“So?”

"So nothing. Just something to bear in mind for later, is all.”

“What’s later?”

“You’ll find out,” Reacher said.

“What do you want?”

“I want proof.”

“Of what?”

“Of exactly how dumb a piece of shit like you really is.”

McGuire paused. His eyes narrowed, pushed into deep furrows by his brow.

“Easy for you to talk like that,” he said. “Standing six feet away from these bars.”

Reacher took an exaggerated pace forward.

“Now I’m two feet from the bars,” he said. “And you’re still a dumb piece of shit.”

McGuire took a step forward, too. He was a foot inside the cell, holding a bar in each fist. A level gaze in his eyes. Reacher stepped forward again.

“Now I’m a foot from the bars, same as you,” he said. “And you’re still a dumb piece of shit.”

McGuire’s right hand came off the bar and closed into a fist and his whole arm rammed straight out like a piston. It was headed for Reacher’s throat. Reacher caught the wrist and swayed and whipped the fist past his head and rocked his weight back and hauled McGuire tight up against the inside of the bars. Twisted the wrist palm-out and walked left and bent the arm back against the elbow joint.

“See how dumb you are?” he said. “I keep on walking, I break your arm.”

McGuire was gasping against the pressure. Reacher smiled briefly and dropped the wrist. McGuire stared at him and hauled his arm back inside, rolling the shoulder, testing the damage.

“What do you want?” he said again.

“Want me to open the cell gate?”

“What?”

“Keys are right over there. You want the gate open, even things up a little?”

McGuire’s eyes narrowed a little more. He nodded. “Yeah, open the damn gate.”

Reacher stepped away and lifted the hoop of keys off the knob of the exit door. Shuffled through them and found the right one. He’d handled plenty of cell keys. He could pick one out blindfolded. He stepped back and unlocked the gate. Swung it open. McGuire stood still. Reacher walked away and put the hoop of keys back on the doorknob. Stood facing the door, his back to the cell.

“Sit down,” he called. “I left the stool there for you.”

He sensed McGuire coming out of the cell. Heard his bare feet on the concrete floor. Heard them stop.

“What do you want?” McGuire said again.

Reacher kept his back turned. Straining to sense McGuire’s approach. It wasn’t happening.

“It’s complicated,” he said. “You’re going to have to juggle a number of factors.”

“What factors?” McGuire asked, blankly.

“First factor is I’m unofficial, OK?” Reacher said.

“What does that mean?”

“You tell me.”

“I don’t know,” McGuire said.

Reacher turned around. “It means I’m not an Army cop, I’m not a civilian cop, in fact I’m not anything at all.”

“So?”

“So there’s no comeback on me. No disciplinary procedures, no pension to lose, no nothing.”

“So?”

“So if I leave you walking on crutches and drinking through a straw the rest of your life, there’s nothing anybody can do to me. And we got no witnesses in here.”

“What do you want?”

“Second factor is whatever the big guy says he’ll do to you, I can do worse.”

“What big guy?”

Reacher smiled. McGuire’s hands bunched into fists. Heavy biceps, big shoulders.

“Now it gets sophisticated,” Reacher said. “You need to concentrate real hard on this part. Third factor is, if you give me the guy’s name, he goes away somewhere else, forever. You give me his name, he can’t get to you. Not ever, you understand?”

“What name? What guy?”

“The guy you were paying off with half your take.”

“No such guy.”

Reacher shook his head. “We’re past that stage now, OK? We know there’s such a guy. So don’t make me smack you around before we even get to the important part.”

McGuire tensed up. Breathed hard. Then he quieted down. His body slackened slightly and his eyes narrowed again.

“So concentrate,” Reacher said. “You think that to rat him out puts you in the shit. But you’re wrong. What you need to understand is, you rat him out and actually it makes you safe, the whole rest of your life, because people are looking at him for a bunch of things a whole lot worse than ripping off the Army.”

“What’s he done?” McGuire asked.

Reacher smiled. He wished the video cameras had sound. The guy exists. Leighton would be dancing around the office.

“The FBI thinks he killed four women. You give me his name, they’ll put him away forever. Nobody’s even going to ask him about anything else.”

McGuire was silent. Thinking about it. It wasn’t the speediest process Reacher had ever seen.

“Two more factors,” he said. “You tell me right now, I’ll put in a good word for you. They’ll listen to me, because I used to be one of them. Cops stick together, right? I can get you easy time.”

McGuire said nothing.

“Last factor,” Reacher said gently. “You need to understand, sooner or later you’ll tell me anyway. It’s just a question of timing. Your choice. You can tell me right now, or you can tell me in a half hour, right after I’ve broken your arms and legs and I’m about to snap your spine.”

“He’s a bad guy,” McGuire said.

Reacher nodded. “I’m sure he’s real bad. But you need to prioritize. Whatever he says he’s going to do, that’s theoretical, way off in the future, and like I told you, it isn’t going to happen anyway. But what I’m going to do, it’s going to happen right now. Right here.”

“You ain’t going to do nothing,” McGuire said.

Reacher turned and picked up the wooden stool. Flipped it upside down and held it chest high with his hands around two of the legs. Took a firm backhand grip and bunched his shoulders and pulled steadily. Then he breathed hard and snapped his elbows back and the legs tore away from the rungs. The rungs clattered to the floor. He reversed the stool and held the seat in his left hand and splintered a leg free with his right. Dropped the wreckage and retained the leg. It was about a yard long, the size and weight of a ball bat.

“Now you do the same,” he said.

McGuire tried hard. He turned over his own stool and grasped the legs. His muscles bunched and the tattoos swelled, but he got nowhere with it. He just stood there, holding the stool upside down.

“Too bad,” Reacher said. “I tried to make it fair.”

“He was Special Forces,” McGuire said. “He was in Desert Storm. He’s real tough.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Reacher said. “He resists, the FBI will shoot him down. End of problem.”

McGuire said nothing.

“He won’t know it came from you,” Reacher said. “They’ll make it look like he left some evidence behind. ”

McGuire said nothing. Reacher swung the leg of the stool.

“Left or right?” he asked.

“What?” McGuire said.

“Which arm you want me to break first?”

"LaSalle Kruger,” McGuire said. "Supply battalion CO. He’s a colonel.”