He lifted the tire iron and swung for my head. I raised my left arm and caught the blow on my tattooed wrist.
It didn’t hurt, but I did my damnedest not to show that. I cursed and clutched at my wrist as though he’d broken it.
The other two laughed. The tall guy wasn’t in a mood to be entertained. “Harlan is my friend, and he’s in the hospital because of you.”
He swung the tire iron again. This time I caught the blow on my right arm. I made a small, strangled noise and cradled both arms against my chest.
The scarecrow sneered at me and dropped the revolver into his pocket.
Perfect. He stepped toward me and raised his tire iron again.
I laid a quick, right uppercut on the point of his jaw. He went limp and my left hand was in his jacket pocket before he hit the ground. I yanked the revolver free and fumbled it into the proper position. The scarecrow’s tire iron clattered to the ground.
Glasses and the fireplug stepped back.
I pointed the gun at them. They froze in place.
“All right, kids. This doesn’t have to get interesting. Let’s make a deal. You never come near me again, and I won’t kill you.”
“Forget it,” the tall guy said, struggling to his feet. “The gun’s not loaded.”
Glasses turned on him. “What do you mean, it’s not loaded?” I wanted to know the same thing. “I told you what we needed to do.”
The tall guy shrugged. “You’re my friend, Wyatt, but… I left the bullets at home.”
While they hashed that out, the fireplug grinned. He hefted his tire iron and stepped toward me.
I threw the gun onto the roof of the bar and jumped onto the trunk of the Reliant. Then I stepped onto the roof and leaped for the top of the fence. I hit it at waist level and rolled over the top. There was a Dumpster below me. I twisted and landed on it. I heard cloth tearing. I jumped to the ground and ran for the street, wondering if Annalise would spring for more clothes.
When I reached the street, I sprinted toward the left, away from the business district into a residential neighborhood.
I heard them shout behind me and kept running. I was confident I could take any one of them, especially with the protections Annalise had given me. But three was too many. Too easy for one of them to knife me in the armpit or smash in my skull while I was dealing with another.
So I ran. I passed one block, then another. As I started on the third, I looked back. All three were chasing me, and the tall one seemed to be gaining. That was fine. Wyatt and the fireplug were falling back, puffing and straining to keep up.
I rounded a corner and was suddenly sprinting right beside a police car. The fat officer sat behind the wheel drinking Mountain Dew from a two-liter bottle. The engine was off. He watched me run past but didn’t reach for his keys or the radio. Great.
In the next block, I nearly stepped on a thick black streak on the sidewalk. I jolted to the side at the last minute, running into the street to go around it.
The beer and pizza began to weigh on me. I stopped beneath a streetlight and waited for the scarecrow.
He didn’t keep me waiting long. And he wasn’t stupid, either. He ran straight at me, then dodged to the side as he passed, swinging that tire iron.
I feinted a lunge at him, then stepped away from the swing. It missed.
The guy slapped his feet on the sidewalk as he tried to stop himself. I charged him. He turned and tried to leap back. With a weapon and a longer reach, I’m sure he was hoping to avoid a clinch.
He feinted a swing for my head, then went for my ribs. I barely managed to get my elbow in the path of the iron. It glanced off my arm without any harm but thumped into my hip. That one hurt.
I grabbed the tire iron as he tried to pull it away. My grip was stronger, and I ripped it from his hand and tossed it into the street. The scarecrow backed away into the streetlight, right where I wanted him.
I spared a glance at Wyatt and the fireplug. They were still half a block away, puffing toward us.
The scarecrow threw a solid left jab followed by a long, hard, circling right. Both were respectable efforts, although neither connected. I ducked under his right and landed a hard left against his floating ribs. I felt something crack.
He woofed and bent sideways. I threw a right into his midsection and slid a left hook over his shoulder against his jaw. He dropped.
I turned toward Wyatt and his remaining friend. We’d been standing in the light, and they had seen the whole show. They stopped running. After a second of indecision, they started walking away. I watched them go for a second or two, then went back to the man I’d just beaten.
I’d known guys who thought winning a fight was cause for celebration. They’d laugh and cheer and spread around high fives. I didn’t feel like cheering.
I took the guy’s wallet while he was coming around. His driver’s license said he was Floyd O’Marra. I also found thirty dollars inside. Good. Eventually, Annalise was going to want her plastic back. I decided to charge Floyd for the important life lessons I was teaching him. I pocketed the money.
“Damn,” Floyd said, rousing himself. “Where am I?”
“Look around,” I told him. “Tell me if you see anything familiar.”
