The Leveling

Daria pulled up to the gate. And waited. And waited some more.

“Where’s your man?” asked Mark.

Amir lifted his head and strained to see through the front windshield. “I don’t know.”

“Is this gate always manned?”

“Always.”

“Is it locked?”

“Yes.”

Mark produced his cell phone. “Call your men.”

“The phone won’t work here.”

Mark checked, and indeed there was no reception. He considered getting out of the car and trying to scope out the situation on foot. But that would take time. Someone might be watching them now.

He leaned across Amir Bayat and used the butt of his knife to smash out the window.

“Sorry,” he said to Bayat. “The window handle was broken. Call out to your man.”

Bayat sucked in a few quick breaths, then called, “Farid?”

“Louder.”

“Farid! Open the gate!”

Mark waited. The road beyond the gate cut through the base of a ravine that was lined with stunted juniper trees and a few larger white pines. Jagged rock-strewn hills walled in the property on three sides, but it was completely open toward the south, letting in plenty of sun. Landslides of black and dun-colored scree had gathered around the base of the ravine. A flock of gray-bellied crows circled overhead.

“Fuck it,” Mark said to Daria. “Ram the gate. Get us to the house. We’ll improvise.”

Daria threw the Paykan into reverse, executed a quick turn, and then slammed into the gate with the rear of the car. The Paykan’s trunk crumpled, but the gate popped open. Once through, she turned the car around again and floored it. The Paykan bounced over the pothole-riddled road, and the rear bumper, half of which had fallen off, clattered loudly as it hit rocks in the road.

A two-story house built into the hillside at the end of the ravine came into view. Hidden from the road, it was vaguely reminiscent of a Swiss chalet, albeit a utilitarian one. The green metal roof was rusting in places. A long second-floor balcony with steel guardrails stuck out from the front. Brown paint was peeling off in places on the front of the house, where the sun was the most intense. Tucked behind an overgrown privet hedge, and barely visible from the driveway, was the front door.

“Ram the front door,” said Mark.

A man appeared on the second-floor balcony. With a gun. Daria sped up and ducked below the steering wheel.

A few shots hit the roof of the car. Daria kept the Paykan on course. When she was a few feet from the house, she slammed on the brakes. The car skidded into the front door, smashed it open, and came to a stop halfway inside the house.

Mark jumped out. “Stay in the car, low on the floor, with the engine block between you and the house,” he said to Daria. “But call out for help, in Farsi, as if you’re hurt. It’ll confuse them.”

“Who’s them?”

“Who the hell knows.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Me neither. If things get too hot, take off without me.”

Amir Bayat was still upright, but the force of the collision had thrown him forward, so that his chin now rested on the back of the front passenger seat.

Mark leaped over the hood of the Paykan and stepped silently into the house. A stairwell with a chunky wood banister led to an upper floor. Because the house had been built into a hillside, half of the first floor was underground, and there were no windows on the back wall. The lime-green carpet was soiled. The place stank of cigarette smoke and mold.

Now that he was inside, Mark noticed delicate shafts of sunlight streaming in from bullet holes all around him. In the corner lay a dead bearded man. Iranian, Mark guessed. A small trickle of blood, still bright red with oxygen, streamed down his forehead. Whatever fighting had taken place in the house had only ended recently.

Footsteps pounded across the floor upstairs. Judging from the sound, Mark guessed there were at least two men up there.

“Farid!” called Daria in Farsi, from the car. “Help me, I can’t move.”

Mark crouched behind the stairwell. One set of footsteps drew close to the top of the stairs, and then someone fired down the stairwell. If the shooter made it to the base of the stairs, he’d have a clear shot at the Paykan. He’d see Bayat and hear Daria.

Daria called out for help again.

Someone bounded down the stairs taking three at a time and firing an AK-47. Mark waited until the barrel of the gun was just past the base of the stairs and then he swung his knife deep into the chest of a slender man who looked Chinese. He yanked the gun out of the man’s hands, aimed, fired two lethal head shots, and bounded up the stairs.

A voice cried out a question in Chinese from the upper floor. Mark couldn’t understand it, but he tried to repeat the question back, hoping to cause confusion even for just a second.

Below, Daria cried out for help again, but this time, she spoke Chinese.