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the lucky guess.
    “I wonder how he’ll
feel when he learns what you’re doing here?”
    “Sasha—” her
mother hissed in warning.
    The boy’s dusky
skin reddened with anger and shame. He dropped the bag and balled his hands
into fists.
    “You should take
care,” he warned, gesturing toward the machete at his side.
    She shuffled
closer in small steps, restrained by her gown, and leaned forward as if she
were inspecting the weapon, then she laughed. “That dull thing? Looks like it
needs to be sharpened.”
    Confusion
flashed in his eyes.
    She waited.
    He bent his head
to look at the wickedly curved blade.
    When he raised
his chin to tell her she was wrong, she was ready. She swung her right elbow,
up and out. It crashed into his cheekbone and propelled him sideways into the
wall.
    She moved with
him, fisting his t-shirt into a ball in her left hand, and drove her forearm
into his windpipe.
    Behind her
someone screamed.
    He struggled and
flailed, reaching for the knife. She pushed harder.
    His eyes bulged.
    “I don’t want to
hurt you, but I will,” she told him in a soft voice.
    He continued to
squirm. She stood on her toes and wrapped her left arm around his neck,
pressing the crook of her elbow against the carotid artery on the side of his
neck. She pushed her bicep hard against his throat and clasped her hands
together, applying equal pressure to the other side of his neck.
    “Oh, God, she’s
going to kill him,” Jordan wailed.
    Sasha could have
sworn she heard her mother shush her hysterical daughter-in-law. She
couldn’t exactly turn around to check, though.
    She squeezed and
watched the teenager’s face grow flushed as the pressure reduced, and then
halted, the flow of blood to his brain.
    She counted
silently, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two ...  He slumped
against the wall, unconscious. She caught him under his armpits and lowered him
gently to the floor, taking care not to trip herself with her long dress as she
eased him down.
    She looked down
at his closed eyes, the long, thick lashes brushing his cheeks.
    He really was
just a kid.
    “Is he going to
be okay?” Naya breathed near her ear.
    “He’ll be fine.
He’ll probably wake up with a killer headache.”
    Connelly’s
chisled face popped into her mind—his crooked little smile; his eyes, warm and
liquid like hot chocolate. She had to find him. Before the armed men did.
    She unsheathed
the unconscious man’s machete and turned it slowly in her hand. Contrary to her
taunt, the blade was razor sharp. Like a scalpel , she thought and
shivered involuntarily.
    She took a
hurried step toward the door and stopped short. Trapped by her dress.
    It would take at
least ten minutes, maybe longer, for someone to fumble around in the dim
moonlight streaming through the window and undo the row of buttons that ran up
the back of her dress. That was time she didn’t have.
    She looked down
at the exquisite creation that gloved her body and hesitated for a second
before giving Marisole an apologetic look.
    “Sorry about
this,” she said, carefully slashing the machete along the fabric at the side of
her leg between her left knee and her ankle, creating a long slit in the flared
skirt.
    Marisole gasped.
Behind her, Valentina moaned.
    Sasha sliced a
matching gash down the right side. Then she bent over the prone kid to remove
his scabbard. She belted the rough leather awkwardly around the smooth silk of
her gown’s waist. She sheathed the machete then turned, taking a long,
unimpeded stride, and her feet got caught up in the long ribbons that fluttered
out behind her.
    “Son of a—” she
muttered between gritted teeth, pulling the weapon back out.
    “Wait!” Marisole
yelped. She hurried around and snipped the ribbons’ thread carefully with a
pair of tiny gold scissors. Maisy rushed over to help her before Sasha could
hack them off.
    When they were
finished, Sasha turned to Naya. “He won’t be out for long. Find something to
tie him up