“But your group’s a tad looser,” Walls said. They laid the targets on top of each other and Walls shook his head. “I can’t call it. Wait, Icancall it. It’s a tie.”
“This is bullshit,” Kaiser said. “Like, this rim right here...” He pressed a thumbnail into one of his shots that overlapped one of Letty’s.
Letty said, “I’ll admit it’s not bad shooting, even for four seconds.”
Walls laughed and clapped her on the back with a heavy hand, like she was a guy, making her half-smile, half-grimace, and said, “I wasn’t gonna say nothin’, though it wasn’t awholefour. Three-point-five to be exact.”
“Fuck both of you,” Kaiser said. He might have suppressed a grin.
Letty slipped a hand into her jeans pocket and pulled out a thin, compact Sig 938. “You got a carry gun on your belt. You want to go again?”
“I got a carry gun, but it’s not a toy,” Kaiser said. He reached under his shirt, which he’d worn loose. He produced a pistol smaller than either of the bigger guns they’d been shooting, but larger than Letty’s carry gun; still an ugly desert tan. “Three shots at seven yards, one and a half seconds.”
They spent an hour shooting, burning up ammo, trading pistols, Letty winning some, Kaiser some others, at seven, ten, fifteen, and twenty-five yards. Walls got his own gun, an accurized Kimber .45, but he was older and past it, and wasn’t competitive. A couple of the other shooters came over to watch, and one jumped in, but he wasn’t competitive, either.
On the way out, Walls said, “You’re not a terrible-bad shot, little lady. Come back anytime.”
“I will, Mr. Walls.”
“You can call me Carl,” Walls said.
She nodded. “And you can call me Letty.”
In the truck,Kaiser squirmed around in the driver’s seat, getting his butt settled in, then said, “I’d kill for that fuckin’ Staccato.”
“You could sell your Rolex and Range Rover and buy several,” Letty said.
“Can’t do that,” Kaiser said and grunted. “When you’re Delta, you spend a lot of time in combat zones. Good pay and no income tax. If you’re careful, when you get out, you’ve got a nice bankroll. The first things you gotta buy are a Range Rover and a Rolex. Couldn’t hold my head up with the boys if I didn’t.”
“What if you’re not careful?”
“It’s a Prius and an Apple Watch.”
“I didn’t realize that,” Letty said.
“I got a personal question, if you don’t mind,” Kaiser said. “I know why I’m good with guns. It was my job. It’s still my job, to a certain extent. I don’t love guns. They’re like hammers. Tools. But why are you a shooter? You a gun freak?”
Letty shrugged. “I grew up with guns and I needed them. Most people don’t. All these high-capacity guns flashed by the nutcakes? They’re a disaster. If I had my way, there’d be no guns but single-shot hunting rifles and single-shot shotguns. You could do all the target shooting you want with those. You could hunt to your heart’s content. Of course, you’d actually have to learn how to hunt or how to hit a target, and most of those dimwits don’t want to be bothered. They want to play with guns because they can’t get laid, is my opinion.”
“So it’s women’s fault.”
“Got me there,” Letty said.
Kaiser laughed, then said, “Still, you don’t believe in high-capacity weapons, but you...”
“I don’t believe in them, but that’s not where we’re at, is it? There are more guns in this country than there are people, so it doesn’t matter what I believe. I willnotbe the victim of some lunatic.”
“Okay.” Kaiser sat staring through the windshield, then said, “Listen. About this morning. I apologize. I was an asshole. You’re the best female shooter I’ve ever seen. But I can tell you something,Ms. Davenport: punching paper is a lot different than shooting real live people.”
As he put the Range Rover in gear, Letty said. “I know. I’ve shot three people. Killed two of them. The other one was a cop. I shot him four times, two different occasions. Little .22-short, that was the problem. No punch. He always wore this heavy canvas winter coat. Never did kill him, not for want of trying. Though my dad and another cop did. None of it bothered me much.”
Kaiser let the truck coast in a shallow circle across the parking lot. “You’re serious?”
“Yes,” she said. “If you have your doubts, it’s all on the Internet. You could look it up.”
She listened, heard her mother’s voice and a male rumbling, then the voices went up and her mother began screaming RUN, LETTY! and Letty turned and stepped across the room and picked up her rifle, which was unloaded because her mother made her swear to keep it unloaded in the house, and she fumbled in the pocket of her trapping parka for a box of shells and then heard a crash of breaking glass and a RUN, LETTY! and she broke the gun open and there was a sudden tremendous BOOM and the sounds of fighting stopped...
Too late.
