Hands grabbed her shirt, jerking her roughly, but Ashley's instinct kicked in. She got her feet underneath her and pushed back against her attacker. By stroke of luck, the back of her head collided with his chin, catching him off guard. It was enough for her to break away from his grasping hands. She spun, still dizzy from the blow to her head, but managed to center herself enough to regain her focus.
Her attacker was tall and lean, had dusty blond hair, and wasted no time coming at her again. She had nowhere to go. The room was too small. She dropped to her knees as he reached for her, and his hands clasped only air above her head. She punched out hard, straight to his groin.
The man huffed as he collapsed on top of her, neither one of them in the proper position to attack, but he still had the advantage. He could hold on to her while she struggled to get away, and there was no chance for her to overpower him. Panic raced through her body as she fought to gain some type of control over a situation that was quickly becoming dire.
Ashley braced her legs under her and pushed up, using her small body as a weapon. She threw him off balance, and his head smacked against the desk. It wasn't a hard hit, but his grip loosened as he tried for a better hold. She wouldn't be subdued so easily. She was panicked but growing angry. Continuing to use her body as a battering ram, she kicked off from the floor and drove herself into him. His head slammed against the wall and rebounded against the desk.
His grip on her was gone, and she went careening into the wall as she sprang away from him. Within seconds, he was reaching for her again to stop her flight, but thoughts of flight were gone. She was pissed. She kicked him square in the face. Hard. Her heel connected with his upper lip, scoring a solid hit and sending his head into the desk one more time.
"Jesus!" He spat blood and reached for the gun tucked into his belt harness. She hadn't noticed that before. Ashley was about to be in real trouble and frantically kicked at his hands. She wasn't willing to give up yet, and she already figured this guy wasn't exactly on the straight and narrow.
"Goddammit!" he yelled, giving up on his gun and grabbed at her kicking leg instead. He kicked out, sweeping the foot she was balanced on out from under her, and she fell back, landing hard on her ass. Scrambling backwards into the hallway, she stared up at the gun that had made it to his hands. The option of flight was gone. There was nowhere to hide from a bullet in these straight hallways, and she didn't know if she wanted to chance this guy actually pulling the trigger.
"Fuck," she said simply, staring up at him.
"Yeah, why don't you calm down and get back inside here, eh?" he sneered and leaned to the side to spit out a mouthful of blood. "Hal wasn't lying about you."
"Oh, we're good friends," she snapped as she complied with his instructions, slowly inching her way into the storage room. Of course, he knew Hal. That was no surprise. Her head was throbbing from where he'd slammed her against the desk, but the adrenaline pumping through her helped to clear her mind. She had to get the gun away from him.
"So, I take it you're the muscle in this operation?" she sniffed, sizing him up. He was taller than Hal and definitely more fit than the tubby pig. His blue eyes were cold as they glared at her from a rounded face, framed with chubby cheeks that drooped with age. She pegged him early forties and smirked as she noticed his upper lip was already starting to swell.
"Shut up," he growled. "I have to figure out what to do with you now." Ashley could see him thinking through his problems, his facial expression contorting from anger to confusion and back again.
Could he be thinking about killing her? No, certainly not. That was much too drastic for the crime here. It didn't fit. More likely he was thinking about kidnapping her and dumping her somewhere later, but how to get her out of here without notice? The employees were scarce, but there were still the surveillance cameras. What about Lance?
She swallowed hard, thinking about Lance sitting in the car waiting for her. How long would he wait? She had only been in here ten minutes at most, but what would he do when twenty minutes had gone by? Thirty? She knew he would come looking for her, and she was sure that wouldn't be a good thing.
"Going through an awful lot just to protect some clothes." She cocked an eyebrow at him, digging for more information as she tried to stall him. He glanced at the boxes and a sly grin crept across his face. The cold glare he turned back to her didn't reveal much.
"They're special clothes," he said snidely, and that revealed everything. He was done messing around with her and threw a badly telegraphed punch. Even though she saw it coming, the room was small and she wasn't able to dodge it completely. His fist grazed her cheek, landing a glancing blow, but it wasn't nearly enough to stop her. Her arm swept up in a block, catching his opposite forearm and deflecting the gun to the side. She balled up a small fist and delivered three quick punches to his ribs, receiving a grunt from him with each jab.
Her left hand had a tight grip on his wrist, and she locked her arm straight, fighting against his superior strength to hold the gun away from her. It was a position she couldn’t hold, so she quickly reversed momentum, freeing him to jam the gun and his arm into the wall. It was enough to cause him to stumble forward, but the gun remained in his hand.
Ashley didn't wait for him to regain his footing. She clenched her teeth, grabbed his shoulders for balance and pushed off towards the opposite wall. Her sneakered feet hit the wall a foot off the ground and found traction on the sheet rock. Pushing herself even higher as she kicked off, she aimed towards the staggering man. Her body was a living missile as her knee crashed into his back. He crumpled to the floor with Ashley coming down hard on top of him.
The move was desperate, risky, but Craig would have been proud. Her landing was not graceful, and she barely stopped herself from ramming head first into the desk, but he was in a manageable position now. She jumped to her feet and began to deliver one swift kick after another to his forearm. She had to get the gun away from him, and it finally clattered to the ground. The man was quick despite all the punishment Ashley was giving him, and he made a grab for his gun. She kicked him in the face to knock him back, but not before his grasping hand accidentally pushed the gun toward her.
Ashley barked a short laugh, but instead of going straight for the gun, she attacked again, resulting in an off balance, sloppy Ap Chagi that didn't quite connect the way she intended. He dodged backward, her foot barely grazing his already battered mouth and nailed his collarbone instead.
Ashley dove for the gun then, hoping that would end this, but it was a mistake. The room was too small. She saw his booted foot flying toward her head too late. To her credit, she got her arm up to block, but it was futile against the power behind his kick, and his foot slammed into her, throwing her back. Her head collided with something hard and unyielding, and she crumpled to the floor as darkness swept in on her.
Chapter 12 – Thief