see what she’s really got on the inside.”

He drew a black-bladed knife from his belt, then rushed the two steps forward towards the woman again being held by his two colleagues.

As Fox shouted “No!” Ari thrust the weapon at Zoya’s abdomen.

But the blade never connected with its target.

The Israeli security man was shot through the right side of his head, his medulla oblongata destroyed by a subsonic Winchester .300 Blackout round, and this instantly ceased transfer of motor and sensory neurons to his body. He tumbled to his left and dropped like a sack of bricks, as blood splattered all the way to the paneled wall fifteen feet away. The two Israelis flanking Zoya let go of her and spun to the now-broken window. As they raised their weapons they immediately fell backwards in the room, one after the other, both shot through the head.

Zoya launched herself backwards over the desk, difficult to do with her hands zip-tied behind her back, but she kicked her feet over her head and did a reverse somersault and fell down onto the floor awkwardly, out of sight of the window and the two men still alive in the room with her.

She heard Fox and the big man running through the room towards the door, then taking off up the hall for the stairs.

She crawled around to the far side of the desk, away from the window and the sniper, and grabbed one of her knives lying there where it had been tossed by her attackers. Using it, she cut her zip ties from behind. The dead Israeli named Ari was on the floor just feet away, but his rifle was to his right, and in view of the window where the shots came from, so she didn’t dare go for it. Instead she tucked back down behind the desk to think.