LITMIR.BIZ

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the consecutive-hour limit and then busting right through it, risking getting in trouble if he was pulled over and the troopers checked his log. But he was stopped now, ready to crash for the night.

      As soon as he dealt with whatever had gotten the hooker so frightened. Couldn’t be anything good.

      She trotted up to him, pushed her lank blond hair out of her face, and said, “Mister, just get back in the truck and let’s go.”

      McCabe shook his head. “Nah, I’m stopped for the night.”

      She clutched his arm. Her long fingernails dug into his skin through the sleeve of the khaki shirt he wore.

      “Some people are after me. I’ll make it worth your while. You won’t even have to pay me. I’ll be paying you, I guess you could say.”

      McCabe looked at her and thought about his wife and said, “Honey, what I got at home, you can’t even come close to matching.”

      She looked surprised and angry as she said, “Well, then, why’d you call me over here, asshole?”

      McCabe’s voice was mild as he replied, “You looked like you were in trouble.”

      “The only way you can help is to get me out of—”

      “Hey, there she is! Hey, Lindy!”

      Three men emerged from behind one of the big tractor-trailer rigs scattered through the parking lot. They started toward McCabe and the woman, moving fast. In the yellow glare of the sodium lights that washed over the parking lot, McCabe saw that they were all tall and muscular. They towered over his medium height, and their shoulders were broader, too. They had youth on him as well. None of them looked to be over thirty.

      But their guts were soft. McCabe noted that right away. Big muscles and soft guts…not the best combination in the world.

      “Oh, hell,” the hooker said. “Better go while you still can, mister.”

      She turned to run again before the three men could reach her.

      McCabe stopped her with a hand on her arm. “Stay here,” he told her.

      She tried to pull away, but couldn’t get loose. “You bastard!” she hissed. “You’re gonna give me to them.”

      McCabe didn’t say anything.

      The three men slowed from their trot to a stop as they came up to the truck. “Thanks, buddy,” one of them said to McCabe. “This little lady tried to run out on a business deal after she took our money.”

      Lindy stopped struggling in McCabe’s grip and glared at the three men. “I didn’t know what you had in mind,” she snapped. “I may be a whore, but there’re still some things I won’t do.”

      The man who seemed to be the spokesman for the trio returned the glare. He wore a John Deere cap and had a goatee. “We paid you good cash money,” he said as he reached for her. “Now you come on with us like a good girl.”

      McCabe moved so that he was between the men and the woman. He didn’t get in a hurry about it, but he was there before any of them seemed to know what was happening.

      “Hold on a minute,” he said. “You mean she took your money and ran off?”

      “Damn right,” one of the other men said. He took his cap off and wiped a hand over his mostly bald head. “That’s thievin’, in my book.”

      “Yeah, it is,” McCabe agreed. He turned to Lindy. “Give them back their money.”

      “We don’t want the money,” Goatee said.

      “We want her,” the third man said. Tufts of red hair stuck out from under his cap.

      “Well, she doesn’t want to go with you, so I think she should just give you your money back and we’ll all just say that the deal is off.” McCabe looked at Lindy. “How about it?”

      She was sullen and obviously reluctant to part with the money. “What if I don’t give it back?” she wanted to know.

      McCabe shrugged. “Then I’ll go on inside and get that cup of coffee I’ve been wanting for the last hundred miles, and you can work things out with these gentlemen on your own.”

      Before Lindy could say anything else, Goatee said, “You just don’t get it, mister. We don’t want the money back. We want the girl.”

      “Yeah,” Red said, grinning.

      Lindy looked at the three of them, then started to open the little purse she carried. “All right, all right, I’ll give them the damn money.”

      “Now hold on,” Baldy began.

      “That’s the deal,” McCabe interrupted. “You boys get your cash back, and you leave the lady alone.”

      Red said, “Who died and left you in charge, hoss?”

      “I’m tired o’ this shit.” Goatee started to reach past McCabe. “Come on, bitch—”

      McCabe put a hand on the man’s broad chest. “She said she’d give the money back. That’s it. Deal’s off.”

      “What the hell’s wrong with you, old man?” Goatee demanded. “You in the mood to get your ass kicked or somethin’?”

      McCabe knew what they saw when they looked at him—a guy on the wrong side of forty, with some gray in his dark hair and a decent enough build in his work clothes but nothing special. Just another truck driver, and worn out from a long day on the road.

      True enough, he supposed, but it wasn’t all the story. They didn’t know the places he’d been, the things he’d done.

      Goatee thrust his jaw out and said, “I asked you a question, you sumbitch. You lookin’ to get your ass kicked or somethin’?”

      “Or something,” McCabe said.

      Then he punched Goatee in that belligerent jaw, as hard as he could.

      Goatee went backward. Not far, just a couple of steps, because he was a big man with a lot of weight to move. But that gave McCabe enough room to operate. He half-turned to the left and snapped a kick with his right foot into Baldy’s belly. The guy’s gut was as soft as McCabe had figured. Baldy doubled over so fast that his cap went flying. He stumbled backward and collapsed on the pavement, curling up in a ball.

      Red came at McCabe with fists flying. He was fast and strong and McCabe was no miracle worker. One of the punches got through and clipped him on the side of the head. The impact stunned him.

      But instinct and training had taken over by now. McCabe could take some damage and keep functioning. He had taken a lot worse than a punch to the head before. He stepped inside Red’s mad rush and brought the base of his left hand up under the man’s chin. McCabe overcame his instincts and pulled the blow at the last second so that it wouldn’t break the guy’s neck and either kill him or leave him a hopeless cripple for the rest of his life. Instead, it just sent Red flying off his feet to crash down onto the concrete on his back.

      Goatee had recovered his balance. With a roar he lunged at McCabe and got his arms around the smaller man. Those arms were like tree trunks, and they closed with bone-crushing force.

      McCabe broke Goatee’s nose with a head butt. Goatee screamed, then screamed again as McCabe’s knee smashed into his groin. He let go of McCabe, stumbled around in a wobbly, bent-over circle for a second, and then folded up like a puppet with its strings cut.

      McCabe was breathing a little hard. He turned to see Lindy cowering against the rig. “You…all right?” he asked her.

      “How…how did you…there were three of them!” Her eyes were wide with amazement.

      The commotion had drawn some attention. Several men approached from the direction of the truck stop. They were all drivers, and McCabe recognized a couple of them.

      One

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