Die Trying

outright, but he’d bleed to death in the dirty straw. Femoral artery gone, about a minute, maybe a minute and a half. In those circumstances, no real reason to make a big deal out of giving this guy a name.
    “Jack Reacher,” he said.
    The leader nodded in satisfaction, like he’d achieved a victory.
    “You know this bitch?” he asked.
    Reacher glanced across at Holly.
    “Better than I know some people,” he said. “I just spent six hours handcuffed to her.”
    “You some kind of a wise guy, asshole?” the leader asked.
    Reacher shook his head.
    “Innocent passerby,” he said. “I never saw her before.”
    “You with the Bureau?” the guy asked.
    Reacher shook his head again.
    “I’m a doorman,” he said. “Club back in Chicago.”
    “You sure, asshole?” the guy said.
    Reacher nodded.
    “I’m sure,” he said. “I’m a wise enough guy that I can recall what I do for a living, one day to the next.”
    There was silence for a long moment. Tension. Then the jumpy guy with the Glock came out of his shooting stance. The driver with the shotgun swung his weapon down toward the straw on the floor. He turned his head and went back to staring at Holly’s breasts. The leader nodded at Reacher.
    “OK, asshole,” he said. “You behave yourself, you stay alive for now. Same for the bitch. Nothing’s going to happen to anybody. Not just yet.”
    The three men regrouped in the center aisle and walked out of the barn. Before they locked the door, Reacher saw the sky again, briefly. Darker. Still cloudy. No stars. No clues. He tested the chain. It was securely fastened to the handcuff at one end and the railing at the other. Maybe seven feet long. He could hear Holly doing the same experiment. Tightening her chain and scoping out the radius it gave her to move through.
    “Would you mind looking away?” she called across.
    “Why?” he called back.
    There was a short silence. Then a sigh. Part embarrassed, part exasperated.
    “Do you really need to ask?” she called. “We were in that truck six hours, and it didn’t have a bathroom, did it?”
    “You going in the next stall?” he asked.
    “Obviously,” she said.
    “OK,” he said. “You go right and I’ll go left. I won’t look if you won’t.”

    THE THREE MEN came back to the barn within an hour with food. Some kind of a beef stew in a metal messtin, one for each of them. Mostly rare steak chunks and a lot of hard carrots. Whoever these guys were, cooking was not their major talent. Reacher was clear on that. They handed out an enamel mug of weak coffee, one for each of them. Then they got in the truck. Started it up and backed it out of the barn. Turned the bright lights off. Reacher caught a glimpse of dim emptiness outside. Then they pulled the big door shut and locked it. Left their prisoners in the dark and the quiet.
    “Gas station,” Holly called from twenty feet away. “They’re filling up for the rest of the ride. Can’t do it with us inside. They figure we’d be banging on the side and shouting out for help.”
    Reacher nodded and finished his coffee. Sucked the fork from the stew clean. Bent one of the prongs right out and put a little kink into the end with pressure from his thumb-nail. It made a little hook. He used it to pick the lock on his handcuff. Took him eighteen seconds, beginning to end. He dropped the cuff and the chain in the straw and walked over to Holly. Bent down and unlocked her wrist. Twelve seconds. Helped her to her feet.
    “Doorman, right?” she said.
    “Right,” he said. “Let’s take a look around.”
    “I can’t walk,” she said. “My crutch is in the damn truck.”
    Reacher nodded. She stayed in her stall, clinging to the railing. He scouted around the big empty barn. It was a sturdy metal structure, built throughout with the same flecked galvanized metal as the stall railings. The big door was locked from the outside. Probably a steel bar pad-locked into place. No problem if he could get at the padlock, but he was inside and the padlock was outside.
    The walls met the floor with a right-angle flange bolted firmly into the concrete. The walls themselves were horizontal metal panels maybe thirty feet long, maybe four feet tall. They were joined together with more right-angle flanges bolted together. Each flange gave a lip about six inches deep. Like a giant stepladder, with the treads four feet apart.
    He climbed the wall, hauling himself quickly upward, flange to flange, four feet