Yes, the shutter. After his meeting tomorrow he would take a moment to go on Yelp and write another scathing review of the handyman service.
He made his way down the stairs with the bearing of a king, the amber glow from the tiny art spotlight floating ahead of him, ever dimmer and more diffuse. He didn’t bother turning on a light at the bottom of the stairs. The white of the streetlight at the end of the block came in through the transom above the front door. Turning, he made his way toward the back of the house. His study was just beyond the dining room. He would shut the study door, and shut the heavy pocket doors to the dining room on his way back.
Bang thump . . . bang thump . . . bang thump . . .
The sleet tapping on the windows seemed louder to him down here for some reason. His level of irritation rose as he realized he must have neglected to turn off the lamp in the study. The glow came into the dining room from across the far hallway. The dining room seemed cold and drafty. The diaphanous white curtain at the French doors to the patio drifted into the room, fluttering like a ghost in a movie.
The chill he felt then came from within.
One of the doors stood open a foot or so—just enough for a person to slip inside.
Lucien stood frozen, unable to think, unable to move.
The dark figure came from the direction of his study. A ninja! he thought in astonishment. A silent intruder dressed entirely in black, even the hands covered; even the head was covered in black, only the eyes showing. Eyes looking straight at him, shining black, like an animal’s.
Lucien drew a breath to call out, but no sound came out of his suddenly bone-dry mouth. It felt as if the walls of his throat were stuck together, cutting off his air, as if an unseen hand had him by the neck.
In the next instant, the violence began like a sudden, terrible storm. The ninja came at him, and was on him before he could do more than stagger back and slam into the dining room table. The strength and power of the assailant was overwhelming. He felt like a frail old man, like his bones would snap and crumble to dust beneath the other’s strength.
And they did. His collarbone shattered beneath the first strike. He could raise only one arm up to protect his head, and it went numb as he was struck on the wrist.
The attacker’s fists were like iron, raining down blow after blow. Lucien scrambled to get away, falling toward the open patio door, landing on one knee on the hardwood floor. His kneecap exploded with pain. Even as he tried to crawl for the door, he looked back over his shoulder.
The faint light caught for a second—not on the fist of his assailant, but on the weapon he clutched in one hand. The nunchaku: two handles fashioned of iron-hard oak connected at one end by a short horsehair rope. The ninja wielded the weapon as a club, bringing it down with vicious intent, striking Lucien’s head once, then twice.
His vision blurred as his eye socket collapsed. He heard the crunch of his skull fracturing beneath the second blow. He lost consciousness before he could register the next strike. He was unaware as the assailant kicked him viciously in the ribs and then stepped behind him and brought the himo, the horsehair rope that linked the two handles, beneath his chin and used the ancient weapon as a garrote to choke him until his tongue came out of his mouth, swollen and purple.
The assailant dropped him to the floor in a heap, and dropped the bloody nunchaku beside him. Shards of bone penetrated the left frontal lobe of Lucien’s brain, severing neural pathways, disconnecting the structures vital for forming thought and emotion. The damage set off an electrical storm, sending random signals to his limbs. His arms and legs jerked and twitched like those of a marionette in the hands of a mad puppet master.
*
THE ASSAILANT STOOD BACK and watched by the silvered light that fell through the patio door, mesmerized as the victim’s arms and legs jumped and flopped. The movement subsided slowly until the man lay still on the floor.
The face was caved in like a smashed jack-o’-lantern’s. His right cheek was lying in a pool of blood. The left eye hung from its shattered socket by a tangle of nerves and blood vessels. The nose was a lump of mush. He was still breathing in irregular fits and starts, gurgles and wheezes, causing tiny bubbles to form in the bloody mess of his mouth. Several teeth lay scattered on the Oriental rug.
The weapon lay near the man’s mangled left hand, as if he had been the one wielding it. Blood and hair stuck to the heavy oak handles.
Pulling a cell phone from a pocket, the killer leaned down close and took a photograph of the victim’s face, and then took another from slightly above, making sure to get the weapon in the picture, feeling almost giddy with the rush of excitement.