The next thing I tried was improvisation, no thought, just muscle memory. I pushed back against the guy using his body mass as an anchor. Just threw myself backward at him and leveraged his strength and resistance by walking up the tree I had been hiding behind. When I got more or less horizontal I kicked off, used the muscle power of my quads and calves to explode into him with all my weight. The guy was strong, but no one’s that strong, and he went over, stumbling down the incline until we both crashed into the river.

The shock of the fall and the water was enough to loosen his grip, so that I managed to squeeze my chin into my chest and duck out from under his forearm. Then I spun myself around like a wrestler, boots scrambling in the shallow riverbed, and jumped off him. I backed up into a fighting crouch, catching my breath. I could hardly see the guy, just a massive shadow in front of me. The shadow came at me instantly and aggressively. He was about my height, compact and muscular.

The guy came at me with a left cross, so I stepped left and threw a right hook into his nose. It connected and crunched, but that didn’t stop him. He followed with an elbow into my ribcage that landed like a sack of bricks. I fought the pain, stepped up and kicked him in the knee, which made the guy stagger a little, giving me the chance to send an elbow to his right temple. That didn’t land too solid, just glanced off him. By which time he had grabbed me around the waist and was pulling me into a bear hug.

We were now face to face. Two guys battling in the dark, splashing in the water. I couldn’t see his features because it was dark, and he was too close to me, squeezing as hard as he could. My face was pressed into his skull, which was cleanly shaved and smelled like aloe-vera moisturizing lotion. He smelled familiar.

I grabbed his face and thrust thumbs into both of his eyes. I had to go deep before he let go of me. Then I was done fooling around. I scrambled up the incline and found the gun. Got the H&K up and ready. The guy was already coming back at me from the river. I clicked the safety off and he stopped. The guy was a shadow, about four yards from me.

I said, “Grouse.”

The guy was breathing hard. He coughed out a laugh. “Yeah. How’d you know.”

Everything clicked into place for me then, like a Rubik’s cube solving itself or a series of tumblers and cogs clicking in satisfaction. I said, “Your skin care products.”

“So what do you want?”

“If you’re not a cop, I want to know who you work for.”

Grouse spat. “Forget about it.”