by Lee Child
The handgun was a nine-millimeter automatic. It was brand-new. It was oiled. It was held low, lined up right on his old scar. The guy holding it looked more or less like he knew what he was doing. The safety mechanism was released. There was no visible tremor in the muzzle. No tension. The trigger finger was ready to go to work. Reacher could see that. He was concentrating hard on that trigger finger.
He was standing next to a woman. He was holding her arm. He had never seen her before. She was staring at an identical nine-millimeter pointed at her own gut. Her guy was more tensed up than his. Her guy looked uneasy. He looked worried. His gun was trembling with tension. His fingernails were chewed. A nervous, jumpy guy. The four of them were standing there on the street, three of them still like statues and the fourth hopping slightly from foot to foot.
They were in Chicago. Center of the city, a busy sidewalk, a Monday, last day of June. Broad daylight, bright summer sunshine. The whole situation had materialized in a split second. It had happened in a way which couldn’t have been choreographed in a million years. Reacher had been walking down the street, going nowhere, not fast, not slow. He had been about to pass the exit door of a storefront dry cleaner. The door had opened up in his face and an old metal walking cane had clattered out on the sidewalk right in front of him. He’d glanced up to see a woman in the doorway. She was about to drop an armful of nine dry-cleaning bags. She was some way short of thirty, expensively dressed, dark, attractive, self-assured. She had some kind of a bad leg. Some kind of an injury. Reacher could see from her awkward posture it was causing her pain. She’d thrown him a would-you-mind look and he’d thrown her a no-problem look and scooped up the metal cane. He’d taken the nine bags from her with one hand and given her the cane with the other. He’d flicked the bags up over his shoulder and felt the nine wire hangers bite into his finger. She had planted the cane on the sidewalk and eased her forearm into the curved metal clip. He had offered his hand. She had paused. Then she had nodded in an embarrassed fashion and he had taken her arm and waited a beat, feeling helpful but awkward. Then they had turned together to move away. Reacher had figured he would maybe stroll a few steps with her until she was steady on her feet. Then he would let her arm go and hand back her garments. But he’d turned straight into the two men with the nine-millimeter automatics.
The four of them stood there, face-to-face in pairs. Like four people eating together in a tight booth in a diner. The two guys with the guns were white, well fed, vaguely military, vaguely alike. Medium height, short brown hair. Big hands, muscular. Big, obvious faces, bland pink features. Tense expressions, hard eyes. The nervous guy was smaller, like he burned up his energy worrying. They both wore checked shirts and poplin windbreakers. They stood there, pressed together. Reacher was a lot taller than the other three. He could see all around them, over their heads. He stood there, surprised, with the woman’s dry cleaning slung over his shoulder. The woman was leaning on her crutch, just staring, silent. The two men were pointing the guns. Close in. Reacher felt they’d all been standing like that for a long time. But he knew that feeling was deceptive. It probably hadn’t been more than a second and a half.
The guy opposite Reacher seemed to be the leader. The bigger one. The calmer one. He looked between Reacher and the woman and jerked his automatic’s barrel toward the curb. “In the car, bitch,” the guy said. “And you, asshole.”
He spoke urgently, but quietly. With authority. Not much of an accent. Maybe from California, Reacher thought. There was a sedan at the curb. It had been waiting there for them. A big car, black, expensive. The driver was leaning across and behind the front passenger seat. He was stretching over to pop the rear door. The guy opposite Reacher motioned with his gun again. Reacher didn’t move. He glanced left and right. He figured he had about another second and a half to make some kind of an assessment. The two guys with the nine-millimeter automatics didn’t worry him too much. He was one-handed, because of the dry cleaning, but he figured the two guys would go down without too much of a problem. The problems lay beside him and behind him. He stared up into the dry cleaner’s window and used it like a mirror. Twenty yards behind him was a solid mass of hurrying people at a crosswalk. A couple of stray bullets would find a couple of targets. No doubt about that. No doubt at all. That was the problem behind him. The problem beside him was the unknown woman. Her capabilities were an unknown quantity. She had some kind of a bad leg. She would be slow to react. Slow to move. He wasn’t prepared to go into combat. Not in that environment, and not with that partner.
The guy with the California accent reached up and grabbed Reacher’s wrist where it was pinned against his collar by the weight of the nine clean garments hanging down his back. He used it to pull him toward the car. His trigger finger still looked ready to go to work. Reacher was watching it, corner of his eye. He let the woman’s arm go. Stepped over to the car. Threw the bags into the rear seat and climbed in after them. The woman was pushed in behind him. Then the jumpy guy crowded in on them and slammed the door. The leader got in front on the right. Slammed the door. The driver nudged the selector and the car moved smoothly and quietly away down the street.
THE WOMAN WAS GASPING IN PAIN AND REACHER FIGURED she had the jumpy guy’s gun jammed in her ribs. The leader was twisted around in the front seat with his gun hand resting against the thick leather headrest. The gun was pointed straight at Reacher’s chest. It was a Glock 17. Reacher knew all about that weapon. He had evaluated the prototype for his unit. That had been his assignment during his light-duty convalescence after the Beirut wound. The Glock was a tough little weapon. Seven and a half inches long from firing pin to muzzle tip. Long enough to make it accurate. Reacher had hit thumbtack heads at seventy-five feet with it. And it fired a decent projectile. It delivered quarter-ounce bullets at nearly eight hundred miles an hour. Seventeen rounds to a magazine, hence the name. And it was light. For all its power, it weighed under two pounds. The important parts were steel. The rest of it was plastic. Black polycarbonate, like an expensive camera. A fine piece of craftsmanship.
But he hadn’t like it much. Not for the specialized requirements of his unit. He’d recommended rejection. He’d supported the Beretta 92F instead. The Beretta was also a nine-millimeter, a half-pound heavier, an inch longer, two fewer rounds in the magazine. But it had about ten percent more stopping power than the Glock. That was important to him. And it wasn’t plastic. The Beretta had been Reacher’s choice. His unit commander had agreed. He had circulated Reacher’s paper and the Army as a whole had backed his recommendation. The same week they promoted him and pinned on his Silver Star and his Purple Heart, they ordered Berettas even though the Beretta was more expensive and NATO was crazy for the Glock and Reacher had been just about a lone voice and was not long out of West Point. Then he had been assigned elsewhere and served all around the world and hadn’t really seen a Glock 17 since. Until now. Twelve years later, he was getting a pretty damn good second look at one.
He switched his attention away from the gun and took a second look at the guy holding it. He had a decent tan which whitened near his hairline. A recent haircut. The driver had a big shiny brow, thinning hair swept back, pink and vivid features, the smirk that pig-ugly guys use when they think they’re handsome. Same cheap chainstore shirt, same windbreaker. Same corn-fed bulk. Same in-charge confidence, edged around with a slight breathlessness. Three guys, all of them maybe thirty or thirty-five, one leader, one solid follower, one jumpy follower. All of them tense but rehearsed, racing through some kind of a mission. A puzzle. Reacher glanced past the steady Glock into the leader’s eyes. But the guy shook his head.
“No talking, asshole,” he said. “Start talking, I’ll shoot you. That’s a damn promise. Keep quiet, you could be OK.”
Reacher believed him. The guy’s eyes were hard and his mouth was a tight line. So he said nothing. Then the car slowed and pulled onto a lumpy concrete forecourt. It headed around behind an abandoned industrial building. They ha
d driven south. Reacher figured they were now maybe five miles south of the Loop. The driver eased the big sedan to a stop with the rear door lined up with the back of a small panel truck. The truck was standing alone on the empty lot. It was a Ford Econoline, dirty white, not old, but well used. There had been some kind of writing on the side. It had been painted over with fresh white paint which didn’t exactly match the bodywork. Reacher scanned around. The lot was full of trash. He saw a paint can discarded near the truck. A brush. There was nobody in sight. The place was deserted. If he was going to make some kind of a move, this was the right time to make it, and the right location. But the guy in front smiled a thin smile and leaned right over into the back of the car. Caught Reacher’s collar with his left hand and ground the tip of the Glock’s muzzle into Reacher’s ear with his right.
“Sit still, asshole,” the guy said.
The driver got out of the car and skipped around the hood. Pulled a new set of keys from his pocket and opened up the rear doors of the truck. Reacher sat still. Jamming a gun into a person’s ear is not necessarily a smart move. If the person suddenly jerks his head around toward it, the gun comes out. It rolls around the person’s forehead. Then even a quick trigger finger won’t do much damage. It might blow a hole in the person’s ear, just the outside flap, and it’s sure to shatter the person’s eardrum. But those are not fatal wounds. Reacher spent a second weighing those odds. Then the jumpy guy dragged the woman out of the car and hustled her straight into the back of the truck. She hopped and limped across the short distance. Straight out of one door and in through the other. Reacher watched her, corner of his eye. Her guy took her pocketbook from her and tossed it back into the car. It fell at Reacher’s feet. It thumped heavily on the thick carpet. A big pocketbook, expensive leather, something heavy in it. Something metal. Only one metal thing women carry could make a heavy thump like that. He glanced across at her, suddenly interested.
She was sprawled in the back of the truck. Impeded by her leg. Then the leader in the front pulled Reacher along the leather seat and passed him on to the jumpy guy. As soon as one Glock was out of his ear, the other was jammed into his side. He was dragged over the rough ground. Across to the rear of the truck. He was pushed inside with the woman. The jumpy guy covered them both with the trembling Glock while the leader reached into the car and pulled out the woman’s metal crutch. He walked over and tossed it into the truck. It clanged and boomed on the metal siding. He left her dry cleaning in the back of the sedan with her handbag. Then he pulled a set of handcuffs from the pocket of his jacket. He caught the woman’s right wrist and cuffed it with half the handcuff. Pulled her roughly sideways and caught Reacher’s left wrist. Snapped the other half of the cuff onto it. Shook the cuff to check it was secure. Slammed the truck’s left rear door. Reacher saw the driver emptying plastic bottles into the sedan. He caught the pale color and the strong smell of gasoline. One bottle into the back seat, one into the front. Then the leader swung the truck’s right rear door shut. Last thing Reacher saw before darkness enveloped him was the driver, pulling a matchbook from his pocket.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Teaser chapter
Praise for DIE TRYING
“It takes a brave man to move into the macho territory of suspense writer Stephen Hunter, but Lee Child is making his move with [Die Trying].”—Chicago Tribune
“A literate scenario-cum-thriller.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer
“Lee Child’s knowledge of the modern military and its combat tactics amazed me. A chilling and all-too-realistic story, and a damn good book.”—Steve Thayer
“[A] redoubtable yet romantic hero . . . [a] fast-paced misadventure . . . Cunning and explosive, it’s a thumping good read.” —Time Out
“Child presents his tense, action-packed adventure in vivid prose, as lean and capable as his central character. Jack Reacher is not merely a terrific hero; he sets a new standard.”—Tom Savage
“Furiously suspenseful.” —Kirkus Reviews
“Jack Reacher is an ex-military policeman, the sort who meets terror with a shrug, tragedy with the tiniest flick of jaw-muscle, and copes with hours of brutal confinement by doing intricate mental arithmetic.” —Sunday Express
Praise for LEE CHILD
“Reacher is a wonderfully epic hero: tough, taciturn, yet vulnerable.” —People
“Great style and careful plotting. The violence is brutal . . . depicted with the kind of detail that builds dread and suspense.” —The New York Times
“The author pens nightmarish images as casually as an ordinary writer would dot an ‘i’ or cross a ‘t.’ ”
—The Philadelphia Inquirer
“[Child] must be channeling Dashiell Hammett . . . Reacher handles the maze of clues and the criminal unfortunates with a flair that would make Sam Spade proud.”
—Playboy
“Reacher is as tough as he is resourceful.”
—The Denver Post
“Child . . . gives us one of the truly memorable tough-guy heroes in recent fiction: Jack Reacher.”
—Jeffery Deaver, author of The Bone Collector
“I love the larger-than-life hero Jack Reacher. I grew up a fan of John Wayne’s and Clint Eastwood’s movies, and it’s great to see a man of their stature back in business.”
—Nevada Barr
“Jack Reacher has presence and dimension—a man you definitely want on your side. Child has a sure touch and a strong voice. Definitely a talent to watch.”
—Lynn Hightower
Praise for Lee Child’s JACK REACHER NOVELS
KILLING FLOOR
A People Magazine “Page-Turner”
An Anthony Award Winner
“It’ll blow you away.” —The Philadelphia Inquirer
“From its jolting opening scene to its fiery final confrontation, Killing Floor is irresistible.” —People
TRIPWIRE
“A stylish thriller as complex and disturbing as its hero.”
—Stephen White
“A sort of millennial reshaping of John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee character.” —The Dallas Morning News
RUNNING BLIND
“Swift and brutal.” —The New York Times
“Spectacular . . . muscular, energetic prose, and pell-mell pacing.” —The Seattle Times
WITHOUT FAIL
“If Without Fail doesn’t hook you on Lee Child, I give up.” —The New York Times
“Child’s plot is ingenious, his characters are first-rate, and his writing is fine indeed. This is a superior series.”
—The Washington Post Book World
ECHO BURNING
“Child is a vigorous storytell
er, gradually building the suspense to almost unbearable levels.” —St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“As sweltering as the El Paso sun. Bottom line: jalapeño-hot suspense.” —People
Titles by Lee Child
WITHOUT FAIL
ECHO BURNING
RUNNING BLIND
TRIPWIRE
DIE TRYING
KILLING FLOOR
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada
(a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)
Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia
(a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)
Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand
(a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)