Separation of Power

chapter TWENTY-THREE

Rapp rounded the last corner and instead of taking a hard right and coming up directly behind the car, he crossed over to the other side of the street. He was breathing hard from the sprint but ignored the pain. He was too close to getting the answer he desperately needed. Rapp saw the car up ahead on his right as he ran down the sidewalk in a slight crouch. His eyes scanned the parked cars and sidewalk for any signs of trouble. There was no turning back.

He was close now. He kept his eye on the car at the next corner and then slowed enough to cut in between two parked vehicles. He darted out into the street at the perfect place. He was in the car's blind spot, moving toward it quickly. Rapp drew his gun with his left hand and took aim. With ten feet to go he squeezed the trigger.

The bullet leaving the thick black silencer barely made a noise, and the safety glass window breaking on the driver's side wasn't much louder. At least from the exterior of the car, but from the inside it was considerably louder. The man sitting behind the wheel jerked spastically in reaction to the shattered glass. His arms flew up in a vain attempt to stop the thousands of broken pieces from hitting him.

Rapp was now at the window. It had taken less than a second for him to fire the shot and get to the door. The man's hands were up shielding his face, and the glass was still tumbling from his lap to the floor of the car. Rapp reached in with his right hand and grabbed the mans wrist. Rapp's pistol was still in his left hand and he reached in to smack the man with the butt end of the grip. He aimed for the man's temple. Just before the hard metal made contact the man yelled, and then his body went limp from the sharp blow.

Quickly, Rapp unlocked the door and opened it. He immediately removed the man's gun from his hip holster, and threw it into the backseat as he continued his search. While looking for a backup weapon it occurred to him that he'd almost missed something. He'd been breathing so hard, and the adrenaline was coursing through his veins so fast, that it didn't register what the man had yelled, and more importantly, what language he had yelled it in. The man had sworn in Hebrew.

rosenthal's pistol was trained on the woman. He slowly approached her from his corner of the room. She was on her butt, her body limp and leaning against the side of the chair. Her pistol was a good eight feet away sitting in the middle of the hardwood floor. Rosenthal was pretty sure she was dead. He'd hit her once in the shoulder and then in the head. He'd put one more in her just to make sure.

With his gun still aimed at her he called for his partner through clenched lips, "Jordan." There was no answer. "Jordan, can you hear me? Are you all right?"

Rosenthal tried to make sense of what had just happened. How had she known they were waiting for her? What had he done wrong? How would he explain to the colonel that he had lost Jordan Sunberg? Rosenthal was pondering these questions when out of nowhere came a loud noise over his earpiece and then the voice ofdavidyanta swearing in Hebrew. Rosenthal stopped dead in his tracks. Yanta was a professional, and knew that under no circumstances were they ever to speak in their native tongue while on a mission. For him to make such a mistake someone had to have surprised him. Rosenthal had lost one man and maybe two. He was jolted by the horrible sinking feeling of going from the hunter to the hunted in just seconds. With one hand on his lip mike and the other holding his gun he began to call in earnest for Yanta to check in.

donatella HAD landed on her butt. She was leaning against the chair with one of her legs bent under her. Her shoulder hadn't begun to throb yet. It was too early for that, but she felt a stinging sensation on the back of her scalp. One of the shots must have grazed her. Her head was tilted down, her chin resting on her chest. She looked dead, or at the least, unconscious. She didn't dare move, not without her pistol. The man would have to come closer.

With her hair hanging down in front of her face she cracked her eyes ever so slightly. She looked for her Walther, but it was nowhere in sight. She heard the man's steps as he approached her. She'd have to act dead. Donatella tried to discern if there were any more of them. The man called out someone's name, but there was no response. That must have been the one she'd killed with the head shot.

Donatella took a quick inventory of her body. Her right arm was useless, but she still had both her legs and her left hand, which was thankfully still holding onto the knife. The man would not be able to see the weapon since she held the blade flat against her forearm.

The man took another step forward. "David, come in. Can you hear me?"

He was checking with his partner on the street. That was good; he was distracted. The shoes came another step closer and the man was standing right in front of her. Through her hair she could see the gun that was pointed at her head. Donatella knew what she had to do. She jerked her head away from the gun and brought her left hand up at the same time. The razor sharp blade sliced through the flesh and tendons of the man's wrist. The silenced gun thudded to the floor before a shot could be fired.

Donatella's next move was a vicious kick that just barely caught the man's groin, but nonetheless sent him retreating across the room. In that fleeting moment Donatella abandoned the knife and lunged for the man's gun. The man realized his mistake and stopped his retreat. With his life in the balance, he stepped forward and dove for the gun. Donatella beat him to it by less than a second. She grabbed the gun with her left hand just as he landed on top of her. The force of him hitting her sent them skidding across the hardwood floor. It was her good arm against his good arm.

Donatella wrestled to get free and Rosenthal struggled to keep her down. She was on her back, and he was on top of her. He was stronger and had the leverage. The gun started to move closer to Donatella's head. Her brain sent signals to her wounded right arm to do something. With incredible effort it began to twitch. Donatella felt herself losing her grip on the pistol and she lashed out. The man's head was just above her. She opened her mouth wide, lifted her head off the floor and bit down as hard as she could. After just a second she could taste the warm salty blood of the man's right ear dripping into her mouth. The man growled in pain, but did not release his grip. Donatella kept her jaw locked and started shaking her head violently. In her teeth she could feel the ear tearing away from the mans head. His groan turned into an all out scream, but his grip stayed firm.

The thought occurred to Donatella again that she was going to die, that this man was too tough for her. It was this feeling of absolute desperation that caused her right arm to move, and when it did it bumped into a familiar object. Donatella closed her eyes, as her fingertips searched the familiar shape. After what seemed like an eternity she had it in her hand. With agonizing pain she picked it up and released her bite on the mans ear.

His head snapped around, his ear barely still attached, flapping loosely down by his neck. He looked at her with absolute rage in his eyes. Her sweaty left hand lost the battle over his gun and he twisted it from her grip. Any feeling of accomplishment or celebration that he might have felt was short-lived. Donatella stuck her silenced Walther .22 against the bloody spot where the man's ear should have been and pulled the trigger. Rosenthal's head jerked violently, his eyes opened wide with the horror of what had just happened and then his whole body went limp. Donatella did not have the strength to move. She just lay there, covered by the body of the man she'd killed.