Chapter 55: One Chance
Chapter 55: One Chance
The car wheels rolled to a stop, pressing down the unsettled dust that had just begun to rise. The cheap vehicle, worth no more than two or three hundred dollars, parked in an alley across the street from the casino.
Lance placed the revolver in the car’s center console. He wasn’t sure if they would search him, and carrying the gun could end up arming his opponents if confiscated. The folding knife, however, was tucked discreetly behind his belt at his waist, a spot less likely to be searched.
After preparing himself, Lance turned to Morris. “Stay in the car. If I’m not back in thirty minutes, call this number and have them come find me.”
He handed Morris a slip of paper with Alberto’s number.
“Though,” Lance added, “I doubt you’ll need to use it.”
Lance had initially refused Fordis’s offer of help to avoid owing favors, but if his life was truly at stake, he’d rather owe a favor than gamble with survival. That said, he didn’t believe his life was in real danger. Killing over a handful of inexperienced kids wasn’t worth the risk of becoming a wanted criminal.
This wasn’t the Wild West, where you could vanish into the wilderness. In a city, both the police and criminal gangs would be after you, along with professional bounty hunters—specialists in tracking fugitives for rewards.
The Federation’s bounty hunters were a unique group who thrived on apprehending criminals for money. They originated in the West but spread across the country, drawn by government-issued bounties that offered a cost-effective alternative to deploying police forces.