Read Online London Twist: A Delilah Novella by Barry Eisler - Free Book Online Page A

he flicked his right arm out and a collapsible steel baton snapped into position. Delilah watched in adrenalized slow motion as the shorter guy kept turning, turning, and now the lead man had planted his left foot and the baton was rocketing in like a tennis forehand, and the shorter guy must have picked up the problem in his peripheral vision because he started to flinch, his shoulders reflexively rising, his arms coming up, his head turtling in, but it was too late, and before he could reverse his turn, the baton whipped into his face. His head blew back and his legs went flying out from under him, shattered teeth tumbling through the air as he fell. Delilah could tell from the instant loss of rigidity in his limbs that he was out before he even hit the pavement.
    The taller guy hadn’t even begun to come to grips with his shock before the trailing man had reached him. He grabbed the taller guy by the back of his collar and suddenly there was a knife in his hand, pressed against the taller guy’s throat.
    “Is there a problem?” the trailing man said in English. Delilah wasn’t sure of the accent—Punjabi, she thought, though maybe Urdu. Not Arabic.
    Other than a pair of extremely bulging and frightened eyes, the taller guy seemed too stunned even to respond.
    The trailing guy pressed the knife harder. “I said, is there a fucking problem?”
    The taller guy vibrated his head no, as though he wanted to shake it violently but was too mindful of the knife. “No. No problem.”
    “Good. Then get the fuck out of here. Now.” He shoved the taller guy so hard that the guy stumbled back and had to pinwheel his arms to keep from falling. The moment he had recovered his balance, he turned and sprinted away.
    The lead man knelt and took a closer look at the guy he’d decked, who was, as Delilah already knew, unconscious, or, from the force of the blow, possibly even dead. He reversed his grip on the baton so he was holding it like an ice pick and smashed the tip against the sidewalk, collapsing it. Then he stood and looked at Fatima.
    “Are you all right?” he said, in an accent like his partner’s.
    Fatima looked at the guy on the ground, then at the lead man. For a moment, she was speechless. Then she stammered out, “Yes. Yes, we’re fine.”
    The lead guy glanced at his partner, then at Delilah. “I’m… sorry,” he said. “This place, sometimes, bad men at night. I’m sorry.”
    Delilah shook her head. “No need to apologize.”
    The man glanced at the Hideaway protruding from her knuckles. “But maybe you are already okay.”
    Delilah eased the knife back into its sheath. “Maybe. Thank you for your help.”
    The other man glanced around nervously. “You should go. Police come. Police no good.”
    Fatima seemed stunned. Delilah put a hand on her elbow and said, “Yes. We’re going. Thank you again.”
    They headed quickly southeast, the general direction of Paddington Station. Delilah was intuiting a lot from the encounter and she wanted to process it more fully, but she needed to stay in character. There would be time later.
    “Was that a knife?” Fatima asked, glancing back as they walked. Her tone was incredulous.
    “Yes.”
    “Show me.”
    “Later. I think we should get out of here. Do you go to that shisha shop a lot? Do they know you?” This was a little more tactical acumen than she would have preferred to reveal, but she thought the risk was less than the opportunity to learn more.
    “I go there sometimes. And yes, they know who I am.”
    “Well, that’s not good.”
    “Why? We didn’t do anything wrong. We didn’t do anything.”
    “No, but do you want to have to persuade the police of that? I mean, did you see that guy’s face? I think he might have been dead.”
    “Oh my God, I know, I mean, he went flying!”
    She was talking faster than usual, her demeanor giddy. Normal, in the aftermath of violence. “Do you know who those guys were?” Delilah said, being careful to