David Morrell: The naked edge

"The gun has to fit the hand."

"Right. If the grip's too large, your finger can't reach the trigger without stretching. The gun twists to the side and ruins your aim."

Reaching the kitchen, Cavanaugh looked at a row of monitors under a cupboard. Linked to security cameras, the screens showed various areas of the property. Satisfied that everything appeared normal, he turned toward where Mrs. Patterson rolled a pie crust. A sixty-year-old widow whose children and grandchildren lived in Jackson, she had worked for the dude ranch and agreed to stay.

"What kind of pie are you making?" Jamie asked.

"Pumpkin."

"Maybe I'll skip dinner tonight and just eat the pie."

Cavanaugh shook his head in amazement at Jamie's appetite. He opened a cupboard, took out a box of nine-millimeter ammunition and an equipment bag, then headed toward the back door. "It's going to be loud for a while, Mrs. Patterson."

The gray-haired woman set down her rolling pin, pulled a Kleenex from her apron, tore it in two, and wadded the halves into her ears.

The screen door banged shut as Cavanaugh and Jamie walked toward a shooting area next to a barn. Feeling the intense sunlight, they stopped at a weathered wooden table and faced metal targets twenty-five yards away, a mound behind them. Each target had the outline of a human head and torso.

Cavanaugh opened the case, took out the pistol, and showed Jamie that there wasn't a magazine in it. Then he locked back the slide to reveal that there wasn't a round in the firing chamber.

"Cold gun?"

"Cold gun," she agreed.

He set the pistol and the gear bag on the table. Then he opened the box of ammunition. With practiced efficiency, he and Jamie loaded ten rounds into three magazines.

"It always amazes me that you don't break your fingernails," Cavanaugh said.

"That's how little attention you pay. Hanging around with you, I'd don't have any fingernails. So tell me about the P-2000."

"Even Goldilocks would like it." Cavanaugh showed Jamie three polymer strips labeled S, L, or XL. A strip on the back of the weapon's grip was labeled M.

"You're telling me you can size the grip…?"

"To fit the hand. Try it."

Although the pistol was still "cold," Cavanaugh approved of the way Jamie pointed it down range, as if it were loaded.

"Not quite comfortable," she said. "Slightly too big for my hand."

"Then we'll reduce the grip." Cavanaugh pulled a hammer and a punch from the equipment bag. With a few taps, he removed a pin from the strip. He took it off and attached the one marked S. "Now try it."

"Perfect," Jamie said.

Cavanaugh was fascinated by the problem of hands fitting grips because his own hand was small in comparison to his six-foot frame. Prior to his Delta Force training, he'd been obligated to use the Army's standard sidearm, Beretta's fifteen-round nine millimeter. For a magazine to hold that many rounds, it needed to have two columns of ammunition. The result was a grip too large for him. He'd managed to compensate and control his aim, but like someone forced to wear tight shoes for a long time, he was now obsessed with proper size and comfort.

"Put some rounds through it," he suggested.

"Ladies first? Gosh." Jamie shoved a magazine into the grip and pressed a lever on the side. A similar lever was on the opposite side, making the weapon ambidextrous, another rarity. The slide, which had been locked back, rammed home, chambering a round.

"I need my fashion accessories," she told him.

They put on their protective glasses and ear guards, then approached the targets, stopping ten yards away, a standard shooting distance. Most gunfights occurred within half that space.

Jamie raised the pistol, both arms straight out, both hands solidly on the grip, both thumbs pointed along the side as a further way of aligning the barrel with the target.

Cavanaugh considered the freedom with which she lifted her arms. No evident discomfort, no stiffness to indicate her bullet wound five months earlier.

She pulled the trigger.

Hidden among the trees on the ridge, the spotter frowned toward the back of the lodge. The target and the woman were out of sight behind a barn

Interesting that I want to objectify him by calling him "the target" instead of using his name. Doesn't seem a day older. Kept in shape. Picked a damned good-looking wife.

You son of a bitch.

The spotter unclipped a polished ebony knife from his pocket, thumbing the blade open and closing it. "Target practice," he said in response to the gunshots.

"A handgun," the sniper commented.

"Yes. Sounds like a nine millimeter. Must be a metal target. Hear the bullets hitting it?"

"Accurate shooter."

"Oh, he's definitely an accurate shooter," the spotter said. "That's why we're up here and not down there."

The sniper counted. "Nine, ten, eleven, twelve."

"Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen."

"Large magazine. Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen. Hell of a large magazine. You know any handguns that hold that many rounds?"

"No," the spotter said. "After ten, a slight pause. Hard to notice. That's when the magazine got changed."

"Damned fast magazine change."

"Twenty-two. Twenty-three. After twenty, another slight pause."

"Yeah, a super-fast magazine change," the sniper agreed. "Well, I'm here to blast his eye out at seven-hundred yards, not have a gunfight with him."

Amid the shots echoing across the canyon, they heard an approaching rumble.

Ear guards muffle sounds but don't eliminate them. Cavanaugh listened to the rhythmic thunder and peered toward the southern rim of the canyon, from behind which a helicopter appeared, its dragonfly shape getting larger, silhouetted against the cobalt sky.

Jamie lowered the pistol and glanced at her watch. "He's early."

"Yeah." Cavanaugh took off his ear guards. "A half hour. I was hoping he wouldn't come at all."

"You still don't know what he wants?"

"Only that he said it's important. But I can guess. He plans to offer me a job."

As the helicopter roared closer, Cavanaugh was able to read the name stenciled in red across the side: Global Protective Services. Memories rushed through him… the clients he'd protected, some wealthy and powerful, others ordinary people whom he'd persuaded GPS to help, all sharing the common denominator that they were prey… the protective agents he'd worked with, all of them linked by their hatred of predators and their devotion to being guardians, even at the cost of their lives.

Jamie said something, but the growing din of the chopper prevented him from hearing her. Or perhaps it was the memories.

"What?" he asked.

"Are you going to take the job?"

Preoccupied, Cavanaugh reached under his loose denim shirt and removed his knife from its sheath on the left side of his belt. A rugged utility knife, useful for work around the ranch, it was a gift from his friend, Gil Hibben, commemorating Gil's induction into the Knifemaker's Hall of Fame. It had the balance for what Cavanaugh did next. Releasing the emotions that memories of his dead friends had caused, he drew back his arm and hurled the blade toward a post fifteen feet away, expertly judging the number of flips the knife had to make.

It struck solidly, the force of his throw and his emotions embedding it.

"No," he said. "I won't take the job."

"I think you should."

The chopper was nearer, louder.

Ignoring it, Cavanaugh turned toward Jamie. "Five months ago, you nearly died. I still have nightmares about it."

"You didn't force me to go along. I made a choice. It wasn't your fault I was shot."

"I'm never going to put you at risk again."

"But a lot of people need help."