“I don’t know who the fuck you are, but you should not be here.” The merc’s words were a final indication of our fate.

“We came here to kill you,” I snapped. My words covered the faint click from behind my back.

They also served to focus the mercenary’s attention fully on me. He sneered, aimed the gun directly at my head. “You are in no shape for killing anyone.”

Rink is right-handed. But he has trained to use his left when in a pinch. As I dipped away from him, shoving against Harvey with my shoulder, the mercenary’s gun followed. Rink’s left arm had clearance and it came up in a blur. He launched the switchblade like some sort of Ninja move, a weird underhand flick that sent it unerringly at the mercenary’s gut.

The man reacted, trying to avoid the missile. His bullets churned a line through the ceiling even as Harvey and I ducked low. The knife jabbed into him just below his left ribs. Not a fatal wound by any stretch of the imagination, but Rink was already moving.

Ten feet had separated us, and Rink covered it in less than a second. He got an arm under the machine gun, ramming it higher in the air. Wasted bullets blasted plaster from the ceiling a second time. He got his other hand on the hilt of the knife and he ripped sideways. The man’s gut was laid open, but Rink wasn’t finished. He tugged the blade loose, then jammed it into the meat of the man’s neck just below the lobe of his left ear.

Now that wound was fatal.

The German dropped facedown. Rink stood over him, then reached down to pluck the knife free and wiped it clean on the man’s shirt. He turned to me with a cold smile, waggling the knife. “Bet you’re pleased I gave you this now?”

I’d almost forgotten about the knife that Rink took off Wetherby’s henchman back in Miami. It had just been one of those things that I’d transferred from my pockets with each change of clothing, along with cash and wallet and a couple of other oddments.

Harvey ran a palm over his slick forehead. “Jesus, you guys, I wish you’d warn me when you’re going to go all Shogun Assassin on me.”

We laughed. Sometimes I forget that Harvey didn’t spend all those years fighting alongside the two of us. Together Rink and me are finely tuned and can work symbiotically. But Harvey was getting there. Couple more situations like this and he would be part of the hive mentality we shared.

“Wasn’t no samurai move.” Rink grinned at Harvey as he joined us. “Got that one from West Side Story.”

We gathered up our weapons. Harvey was muttering at Rink in good nature, eliciting an even wider grin.