The flashlight flew straight up into the air. On its way down, the assassin snatched it — just because she could.
Damn, she felt invincible right now.
She pointed both beams at El-Hashim, lying now in the water, her body trembling.
“I bring a message from your employer,” the assassin said. “Your services are no longer needed.”
The fear suddenly turned to shock. “The committee sent you?”
“Life’s a bitch, ain’t it?”
The assassin reached down and put a hand on each side of El-Hashim’s head. The woman grabbed at them, trying to pull them off, while rolling side to side.
The assassin dropped her knee onto the woman’s chest, pinning her down. “Just relax,” she said. “This will be nice and easy.”
“No! No! Let go of me!”
As she ran, Alex discovered that the edges of the floor curved up into the wall. If she traveled along them, she could minimize the amount of water she stepped in. This helped her increase her speed while making little noise. Her new pace wasn’t fast enough, however, to keep the attacker from reaching El-Hashim.
Alex saw El-Hashim go down and the woman jump on her, grabbing for El-Hashim’s head.
There were some words, but Alex didn’t try to listen.
She raced forward, the rock gripped tightly in her hand. As she angled herself to circle around them, she pulled her arm back and swung it forward, flinging the rock into the attacker’s forehead.
Right before the stone connected, she registered the woman’s battered face.
Frida.
Alex had no time to consider what this might mean as Frida flew backward with a watery thud against the stone floor.
Grabbing the flashlights, Alex pulled El-Hashim to her feet.
“Come on!”
Frida remembered the feel of the woman’s head in her hands. But what she didn’t remember was how she had ended up on her back, with El-Hashim gone.
Pushing herself up on her elbows, a wave of dizziness swept over her, nearly sending her back down. She gritted her teeth through it, then stood up.
Pain radiated through her forehead, and there was water trickling down her face. She reached up to wipe it off, winced, and jerked her hand away, looking at her fingers.
Though it was too dark to see them, she knew they were covered in blood.
How long had she been out?
Minutes? Hours?
Listening carefully, she heard rapid footsteps moving away. Two sets.
Powell, goddammit. Frida knew not finishing her off before would be a problem.
At least they hadn’t gone far, so that meant she must have been out for only a few seconds.
She didn’t care that she didn’t have a flashlight.
She could operate in the dark.
She had always operated in the dark.
“Hurry,” Alex urged.
El-Hashim had been limping since they left Frida behind, but that wasn’t what was slowing her down. She seemed distracted, even stunned.
“What did she say to you?” Alex asked, still hardly believing that Frida was the assassin.
El-Hashim didn’t respond, lost in her own thoughts.
“What did Frida say to you?”
El-Hashim came around now. “Frida?”
“The woman who was sitting on your chest. Frida was the name she used in the prison.”
“She’s…the one they sent to kill me.”
“Who sent to kill you?”
It was obvious El-Hashim had descended into thought again, so Alex decided to drop it for now.
The map was soaking wet as she pulled it from her pocket, but at least the lines were still visible. According to Teterya’s directions, there was one more false tunnel, then a straight shot to the end of a passageway that would lead to the rendezvous point, where hopefully Deuce and Cooper would be waiting.
Before they reached that point, though, she still had to get them through this godforsaken tunnel, and get El-Hashim to tell her how to contact her father.
She pointed the light ahead, and spotted the split with the last tunnel.
“Come on,” she said, giving El-Hashim a tug. “We’re getting close.”
With every step, Frida’s mind cleared a little more.
She knew Powell and El-Hashim had to be getting near the end of the tunnel. She also knew if they were able to reach it, her job would become exponentially much more difficult.
So she was surprised when she saw the beam of the flashlight less than a minute later. El-Hashim and Powell were walking not nearly as rapidly as Frida had expected. As the gap between her and her target narrowed, she thought she could hear Powell urging El-Hashim on.
And a moment later she saw why.
El-Hashim was limping.
Hurt when I took her down. Good.
Frida was only twenty feet away from them when her toe caught on a hole where a stone should have been. She grabbed at the wall, searching for a handhold, but her momentum was already carrying her toward the center of the tunnel.
With a loud splash, she stepped into the water, and started to fall to the ground. She jammed a hand down onto the stone floor, catching herself at the last second.
As she shoved herself back up, the beam of light caught her in the face.
“Go!” Powell yelled. “Run!”
Alex would have liked to take the final false tunnel and execute the plan she was going to do before, but with Frida somewhere behind them, that wasn’t an option. As they passed the junction, she noticed that El-Hashim’s limp seemed more prominent than before.
“Is it your knee?” she asked.
“Yes,” El-Hashim said, pain lacing her voice. “It’s hard to bend it now. I think maybe it is swollen.”
“We’ll take a look at it when we get out. And the faster you go, the sooner that’ll happen. Lean more on me.” Alex slipped her arm around El-Hashim’s back. “There. That help?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s see if we can pick up the pace.”
They had taken no more than three steps when Alex heard a splash in the tunnel behind them.
She let go of El-Hashim and twisted around, bringing the flashlight with her.
Frida.
There was blood on the assassin’s forehead where the rock had smashed into her, but it didn’t seem to be fazing her.
“Go!” Alex said to El-Hashim. “Run!”
El-Hashim got the message. Though she didn’t exactly run, she took off at a faster speed.
Frida charged. By the angle she took, it looked as though she intended to run right past Alex and go after El-Hashim.
But Alex wasn’t about to let that happen.
She waited until Frida was five feet away, then launched herself, knocking into the other woman’s shoulder, and slamming the crown of her head against Frida’s jaw. In a tangle, they crashed against the wall, the flashlight falling to the floor, its beam now pointing across the width of the tunnel.
Frida tried to pull herself free, but Alex kept her arms wrapped around her as she turned her back toward the center of the tunnel, and hooked her foot behind the killer’s. Down they went, Alex on top, water soaking both of them.
Frida screamed in rage. She jerked side to side, trying to get her arms free, then jammed her knee up into Alex’s thigh. The sudden pain was enough to momentarily loosen Alex’s hold.
Frida ripped her arm from Alex’s grasp, and shoved her hand into Alex’s face, pushing her back. With her other fist, she repeatedly jabbed Alex in the ribs.
Alex could feel her hold on the woman slipping away. Frida must have sensed it, too. With a final, extra hard push, she sent Alex tumbling to the side.