Lee Child - Echo Burning

"You picked the wrong guy," he said.

"But why? You've killed people before. In the army. You told me that."

"This is different."

"How?"

"This would be murder. Cold-blooded murder. It would be an assassination."

"No, it would be just the same. Just like the army."

He shook his head. "Carmen, it wouldn't be the same."

"Don't you take an oath or something? To protect people?"

"It's not the same," he said again.

She passed an eighteen-wheeler bound for the coast, and the Cadillac rocked and shimmied through the superheated turbulent air.

"Slow down," he said.

She shook her head. "I can't slow down. I want to see Ellie."

He touched the dashboard in front of him, steadying himself. The freezing air from the vents blasted against his chest.

"Don't worry," she said. "I'm not going to crash. Ellie needs me. If it wasn't for Ellie, I'd have crashed a long time ago, believe me."

But she eased off a little, anyway. The big rig crept back alongside.

"I know this is a difficult conversation," she said.

"You think?"

"But you have to look at it from my point of view. Please, Reacher. I've been through it a million times. I've thought it through. I've been from A to B to C to D, all the way to Z. Then again, and again. And again. I've examined all the options. So this is all logical to me. And this is the only way. I know that. But it's hard to talk about, because it's new to you. You haven't thought about it before. It comes out of the blue. So I sound crazy and cold-blooded to you. I know that. I appreciate that. But I'm not crazy or cold-blooded. It's just that I've had the time to reach the conclusion, and you haven't. And this is the only conclusion, I promise you."

"Whatever, I'm not killing a guy I never saw before."

"He hits me, Reacher," she said. "He beats me, badly. Punches me, kicks me, hurts me. He enjoys it. He laughs while he does it. I live in fear, all the time."

"So go to the cops."

"The cop. There's only one. And he wouldn't believe me. And even if he did, he wouldn't do anything about it. They're all big buddies. You don't know how it is here."

Reacher said nothing.

"He's coming home," she said. "Can you imagine what he's going to do to me?"

He said nothing.

"I'm trapped, Reacher. I'm boxed in, because of Ellie. Do you see that?"

He said nothing.

"Why won't you help me? Is it the money? Is it because I can't pay you?"

He said nothing.

"I'm desperate," she said. "You're my only chance. I'm begging you. Why won't you do it? Is it because I'm Mexican?"

He said nothing.

"It's because I'm just a greaseball, right? A beaner? You'd do it for a white woman? Like your girlfriend? I bet she's a white woman. Probably a blonde, right?"

"Yes, she's a blonde," he said.

"Some guy was beating up on her, you'd kill him."

Yes, I would, he thought.

"And she ran off to Europe without you. Didn't want you to go with her. But you'd do it for her, and you won't do it for me."

"It's not the same," he said for the third time.

"I know," she said. "Because I'm just beaner trash. I'm not worth it."

He said nothing.

"What's her name?" she asked. "Your girlfriend?"

"Jodie," he said.

"O.K., imagine Jodie over there in Europe. She's trapped in some bad situation, getting beat up every day by some maniac sadist. She tells you all about it. Bares her soul. Every horrible humiliating detail. What are you going to do?"

Kill him, he thought.

She nodded like she could read his mind. "But you won't do that for me. You'd do it for the gringa, but not for me."

He paused a beat with his mouth halfway open. It was true. He would do it for Jodie Garber, but he wouldn't do it for Carmen Greer. Why not? Because it comes in a rush. You can't force it. It's a hot-blooded thing, like a drug in your veins, and you go with it. If it's not there, you can't go with it. Simple as that. He'd gone with it before in his life, many times. People mess with him, they get what they get. They mess with Jodie, that's the same thing as messing with him. Because Jodie was him. Or at least she used to be. In a way that Carmen wasn't. And never would be. So it just wasn't there.

"It's not about gringas or latinas," he said quietly.

She said nothing.

"Please, Carmen," he said. "You need to understand that."

"So what is it about?"

"It's about I know her and I don't know you."

"And that makes a difference?"

"Of course it does."

"Then get to know me," she said. "We've got two days. You're about to meet my daughter. Get to know us."

He said nothing. She drove on. PECOS 55 MILES.

"You were a policeman," she said. "You should want to help people. Or are you scared? Is that it? Are you a coward?"

He said nothing.

"You could do it," she said. "You've done it before. So you know how. You could do it and get clean away. You could dump his body where nobody would find it. Out in the desert. Nobody would ever know. It wouldn't come back on you, if you were careful. You'd never get caught. You're smart enough."

He said nothing.

"Are you smart enough? Do you know how? Do you?"

"Of course I know how," he said. "But I won't do it."

"Why not?"

"I told you why not. Because I'm not an assassin."

"But I'm desperate," she said. "I need you to do this. I'm begging you. I'll do anything if you'll help me."

He said nothing.

"What do you want, Reacher? You want sex? We could do that."

"Stop the car," he said.

"Why?"

"Because I've had enough of this."

She jammed her foot down hard on the gas. The car leapt forward. He glanced back at the traffic and leaned over toward her and knocked the transmission into N. The engine unloaded and screamed and the car coasted and slowed. He used his left hand on the wheel and hauled it around against her desperate grip and steered the car to the shoulder. It bounced off the blacktop and the gravel bit against the tires and the speed washed away. He jammed the lever into P and opened his door, all in one movement. The car skidded to a stop with the transmission locked. He slid out and stood up unsteadily. Felt the heat on his body like a blow from a hammer and slammed the door and walked away from her.

He was sweating heavily twenty yards after getting out of the car. And already regretting his decision. He was in the middle of nowhere, on foot on a major highway, and the slowest vehicles were doing sixty. Nobody was going to want to stop for him. Even if they did want to, give them a little reaction time, give them a little time to check their mirrors, a little braking time, they'd be more than a mile away before they knew it, and then they'd shrug their shoulders and speed up again and keep on going. Dumb place to hitch a ride, they'd think.

It was worse than dumb. It was suicidal. The sun was fearsome and the temperature was easily a hundred and twelve degrees. The slipstream from the cars was like a hot gale, and the suction from the giant trucks wasn't far from pulling him off his feet. He had no water. He could barely breathe. There was a constant stream of people five yards away, but he was as alone as if he was stumbling blind through the desert. If a state trooper didn't come by and arrest him for jaywalking, he could die out there.

He turned and saw the Cadillac, still sitting inert on the shoulder. But he kept on walking away from it. He made it about fifty yards and stopped. Turned to face east and stuck out his thumb. But it was hopeless, like he knew it would be. After five minutes, a hundred vehicles, the nearest thing he'd gotten to a response was some trucker blasting his air horn, a huge bass sound roaring past him with a whine of stressed tires and a hurricane of dust and grit. He was choking and burning up.