Chapter 4: "Don't ever be sorry..."
After their second round of cherry Cokes, Johnny headed towards the men's room next to Ghostland, while Tara waited by a ring toss booth across the way. With her academy-honed habits, she took the opportunity to scan the area for threats – and noticed a tall, hulking man watching Johnny enter the lavatories. Unlike with the previous stranger, she recognized this face for sure. It was earlier that day, in the mugshots she reviewed. He was a New York hit man, named Burke – and he apparently had Johnny on his to-do list.
A minute later he started heading towards the men's room entry, where Johnny had gone. Tara likewise started across the concourse, with no hesitation about confronting him in there or anywhere else. But at that moment Johnny emerged, and sauntered towards her. The other man pulled up, and began circling around, between the various rides and booths. Johnny came up to Tara with a bright smile. "All set. Let's go!"
Tara sized up the situation. She tapped Johnny on the chest, and told him she had to find a ladies room.
"But you said a minute ago –"
"I just said I do now," she repeated, with a testy tone that she hoped would intimidate him. He did back down, rather sheepishly, and she made a mental note to explain it later. "Wait here, till I get back." And she began circling in the opposite direction as the man had walked.
She paced herself carefully, losing sight of Johnny, the hit man, or both, and then catching them again, amid the milling crowds and souvenir vendors and food stands. The man, moving the other way, slipped into a booth that was closed, with the tarps dropped on all four sides. Possibly to ready something, or lie in wait.
Tara sidestepped carefully between the booth and the adjoining one, until she stood directly behind the crease in the canvas where the man was standing. She peeked through the gap, drew back, and gave a low whistle. The man came close to explore, bent down, came even closer – and Tara lunged both arms through the gap, and pulled him back through it with all her weight. She teed up his hulking frame, and delivered a left cross, and right cross. Then she socked a booming uppercut that reeled him backwards to the ground; his head landing on a steel-plated circuit box, with a bounce. The impact stunning him cold.
Tara straightened up, wearily and warily. When he didn't move, she breathed a sigh of relief, and began thinking ahead. But even as she relaxed, the box started sparking and smoking. The goon's eyes opened, and he rose like a Frankenstein monster, with a roar. The close quarters worked to his advantage, and against hers. As he came at Tara, she swung a hard right, towards the hinge of his jaw – to gain a few precious seconds, and a foot of clearance, to draw her Beretta. But her punch snagged on a guy line, and he managed to grasp her throat with both brawny hands. Tara struck at his neck with karate chops, to no effect. Her kicks couldn't quite reach his vulnerable points; and her purse dangled behind her, just out of reach. Within seconds, with her breathing cut off, and the carotid artery, her struggles began to weaken. He squeezed tighter, with a grin, as her voice gurgled; and her arms sagged. Then tighter still. Her eyes started to roll back. She was caught; her options gone.
It was the end, at last. She knew it. She had seen home for the last time. The slender shaft of sunlight through the canopy, from a foreign sky, would be her final glimpse of life. If she died, she knew Johnny would be next; and she made a final effort to raise an arm, to land a blow. But the arm fell limp.
The light faded; her eyes closed. Images flickered in the darkness. A keen wind; a path by a distant shore. Things done, and not done... and now never to be. Then even these dimmed, as her body surrendered, and she slipped beneath the water. And with perhaps seconds left, two other hands brought down the same circuit box, still sparking, upon the brute's head. He released Tara, and turned around in a rage. Johnny froze in fear. Then he raised the box overhead again, forcing himself to endure its heat and shocks – when the attacker's eyes rolled even as Tara's had, and he fell in a heap to the dusty ground. Johnny dropped the smoky, flaring circuit box, and nursed his smarting hands for a moment, before rushing to Tara.
He sat her up – and, with her youth and fitness, she started to recover. "Th-thank you," she said in a husky voice, as she massaged her throat. Then she looked up at his face, and in a lower, clearer voice, "Thank you... very much."
His eyes were haunted. "I'm so sorry. This was my fault. I insisted on staying here."
"No," Tara said, a touch hoarsely, but firmly. "It's his fault. Just him." She placed a hand on Johnny's shoulder. "Don't ever be sorry, for living your life."
They made their way out of the back area, into the sunlight. Tara gave herself a minute to savour the world, and being alive, when she had thought it was over. Then she was curious about something else. "Why did you come looking for me, anyway?"
"Well, there was a ladies room right next to the men's. So when you took off the other way, I figured something was up."
Tara had to smile. She made another mental note to plan her clever maneuvers a little better – although she was glad this one wasn't so clever after all.
Now she looked around for a telephone box, to report the incident to New York, so they could arrange to scrub the scene. But instead she saw, lurching towards them, the short, oddly-dressed stranger from before. Tara, though weary, separated from Johnny, to bring any attack away from him, and to herself. But Johnny resolutely stayed by her side, and glanced around for something more wieldly than a circuit box this time.
However, the man pulled up to a halt, and exclaimed, "Miss King! What happened? Have you been assailed?"
Tara peered in, under the floppy brim, and the man pulled off his dark glasses. Tara, even in her aches and fatigue, almost laughed. Almost.
"My gawd... Watney?" The dedicated Agent, Second Class, came to attention at his name.
"At your service, suh!" he snapped to the young gentleman.
Tara crossed her arms and said to Johnny, "Remember that cliff dive I told you about? This is who reported me dead." Watney, oblivious to any irony, beamed proudly. "Duty seen, duty done," he declared.
Johnny, now relieved, got into the lighter mood. He asked the new arrival if he was here for the park's farewell.
"Oh no, suh. I have been on special assignment in the New York office for the past six months,"– Johnny gathered from Tara's expression that Special Assignment might be more like exile – "and was aware of your case. When I learned... in-di-rectly... that Miss King would be your protector, I took it upon myself to shadow you here. So as to be on hand in case of peril."
"Well, Watney," Tara chimed in, "I am truly pleased. We would be grateful if you could take care of the gentleman who, umm, assailed me. He is reclining right between those two tents. I promise to commend your initiative to Mother, and perhaps we'll see you back in London for tea."
"That would be jolly!" he replied. He snapped a salute and, with somewhat dramatic glances left and right, moved into the rear area to take charge of the scene.
Coming next...
CHAPTER 5: Hitting the dance floor