Worth Dying For

Iranian, possibly. They were small and rumpled and unshaven and not very clean. One of them glanced at Reacher and Reacher nodded politely and headed for the door. It was dark outside, and cold. Reacher figured he would use the diner for breakfast, and therefore the rib shack for dinner. So he turned right on the back street and hustled.
    The doctor walked fast to beat the cold and made it home inside an hour. His wife was waiting for him. She was worried. He had some explaining to do. He started talking and got through the whole story before she spoke a word. At the end he went quiet and she said, ‘So it’s a gamble, isn’t it? Is that what you’re saying? Like a horse race. Will Reacher come back before Seth gets home and finds out that you just sat there and watched his car get stolen?’
    The doctor said, ‘Will Reacher come back at all?’
    ‘I think he will.’
    ‘Why would he?’
    ‘Because the Duncans took that kid. Who else do you think did it?’
    ‘I don’t know. I wasn’t here. I was in Idaho. I was a kid myself. So were you.’
    ‘Believe me.’
    ‘I do. But I wish you would tell me exactly why I should.’
    She said nothing.
    The doctor said, ‘Maybe Seth won’t go home. Maybe he’ll spend the night at his father’s place.’
    ‘That’s possible. People say he often does. But we shouldn’t assume.’ She started moving around the house, checking the window locks, checking the door locks, front and back. She said, ‘We should wedge the doors with furniture.’
    ‘Then they’ll come in the window.’
    ‘Tornado glass. It’s pretty strong.’
    ‘Those guys weigh three hundred pounds. You saw what they did to my car.’
    ‘We have to do something.’
    ‘They’ll burn us out. Or they’ll just stand on the step and tell us to open up. Then what are we going to do? Disobey them?’
    ‘We could hold out a day or two. We have food and water.’
    ‘Might be longer than a day or two. Might be for ever. Even if you’re right, there’s no guarantee Reacher will find the proof. There probably isn’t any proof. How can there be? The FBI would have found it at the time.’
    ‘We have to hope.’
    Reacher ordered baby back ribs with coleslaw and a cup of coffee. The place was dim and dirty and the walls were covered with old signs and advertisements. Probably all fake. Probably all ordered in bulk from a restaurant supplier, probably all painted in a Taiwanese factory and then scuffed and scratched and battered by the next guy along on the production line. But the ribs turned out to be good. The rub was subtle and the meat was tender. The coleslaw was crisp. The coffee was hot. And the check was tiny. Tip money, any place east of the Mississippi or south of Sacramento.
    Reacher paid and left and walked back to the hotel. Two guys were in the lot, hauling bags out of the trunk of a red Ford Taurus. More guests. The Marriott was experiencing a regular wintertime bonanza. The Taurus was new and plain. Probably a rental. The guys were big. Arabs of some kind. Syrians, maybe, or Lebanese. Reacher was familiar with that part of the world. The two guys looked at him as he passed and he nodded politelyand walked on. A minute later he was back in his room, with faded and brittle paper in his hands.
    That night the Duncans ate lamb, in Jonas Duncan’s kitchen. Jonas fancied himself a hell of a cook. And in truth he wasn’t too bad. His roast usually came in on the right side of OK, and he served it with potatoes and vegetables and a lot of gravy, which helped. And a lot of liquor, which helped even more. All four Duncans ate and drank together, two facing two across the table, and then they cleaned up together, and then Jasper looked at his brother Jacob and said, ‘We still have six boys capable of walking and talking. We need to decide how to deploy them tonight.’
    Jacob said, ‘Reacher won’t come back tonight.’
    ‘Can we guarantee that?’
    ‘We can’t really guarantee anything at all, except that the sun will rise in the east and set in the west.’
    ‘Therefore it’s better to err on the side of caution.’
    ‘OK,’ Jacob said. ‘Put one to the south and tell the other five to get some rest.’
    Jasper got on the phone and issued the instructions. Then he hung up and the room went quiet and Seth Duncan looked at his father and said, ‘Drive me home?’
    His father said, ‘No, stay a little longer, son. We have things to talk about. Our shipment could be here this time