A Hard Man To Forget

by Dan Ames

  The man Tallon assumed was the woman’s husband did not share this intensity. He was speaking quietly to the woman and Tallon knew he was urging his wife of many years to not get involved.

  She would have none of it.

  Tallon watched as the woman crossed the dining area. She had on a pair of blue slacks, a white blouse buttoned up to the neck, and sensible black shoes. She was tall, maybe a former athlete.

  A woman of action, Tallon thought.

  Most of the humdrum, muted conversations taking place in the restaurant stopped. It seemed to Tallon that even the requisite kitchen noise from behind the service counter had suddenly diminished to a quiet lull.

  The older woman arrived at the table of the man and the young girl.

  “You’re teaching your daughter to accept being abused by a man,” the old woman said. “If you continue, she’ll look for someone just like you. A thug who berates her and probably beats her. Is that what you want?”

  In the background, Tallon saw a worker at the counter dart back into the kitchen, most likely looking for a manager. The old woman’s husband began to slide out of his booth. It wasn’t a neat, quick move. He wasn’t as spry as his wife.

  But Tallon knew the big man wasn’t going to hesitate. Those rings weren’t for display. The guy was a brawler. He had it written all over his face, and his hands.

  “Fuck off, you old bitch,” the big man roared. He lunged to his feet and the old woman retreated halfway back to her husband. They collided, and the woman fell to the floor.

  “No, Dad! Leave her alone,” the young girl screamed. Her face had turned red and she had started to cry. It was terror that had given her the courage to talk. And a compassion for someone other than herself. Her father had probably beaten down the ability to care for herself, but the inherent goodness was still there, as long as it was reserved for others.

  But the big man wasn’t listening.

  He moved quickly toward the woman and her husband.

  Tallon noted the big man’s dirty blue jeans and his thick, black leather steel-toed boots. He was walking toward the woman and Tallon knew with utmost certainty that he planned to punch and then stomp the woman before she got to her feet. He’d probably try to clobber the old husband, too.

  Had to impress his daughter, his pea brain probably told him.

  Tallon’s rules about bad parents were one thing.

  Innocent bystanders were a whole different ballgame. There were no blurry lines on that one.

  He was out of his booth and between the big man and the older couple before anyone had a chance to react.

  Tallon was face-to-face with the big man.

  “Turn around, go back and apologize to your daughter,” Tallon said.

  The man laughed, his face incredulous. He looked behind him, wondering, Tallon supposed, if a bevy of cops had suddenly arrived to supply backup.

  But there was no one. Just a scared girl and a restaurant staff all peering out from behind the counter with blank stares.

  Tallon read the story that was on the man’s face. A cruel man, wanting to prove his superiority, and single-handedly destroy everyone who got in his path, in a little chain restaurant on the outskirts of nowhere, U.S.A.

  The eyes changed, turned almost gleeful, and Tallon knew the punch was on its way before the big man even did.

  The man’s blow was slightly unorthodox, slow, but with a fair amount of power behind it.

  Rather than avoid it, Tallon simply stepped into it, deflected the arm wide, caught it in both hands and slammed it down on the back of one of the restaurant’s fixed chairs.

  The arm snapped like a medium-sized piece of driftwood.

  The man screamed and staggered, almost falling to his knees.

  Tallon drove his elbow into the man’s throat, cutting off the scream, and then as the man continued to drop, followed it with a knee to the face. Tallon both felt and heard the cartilage squish like fresh roadkill beneath a truck tire.

  The man’s eyes rolled back into his head.

  Behind them, the manager disconnected from a call he had just made. 9-1-1, Tallon knew.

  He had just enough time, so he began pulling the rings from the man’s fingers.

  He wasn’t sure why, exactly.

  A part of him recognized the rings were old, and that the man’s fingers had grown fat around them. They were the man’s armor. Something about the way they had looked made Tallon feel like the man got some kind of special confidence from them. And had felt that way for a long time.

  So they didn’t come off easily.

  One pulled most of the skin off the finger it was attached to.

  Tallon had to break three fingers to get the accompanying rings free.

  With all of the rings now in his right hand, he forced them into the man’s mouth, breaking several teeth in the process.

  Tallon then returned to his table, took his tray and slid the plate and remaining food into the waste bin. He took an extra napkin and wiped off his hands.

  He walked over to the young girl and pulled out a wad of cash from his front pocket. He guessed there was nearly a thousand dollars there. Using his body to shield the view of the man on the ground even though he was completely unconscious, he handed the girl the money.

  “Get on a bus. Take your Mom if she loves you. Get out of here. He probably didn’t learn the lesson.”

  The girl mumbled something soft but she slipped the money into her pocket and stood to leave.

  With a nod to the old couple, Tallon left.

  He still had a six-hour drive ahead of him.

  4

  Miles from the dead man who’d been forced to dig his own grave, another project was being undertaken.

  This, too, was being performed under the cover of darkness, with only modest lighting required.

  The coyote who had serenaded the dead man during his execution was now nowhere to be found.

  Instead, the same two men with guns were now present, along with a half-dozen others.

  The activity took place behind a gated entrance off a dirt road in the middle of the desert, surrounded by razor wire and signs proclaiming private property. There were a half-dozen buildings, spread out in the style of a quasi-military complex. The biggest of the structures was the size of an airplane hangar.

  Bundles of desert camouflage netting were littered throughout the complex, some in place, others waiting to be utilized as circumstances arose.

  Unlike their activity hours earlier, the two men with guns were not burying a human being.

  This time, a large piece of machinery was slowly making its way into a new home.

  Underground.

  In the large, hangar-like building, a huge retractable door was raised, revealing a tunnel the width of three traffic lanes. Everything was painted military gray, and the path was illuminated with lights protected by metal screens.

  There was some hushed talking, subtle yet unmistakable hand gestures being made, and a delicate job was in the process of precise completion. The air smelled of gasoline, motor oil and fresh paint.

  Near the back of the hangar, a man stood silently. He was very tall. Very thin. With a bald head that caught the harsh light of the hangar’s interior. The men working did not look at him directly, instead, they seemed to note his presence in their peripheral vision.

  Once the large item was securely deposited and the huge door rolled back into place, the bald man turned and entered an elevator with buttons showing two floors beneath ground level.

  He entered the elevator and pressed the button for the lowest level.

  Outside, the lights of the complex were shut off and the camouflage netting was moved into place by an automated system, like a football stadium with a retractable roof.

  In the dark, with the netting in place, the entire structure was nearly invisible.

  Along the dirt road, the tire tracks from the vehicles were slowly being erased by the night’s desert wind.

  5 />
  When the situation demanded it, Lauren Pauling could move with a quickness and agility that often surprised the people around her. Her fast-twitch muscle fibers were always primed, and her reflexes as well as her endurance were a bit of a legend at the Bureau.

  Her preference, however, was to always proceed when possible with deliberation.

  Survey. Analyze. Intuit.

  Which is how she handled the arrival of the mysterious white envelope.

  The one that simply read Reacher.

  She stood still in her office, her head cocked slightly to one side as she ran a series of rapid observations and calculations through her mind.

  Definitely not delivered by the mail.

  Too early.

  Definitely not delivered via one of the overnight services as the envelope was plain, with no labels bearing the name of a shipping company.

  She also rapidly discounted the notion that it had been incorrectly delivered to another address and brought to her office by the resident of the wrong address.

  There was no address at all on the front.

  Nor was her name included.

  All of which told Pauling that the letter had been hand-delivered.

  A courier, maybe.

  Still, most couriers had instructions on whether or not to obtain proof of delivery. In the majority of cases, that was the norm.

  Which meant if the envelope had been brought by courier, the instructions had been to simply deliver the envelope without obtaining a signature.

  Why?

  Had the courier been told not to be seen? To simply slide the letter under the door and disappear?

  Pauling took a step closer to the mysterious guest on the floor of her office.

  Living in New York, the favorite target of various terrorists groups, tended to make a person suspicious of generic packages being delivered. And Pauling was no exception.

  Added to that, she was ex-FBI and had performed her share of duties involving foreign enemies of the state.

  If that weren’t enough, she and Jack Reacher had done some serious damage to a crooked mercenary. Maybe one of his gang was back and wanted revenge.

  Pauling discounted that as well.

  Even a letter bomb would have some kind of shape.

  This was slim. Pauling guessed it held one piece of paper. Probably not even a full sheet. Notecard sized.

  Pauling also ruled out the notion that Jack Reacher had delivered the message. Not Reacher’s style. He was direct and to the point. Yes, he moved around the country anonymously, but there was no way he would have arrived at her door and dropped off a piece of paper without announcing his presence.

  Pauling had gathered all of this intelligence by assessing the front side of the envelope only. Now she stepped forward, leaned down and turned the letter over before picking it up.

  There was nothing on the back.

  That, too, confirmed her previous theories.

  A hand-delivered letter.

  She picked it up, brought it to her desk and set it before her. She sat down. Leaned forward. Smelled the envelope.

  Only the vague smell of paper, a kind of unimpressive scent one associated with a tiny copy room in a corporation. Or an office supply store when it first receives its shipments of back-to-school supplies.

  A trace of New York car exhaust as well.

  That was it.

  Deciding she had gathered all of the information she could, Pauling used a letter opener and sliced the envelope open.

  One slip of paper eased itself out onto her desk.

  It was notecard sized.

  Folded in half.

  No fancy trim. Or bold lettering. Or heavy linen stock.

  Just a garden-variety notecard.

  Pauling opened it.

  Written in black ink with a firm hand, was a phone number.

  The number meant nothing to her.

  6

  Nearly two thousand miles from the mysterious activity in the desert, a group of people assembled around a large table made of a dark wood polished to perfection. It was nearly black, and reflected the recessed lighting above, as well as the anguished faces seated around its perimeter.

  There were file folders on the table. Laptops with multiple wires running into neatly camouflaged openings. Paper cups filled with industrial-strength coffee.

  Very few words were spoken.

  A large screen at one end of the room displayed a satellite map. There were no cities listed. No roads with electronic labels attached. Any clearly delineated location was absent.

  What little activity was taking place stopped when the door opened and a man entered.

  He was older than most, but with square shoulders, a neat buzz cut, and a posture that implied confidence, assertiveness and total command.

  Without hesitation, he walked to the head of the table. He looked down at the chair, but chose to stand. He appraised the various men and women seated around the table.

  He spoke in a clipped manner, with a timbre that betrayed authority.

  “I want the person in the room with most current information to tell me in as few words as possible…” he said.

  His eyes went from person to person before he finished the thought.

  “…just what in the hell is going on.”

  7

  Death was home to Michael Tallon.

  The small town of Independence Springs was nestled in the southwestern crook of Death Valley.

  It was situated between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, in an area most people saw from the very distant highway.

  Tallon owned a decent-sized chunk of land and a small adobe house. Some referred to it as a casita. Others, a ranch.

  To Tallon, it wasn’t a home. He thought of it as headquarters.

  From the outside, it appeared to be a typical California gentleman’s ranch. Someone who might prefer to play cowboy on the weekends. Or the kind of home a retired couple who couldn’t afford the lavish homes of a bigger city might turn to for a warm and low-cost option.

  Because of Tallon’s background, the home had some interesting features.

  Multiple security cameras. An alarm system with two backup generators. An armory. A weightlifting room that occupied the entire garage. A landscape that appeared to be ordinary, but was in fact strategically laid out to prevent cover for an attacking force while also providing advantageous shooting lanes for someone inside the structure.

  Likewise, the home’s electronics were significantly out of the ordinary. There was a hardwired landline. A wireless radio unit. Two satellite phones with multiple batteries and chargers. A hardwired communication system for cable and Internet, along with a satellite-based stream that could continue to feed the home information without power and if the physical cables were somehow severed.

  The windows were bulletproof, the entry doors made of specific construction designed to withstand explosives and fire.

  One might assume Michael Tallon was a man with a great deal of enemies.

  While that was true, it was also true that most of them were dead.

  Still, Tallon had taken some precautions because he could afford to, and it made more sense to install fortifications than to skimp.

  When he did things, Tallon tried to do them the right way.

  Now, he disarmed the security system, walked through the house and satisfied with the results, unloaded his gear. He stashed his weapons, showered, and splashed a finger’s worth of whiskey into a glass.

  He sat in the living room, with the picture window looking out over the broad expanse of desert to the mountains beyond. The interior of the room was darker than the outside, and a film of reflective material adorned the exterior. No one could see in, but Tallon could see out.

  It was good to be back, he thought.

  His project had been completed with neat efficiency, and all had gone as planned.

  Except for the confrontation in the restaurant.

  Tallon’s mind went to the young girl. S
he had a challenge in front of her, that was for certain. The police would come. They would do a half-hearted search for the man who had injured the original assailant. But they wouldn’t find anything. Tallon was quite gifted when it came to leaving no trace of his presence.

  But the girl. He hoped she would take his money and leave. Find a friend. Or a family member. Maybe her Mom wasn’t so bad. Maybe they just needed a break.

  Maybe consider the intervention of a stranger a sign to forge a new path.

  He hoped so.

  But it was a guarded kind of hope. He wished he had a way to follow up, but he knew he couldn’t. To have given the girl any kind of information would have been a mistake. She would have been forced to give the same information to the police, and then there would be issues.

  He had done the right thing.

  But a part of him wondered…had he done enough?

  8

  The deliberations continued.

  Pauling had lunch with a contact at the United Nations. She was a woman, too. She and Pauling had a professional relationship. But they recognized in each other the same trials and tribulations that always came with being a strong and intelligent woman in the world.

  Their friendship had benefits.

  Pauling sometimes used the woman for information. Information she couldn't get from her regular contacts at the Bureau. Or the State Department. Or even her databases for which she paid significantly large sums of money every month.

  There simply was no substitute sometimes for boots on the ground.

  It was something she knew Jack Reacher strongly believed in as well.

  The woman from the UN also received benefits. Mostly career advice and world experience. The woman from the UN spoke multiple languages, had traveled far and wide but not in the same circles that Pauling had traveled in. Therefore, she often used Pauling as a sounding board. Pauling’s analytical mind was razor-sharp and the woman had recognized a resource when she saw it.