Rickard moved quickly up the stairs.

He paused at the door to the roof, listening. He couldn’t hear anything but that didn’t mean they weren’t there. He placed the knife between his teeth, and dropping low so he was supported on his fingers and toes, he crawled out. Alisha’s imported plants were both a blessing and a curse. They gave him cover as he made his way over to a service conduit, but they also blocked his view of anyone coming onto the roof via the fire escape.

In the shadows of the conduit, he crouched, feeding the knife from lips to hand. He didn’t have to wait long. Beyond Alisha’s palms he caught movement. Big man in dark clothing, beanie hat pulled low. The man was holding a handgun. Judging by the length of the barrel it wasn’t silenced, which Rickard found odd. Impulse was to attack the man immediately, stick him in the throat and open his carotid artery, but Rickard waited.

A second figure came over the balustrade and onto the roof. He too was dressed in dark clothing and packing a gun.

So, at least three of them. Rickard weighed the equation in his mind. Three men, possibly more, with guns. Him with a knife. No problem.

The men made their way across the roof warily, eyes scanning. They paused to whisper to each other, then one of them lifted something and pressed a button. To his credit he didn’t talk into the radio, just depressed the button in a prearranged sequence. Giving the all clear to the others downstairs.

The men paused at the open door, but then one of them shrugged and used the barrel of his gun to tease it wider. Bad form, Rickard noted: you never compromise your weapon like that. Then one of them went down the stairs. A few seconds later—a final check over his shoulder—and the second man followed into the stairwell.

Rickard moved after them.

Dressed only in trousers, chest bared, he felt primal. Like an unstoppable force of nature.

At the entrance to his apartment both men had halted. One of them nudged open the door and took a quick look into the room. The one with the radio quickly keyed the send button. Almost immediately, there was the sound of the front door crashing back on the jamb as someone powered their way inside. From the bathroom, Alisha shrieked loudly.

Good girl, Rickard thought. Her screech attracted the attention of both men in the stairwell. One of them moved forward, his friend’s hand on his shoulder.

Rickard came down the stairs silently.