Fireburst

“Roger, please.”

She smiled, revealing unexpected dimples. “Hitesri Chandra… Sherry to my friends.”

“A pleasure to meet you, Sherry.”

She glanced at Kirkland.

He grinned. “Lamont Cranston.”

She arched an eyebrow at that. “Is Ms. Montenegro expecting you?” Sherry asked hesitantly.

“No, this is a surprise visit,” Bolan said.

“However, we did leave a message at her AA meeting,” Kirkland suddenly added with a straight face.

Frowning at that, Sherry turned to look only at Bolan. “Well, I’m sorry, but Ms. Montenegro is conducting a private class at the moment. But if you’d care to wait…” She smiled invitingly and didn’t finish the sentence.

“Mind if we just go straight up?” Kirkland asked, pulling open the stairwell door.

“Sir, that’s not allowed!” Sherry shouted, reaching out a hand.

But Kirkland was already gone, taking the steps two at a time.

“Please excuse my friend,” Bolan apologized, heading for the open doorway. “He was raised in a cave by bears.”

“Pity they didn’t eat him,” Sherry muttered, sitting back down.

At the top of the stairs, a small landing led to a changing room lined with lockers. There were private showers, a steam room, and from down a short hallway came the familiar sounds of a fight in progress.

Heading that way, Bolan and Kirkland caught the smells of sweat, blood and some sort of stringent herbal compound.

“Ah, Tiger Balm, just the smell makes me ache,” Kirkland said wistfully. “You know, I still carry some of the stuff in my bag?”

“Who doesn’t?” Bolan replied, as they proceeded along the hallway.

“I just wish it didn’t reek like the southern end of a northbound rhinosaurus.”

As they’d expected, the room wasn’t a gymnasium, but a dojo, a martial arts studio. Although it was large and well-lit by ceiling fixtures, there was no furniture of any kind, just thick mats covering the floor and punching bags hanging in every corner. On the walls were racks of blunt bamboo poles, cushioned wooden sticks, then uncushioned sticks, knives and swords, followed by a wide variety of more exotic weaponry. The only decorations were framed pictographs in Japanese, Chinese and Korean extolling the virtues of honor and courage.

There were a dozen people of various ages sitting on the mats. Everybody was barefoot and wearing a loose cotton judo uniform, the twill jackets held shut with twisted cloth belts. Most of the students wore the red belts of advanced pupils, but there were also a few beginners in white belts and one high-ranking brown belt.

Standing at the front of the class was a tall woman with flaming red hair tied off her face with a strip of rawhide. She was completely without cosmetics and strikingly beautiful, with a full mouth and slightly slanting eyes of emerald-green that spoke of a mixed ancestry. Her white uniform was edged with black piping, and she wore the black belt of a teacher tied around a trim waist.

“So that’s the deal. The first person to physically touch me gets a full refund on all of their fees,” Heather Montenegro said, tightening her belt.

“That’s all?” a burly black man asked suspiciously. “Just touch you? Not put you down or draw blood?”

Tolerantly, Montenegro smiled. “If you manage either of those, Mr. Cortland, you can have the building. Now, everybody stand!”

In unison, the students rose smoothly to their feet, many of them going immediately into an attack stance.

“Any volunteers for today’s demonstration?” Montenegro asked, adjusting the rawhide around her forehead.

Three men and two women stepped forward, everybody else stayed in place.

“All right, begin,” Montenegro said calmly, both hands at her side.

Instantly, the group of five charged forward, three of the students assuming the cat stance, the last two dropping into the horse position. Separating fast, they all converged on Montenegro from different directions.

“Pitiful,” Kirkland muttered. “Five will get you six she drops them all in under a minute.”

“No bet,” Bolan said, shaking his head.

As the first student got close, she collapsed into a dragon crouch and did a leg sweep. Swaying out of the way, Montenegro caught the foot by the ankle, and twisted, sending the woman tumbling away.

Extending both arms, a man dove forward, obviously intent on trying merely to touch the teacher. Montenegro ducked under the arms, then spun around the man and slammed him in the back, adding her force to his own rush. Out of control, he slammed into the cushioned wall and rebounded, bleeding profusely from a broken nose.

The third student flipped over backward like an acrobat to land in the drunken monkey position, both arms raised for a double strike. A split second later, Montenegro buried her heel into the stomach of the man. Turning bright red, he doubled over, gasping and choking.

The last two students immediately retreated slightly, circling the motionless Montenegro. Then they both moved with blinding speed, the man chopping for her neck, while the woman kicked for a knee. A classic hi-lo formation.

Swatting aside the punch, Montenegro lashed out a foot to block the kick, then threw the man over her shoulder to crash into the woman. They went down in a tangle of limbs.

“Enough!” Montenegro called, straightening her stance. “Now, class, what was wrong with—” Spinning, she blocked a punch from the man with the bloody nose, then effortlessly flipped him sideways.

“While I applaud your tenacity, Steven,” Montenegro said, walking closer to stand over the panting man. “The next time you attack after I called a stop, I’ll break both of your arms.”

“Yes, sensei,” he muttered, his face pressed into the mat.

“Only try something fancy when you’re desperate,” Montenegro continued, kneeling to massage his spine with her knuckles. Almost instantly, the bleeding stopped and he began to breath more easily.

“Better?” Montenegro asked, ceasing the administrations.

“Better,” he muttered, stiffly getting to his feet. “You’re fast, sensei.”

“True. So never underestimate an opponent,” Montenegro said sternly, then turned about. “All right, class, as I was saying…” Her voice faded away at the sight of Bolan and Kirkland across the room.

“What the hell are you two doing…aw, crap,” Montenegro said, yanking off the rawhide strip.

Politely, Bolan gave a short bow of respect, while Kirkland waved in greeting. “Hiya, toots! How’s tricks?”

Scowling in annoyance, Montenegro deeply inhaled, then sighed. “Barbara!”

“Yes, ma’am?” replied the short blonde wearing the brown belt.

“Please take over for me. Work on disarming an opponent armed with a knife without breaking their bones. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

“Days,” Bolan corrected.