Run to Ground by Don Pendleton Read Free Book Online Page A

the stench of violence. Suddenly she realized her hands were trembling.
    Who was this man who had intruded on her life? What had he done? What had he suffered? And, above all, did she really want to know?
    * * *
    Grant Vickers checked his watch again and knew the diner would not open for another fifteen minutes. Old man Beamer was as regular as clockwork, pulling up behind his greasy spoon at seven on the dot and spending half an hour in the back, preparing for the day. It took him maybe half that long to fire the grill and put the coffee on, but he would no more deviate from lifelong work habits than he would put on purple pants and dance the monkey, or whatever kids were calling all that shit these days. The old man was an institution, and you didn't screw around with institutions. Not in Santa Rosa, anyhow.
    In fifteen minutes he could damn near finish off his rounds, and Vickers put the cruiser back in motion, scanning left and right with all the interest of a drowsy fisherman surveying ripples on a pond. In his seven years as constable, he had become convinced that there was no such thing as crime in Santa Rosa. There were "incidents" from time to time, involving drunkenness or family disputes, but even they were few and far between. There were infractions, mostly violations of the traffic ordinances, and he wrote his share of tickets on assorted smart-ass kids, but otherwise the town was as quiet as a grave.
    To Vickers, "crime" meant murder, robbery, or rape. The biggies. Getting drunk at Al's on Saturday and pissing in the gutter might be damned unsightly, but it wasn't anything you jailed a neighbor for. If certain good old boys put down a few too many beers and started teeing off on one another, it was Vickers's job to patch things up, make sure that any damages were settled to the dime before he saw them safely home. The teenagers were smart enough by now to do their stealing or whatever up in Ajo, or the other nearby towns, and Vickers felt that he had taught them all a valuable lesson. You don't shit where you eat.
    In seven years, Grant Vickers had not fired a shot, though he packed the big Colt Python with him everywhere, just in case. On one occasion he had used his nightstick; he had broken it, in fact, across the skull of an aggressive drifter who had tried to start some trouble with the good old boys. The prick got ninety days, and Grant had been a hero down at Al's until the story went around and everybody had heard it twice, and then it died away like all things did in Santa Rosa. Still, a week of glory might be all that any man could reasonably count in his life, and for the most part he was satisfied.
    Oh, sure, he sometimes wondered what it might be like to pull up stakes and try his luck in Phoenix, even in L.A. At thirty-five they might consider him too old for a police recruit, but his experience would have to count for something. There was real crime in Los Angeles, with murders every day and rapes around the goddamned clock, more robberies and sexual assaults than you could shake a stick at. He would really see some action in Los Angeles.
    And in the end, it was the prospect of that action that inevitably made his mind up for him. Proud of what he had achieved in Santa Rosa, Vickers knew that he would be just one more body in Los Angeles... and, frankly, he was never certain he could cut it. It was something else again, with real, live criminals who didn't give a shit about your badge or gun. Forget about the pyschos and the heavy syndicate connections; in L.A., the kids alone would chew you up and spit you out. They killed one another by the dozens, and they weren't afraid to drop a uniform or two, if it came down to that.
    The bottom line was fear. Grant Vickers would not say as much — would not admit it, even to himself — but he was desperately afraid — of failure as an officer, of death or injury, of being finally revealed as second-rate, inadequate.
    And there was money, too. If Grant