Knock on his door or wait?
I pass room 208.
But what would happen if I did knock on his door? If I did confront him? He fled once and left a writhing pile of cobras behind to block my path. He’s obviously dangerous—
Room 210.
But if the police just release him, he’ll get on that bus and he’ll be gone—
212.
And he’ll undoubtedly take steps to make sure we never find him again.
I arrive at room 214.
And stare at that door.
No police sirens yet, but that doesn’t exactly surprise me. I doubt they would come in with their lights flashing and sirens blaring, especially if they were coming to apprehend a murder suspect, as I’d told them Tomás was. After all, making that much of a scene would only warn a suspect and give him a chance to flee.
The muted sound of a television in the room seeps through the thin walls, but I can’t see inside because of the heavy curtain that’s pulled across the window.
Is he even here? Was Solomon telling the truth?
A phone rings inside the room.
I lean close to listen. The ringing stops, but I can’t pick up any of the conversation.
Now I’m really not sure what to do.
I glance back toward the parking lot and see that a police cruiser has crawled into the far end over near the motel office.
Okay, now the police are here, now I can—
The door in front of me bursts open and Tomás appears.
After three years of sparring, instinct takes over, and I raise my hands to fight back or block if he comes at me.
But rather than run like he did in the Philippines, he immediately flicks out an automatic knife.
“Señor, retrocedes.”
“No. I’m not getting out of the way.”
Not until the police get up here.
With his other hand he flicks out another knife, then cries out something in indistinguishable Spanish and lunges through the doorway at me.
The Warehouse
I like sparring in the gym, but I’ve only had to use TaeKwonDo twice in real life. Both times were against the same man and both times he had a knife. The first time, he managed to slash Charlene’s arm; the second time, he didn’t fare so well. I knocked him down, he landed on the blade, and he never rose.
One knife that time.
Two tonight.
Agcaoili swipes one blade toward my abdomen, but I step to the side and knock his arm out of the way with an outer forearm block. Out of instinct I use my right one, which is also my wounded one, and a rush of pain shoots through it, cutting across my shoulder and burying itself in my chest.
Okay, that arm’s out of commission.
Not good.
Although the walkway runs the length of the building, it’s only about five or six feet wide — not a lot of room to maneuver, so when he comes at me with the knives again, I end up with my back against the railing.
I land a kick to the side of his knee and it buckles but doesn’t break, and he manages to still rush me, slashing a knife wickedly through the air at my left arm.
I slide to the side just in time and do a jump front kick to his sternum to push him back. I manage to land a spinning side kick against his ribs. I don’t know if I broke any or not, but I know he felt that.
His expression becomes fierce, barbarous, and he flips the knife in his left hand around and goes for my throat, but I duck and land a punch to his rib cage where I kicked him.
All at once, the police siren cuts through the night and the flash of blue lights flicks across the side of the building. Out of the corner of my eye I see an officer sprinting toward the stairwell.
Hold Tomás off. Just for a few more seconds.
I’ve retreated a step and my back is against the railing again.
He comes at me fast, just as the officer makes it to the top of the stairs about fifty feet away. “Drop the knives!”
I knock Agcaoili’s right hand out of the way, and the blade in his left skims across my chest. Snagging his elbow, I spin backward to get out of the way. He smacks hard against the railing and the momentum tips him forward, he flails for a moment and then falls two stories and lands on his back with a harsh crunch on the roof of a car parked below.
The police officer has his gun drawn on me. “Put your hands to the sides!”
I do.
“Down! Get down!”
As I kneel and then lie down on my stomach, I peer through the railing. Amazingly, Tomás pushes himself to his feet and scuttles off the car. A female officer is dashing toward him.
The cop by my side cuffs me.
My attention is on what’s unfolding in the parking lot. Tomás still has one of the knives in his hand and is facing down the cop who’s standing about fifteen feet from him. She has her gun aimed at Tomás’s chest and is shouting for him to drop the knife now!
Rather than pull me to my feet, the cop here on the walkway tells me to stay down, then aims his gun at Tomás to help his partner.
More sirens blare through the night.
Backup.
It’s over. They’re going to get him.
Part of me wants the officers to shoot him, to end this, to deliver swift and certain justice. A life for a life.
The police officer in the parking lot orders Tomás to drop the knife and finally he must realize that the gig is up, because he tosses the knife aside. A moment later he’s on the ground and cuffed.
Well, at least with him in custody, maybe we’ll be able to find out some answers about how Akinsanya is involved in all this and why he wanted Emilio dead.
As the cop pulls me to my feet and hustles me toward the stairs, I expect him to read me my rights like they always do in movies, but instead he just says, “What happened here?”
“I was standing outside his door waiting for you to arrive. He came at me with the knives. I was trying to defend myself.”
“I saw what you did,” he says somewhat cryptically, and I’m not sure how to take that — if he’s accepting my version of things or not. “We got a call that there was a murder.”
“It was overseas. I think if you offer him something in exchange for information, he can tell you who paid him to kill my friend. I think it’s a fugitive wanted by the FBI who goes by the code name Akinsanya.”
The officer stares at me blankly. “What?” I run through it again as succinctly as I can, and then we reach the bottom of the stairs and Charlene rushes toward me.
“Stand back, ma’am.”
From here I have no idea how things are going to play out.
The officer walks me toward one of the police cars as his partner and two other officers who’ve just arrived manhandle Tomás into another squad car.
Just how much trouble I’m in, I don’t really know.
But right now at least I’m happy about one thing.
Tomás Agcaoili is in custody.
And he is going to face justice for what he did to Emilio.
“So where is it?” Fred demanded. He was running out of both patience and time.
“This way.” Wray led him past a series of water torture chambers, spinning blade machines, and other strange apparatuses that Fred couldn’t even identify but that Banks evidently used for his escapes.
A set of fluorescent lights high above them lit the room brightly, and Fred was glad because in a place this cluttered with hiding places, he did not want Wray to slip off somehow into any shadows.
An extensive collection of handcuffs, shackles, straightjackets, ropes, and manacles lay on a wide counter attached to one wall. Swords and daggers hung on a vast pegboard. Handguns, throwing knives, targets, and walkie-talkies in various need of repair were scattered across the countertop. Fred had no way to know if the guns were genuine or just props for the show.