Nelson held up a hand, shushing him. “Let’s just eat something and see where that leads.”
“I’ll tell you where it will lead,” Kenny said. “It’ll lead to getting your infidel heads sawed off… but what do I know? You guys eat up.”
The freckled kid’s head moved like a bobbing dog statuette and he broke into a maniacal giggle.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Kashgar, China 0530 hours China Standard Time
“You cannot win. Do you understand?” A cloud of vapor enveloped Gabrielle Deuben’s face in the pink-orange chill of early morning.
“I know,” Quinn said.
Garcia rubbed her eyes and gave a long, feline yawn. “I’ve seen you fight,” Garcia said. “I think you can take this guy. He’s big, but he’s fat.”
Deuben shook her head. “That’s not the point. If he wins, Umar loses even more face.”
Garcia’s eyes followed a potbellied Uyghur who looked more like a draft horse than a man. She’d been disappointed but not surprised last night when Quinn had slept on the floor, letting her have the bed. Even on the hard floor he appeared to have slept better than her. “And what if he kills you?” she asked.
“I won’t let that happen.” Quinn sat with his back to the wall. The eight-foot-high clay block enclosure was normally used to house livestock during the Sunday market. It was five-thirty in the morning and the camels would be arriving in a half an hour.
The fight would be long over by then.
“But remember,” Doctor Deuben whispered. Her eyes, too, followed the Uyghur as she spoke. “You can’t throw the match. That would be the worst of all for Umar’s reputation.”
“Don’t win and try not to lose.” Quinn nodded as if taking a mental note. “That should be easy enough.”
Garcia wanted to scream.
Umar leaned against the same clay wall and did a press-up twenty feet away, stretching calf muscles the size of grapefruit. He wore a pair of dirty canvas pants and scuffed leather boots. A morning chill pinked the hairy skin of his bare back.
Garcia shook her head. The man’s neck looked as big around as Quinn’s waist. She’d spent no small amount of time wondering what Quinn might look like with his shirt off. Now her stomach was too tied up in knots to enjoy it.
“Shall we begin?” Umar’s ancient gray-bearded assistant wheezed around his smoldering cigarette. Two lines of at least a dozen men each squatted stoically along the outer edge of the oblong arena.
Quinn turned to Garcia and smiled. “You think anyone’s betting on me?”
Ronnie watched Umar flex his thick chest, bouncing his pecs as he ground a huge fist into an open palm. Quinn peeled off his white T-shirt to reveal at least a dozen puckered white scars on the tight copper flesh across his lower back. She wondered if maybe he’d been shot. His body was fluid and moved easily, seeming as much tendon and bone as muscle. He looked like a well-built ant about to fight a hippo.
Shivering at the sight of him, Ronnie gave Quinn a soft jab in the shoulder.
“Sorry, mango, my money’s on Umar.”
Quinn stood, stretching his neck back and forth to either side, hearing the cracks. But for the odor of animal dung and the sound of braying donkeys over the walls, he was taken back to his boxing days at the Air Force Academy. There was something about a pending fight that changed the very nature of the air and made it sweeter to breathe.
Umar the Uyghur had a jowly, egg-shaped face with short-cropped hair that reminded Quinn of Thibodaux’s marine high-and-tight. A roll of fat around the man’s belly said he didn’t get much cardio exercise, but the rippling muscles in his arms and shoulders said there was a good chance he won his fights without even raising his heart rate.
Umar lumbered to the center of the camel pen, slapping his great chest with hands the size of dinner plates. He swayed like a mountain gorilla. Each scuffing step of his heavy boots kicked up a pink cloud of dust in the long rays of morning light.
He turned to Quinn, tilting his big head into the beginnings of a nod. Quinn returned the gesture, hands hanging relaxed at his sides. There would be no referee and no one to explain the rules. There were none.
Umar slapped his chest again, leaving a pink handprint on the undulating flesh. He flicked his fingers, beckoning Quinn out. His twinkling eyes all but disappeared behind a cheeky grin.
“I don’t like this,” Ronnie said through clenched teeth. “Here we are at the edge of the world and all the local police are passed out drunk. What if he decides he has to kill you to save face?”
Quinn gave her a wink. “I’m pretty skilled in the not-dying category.”
He took a half step forward-and the giant Uyghur charged like a raging bull elephant.
Quinn stepped deftly to the side to avoid the oncoming freight train. A thick cloud of dust engulfed the Uyghur as he slid to a stop.
In general, fights with no rules lasted under a minute. Umar was over six and a half feet tall. Quinn knew one solid punch from this man and the fight would be over much quicker than that.
The Uyghur spun, dragging his left leg in an almost imperceptible gimp. His left shoulder sagged as he moved. Just a hair, but Quinn noticed. Big people tended to have big injuries. Sheer mass compounded any sprain, crack, or pull. Within ten seconds, Quinn was able to identify bruised floating ribs on the giant’s right side, a strained AC ligament on each knee, acute plantar fasciitis of the left heel, and a badly torn rotator cuff. Collectively, the injuries were debilitating enough Quinn could have scored a decisive victory in a matter of moments. Unfortunately he wouldn’t have that luxury. He’d have to drag out the battle-make Umar work for it. And both men would have to endure a considerable amount of pain.
Quinn dodged the direct effects of a crashing right hook, letting it graze his chest. He staggered backward, coughing as if it had been a devastating blow. For a man of his bulk, Umar could turn on a dime. Circling, he brought the screaming right fist around for another try. This time Quinn stepped past and gave him a swift cow-kick low on the left calf, an area sure to be painfully tight from the plantar fasciitis.
Umar turned again, nostrils flaring, panting hard. He gave a little shake of his leg and eyed Quinn through narrow slits. The kick had set his leg on fire; Quinn could see it in his eyes. Feinting with his left, the Uyghur followed with a growling bum rush. The crowd of squatting onlookers cried out in delighted surprise as they parted like the Rea Sea before the oncoming giant.
Quinn stepped aside again, a matador avoiding an enraged bull. He drove his knuckles into Umar’s cracked ribs, and then slapped him in the groin as he bowled past so the crowd couldn’t see what had just happened. Unable to stop in time, Umar slammed straight into the high block wall.
He pushed back, dazed and blinking. A trickle of blood ran from his nose and cracked lip where he had kissed the rough stone.
From the corner of his eye, Quinn could see the quizzical looks on the local men’s faces. They’d clearly expected their champion to wipe the floor with the visiting American.
Umar wasted no time in rejoining the fight. In the blink of an eye he rushed back to the center of the camel pen, now a boiling haze of pink-tinged dust.
Umar kept his left arm tucked tight, clearly protecting the injured rotator cuff. He threw another staggering right, but Quinn stepped under this time, landing a punch of his own in the soapy exposed flesh of the giant’s armpit. The same nerves that made the area ticklish made it a perfect target to incapacitate the arm.
Umar’s elbow slammed to his side, the entire arm flapping unnaturally as he moved. His round face fell into a slack-jawed stare and he slouched forward as if he might vomit.
Quinn knew he had to let the man win soon, or risk a victory himself.
He sprang sideways, giving the stunned Uyghur a perfect target for a left hook. Quinn took the punch on the chin, counting on the injured shoulder to take out some of the sting.