Free Every Precious Thing by Brett Battles Page B

map in the back of the glove box, wrote the VW’s license number on it, and waited.
    Twenty minutes passed before the old guy finally came out. He shuffled over to the VW like someone who’d lived hard and was now just marking the days. It took him two tries to get the Bug started, but when he did, he wasted no time hitting the road. Logan gave him a five-second lead before following.
    The town wasn’t big, so even though they drove clear to the other side, it was only seven minutes before the bartender pulled into the driveway of a small, boxy house. As he did, Logan coasted his El Camino to the curb a block away and killed the engine.
    The neighborhood had a weariness born from decades existing in the hot, arid desert. Almost half the houses on the block had F OR S ALE signs in their front yards, and many looked like their tenants had already moved out.
    This wasn’t a neighborhood of trees or hedges, but of poorly growing grass and dirt, so Logan had a clear view of the bartender entering his house. Once the front door closed, he quietly exited his car.
    The first thing he did was to check for any indication that someone else also lived there, but there was very little outside. As far as vehicles went, the VW was it. After a quick scan to make sure no one was watching, Logan jogged up to the fence at the side of the house, and took a look over it. More dirt, a couple of forgotten lawn chairs, and a pile of scrap metal in the back corner.
    He lifted the latch and opened the gate. It groaned a little, but not enough for anyone but him to hear. The first thing he noticed once he’d rounded the back of the house was a concrete patio butting up against the building’s foundation. Sitting in the middle was a rusting Weber grill, a lonely monument to a past real or imagined. There was only one door along the back of the bartender’s home. It was at the top of a three-step staircase on the left, near where he’d come in, a window filling its upper half.
    Logan checked the knob. Locked.
    If he’d had the right tools with him, he could have picked it easily enough, but he didn’t. He glanced back at the yard, his eyes settling on the discarded lawn chairs. They were the metal kind, with the plastic straps that served as seat and backing. Only the plastic had rotted away, leaving just the frame and a few tattered fragments. He walked over and picked one up, checking its heft.
    Perfect , he thought.
    He carried the chair to the edge of the patio, took careful aim, and threw it at the grill as hard as he could. While the base of the Weber remained standing, he scored a direct hit on the top. It flipped off, tumbled through the air a couple times, and clattered loudly onto the concrete.
    Logan immediately raced back to the house, hiding around the corner. Barely five seconds passed before he heard hurried footsteps thundering through the house and then stopping just on the other side of the door. He could imagine the bartender looking through the window, trying to see what had caused the noise.
    A moment later, the door opened.
    “What the hell?” the man muttered.
    As soon as the man descended the steps, Logan peeked around the side. As he’d hoped, the bartender was heading for the patio, his back to the door. Without hesitating, Logan slipped over to the stairs, then into the house. Moving quickly now, he passed through a kitchen, a small dining room, and entered a slightly larger living room.
    Outside, he heard the man pick up the chair and call out, “Who’s out here?”
    Logan crossed into a tiny hallway and headed straight into the only bedroom.
    From the look of the bed covers, the man had already been lying down when the chair hit the grill. A quick scan of the room revealed the only practical hiding place was the three-foot space between the bed and the far wall. As he dropped into it and tucked himself tight against the bed, Logan heard the distant thud of the kitchen door closing.
    Less than a minute later, the