Breathing hard, Shada reached over and snatched the knife from Karoly’s limp hand, cutting her safety line before she wound up tangled in it herself. The fight hadn’t taken long and had been reasonably quiet, but odds were that Karoly’s client had heard the ruckus and would be coming to investigate. If she could arrange to meet him halfway&mdash
A movement at the corner of her eye was her only warning. But it was enough. Even as she threw herself to the side in a flat dive a blaster bolt sizzled through the air where she’d been standing. She rolled back to her knees, eyes sweeping the raised section of rooftop and locating her assailant: a prone figure in a black poncho and hood, the protruding snout of his blaster rifle tracking toward her. Snapping her hand up, Shada threw Karoly’s knife toward him.
The sniper rolled instantly to the side, leaning his head into the relative protection of his arms and rifle, the weapon now spitting its deadly fire on repeater mode as it tracked toward her. But in this case the old bounty hunter’s reflex had betrayed him. The knife spun precisely into its intended target not the dodging sniper himself, but the flicker of blaster fire from his weapon. It cut across right in front of the gun barrel, the bolts catching the blade and blasting it apart in a blue of molten shards and reflected light.
And for the next pair of heartbeats the sniper would be effectively blind.
Two heartbeats was all Shada needed. She came all the way up off the roof, leaping over the sputtering blaster fire now tracking blindly toward her, fingers darting into her plaited hair for one of the lacquered zenji needles. It came free in a cascade of loosened coils; and as her feet hit the roof again, she threw it.
And with a muffled clatter the blaster fell silent.
She was beside the sniper in an instant, twisting the weapon out of the dead man’s hands and running across the roof. If the sniper was merely the backup and not the main attack, she might still have failed. Skidding to a halt beside the skylight, she crouched at its edge and peered down into the high-ceilinged room below.
She hadn’t failed. Three meters below her was an ornate decorated table, with Mazzic and Griv on one side and the Kubaz and a rough-looking human on the other. The two sides had already exchanged cases and were in the process of checking their new prizes. The Kubaz shut his case after what seemed to be a cursory examination, standing stiffly behind the table with an obvious air of expectation about him. It took Mazzic another minute to be similarly satisfied with his side of the trade, then he too close d his case. He nodded pleasantly to the Kubaz and took a step back from the table, his mouth moving with what were probably his usual farewell remarks. The Kubaz remained where he was . and as Mazzic and Griv took another step back, his air of expectation gave way to one of puzzlement. His long snout twitched in indecision, clearly wanting to look up but just as clearly not wanting to telegraph the surprise ending he was still expecting.
Still, if a surprise was all he wanted, Shada could oblige him. Lining the blaster rifle up on the base of the alien’s long snout, she tapped the barrel lightly against the skylight.’
All four of them looked up. The Kubaz’s expression was impossible to read, but his companion’s more than made up for it. His mouth fell open in stunned disbelief, his hand dropping to the blaster belted at his side. Shada shifted her aim to his forehead; slowly, he raised the hand-empty-to his chest. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Mazzic throw her an abbreviated salute, and then he and Griv walked out of her field of view.
Shack kept her weapon trained on the Kubaz and his friend for a count of thirty. Then, throwing them the same salute Mazzic had just given her, she backed away from the skylight.
“It’s over?” Karoly’s voice asked from behind her.
Shada turned to look. The younger woman was standing beside the dead assassin at the edge of the upper roof, her expression impossible to read. “Yes,” Shada told her. “Your client decided not to go back on the deal after all.”
Karoly looked down at the body at her feet. “The Eleven aren’t going to be happy about this.”
“I’m used to people not being happy with me,” Shada sighed, lowering the blaster rifle to the rooftop. “I’ll get by.”
“This is not a joking matter, Shada,” Karoly growled. “You’ve been given a direct order. You stay with Mazzic now and they’ll have a squad on you before the week’s over.”
“I’m not staying with Mazzic,” Shada said. “As I told you, I’ll resign as his bodyguard tonight.”
“And you think that will fix this with the Eleven?” Karoly scoffed.