I could feel Ranger laughing behind me as he turned to the second page. Connie and I were smiling, too. We all knew Roger Pitch. He deserved to have one less thumb.

“Vinnie wrote a five-figure bond that wasn’t totally secured because there seemed to be a low risk of flight,” Ranger said.

“Pitch was a local guy with only one thumb. What could go wrong?” Vinnie yelled from his inner office, his words muffled behind his closed door.

“Goddamnit,” Connie said, opening drawers, looking under her desk. “He’s got me wired again. I hate when he does that.” She found the bug and dumped it into a cup of coffee.

“Pitch didn’t flee,” Connie said. “He’s just refusing to show up for court. He’s at home, watching television, beating on his wife when things get boring.”

“He’s only a couple blocks from here,” Ranger said. “We can pick him up and I’ll call someone in to shuttle him over to the station.”

Roger Pitch was mean as a snake and twice as stupid. Not someone I wanted to tangle with. “Yeah, but Connie has other files. Maybe there’s something more fun.”

“Pitch is a fun guy,” Ranger said.

“He’s a shooter.”

“Not anymore,” Connie said. “He blew this thumb clear to Connecticut. His hand’s going to be bandaged.”

CONNIE WAS RIGHT about Pitch’s hand being bandaged. The incident happened three weeks ago, but the hand was still wrapped in big wads of gauze.

Pitch answered the door when Ranger and I knocked and he calmly accepted that we were bond enforcement. “I guess I forgot my date,” he said. “It’s all these pain pills they got me on. Can’t remember a damn thing. Lucky I don’t put my pants on my head in the morning.”

Ranger and I were both dressed for the visit in full Super Hero Utility Belts. Sidearms strapped to our legs, handcuffs tucked into the belt, pepper spray and stun gun at the ready. Plus Ranger had a two-pound Maglite, just in case we needed to see in the dark. The lite could also crack a head open like a walnut, but walnut cracking was a little illegal, so Ranger saved it for special occasions.

“Let me just shut the television off,” Pitch said. And then he whirled around, slammed the door shut, and threw the lock.

“Fuck,” Ranger said.

Ranger didn’t often curse and he rarely raised his voice. The fuck had been entirely conversational. Like he was now mildly inconvenienced. He put his Bates boot to the door and the door popped open to reveal Pitch at the end of the hall with a gun in his left hand.

“You’re just a couple amateur pussies,” Pitch yelled.

Ranger gave me a hard shove to the shoulder that knocked me off the small front stoop into a scraggly hydrangea bush. Then he stepped to the side of the door and drew his gun.

Pitch squeezed one off, but he was shooting with his left hand and clearly he wasn’t ambidextrous because the round hit the hall ceiling. The second round bit into the wall.