“Right, sir!” Loots said, and as he took off for the hall to the rear of the home, Verdoorn ran for the back door. Like Hall, the South African was surprised to see the smoke here, but he didn’t expect to find any opposition, because Hall had just radioed that he and the others had made it to the pool house.

* * *

• • •

I’m out of the swimming pool now, water rushing from my boots as I begin moving across the patio, stepping into the smoke with my pistol out in front of me.

I make it no more than a few steps before I hear Kareem through my earpiece.

“A.J. is dead. Repeat, A.J. is KIA.”

Shit.

The gunfire from the house behind me continues and I don’t know how many enemy are still fighting there, but I try to push everything out of my mind so I can focus on my objective.

The slight morning breeze has moved the smoke in all directions; I can’t see my hand in front of my face. Behind me I hear a cacophony of police sirens, but I’m not overly worried about being caught by the cops just yet. There is no way in hell the LAPD is going to race into this maelstrom without knowing what the hell they’re up against. They’ll block roads, they’ll fly helicopters overhead, they’ll do what they can to get civilians out of the line of fire. SWAT trucks will arrive and a plan will be drawn up, and only then will they begin rooting out the shooters.

No, I’m not worried about the cops. The bad guys with guns here on the property are so much more concerning right now.

I start to emerge from the thick obscurant, and I catch a glimpse of a pair of rectangular pools in the patio in front of me before more smoke whirls across my face.

I try to pick up my pace but only go a pair of steps before I feel an incredible impact on my right side. It’s a body; someone running has slammed into me at speed, and I go airborne, my weapon tumbling from my hands. I hit the cut stone patio surface, knocking the wind out of me, and I try to reach to my pack behind me to retrieve the backup pistol I have there.

But before I do, I feel a hand grab me by the leg. I kick free but realize the man who crashed into me is on the ground in the smoke close by.

And then I see the knife. A glint of steel shining through a break in the red cloud, slashing in my direction.

He misses, but he has the advantage.

This man has speed, violence of action; there’s a weapon in his hand while I’m still fumbling with my backpack.

In my world we call my situation a deficit of initiative, but that’s just a fancy way of saying this asshole got the drop on me so now I’m fucked.

I sense more than see him lunging at me through the thick cloud, and I roll out of the way. The blade strikes the stone, and I launch up to my waterlogged boots.

The man disappears in the red cloud, then reappears just as suddenly. He’s on me again as I pull the fixed-blade knife from my belt. He slashes to the right, cuts into my tunic at my rib cage, and I feel a hot sting.

I retreat back a few steps and lose sight of him again.

I’m bleeding. The cut feels long but not deep.

Knife fights on TV are a joke. In the real world there is no dancing around, swinging the blade left and right, or stabbing straight down from the sky. Not by anyone who knows what the hell they are doing. The knife fights I’ve been in are a horror show. A combatant diving forward and jabbing straight out towards the midsection, over and over, three or four times a second if he’s fast. The attacks are difficult to defend against; the person defending does what he can to scramble back, falling backwards or juking to the side, but it’s not like Hollywood, where the guy on the receiving end has time to parry with a thoughtful move and then counterattack.

If you fight with a knife, you are going to get cut. By your enemy, or by yourself, you are going to get cut. More than once.

I get cut more than once.

I see his arm thrust out again through the cloud, and this time the blade nicks me on the right forearm. I feel a second hot sting and hear the blade tip slicing the flesh. The cut is two inches from the muscles that make some of my fingers work, so it’s very nearly a debilitating wound, but his awkward jab presents me with an opportunity.

I lunge low with my own knife, hitting him in the back of the hand and slicing it open with a four-inch gash.

He screams, steps back, and we lose each other in the swirling cloud for a moment again. Smoke wafts over from the back doors of the mansion and spews from the grenade between the koi ponds, and the breeze seems to churn it around us.

I’m breathing hard, not moving, my back to the shallow end of the swimming pool behind me.

Where is he?

From somewhere in the red cloud around me I hear him. “I bladdy love my job, Gentry!”

Fucking Jaco.

He appears on my right, closing fast, and, in a desperate attempt to avoid getting slashed, I fall backwards onto the stone. He lands on me, and we’re wrestling and swinging and ducking now. Two desperate men using all their strength, all their training and cunning, to try both to kill the other and to avoid being killed.

I’m on my back when I drive a knee up into his crotch and jab with my knife, stabbing him in the right forearm, then I roll again as he dives down towards me, smoke swirling around his now-visible form.

Soon we find ourselves with me holding the wrist that’s holding his knife, and him holding the wrist that’s holding my knife.

I roll to my right with all my strength, and we tumble together into the shallow end of the swimming pool. I land on my back on the upper step, only a foot deep. But Jaco’s on top of me, he still has my knife hand tight at the wrist, his knife is pointed right over my heart, and I use all the strength in my body to keep it from plunging straight down.

By being above me, with the weight of his body over his knife hand, I realize that he has leverage I don’t possess.

“Got you, Gentry!” he shouts, and I think he may be right. The knife tip disappears into the water, inches from my heart now.

Smoke wafts over us, obscuring my view of the bald-headed man leaning over me, lying on his knife to drive it down while I hold it up with a weakening left arm.

I find myself hoping Kareem and Rodney will appear over us and save me, but not for long.

I need a new strategy, and hope definitely isn’t it.

I realize what I have to do now, and I don’t love it, but it’s my only play. I drop my knife in my right hand, surprising him, then I spin my wrist down, deeper into the water on my right, whipping out of his grasp. The hand is unarmed now, but I bring it up to grab the knife above my heart. With my left hand I let go now, reach down to my left side, and fumble with my pack there. Jaco senses that I’m making some sort of a move, so he throws his entire body onto the arm holding the knife.