The way she was about to do again.
“Hang back a bit,” she told Malik. “I want a Q&A session with him.”
“You want a what?”
She wanted a chance to grill the prick. But?—
“I think he’s making a move,” Malik suddenly groused. “Coming on your left, watch out. Watch?—”
She spun around, one hand on the phone, the other clutching her mace. Sure enough, the jerk was running hard and fast at her. He also had a knife gripped in his hand.
Someone was a one-trick pony.
She sprayed her mace, aiming right for his eyes, and he screamed. That scream was loud and desperate, and, instinctively, he dropped the knife as he moved to cover his eyes.
“FBI agent, you asshole,” she snarled at him. “You don’t stalk and attack an FBI agent unless you are looking for a world of pain.”
He blinked over and over as his eyes streamed. The street lamp glowed over him as his lips twisted into a snarl. With a shout, he barreled right at her. He was way bigger than she was. Nearly twice her size, and his bear-like hands grabbed for Agnes.
She stepped to the side. Those teary eyes of his weren’t going to provide him with the best vision. Maybe that was why he didn’t see her leg slide out in a quick glide. Her gliding foot hooked him, and he went crashing down on the pavement before her.
Before he could leap to his feet, she was on him. Agnes shoved her phone into her pocket, and she put her gun to the back of his head. “Freeze.” Then in case he’d somehow missed this ever-so-important point of… “FBI Agent. You just tried to stab an FBI agent!”
Malik would be coming in, despite her polite request for him to hang back a bit. Not like Mr. True Blue would hang back when she’d nearly been stabbed. The Fed and cop hangout was about twenty yards away. She was about to be swarmed as “help” burst out of that bar. But first…
“Asshole, who sent you after me?” Agnes demanded. Like she didn’t know a targeted attack when one came stalking through the dark after her.
His hands slapped onto the pavement. “Cass!”
Her heart just stopped. Pain knifed through her. No way, no way could Cass have done that to her. She’d profiled him. She’d been so sure that he was the one she needed. That she was?—
“That prick is gonna pay!” A vow from her would-be attacker.
Her gun pressed harder against him as she tried to make sense of his shout. He was saying Cass had paid him to kill her? No, that could not?—
“He’ll pay for fucking me up!”
Oh, wait. Her breath left in a relieved rush.
“He’ll pay because I’ll kill his girlfriend!”
His girlfriend? “Uh, I think you have the wrong idea,” she began. How did one tactfully explain to an attacker that he’d just gone after a one-night stand and not some emotionally involved and invested girlfriend? “Cass won’t give two shits about what happens to me.”
The guy heaved up. His hands had pushed hard against the pavement, and he levered onto his knees. She eased the gun back an inch or two because it wasn’t like she wanted to accidentally shoot him in the head.
Or…not so accidentally do it.
Nope, not me. I’m a good FBI agent.
Even though the jerk had been sneaking up to stab her in the back. Such a dick move.
Footsteps thundered nearby. “Agnes!” Malik shouted.
Right. The cavalry was there. Good guys, at full attention.
“Turn around,” Agnes ordered the perp. “Slowly. And keep your hands up every second.”
Slowly, he turned. He also rose to his feet. Towered over her. As if she’d be intimidated by a guy with constant tears streaming down his cheeks and dripping into his bushy beard.
