Deep Sleep (Devin Gray #1)(7)
The second attacker pushed his wilted colleague out of the way, then sliced wildly to create some space before quickly settling into a tight knife-fighting stance. Blade in close, pointed at Devin, off hand raised to block or deflect the baton. The guy knew what he was doing. Devin considered scrambling up the stairs but just as quickly dismissed the idea.
Timed with the right baton strike, Devin might be able to disengage from the fight and get up the stairs unscathed, but the chances were just as likely that he wouldn’t. He’d be giving up a controlled close-quarters engagement for a mad dash—that might or might not work.
The guy made the decision for him, thrusting with the knife and taking a small, noncommittal step forward—a basic feint designed to test Devin’s discipline. He kept the baton raised and remained in place, eliciting a grimace from his attacker. The man had just accepted the basic reality of their predicament. This would end terribly for one of them, and there was no guarantee it wouldn’t be him. The heavy fire door on the stairwell landing above slammed shut, signaling Chase’s escape onto the fifth floor.
His opponent’s eyes tracked the noise, briefly flickering between Devin and the stairs a few too many times. Done right, the man could carefully retreat up the stairs and keep Devin out of striking distance. When his eyes darted in the other direction, checking out the stairwell door, Devin saw an opportunity to tip the entire encounter in his favor. He shifted a few feet to the left, subtly eliminating the stairs as an option. The man smirked—before breaking for the door.
Devin made short work of him. The combination of slowing to open the door and being in a compromised fighting stance sealed his fate. Devin’s first blow struck his knife arm at the wrist, knocking the blade clear across the stairwell. The second came straight at his face, exploding the man’s nose and knocking his head against the door edge. A third connected squarely with his right collarbone, most likely cracking it based on the sound made on impact. He grabbed the guy by the back of the suit collar and yanked him away from the door before sweeping the side of the man’s knee with a full-force blow. The leg crumpled, and Devin tossed him onto his unconscious colleague.
Staring at them for a few moments, he noted that they looked older than he had originally reported. More like late fifties, possibly early sixties. Both of them in better shape than their presumed ages suggested, but definitely older than he’d expected. Which explained why he’d been able to put them down so easily. His thirty-seven-year-old frame had twenty years less wear and tear.
“Both hostiles neutralized. One unconscious. One immobile,” said Devin. “Where do you want me?”
“We really need to get Chase out of here now. He’s unraveling. He’ll draw too much attention if he leaves with the rest of us.”
“I’ll be right up,” said Devin. “We’ll take the eastern stairwell down.”
“I’ll reroute the backup team to clear it. You okay?”
“Not a scratch. They were pros, but not top tier,” said Devin.
“The team we sent into room four thirty-four might not agree. They took a beating.”
“Sounded like it,” said Devin. “I’m on the way.”
A few mercifully uneventful minutes later, a black armored Suburban carried him away from the hotel along with Brian Chase, his three colleagues from the rooftop bar, and a heavily armed security operative from the firm’s special activities group. Unlike his slightly inebriated and oblivious dinner companions, Chase had been traumatized by the evening’s unexpected turn of events. The shallow, irregular breathing. Fidgety hands. Trouble focusing, which caused him to squint. Devin knew the signs. He was dealing with all of them himself.
Tonight had been a first for him. In the twelve years he’d spent “ghosting” foreign intelligence officers and spies for the FBI’s Special Surveillance Group, he had never carried a weapon. Never needed one, even while working operatives known to be dangerous. The fact that he’d cracked three skulls on his first full field operation with MINERVA didn’t sit well. That and having to square off against professional killers.
Maybe he should have known better, since they’d spent so much time on his hand-to-hand combat and weapons training, but he truly hoped tonight’s fiasco was an outlier—or his time at the firm would be short lived. Where he landed after MINERVA was anyone’s guess. Devin wasn’t exactly a sought-after commodity in the industry, even if his dismissal from the FBI hadn’t been his fault. More of an unfortunate and irreversible technicality, compliments of his mother’s mental disintegration.
Being the son of a psychotically paranoid former CIA officer came with a few drawbacks. Losing his security clearance, a requirement to remain employed at the FBI, had turned out to be one of them. Going radioactive was another. A lot of good people at the bureau cashed in serious favors just to get him through the door for an interview. Quitting MINERVA this soon after joining would ensure he never worked in the counterintelligence industry again.
The best he could hope for was a corporate investigative security position on the other side of the country or private investigative work. If it came down to the latter, he’d go back to school and reinvent himself. Get a PhD in military history and teach at Annapolis. Or a law degree to specialize in representing foreign state clients accused of espionage. Really stick it to the FBI and Department of Justice.