Shadow Soldier by Dana Marton

open the door already? What was he waiting for?
    Unease lifted the short hairs at her nape and she moved inch by inch into the darkest spot in the room, the shadow of the staircase. She heard some scraping at the door, the noise so faint she wasn’t sure if she had just imagined it. Her gaze darted around for a weapon. Where was a baseball bat when you needed one? Or a ball, for that matter. She’d been the best pitcher on the embassy team in China.
    A good frying pan would have done as well, but she was too far from the kitchen. No heavy candleholders, either, and not a poker in sight, the living room didn’t have a fireplace. The nearest piece of furniture was an end table with a few of the dog-eared magazines she had paged through earlier.
    Great. Someone was breaking in and the worst she would be able to do was to give him a paper cut. Moonlight glinted on something half-covered by a magazine—an ashtray. She grabbed it, pleased at the weight of the heavy glass, then watched in wide-eyed alarm as the door opened without sound.
    Seconds passed before she could see the dark figure creeping forward—the intruder was shorter than Alex. He looked around, then disarmed the alarm.
    So much for security.
    The man stole forward in silence, or if he made noise she sure couldn’t hear it through the rushing blood in her ears. She had only one chance. She aimed the ashtray for the spot between his eyes and hurled it through the air with all her strength.
    Â 
    A LEX FLIPPED OPEN his vibrating cell phone. Security breach at the back door. Damn it, Nicola. He’d told her to stay put. He moved toward the house, waiting for the alarm to go off. He hadn’t shown her how to disarm it for a reason. But as he neared the house, he didn’t hear the low-pitched sound, set loud enough only to alert those in the house but not the whole countryside.
    Someone had disabled the system. He held his gun at the ready but didn’t rush. Couldn’t afford to make a mistake now. He set the phone on the right channel to communicate with her. “Nicola?”
    No response.
    He kept in the shadow of the house, close to the wall. The back door stood open. Nobody outside that he could see. Keeping his body in cover, he looked inside. A dark figure of a man loomed in the living room. He was rising from his knees.
    Alex tucked the gun behind his back, not wanting to alert with gunfire the intruder’s partners if he had any. He stepped inside, careful not to make any noise, then launched himself at the man. An elbow slammed into his stomach hard, but he’d been ready for it. His right hand went around the man’s neck, going for the windpipe.
    â€œ Basta, Rodriguez, get off me.” The muffled words stopped him on the brink of doing permanent damage.
    He let go but got his gun ready as he allowed the man to turn around.
    â€œSpike, you dumbass.” He stepped back to the door and closed it. “I almost killed you.”
    â€œIf I wasn’t half-knocked-out already, you couldn’t have gotten within half a mile of me.” Spike limped to the couch.
    Alex spotted Nicola pressed against the wall bythe staircase. He stared at her neck. “Where is your necklace?”
    â€œI took it off for the shower.”
    She was safe. He felt too relieved to be appropriately annoyed. “Don’t ever do that again. You all right?”
    â€œGot a bump on my forehead the size of a small egg,” Spike answered instead.
    â€œYou deserve it. ¿Qué quieres? ”
    â€œThe Colonel said to see if you recovered yet.”
    â€œHe probably meant to ask me, to see if I looked healthy enough. Are you crazy, coming in like that? I could have killed you.” He didn’t even want to think about it.
    â€œYou could have tried.” Spike shrugged, cocky as hell.
    Alex shook his head and bit back his frustration. Both anger and a lecture would have been wasted on the man. Spike was