I nodded and settled my weight on my back foot.
Crow began a dance to a rhythm inside his head.
There’s a form of dance popular in Brazil called capoeira. To an uneducated eye its execution looks similar to the moves employed by hip-hop break-dancers, very athletic and acrobatic. But as was the case with many folk dances, it disguised a deadly purpose behind the more flamboyant flourishes and somersaults. Back in the bad old days, capoeira was a way for African slaves to continue practicing their martial arts right under the noses of their overseers, and many an unwary whip-wielding slave master had discovered the true meaning of the dance at their peril.
Crow moved constantly, his feet changing position in a triangular pattern as he performed the ginga, a ploy to deceive a combatant while he set up his next moves.
I waited.
Crow tested my defenses with a front push kick.
I merely adjusted my stance, swaying away from his uncommitted attack.
Crow smiled.
His follow-up was delivered with more intent.
He bent from his ginga, placed his right hand on the ground and pivoted on it, his back heel coming around scythe-like at my head.
I bobbed beneath his attack and his leg sailed over me. But his first kick was a feint, and he pivoted again, and the same leg swung at a lower arc, coming for my ducked head.
I’d a few unarmed combat tricks up my own sleeve. I didn’t try to leap back to avoid the kick. I stepped in and rammed the tip of my left elbow into the meat of his thigh, aiming for a cluster of nerve endings.
Crow grunted at the pain flaring through him. But he was as tough as his toned body suggested. He went onto both palms, doing a handstand, and both his heels jabbed at my face in quick succession. I had to disengage to save myself the crushing blows. Crow came back to his feet, grinning, segueing back to the ginga seamlessly despite the agony in his right leg.
Capoeiristas aren’t known for their skill with their hands. Generally, men practiced the style with their wrists bound, hence the proliferation of kicks and somersaults while supported on the palms, but it appeared that John Crow had added to his repertoire. He swept in with another front kick, but immediately followed it with a left jab and right cross taken from western boxing. His left missed but the right sent sparks through my skull as it connected with my forehead. If he’d struck a little lower I’d have been in a worse situation. As it was, my mind went black for a split second, but I counterpunched by instinct and my knuckles drove into his sternum.
Crow fell back, but the move was contrived. His rear leg absorbed the drop, bending at the knee and supporting him like a dwarf flamingo as his opposite foot shot out and got me good in the nuts. Gagging on the nausea that spilled into my guts, I took two hurried steps back, and lucky that I did. Crow placed both palms on the ground and did some sort of move akin to a gymnast on a pommel horse. His foot swept around and aimed to hook my ankle. I hopped ungainly over the top of it and staggered away, even as Crow sprung forward, stood on his hands and cartwheeled both heels at my skull. I felt the wind displacement of the first kick. Then his second heel thudded painfully into my left shoulder, and my arm went numb.
It was pointless wasting any breath on a curse. I moved laterally. Crow came after me, a literal whirling dervish. His baldy pal egged him on, chanting in rhythm to the ginga, aiding the Albino Vulture’s dance.
Okay, I told myself. Time to show them I didn’t have two left feet either.
I took a half step forward, immediately switched stance and shot out a kick at Crow’s forward leg. He took the bait, drawing his leg away and turning into a back kick. But that’s what I expected. I half stepped again, and shot the same foot in for a jab at his previously injured thigh. Crow caught the move by instinct and began to twist aside, to protect both his leg and to set up his next attack, but my two half steps added up to me closing the distance without his knowledge. I was now within the arc of his kicks and his arms were out of range to either block or counterpunch. I struck two fast blows, the first to his left kidney, the next to the back of his skull. His spongy dreadlocks absorbed some of the punch to his head, but not all. He staggered, and spittle sprayed the air as he shouted in pain. I fisted my left hand in his mane of hair, whipping his head around and into the knee I powered into his face.
Crow spat out blood.
He was one tough bastard.
He went to his hands, his heels windmilling toward my face.
All well and good but for the fact that I’d retained a hold on his dreadlocks.
I yanked his hair, pulled him bodily off his palms and spun him onto his back on the floor. Immediately I dropped a knee into his gut, pinning him down, while I rammed my fist into his face. I felt his left cheekbone compress under the onslaught. His jade-green eyes dimmed. I pounded him once more, this time aiming to crush his nose, and succeeded. He wasn’t such a handsome boy now. But neither was he finished. He spun on his shoulders, his knees coming up to butt me away. But he was in my fighting zone now and no way was I going to let him find his own range again. I went with his spin, kept my hand in his hair and knee in place and hooked my spare elbow around one questing hand that went after my eyes. Rolling back I caught him in an armlock that hyper-extended his elbow to the breaking point. I gave it that extra ounce of pressure and heard the tendons popping. Neither did I release his hair. His status symbol now became his undoing, as my hold on the dreadlocks meant he couldn’t find room to move his head and adjust any of the space between us to alleviate the agony on his elbow joint.
I yanked down on his captured hand.
His elbow broke.
Let him try any of those fancy handstands now.
He let out a howl and I kicked him away from me.
He came to his knees, bent away from me as he painfully lifted his snapped arm to his chest. He was vulnerable and I wasn’t about to waste the moment. I shuffled after him on my backside and drove the toe of my right boot deep between his legs, giving him a taste of his own medicine. Crow collapsed onto his belly, his frame contracting around the agony in his balls.
Crow’s shout of agony was echoed by one equally as full of fury as his was of pain. I came to my feet, but still at a crouch, my hand feeding into my boot.
Baldy was probably thinking he was doing the right thing for his boss, even though he’d been given implicit orders to the contrary. He came running at me, and from down the side of his jeans he pulled a concealed knife that had gone unnoticed before. It had a short handle but a long blade, and was almost a mini-machete in design. He came at a lope, the knife going up and over his shoulder. He cursed me in patois, his words lost on me.
I came to my full height, which was still a few inches below his six feet plus, but on this occasion my slighter stature was to my benefit. It meant my left arm easily got beneath his descending elbow and held off the downward swing of his knife. At the same time I plunged in and out with the push dagger in my right hand. Unlike a machete, my dagger was designed for such a task, and I found stabbing the baldy an easier task than I had when killing Hector Wallace. The diamond-shaped blade dipped in and out of his guts, and then, as he began to slump in agony, I gave it a new home in the side of his neck.
The baldy fell to the floor, and blood squirted feebly across the stained linoleum as his heart fluttered and stilled.
When I looked for John Crow, he was sitting on his ass, knees drawn up, cradling his busted elbow.
“You killed him,” he said, eyeing his friend with little emotion.
“Do I still have to kill you?” I walked over to where my SIG waited. Picking it up, I held it loosely at my side.