One Shot

and south and another across the street. The lamps gave each guy three shadows. There was neon outside the bar that filled the shadows with pink and blue. The street was empty. And quiet. No traffic. No noise, except sports bar sounds muffled by the door.
    The air was soft. Not hot, not cold.
    Rule eight: Assess and evaluate.
    The big guy was round and smooth and heavy, like a bull seal. Maybe ten years out of high school. An unbroken nose, no scar tissue on his brows, no misshapen knuckles. Therefore, not a boxer. Probably just a linebacker. So he would fight like a wrestler. He would be a guy who wants you on the ground.
    So he would start by charging. Head low.
    That was Reacher’s best guess.
    And Reacher was right.
    The guy exploded out of the blocks and charged, head low. Driving for Reacher’s chest. Looking to drive him backward and have him stumble and fall. Whereupon the other four could all pile in together and stomp him and kick him to their hearts’ content.
    Mistake.
    Because, rule nine: Don’t run head-on into Jack Reacher.
    Not when he’s expecting it. It’s like running into an oak tree.
    The big guy charged and Reacher turned slightly sideways and bent his knees a little and timed it just right and drove all his weight up and forward off his back foot and through his shoulder straight into the big guy’s face.
    Kinetic energy is a wonderful thing.
    Reacher had hardly moved at all but the big guy bounced off crazily, stunned, staggering backward on stiff legs, desperately trying to stay upright, one foot tracing a lazy half-circle in the air, then the other. He came to rest six feet away with his feet firmly planted and his legs wide apart, just like a big dumb capital letter
A.
    Blood on his face.
    Now
he had a broken nose.
    Put the ringleader down.
    Reacher stepped in and kicked him in the groin, but left-footed. Right-footed, he would have popped bits of the guy’s pelvis out through his nose.
Your big soft heart,
an old army instructor had said.
One day it’ll get you killed.
    But not today, Reacher thought. Not here. The big guy went down. He fell on his knees and pitched forward on his face.
    Then it got
real
easy.
    The next two guys came in together shoulder-to-shoulder, and Reacher dropped the first with a head butt and the second with an elbow to the jaw. They both went straight down and lay still. Then it was over, because the last two guys ran. The last two guys always do. The girl called Sandy ran after them. Not fast. The tight spandex and the high-heeled boots impeded her. But Reacher let her go. He turned back and kicked her three downed brothers onto their sides. Checked they were still breathing. Checked their hip pockets. Found their wallets. Checked their licenses. Then he dropped them and straightened up and turned around because he heard a car pull up behind him at the curb.
    It was a taxi. It was a taxi with Helen Rodin getting out of it.
    She threw a bill at the driver and he took off fast, gazing straight ahead, deliberately not looking left or right. Helen Rodin stood still on the sidewalk and stared. Reacher was ten feet away from her, with three neon shadows and three inert forms on the ground behind him.
    “What the hell is going on?” she asked.
    “You tell me,” he said. “You live here. You know these damn people.”
    “What does that mean? What the hell happened?”
    “Let’s walk,” he said.
    They walked south, fast, and turned a corner and went east. Then south again. Then they slowed a little.
    “You’ve got blood on your shirt,” Helen Rodin said.
    “But not mine,” Reacher said.
    “What happened back there?”
    “I was in the bar watching the game. Minding my own business. Then some underage red-haired bimbo started coming on to me. I wasn’t playing and she got it to where she found a reason to slap me. Then five guys jumped up. She said they were her brothers. We took it outside.”
    “Five guys?”
    “Two ran away.”
    “After you beat up the first three?”
    “I defended myself. That’s all. Minimum force.”
    “She slapped you?”
    “Right in the face.”
    “What had you said to her?”
    “Doesn’t matter what I said to her. It was a setup. So I’m asking you, is that how people get their kicks around here? Picking on strangers in bars?”
    “I need a drink,” Helen Rodin said. “I came to meet you for a drink.”
    Reacher stopped walking. “So let’s go back there.”
    “We can’t go back there. They probably