Free Vegas Vengeance by Randy Wayne White Page A

dreamy for a moment; a world of bright popping lights; the red, green and yellow starburst world caused by a sudden cranial pressure trying to escape through the delicate aqueous jelly of cornea.
    Somehow, the blow jarred the knife from his hands. It fell with a heavy metallic thud into the gravel.
    And then the test of strength began. Hawker had both hands locked around the gun, trying to force the weapon up and away. His attacker had his left hand over Hawker’s hands, trying to force the revolver down to face level. The man grunted and wheezed and groaned, but the match began to lean in Hawker’s favor. Hawker sensed the knee snapping toward his groin, and he turned his thigh into the blow just in time.
    The kick threw the man’s balance off, and Hawker twisted the gun out of his hands. It flew in a high arc into the bushes.
    The adrenaline rush of desperation had left Hawker now, leaving only a cold, cold fury.
    This stranger had pistol-whipped the pretty lady. This stranger had tried to shoot him; had tried to kill him dead, dead, dead.
    Hawker drew back his right fist and drove all his weight behind it. The fist collided with the man’s cheek, making a flat sickening sound.
    The man staggered back against the wall again, and still did not go down. And suddenly, Hawker was back in the old Bridgeport Gym in Chicago again; back training for the Golden Gloves championship, light heavyweight class, and this stranger was the heavy bag.
    Hawker pummeled his ribs and belly, then raised his shots higher when the man’s arms fell limply to his sides. Hawker’s left hand held the man by the throat as he drove his right fist home again and again and again until, suddenly, there was someone beside him, pulling at him, and there was a voice:
    â€œJames! James! It’s over, for God’s sake!”
    Hawker stepped back dizzily, and the man slithered down the wall, collapsing at his feet.
    Barbara Blaine was at his elbow. Hawker took a deep breath and shook himself out of the dreamy world of near-unconsciousness. He took her by the arms suddenly. “Are you all right?”
    â€œYes … I think so. He knocked the wind out of me for a second, I guess. When I finally got to my feet, you were beating him. You beat him for a long time. It seemed like you would never quit. That’s why I got up. That’s why I stopped you.”
    Hawker wiped his hand over his face, checking for blood. Amazingly, there was none. He hadn’t been shot, yet his left ear still burned. The man had fired the gun so close that the powder detonation had scorched him.
    Hawker kneeled over the man. He was bigger than he had expected. Six-three or six-four, maybe 260 pounds. Black, carefully oiled hair over the pulpy mass of face. Dark long-sleeved shirt and dark slacks. Clothes for night stealth. Hawker touched his fingers to the man’s neck, then stood.
    â€œHe’s dead.”
    The woman put her hands to her face. “My God, this is awful, James.” She hesitated. “The police—I’d better go call them.”
    Hawker turned from her and began searching in the bushes where he had first collided with the man. “That’s a decision you’ll have to make, Barbara. We have every right to defend your property—but that’s not going to make the publicity any better. Personally, I have a real aversion to seeing my name in print.”
    â€œBut we have to do something, James. We just can’t leave him here.”
    Hawker kneeled and carefully listened to the shoebox-size package the man had been carrying. In the weak light that came through the main window, he could see that the box was built of wood and metal. There was a toggle switch on the wooden frame and a kitchen timer.
    A homemade bomb.
    Hawker wondered if he should tell the woman. He decided not to. No sense upsetting her any more than she was.
    He stood. “‘We’ don’t have to do anything, Barbara.