location. Much older. It came from a different generation of agriculture. There were two rows of stalls flanking an aisle. The floor was some kind of cobbled stone. Green with moss.
The central aisle was wide enough for horses, but not wide enough for the truck. It was backed just inside the door. Reacher saw a frame of sky around the rear of the vehicle. A big, dark sky. Could have been anywhere. He was led like a horse down the cobbled aisle. Loder was holding the chain. Stevie was walking sideways next to Reacher. His Glock was jammed high up against Reacher’s temple. The driver was following, with the shotgun pressed hard into Reacher’s kidney. It bumped with every step. They stopped at the end stall, farthest from the door. Holly was chained up in the space opposite. She was wearing a handcuff, right wrist, chain looped through the spare half into an iron ring bolted into the back wall of the stall.
The two guys with the guns fanned out in a loose arc and Loder shoved Reacher into his stall. Opened the cuff with the key. Looped the chain through the iron ring bolted into the timber on the back wall, looped it again, twice, and relocked it into the cuff. He pulled at it and shook it to confirm it was secure.
“Mattresses,” Reacher said. “Bring us the mattresses out of the truck.”
Loder shook his head, but the driver smiled and nodded.
“OK,” he said. “Good idea, asshole.”
He stepped up inside and dragged the queen-size out. Struggled with it all the way down the aisle and flopped it into Holly’s stall. Kicked it straight.
“The bitch gets one,” he said. “You don’t.”
He started laughing and the other two joined in. They strolled away down the aisle. The driver pulled the truck forward out of the barn and the heavy doors creaked shut behind it. Reacher heard a heavy crossbeam slamming down into its retaining brackets on the outside and the rattle of another chain and a padlock. He glanced across at Holly. Then he looked down at the damp stone floor.
REACHER WAS SQUATTED down, jammed into the far angle of the stall’s wooden walls. He was waiting for the three guys to come back with dinner. They arrived after an hour. With one Glock and the shotgun. And one metal messtin. Stevie walked in with it. The driver took it from him and handed it to Holly. He stood there leering at her for a second and then turned to face Reacher. Pointed the shotgun at him.
“Bitch eats,” he said. “You don’t.”
Reacher didn’t get up. He just shrugged through the gloom.
“That’s a loss I can just about survive,” he said.
Nobody replied to that. They just strolled back out. Pushed the heavy wooden doors shut. Dropped the crossbeam into place and chained it up. Reacher listened to their footsteps fade away and turned to Holly.
“What is it?” he asked.
She shrugged across the distance at him.
“Some sort of a thin stew,” she said. “Or a thick soup, I guess. One or the other. You want some?”
“They give you a fork?” he asked.
“No, a spoon,” she said.
“Shit,” he said. “Can’t do anything with a damn spoon.”
“You want some?” she asked again.
“Can you reach?” he said.
She spent some time eating, then she stretched out. One arm tight against the chain, the other pushing the messtin across the floor. Then she swiveled and used her good foot to slide the tin farther across the stone. Reacher slid forward, feet first, as far as his chain would let him go. He figured if he could stretch far enough, he could hook his foot around the tin and drag it in toward him. But it was hopeless. He was six five, and his arms were about the longest the Army tailors had ever seen, but even so he came up four feet short. He and Holly were stretched out in a perfect straight line, as near together as their chains would let them get, but the messtin was still way out of his reach.
“Forget it,” he said. “Get it back while you can.”
She hooked her own foot around the tin and pulled it back.
“Sorry,” she said. “You’re going to be hungry.”
“I’ll survive,” he said. “Probably awful, anyway.”
“Right,” she said. “It’s shit. Tastes like dog food.”
Reacher stared through the dark at her. He was suddenly worried.
HOLLY LAY DOWN apologetically on her mattress and calmly went to sleep, but Reacher stayed awake. Not because of the stone floor. It was cold and damp, and hard. The cobblestones were wickedly lumpy. But that was not the reason. He was waiting for something. He was ticking off the minutes in his head, and he was waiting. His guess was it would be about three hours, maybe four. Way into the small hours, when resistance is low and patience runs out.
A long wait. The thirteen-thousand-seven-hundred-and-sixty-first night of his life, way down there in the bottom third of the scale, lying awake and waiting for something to happen. Something bad. Something he maybe had no chance of preventing. It was coming. He was certain of that. He’d seen the signs. He lay and waited for it, ticking off the minutes. Three hours, maybe four.
IT HAPPENED AFTER three hours and thirty-four minutes. The nameless driver came back into the barn. Wide awake and alone. Reacher heard his soft footsteps on the track outside. He heard the rattle of the padlock and the chain. He heard him lift the heavy crossbar out of its brackets. The barn door opened. A bar of bright moonlight fell across the floor. The driver stepped through it. Reacher saw a flash of his pink pig’s face. The guy hurried down the aisle. No weapon in his hand.
“I’m watching you,” Reacher said, quietly. “You back off, or you’re a dead man.”
The guy stopped opposite. He wasn’t a complete moron. He stayed well out of range. His bright eyes traveled up from the handcuff on Reacher’s wrist, along the chain, and rested on the iron ring in the wall. Then he smiled.
“You watch if you want to,” he said. “I don’t mind an audience. And you might learn something.”
Holly stirred and woke up. Raised her head and glanced around, blinking in the dark.
“What’s going on?” she said.
The driver turned to her. Reacher couldn’t see his face. It was turned away. But he could see Holly’s.
“We’re going to have us a little fun, bitch,” the driver said. “Just you and me, with your asshole friend here, watching and learning.”
He put his hands down to his waist and unbuckled his belt. Holly stared at him. Started to sit up.
“Got to be joking,” she said. “You come near me, I’ll kill you.”
“You wouldn’t do that,” the driver said. “Now would you? After I gave you a mattress and all? Just so we could be comfortable while we’re doing it?”
Reacher stood up in his stall. His chain clanked loudly in the silent night.
“I’ll kill you,” he called. “You touch her, you’re a dead man.”
He said it once, and then he said it again. But it was like the guy wasn’t hearing him. Like he was deaf. Reacher was hit with a clang of fear. If the guy wasn’t going to listen to him, there was nothing he could do. He shook his chain. It rattled loudly through the silence of the night. It had no effect. The guy was just ignoring him.
“You come near me, I’ll kill you,” Holly said again.
Her leg was slowing her down. She was trapped in an awkward struggle to stand up. The driver darted into her stall. Raised his foot and stamped it down on her knee. She screamed in agony and collapsed and curled into a ball.
“You do what I tell you, bitch,” the driver said. “Exactly what I tell you, or you’ll never walk again.”
Holly’s scream died into a sob. The driver pulled his foot back and carefully kicked her knee like he was aiming for a field goal right at the end of the last quarter. She screamed again.
“You’re a dead man,” Reacher yelled.
The driver turned around and faced him. Smiled a wide smile.
“You keep your mouth tight shut,” he said. “One more squeak out of you, it’ll be harder on the bitch, OK?”
The ends of his belt were hanging down. He balled his fists and propped them on his hips. His big vivid face
