Durwood felt himself in the middle of rolling thunder. Blows and curses rained down on him. A stairwell rail dug into his side. He was forced shoulder-first to the floor. Cold concrete. He was hit about the chest and face. He rolled over and was hit in the back.

A rum-barrel voice ordered, "Take him inside. Nobody'll hear in the factory."

The voice belonged to the one who'd forced Durwood down. Now the other three gripped his shirt and bluejeans. Big men with big, rough hands. Still in work bibs. They shoved him down one flight, then through a door with rubber seals. Durwood's hat fell.

Nobody hit the lights. Durwood stumbled through the dark, sensing the towering space above, smelling grease thickly. Like drowning in a giant truck axle. The men's voices echoed unevenly. Idle machines loomed like hibernating bears.

Durwood let himself be poked along. The blows angered him. He did not respond. Not yet. In the marines, he'd learned to fight on his own terms. You fight when you're good and ready—under the circumstances you want.

Rum-Barrel said, "Piece'a" and swore. Jerking Durwood by his wrist. "Nothing but a gutless leach."

Durwood wondered what he meant by "leach" but saw no point responding. Instead he culled what senses he still commanded for a mental picture of the factory. Exits. Surfaces. Materials. He spotted a broom leaned against a sink-soap station. The area to his right sounded larger than that to his left.

The men dumped him in an open area and resumed their beating.

Durwood glimpsed the leader's shirt. A sewn-in tag read FOREMAN. His buzzed hair looked like black porcupine quills. He had no neck.

This foreman said, "Take some of this back to your big-city bosses. Chump."

He rammed his knuckles into Durwood's face.

Pain bloomed from the center Durwood's face out. Blood gurted from his nose.

The foreman loaded up a second punch, but Durwood caught it barehanded. He pushed the fist back at the man like bad cantaloupe at a roadside stand.

"I came to help you," he said. "Help y'all. Help this town."

One man squinted, confused. Before Durwood could make anything of the reaction, the side of a hand cracked his knee.

Durwood splatted to the concrete. New bruises joined up with old ones. He felt the toll of muscles forged in labor.

Working with Quaid Rafferty and Molly McGill as part of Third Chance Enterprises, Durwood had battled henchmen and mercenaries from six of the seven continents. Most trained at gyms—or whatever gyms were called in their homeland. Their attacks were precise, clinical. A chop to a pressure point: debilitating, sure, but without the crude, soulful intent of these.

Durwood disliked beating men such as this. But beat them he would.

They were muttering something about liars or phonies. They made a joke at the expense of Durwood's hat.

Durwood waited for their distraction to peak. Then, drawing air deeply, he struck.

"Arrrgh!" the nearest said as Durwood swept his feet.

The man dropped. Durwood used his body and the momentary confusion as cover. He sidestepped, then launched at the second man.

The butt of his shoulder hit first. He was a downhill boulder slamming a tree. Durwood felt his ribs and underarm cinching against the blow. The man flew five feet backward.

Durwood emerged in a crouch. He sensed the third man coming and, leaning into his front foot, snapped his rear around in a roundhouse.

His bootheel connected with the man's jaw. Fella spun like a child's top, then dropped too.

Durwood faced the foreman.

"Me and you," he said.

The foreman circled with flexed knees. Scowling. Breathing. Looking around to see if the others were getting up.

They weren't.

"Came to the wrong town, cowboy," he said. "Maybe you rode in on a horse. We'll send y'home in a bag."

Durwood mirrored each of the foreman's moves, right when he stepped right, left when he stepped left. Tight strides. Their personal arena was bound by an assembly-line tread and what could've been a ten-ton stamper.

Durwood did a straight feint—bold, quick. The foreman swayed to his heels and shielded his face, leaving his middle unguarded.

Durwood drove one foot into his kidneys. The man crumpled that way. Durwood—watching his adversary's defenses shift as though in stop-motion—jabbed the exposed side of his face.

The foreman staggered. His eyes glassed over and Durwood advanced, but too fast—the man brought his knee up hard and caught Durwood's chin.

As they both reeled, the foreman taunted, "Gonna kick like a sissy? We fight with fists in Texas."

Durwood would've smiled if his swollen face allowed it. The idea honor had anything to do with fighting. With putting a fellow human being on the ground.

Instead of smiling, he lowered his hands.

"C'mon," he said. "Show me them fists."

The foreman didn't trust the target in front of him. He peeked to the side. He cocked his fist but did nothing with it.

Durwood focused all his rage on a point in the middle of his eyes. His face stretched taut. Several scrapes were bleeding. Now they bled more. He took a deliberate step forward.

Eighteen inches separated them.

The foreman's lips folded into his mouth, making a small, angry knot. He swung.

Durwood easily ducked the hay-maker. The man's momentum pitched him about in a circle. His legs twisted into a pretzel.

The spent man floundered on his knees, vulnerable. Durwood could've cold-cocked him but instead pushed him over with one finger. Then pinned his chest with a boot.

The other three men were in different states of recovery. They moaned or dragged limbs. One had retched. Another whimpered he couldn't feel his toes.

Durwood said, "Who ordered this?"

The men tried to give no answer, but their eyes betrayed them.

Their eyes ticked toward the foreman.

Durwood looked down at the gasping man.

He repeated, "Who?"

The foreman's missing neck seemed to hamper his breath. He tried sitting up. Durwood kept him pinned down.

A third time, Durwood said, "Who?"

Finally the foreman talked. His eyes were livid. "We aren't giving up this town to you. To no outsiders."

Durwood said, "Your mayor asked me here."

The foreman kept glowering. The others wore dumb looks.

One said, "Mayor Bridges?"

Durwood said yes, Carol Bridges had sent him a letter.

"What for?"

"A letter, huh?"

Another said, "Wish she'd send me a letter..."

Gradually their dumb looks became wary. They turned to the foreman.

Durwood raised his boot off the man's chest, crossing his own arms.

The foreman sat up, red-faced. "I was told you worked for the plaintiffs' lawyers. Some kinda negotiator. Trying to squeeze all the money you could out of us."

"I look like a negotiator to you?" With a calloused thumb, Durwood wiped blood off his bluejeans. "Who gave you that load of nonsense?"

As the others nodded along with Durwood's point, the foreman seemed to think. The whole factory waited on his response. The assembly-line tread. The stamper. The grease and hardhats hung on nails.

The foreman frowned. He didn't want to tell.

When Durwood poised the instep of his boot, though, he admitted, "Chester Lyles."

——

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