Remi backed up to the large fireplace that dominated the foyer. As the third man came toward her, she snatched up the poker. He took a tentative step toward her, but she didn’t budge. “You just came after me because I’m the only girl.”

He smiled.

“Bad choice.” Remi performed a fencing thrust with the fireplace poker, which extended it at least a foot farther than the man had anticipated and poked him hard in the stomach. As he bent over to grasp his stomach, Remi swung the poker overhand and hit him on the head. He straightened and charged for her, knowing that in close quarters he could overpower her. She swung as she stepped to the side, bashed the back of his head as he went by, and put him out, unmoving, on the floor.

She saw the other two had recovered and were beginning to rush Sam and so she thrust the poker between the ankles of the nearest man. As he tripped, she withdrew the poker and brought it across his head as he fell. The third man, the one who had the Škorpion machine pistol on a sling, started to raise it toward her, and Sam delivered a kick to the side of his knee. The sudden pain brought the man down, and Sam was on him to wrest the gun away.

The gun went off, firing an unaimed burst into the floor, the far wall, and the staircase. Then it was empty, and Sam delivered a punch to the face that bounced the man’s head off the floor. He took the gun and pulled the spare magazine out of the leather case attached to the sling, ejected the spent one and inserted the spare.

Remi was already halfway across the foyer to the dining room. They both could hear the thunderous sound of many booted feet coming down the stairs from the second and third floors.

Sam caught up with her, and they dashed through the huge formal dining room, with its thirty-foot table, and then ran into the kitchen. Sam whispered, “Do you know where we’re going?”

“We need to get out, but we can’t go outside yet or they’ll get a clear shot at us.”

“We’ll have to try to make a splash from here.” Sam bolted the door to the dining room, ran to the other side of the kitchen and bolted the door to the back stairway, then locked the door that led outside. They could hear running feet outside as men got into position.

Sam went to the big restaurant-sized gas stove and turned on the burners. There was no sound except the electric starters clicking repeatedly as they produced a spark. “They turned off the gas,” he said. “Electricity’s still on because they expect to catch us in the lights.”