Nothing to Hide (A Roland March Mystery Book #3) Read Online Free PDF Page B

says.
    I pause in the midst of adjusting my new holster, the new matte-silver Browning inside. “I didn’t plan it. You just get sucked in, you know?”
    When I started the league, I was shooting with my off-duty piece, a .40 caliber Kahr with all the sharp edges melted away. Long ago, the Kahr went to Teddy Jacobson for some work, coming back with an action slicker than glass. It’s a flat, short-barreled hideaway pistol, but I can hit targets with accuracy much farther out than you’d expect.
    But after a couple of weeks, all the club’s magazine changes and malfunction drills had me yearning for a full-size pistol. Instead of bringing my duty gun or springing for one of the usual plastic-framed, high-capacity numbers, I’d toured the glass cases at Shooter’s Paradise and gone a little crazy, ending up with a custom Novak Browning Hi-Power. Compact for its punch, slender, and all metal, with a crisp single-action trigger pull. It’s also a natural pointer, which I appreciate.
    In addition to the standard thirteen-round mags, I’d bought a bunch of hi-cap South African magazines, bringing the total up to eighteen with one in the spout. And I’d picked up a couple hundred dollars’ worth of saddle-tan holsters and mag carriers, keeping it all in the new gym bag ready to go.
    I feel a little guilty at all the expenditure. When Charlotte lays out money like this, I can’t help giving her a lecture. But she’s not here to return the favor.
    Out on the range I add my name to the sign-up sheet, then file to the back of the line. Already the air smells of gun smoke. I put my things in an empty lane, locking the Hi-Power’s slide back and slipping it into my belt holster, one of the club’s safety requirements.
    “Hey, man, how’s it hanging?”
    I turn to find Jeff, another new guy, unloading his gear next to me. He wears jeans and a tight-fitting linen safari shirt with epaulets and button tabs securing the rolled-up sleeves. The look is more fashion than function, but he’s the only shooter here I’ve really warmed up to. Maybe because, unlike most people here, we both know what it’s like to be shot at.
    In Jeff’s case, the experience was racked up doing private security work somewhere in Iraq—“outside the Green Zone” is as specific as he’s ever gotten. He’s in his mid-to-late twenties, square-jawed, and sarcastic. His Glock 19 has a gunmetal shine where the finish has rubbed away from use. Compared to my chromed new toy, his gun is a battered workmanlike tool. I like that about him, too.
    It’s hard to have a conversation with ear protection on and guns going off a few feet away. We lean through the lane openings, watching shooters work through the course. Tonight there’s a cardboard wall with a window in the middle. Downrange, two IDPA cardboard bad-guy targets are staggered on the left side of the wall, one at five yards and the other at ten. Through the window, a bad guy becomes visible, most of his body shielded by a hostage target, and on the right side of the wall a crowd of three bad guys stands between five and seven yards away. The shooter takes cover on the left, puts two rounds on each target, reloads, then puts one in the head of the hostage taker through the window. To finish, he angles around the wall’s right edge to put two rounds each on the three final targets. All this with the stopwatch running.
    “Right,” Jeff says. “This would happen in real life.”
    I shrug. “It’s just a game, but you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t like it.”
    He smirks and turns back to the range. One of the hardcore shooters is getting ready to run the course. He wears a white germ mask over nose and mouth, marking him as one of the club’s several handloaders. For economy, since they’re sending so many rounds downrange, these guys make up batches of their own ammo at home. When they get together, they brag to each other about their “lead count”—not the number of bullets