Chapter Two

Alonia was tired. It had been a long day in the boonies. It was hot and humid. Sweat had poured off her all day. The makeup people had to fix her makeup before every scene. Then the bus they used for transportation got stuck and had to be towed. It was almost nine when she got to her room. She pulled off her sweaty clothes and dried off before she called Hammer. Hammer was in a good mood and had been since they were last in Saint Petersburg. She allowed herself to think of him while she was wiping sweat. She wished he had been there to wipe the sweat off for her. That would have been fun.

She resisted the temptation because having Hammer with her when she was on assignment would alert the paparazzi to Hammer’s existence and that would spoil everything. Keeping him out of sight allowed them to have a somewhat normal relationship although at times like this she longed for him to be with her.

The other aspect of her reluctance to bring Hammer with her was how he would react to the paparazzi. Hammer had accompanied her on her last assignment in Paris. The paparazzi noticed him but they thought he was her bodyguard. When one of them tried to take his photograph, Hammer took his camera and tossed it into the Seine. When the man protested, Hammer tossed him into the Seine. Then he threatened the other paparazzi with the same fate if they didn’t leave him alone.

The police were called and it took all of Alonia’s agency’s and Phoebus’s political I.O.Us to keep Hammer from being arrested and the incident out of the newspapers. She had been reluctant to bring Hammer with her on her assignments since that incident.

After she called Hammer and was about to step into the shower, the phone rang. The caller identified herself as from the photography unit and asked her if she could meet the photographers in an hour to plan tomorrow’s shoot. This was not unusual so Alonia agreed. Their hotel was only four blocks from hers. She would enjoy the cool evening walk.

It was a glorious evening. The sky was clear. The moon and stars were out. What an evening to take a stroll. She wished again that Hammer was with her. She was dressed in a halter-top, shorts and tennis shoes. The streets were quiet in this part of town but most of the streetlights were out. Alonia didn’t worry at times like this because she was athletic and strong and could outrun most men who might attack her. Besides she possessed certain powers that rendered her an inappropriate target for purse-snatchers and muggers. This was a family talent. All of her siblings had it. They inherited it from their father, who used it with far more effectiveness than his children did.

As she passed through an especially dark area, she sensed that she was not alone and her guard went up. Then rough hands grabbed her and tried to put a bag over her head. She elbowed one so hard that he gasped and fell to the sidewalk. She kicked another in his groin and he went down. Then she tried to gouge the eyes of the one still trying to get the bag over her head and managed to slip out of his grasp and run. She thought she had escaped until she ran into six men when she rounded the corner of a building. One of the men was huge and very strong. He pinned her arms to her sides and bodily picked her up while another put a cloth bag over her head and tied it so she couldn’t rip it off. While this was going on, Alonia was kicking the big man’s shins so hard he fell down with her in his arms and other men grabbed her legs.

Then somebody put an chloroform-drenched rag to her face and she lost consciousness.