Reloading, Abdul Ali looked toward Sacha and commanded, “Find us a way out of here. Now!”
It had been the Chechen’s idea to flee into the church, where he had legitimately expected little to no resistance. But what the enormous warrior had not planned on was for the men chasing him to be reinforced so quickly-at least not in such a manner as to hinder their escape. They needed to put a lot of distance between themselves and their pursuers as quickly as possible.
While he was incredibly adept at thinking on his feet, the Chechen disliked being put on the defensive and being forced to react. A hasty retreat was hard to turn to one’s advantage, especially when you had no idea where the hell you were going. The most deadly mistakes in combat often came from operating too quickly and without enough information. In this case, though, Sacha had little choice.
Near the altar, he found the door to the sacristy and ruptured it from its hinges with a kick from one of his enormous boots. Signaling to the rest of the team, he took up position in the door frame and tried to pin down their opponents as one by one his men ran past him. As the last man came through, he took a grenade from him, pulled the pin, and threw it toward the center of the church.
When the device detonated, showering St. Bartholomew’s with its deadly shrapnel, Sacha and his men were already running through the sacristy and into a narrow service corridor. The Chechen knew that, if not already, the church would soon be surrounded and that heading back out could be suicide. They needed another route, and as his eyes fell upon a small steam radiator along one side of the corridor, Allah blessed him with an idea.
Once Sacha located the correct door, he opened it, careful not to leave any signs of entry, and sent Ali and the rest of the team down the stairs. Before he could join them, though, he needed a diversion-something that would send the men chasing them in a completely different direction. Moments later he found it.
Sacha didn’t bother opening the glass case. Instead he smashed it with the butt of his weapon and tore the ax from its mounting bracket. With one swing he was through the window, and with two more he had torn away the security wire. He then threw the ax out the window into the narrow, ground-level courtyard and ran back toward the stairwell. With any luck, he and the rest of his team would be long gone before their pursuers had any idea what had really happened.