Unintended Consequences

said irritably.
    Stone didn’t bother to reply.
    “Now,” Majorov said, taking a sheaf of neatly printed documents from the briefcase. “I will need your signature in a dozen or so places.”
    “For what?” Stone asked.
    “We are going to execute a transfer of your stock in The Arrington Corporation to a company that I own in Paris, then a sum of money will be transferred to whatever bank account you wish. Miss Becker will witness your signature.” He nodded to the man standing next to Helga; he produced a switchblade knife and cut the bonds that held her hands behind her back. She held up her limp hands. “My hands are numb,” she said to Majorov. “I can’t hold a pen.”
    Majorov sighed and spoke to the man with the switchblade. “Massage her wrists.”
    The man closed the knife and tucked it into his belt, then did as he was told.
    While they were occupied with Helga’s circulation, Stone took a moment to look around. At one end of the building, perhaps thirty feet away, was the top end of a steel ladder, hooked across the building’s parapet. Fire escape; the only way down, except for the ramp they had driven up. He looked at Helga; she had spotted it, too.
    Stone looked around them for weapons. The man behind him still had the silenced pistol, and the man massaging Helga’s wrists had the switchblade, but those were the only weapons in evidence. He had no doubt, though, that the others were well armed. If he could get his hands on the silenced pistol, he might get off three or four shots before anybody could get ahold of a weapon and fire back, but he was going to need some sort of distraction.
    Helga, thoughtfully, provided that. Her guard had stopped massaging and pulled out the switchblade again. She lifted a leg and drove the six-inch spike heel of her shoe through his shoe and foot. He screamed and let go of the knife, which Helga caught before it hit the ground. She grabbed him by the hair, jerked him around, and stood behind him, the knife to his throat. “Now, please, everyone will throw the guns over the edge of the building.”
    Majorov turned to the man with the silenced pistol and jerked his head toward the man with the knife to his throat. The man raised his pistol and shot his colleague in the chest. Helga held him on his feet for protection.
    Stone seized the moment, grabbed the pistol by the silencer, and wrenched it from the man’s hand. Then things began to happen very fast.

57
    S tone shot the man whose gun he had taken, because he liked him the least, though he wasn’t very fond of the others, either. That left only Majorov and one other man, who was clawing at his clothing, trying in his nervous condition to come up with a weapon. Majorov just stared with an expression of mild surprise at the change in his fortunes.
    Stone trained the pistol on the other man, who stopped groping himself and put his hands on top of his head.
    Helga dropped the dead man she had been holding by the neck for cover, went to the surrendered man, and frisked him expertly, coming up with a .45 automatic, then she began striding toward Majorov.
    “Now, Miss Becker,” Majorov said, backing away from her.
    She raked his face with the barrel of the .45, then, when he leaned back against the Mercedes, kicked him in the knee.
    Majorov fell to the concrete deck, yelling—no doubt swearing—in Russian. A gust of wind came up and scattered the papers that had been stacked on the hood of the Mercedes.
    “Nicely done,” Stone said, starting to embrace her, but she was going over Majorov’s fallen form with care, tossing two guns and a knife onto the deck.
    When she had finished, Stone gave her a hug and a kiss, but not before she had kicked Majorov in the ribs. She seemed to appreciate the affection but then became businesslike. “Now, we must decide how we must dispose of these two,” she said.
    “Dispose?” Stone asked.
    “If we let them be taken by the police, then there will be only a big mess, with lawyers and bail money, et cetera. I know these things, I have watched all the episodes of
Law & Order
, you see.”
    “I see,” Stone said tonelessly.
    Majorov’s henchman, hearing this conversation and seeing them momentarily distracted, made a dive for one of Majorov’s pistols.
    Helga turned and shot him with his own gun. “Good,” she said, “now we have only to deal with Mr. Majorov.”
    Majorov had struggled into a sitting position and was leaning against the Mercedes, clutching