The Midnight Line (7 page)

The guy had a gun. A revolver. It looked like a worn-out Chief's Special. A .38 five-shooter by Smith & Wesson. Short barrel. It looked small in the guy's hand. His right hand. He was half-twisted behind the wheel, aiming half-sideways through the open passenger window, with a bent arm and a cramped right shoulder.

“In the car,” he said again.

Reacher stood still. He had choices. Life was full of them. Easiest thing would be just walk away. Straight ahead along the sidewalk, in the same direction the car had been driving. A right-handed shooter in a left-hand-drive car would have a practical problem with that kind of geometry. His windshield was in the way. Couldn't shoot through it. The bullet would deflect and miss. And afterward there would be a hole in the windshield. Not a smart thing to have. Rapid City was no doubt a tough old town, but it wasn't South-Central LA. Morning gunfire would get called in. Especially downtown, near the hotels and the restaurants. Police cruisers would show up fast. Questions about a bullet hole in a windshield would be hard to answer.

So the guy would have to move. He would have to shift the transmission, and take his foot off the brake, and shrug off his seatbelt, and flip up the armrests, and shuffle his ass across the front bench, and hang his right arm out the passenger window. All of which would take a small but finite amount of time. During which Reacher would be walking farther and farther away. And all the guy had was a worn-out .38 with a two-and-a-half-inch barrel. Not an accurate weapon. More or less a guaranteed miss, with the speed Reacher could walk.

So the better bet would be hang out the driver's window. Much quicker. It was right there. But how? The guy would have to kneel up sideways on the driver's seat, and stick his whole upper body out, and wriggle his right arm free, like putting on a tight sweater, bringing him all the way out of the car up to his waist, and then he would have to twist, and aim, and fire. Except at that point he would also be overbalancing and about to fall out the window. An inaccurate weapon, and a preoccupied shooter clinging to the door mirror. Not a whole lot to worry about.

Which meant the guy's best bet would be step out and brace behind the open door. Like a cop. Except as soon as Reacher heard the creak of the hinge he would duck out of sight into the nearest store or alley. Same thing if he heard the car move off the curb and roll toward him. Stalemate. The whole get-in-the-car thing looked pretty good in the movies, but on the street it was basically optional. Plenty of choices. Keep calm and walk away. Live to fight another day.

But Reacher stayed where he was.

He said, “You want me to get in the car?”

The guy said, “Right now.”

“Then put the gun away.”

“Or?”

“Or I won't get in the car.”

“I could shoot you first and get you in bleeding.”

“No,” Reacher said. “You really couldn't.”

All he had to do was take one fast pace left. Then the guy would be shooting through glass again, or the B-pillar, or the C-pillar, plus anyway his shoulder was tight against the upholstery and wouldn't rotate. Plus again, the cops would come. Lights and sirens. Questions. The guy was stuck.

He was an amateur.

Which was encouraging.

“Put the gun away,” Reacher said again.

“How do I know you'll get in?”

“I'm happy to visit with Mr. Scorpio. He has information for me. I was planning to call on him later today, but since you're here, I guess this is as good a time as any.”

“How do you know I'm working for Scorpio?”

“Magic,” Reacher said.

The guy held still for a second, and then he put the gun back in his coat pocket. Reacher opened the passenger door. The sedan was an ancient Lincoln Town Car. The old square style. The kind that got crashed and burned on the TV shows, because they were cheaper than dirt. The upholstery was red velvet, no better or worse than the restaurant lobby's walls. A little crushed and greasy. Reacher crammed himself in the seat. He put his elbow on the armrest. His left hand hung loose, the size of a dinner plate. The guy stared at it for a second. Long thick fingers, with knuckles like walnuts. Old nicks and scars healed white. The guy looked away. No longer top dog. Uncharted territory, for a man who made his living leaning on walls and scaring people.

“Drive,” Reacher said. “I haven't got all day.”

They took off, left and right through the downtown blocks, back to the low-rent district. They parked outside the laundromat. The guy took out his gun again. Saving face, in front of Scorpio. Reacher let him. Why not? It cost him nothing. He waited until the guy came around and opened his door, and then he got out, and the guy nodded toward the laundromat entrance. Reacher went in first, to the smell of drains and cold soap, and the back-door sentry leaning on a washing machine, and Arthur Scorpio himself sitting in a plastic lawn chair, as if he was a customer hypnotized by the churning drums.

Up close he had pitted skin on his face, unnaturally white, as if it had been treated with chemicals. The pallor made his eyes look dark. He was tall and thin. Maybe six feet two. Maybe a hundred sixty pounds. But only if he had a dollar's worth of pennies in his pocket. All skin and bone, and awkward as a stepladder.

The back-door sentry pushed himself off the washing machine and came over to stand close. The guy who had driven the car stepped up from behind.

Scorpio said, “What do you want?”

“You fenced a ring to Jimmy Rat,” Reacher said. “I want to know who fenced it to you.”

“You got the wrong person altogether. I run a laundromat. I don't know any Jimmy Rat.”

“Is the laundromat doing well?”

“I'm comfortable.”

“And modest. You're doing better than comfortable. Your cash flow is so big you had to hire two guys to watch over it. Except I don't see how. You got no customers.”

“You accusing me of something?”

Out the window a pale blue car stopped on the opposite curb. A domestic product. A Chevrolet, possibly. Nothing fancy. A plain specification. In it was a small Asian woman. Black hair, dark eyes. A severe expression. Nakamura. She just sat there, engine off, head turned, watching. A level gaze, over the hood of Scorpio's parked Lincoln. Her eyes were locked on Reacher's, through two layers of glass and thirty feet of air.

Reacher turned back to Scorpio and said, “Jimmy Rat left you a voicemail, which is why you hired these guys. He told you I was coming. And here I am. It's up to you how long I stay.”

Scorpio said, “Firstly I don't know what you're talking about, and secondly do you know who that is, in the blue car across the street?”

“She's a cop. Detective Nakamura.”

“Who harasses me on a regular basis. As you can see. For completely invented reasons. But this time she can make herself useful for once. You're trespassing, and she can come remove you herself. My tax dollars at work.”

“You pay taxes?”

“You accusing me of something?”

“I'm not trespassing. You invited me here. Kind of insisted.”

“My point is you can stick your little threats where the sun don't shine. Up to me how long you stay? What are you going to do, with a cop watching?”

“I know her name because we talked. She told me you're not well liked within the police department.”

“Mutual.”

“It's a code. In plain English it means I could rip your arm off and beat you to death with it, and they wouldn't stop me. They'd sell tickets instead.”

“What code? You a cop too? From somewhere?”

“You expecting one? Not me. I'm just a guy with a question. Tell me the answer, and I'm gone.”

Scorpio said, “You never asked how I found you.”

Reacher said, “Didn't need to. I already figured it out. From where your boy showed up. Restaurant staff. You slip them a few bucks. They all talk to each other. They all have cell phones. They text. A nice little network. Underpaid and underappreciated. You put the word out. Based on Jimmy Rat's voicemail. Watch out for Bigfoot to come out of the forest. That's what Jimmy said, right?”

“I don't know any Jimmy. Which is my point. I'm going to sit here and deny it all day long. Nothing you can do about it with a cop watching.”

“Maybe she'll leave.”

“She won't. She sits there all day. We'll be gone before she is. Then what are you going to do? Run after us? Which is my other point. Good luck with your night in town. You won't get a meal anywhere. You won't get a drink. You won't get a bed. I got more than one network running.”

“I'm sure you're a regular Al Capone,” Reacher said. “Except you got the worst piece-of-shit car in the world.”

“Get lost. You're wasting everyone's time. Nothing you can do. Not with a cop watching. Code or no code. Which is bullshit anyway. This is America.”

“We could run a test,” Reacher said. “I could punch you in the mouth, and we could time how long she took to get in here.”

The two sentries stepped in closer. No guns. No pushing or shoving. They couldn't. Nakamura was watching. They put themselves one each side of Scorpio's lawn chair, a step ahead of it, overlapping it a little. Closing it off. Reacher was facing them, not more than an arm's length away, in a flat little triangle.

He said, “Is she still watching?”

Scorpio said, “Harder than ever.”

“Are you going to answer my question?”

“You got the wrong person altogether.”

“OK,” Reacher said. “I get it.” He patted the air, a placatory gesture, as if defeated, as if requesting a time out, or a reset, or a reboot, or whatever else might help him. He said, “What if,” in a speculative way, but he didn't finish the question. Instead he cupped his hand on his brow, and rubbed, as if easing a headache or searching for a word, and then he raised his other hand too, and ran his fingers through his hair, back and forth fast, like a mental rinse, and then he moved his hands down and put his fingers flat over his mouth, almost steepled, over pursed lips, a meditative gesture, and then he rubbed his eyes, and then he pressed his fingers hard on his temples, like a person just one thought away from a solution.

All of which got his hands up at eye level, with no one suspecting a thing.

He flicked his right hand out and back real fast, a blur, like a snake's tongue, his fingers closing into a fist as it went, and he hit the right-hand guy in the face. Not much force behind it. A busted nose, maybe. Nothing more. But nothing more was required. The idea was to freeze the guy for a split second. That was all. While the same right hand on its way back pivoted into a full-blown right hook, with a violent twist at the waist and the shoulders, which hit the left-hand guy smack in the throat. Better than the face. No bones.

The left-hand guy went down like a slammed door.

Meanwhile Reacher was unwinding the twist and turning it into an equal and opposite left hook, and hitting the right-hand guy also in the throat.

Perfectly symmetrical.

Less than three seconds, beginning to end.

Plus style points.

The right-hand guy went down late and slowly, like a street light in an auto wreck. Reacher heard the slap of linoleum, and the thump of bone.

He stood there like nothing had happened.

He said, “Just you and me now.”

Scorpio said nothing.

Reacher said, “Is the cop getting out of her car?”

Scorpio didn't answer.

Reacher ducked down, left and right, and took guns out of pockets. Both the same. Smith & Wesson Chief's Specials, both looking older than he was. He put them in his own pockets.

He said, “Is she out of her car yet?”

Scorpio said, “No.”

“Is she on the phone?”

“No.”

“The radio?”

“No.”

“So what's she doing?”

“Just watching.”

“Remember what I said about running a test?”

Scorpio didn't answer.

Nakamura saw the sentries close ranks in front of Scorpio, who was leaning back in his lawn chair, like some kind of emperor on a throne. Reacher was facing the three of them. Up close. An arm's length away. There was some verbal back and forth. Two questions, two answers. Short sentences. Brief and to the point. Then Reacher scratched his head. Then he seemed to have some kind of violent physical spasm, and for no apparent reason the sentries fell over.

He had hit them.

She scrabbled for her door release.

She stopped.

That's good news anyway
.

Don't intervene
.

She took a deep breath, and watched.

Reacher sat down in the lawn chair next to Scorpio's. He stretched out and got comfortable and stared straight ahead at an inert Maytag. Scorpio was silent beside him. They looked like two old men at a ball game. The sentries stayed on the floor, breathing, but not easily.

Reacher took the West Point ring from his pocket. He balanced it on his palm. He said, “I need to know who you got this from.”

“I never saw that before,” Scorpio said. “I run a laundromat.”

“What have you got in your pockets?”

“Why?”

“You need to take it all out. I'm going to put you in the tumble dryer. Keys or coins might damage the mechanism.”

Scorpio glanced at a tumble dryer.

Couldn't help himself.

He said, “I wouldn't fit.”

“You would,” Reacher said.

“I never saw that ring before.”

“You sold it to Jimmy Rat.”

“Never heard of him.”

“Where I set the temperature dial is up to you. We'll start on delicates. Then we'll turn it up. Someone told me it goes all the way to where it can kill a bedbug.”

Scorpio said nothing.

“I understand,” Reacher said. “You're Mr. Rapid City. You're the man. You got a bunch of networks running. Which is your problem. Maybe they're all interconnected. In which case, one question might lead to another. The whole thing might unravel. You can't afford for that to happen. Hence the stone wall. I get it. Perfectly understandable. Except you need to remember two very important things. Firstly, I don't care. I'm not a cop. I don't have another question. And secondly, I'll put you in the tumble dryer. So you're between a rock and a hard place here. You need to get creative. You ever read a book?”