“Well, this is private property,” Simon said, his voice crabbed and just a bit whiny. “You can’t just come here—”
Without breaking stride he jabbed his phone-weighted fist forward into Ginger’s face. His nose spattered across one cheek with a brittle cellophane sound, and blood and snot splashed out to stain his T-shirt. Simon grabbed the slimed jacket collar, wrenched him forward, and kicked his knee out of joint as he went down.
Unfortunately for him Uncle Sam had spent a helluva lot more money teaching Simon to kill.
“Fucker,” the writhing ginger man got out. “Kill the fucker.”
His partner let Jacob drop to the ground and reached for something under his jacket. That made it easier. He wasn’t going for his phone, so whatever Simon did was justified. Not that he had been planning to hold back, but it would just make it easier if the police got involved.
Two long strides closed the distance between them, until Simon could smell the oily coconut hair gel on him. Unlike his ginger friend, the man was almost aggressively nondescript—from his no-color hair to his no-color eyes. Simon closed one hand around the man’s wrist, gouged his fingers down into the nerves, and twisted hard. Pain knotted the man’s face, thin lips peeled back from his teeth, and he aimed a short, nasty heel jab at Simon’s jaw.
Turning from the hips, Simon avoided a broken jaw and caught a callused palm against his cheekbone instead. He felt the crack of bone meeting bone—hopefully not bone snapping bone—and a flash of red bolted through his vision. He ignored the pain, jabbed his fingers into the man’s throat, and felt cartilage bend and the burp of trapped air.
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Jacob struggling up off the pavement. He was only using one arm and held the other hunched close to his chest.
“Si—behind you,” Jacob yelled as he lunged forward and grabbed at Mr. Nondescript’s leg. He wrapped his arms around his knees and yanked, making the man stumble and rattle out a “fuck.” Simon spun on the ball of his foot. Ginger had managed to get up, weight on his good leg, and he squinted as he raised a gun.
“What the fuck have you gotten yourself into, Jacob,” Simon snarled and dove at Ginger. He ducked under the gun, hitting the man in the stomach with his shoulder, and drove him back down onto the ground.
Ginger screamed as he landed on that broken knee—the ripping sound suggested nothing good was happening in there. Simon grabbed him by the front of the face. His fingers slid in the slimy mixture of gore and hooked under his cheekbones. He used his grip to punch Ginger’s head into the pavement. It only took one smack, and the distinct feeling of resistance turning to pulp traveled up Simon’s arm.
Simon took the gun out of Ginger’s lax fingers and rolled to his feet. His arm followed the direction of his eyes, and he swung the gun up on autopilot to aim at Mr. Nondescript. The man was wheezing, a bruise spread up over his throat, and he had a gun pressed to Jacob’s head. The barrel dug into the thin skin over Jacob’s temple.
“Drop it,” Simon said flatly.
Twisting his hand in Jacob’s scruffy curls, Mr. Nondescript yanked his head back. He ground the gun in harder and pressed it until it had to bruise.
“I’ll blow his brains out,” he threatened.
A smile twitched at Simon’s mouth. “Then I’ll shoot you. Right now I’m pissed off at him, so I’d put money on you being fonder of your life than I am of him. But it is up to you.”
Mr. Nondescript curled his tongue over his top lip, wetting the stubble, and narrowed his eyes at Simon. Whatever he saw in the steady regard convinced him Simon meant what he said. He let go of Jacob, stepped back, and held up his hands with the gun dangling loosely.
“We don’t need to… escalate… things,” he said. His voice was broken and scraped past the damage to his throat. “I’m sure this is just a misunderstanding. My name is Shaw, and I work for some very influential people. People you don’t want to cross.”
Jacob scrambled toward Simon and got painfully to his feet as he went. Keeping the gun steady in one hand, Simon reached out to grab Jacob’s arm on the way past. He yanked his ex to a shoulder-wrenching halt and dug his fingers into the firm muscle of his forearm.
“Drop the gun,” Simon repeated, gesturing his own weapon toward the one still held by Mr. Nondescript. “Or I drop you.”
A smug smirk twisted Shaw’s mouth. “You’re going to shoot me? In the middle of San Antonio? I don’t think so. You don’t need the attention.”
“I’m a decorated Marine,” Simon said, gun steady and mind icy clear and confident. “You’re a thug with a gun I caught gay-bashing my ex. And I am sure your influential employer isn’t going to go on record to contradict that. So drop it, or I’ll take my chances with the press.”
The calculation ticked in Shaw’s eyes like clockwork. Then he mugged his best helpless expression and bent down to put the gun on the pavement with ostentatious care.
“Look. I don’t think you quite understand what is going on,” he said as he straightened up. “Mr. Archer here has just taken something that my employer wants. If he would just hand it over—”
Simon took two quick steps forward, sideswiped the gun into the road with his foot, and sent it skipping over the tarmac. Shaw’s eyes followed the movement and then returned to Simon.
“This is a bad fight to pick,” he warned.
“Go,” Simon told him.
There was an equation to that sort of thing—reward divided by risk decides action or inaction. In this case the risk outweighed the reward. Instead of fighting, Shaw retreated, and once he was in the car, the invisible driver behind the black glass threw it into gear. It disappeared around the corner, and Simon lowered the gun. He breathed out and took a second to ride out the empty feeling, disappointed and almost resentful at missing a fight.
Dev thought he was an alcoholic. Drink wasn’t what Simon was addicted to. It didn’t help, but it wasn’t the problem. More of a facilitator.
He used the corner of his jacket to wipe the prints off the gun and tossed it into the supermarket parking lot. Then he turned around, grabbed Jacob’s elbow, and hustled Jacob into a brisk walk. The ragged huff and rasp of Jacob’s breathing was too loud in Simon’s ear and masked the noises of the street.
