man-mountain with a beard hanging over his wide chest and kettle belly. Despite his size, he projected a big cat’s readiness to spring into lethal, lightning-fast action. He had golden dreads and lightly tanned clean-shaven features that might’ve been handsome on somebody else. His eyes were silver, like old-time coins with all the tarnish polished off.
That silver gaze swept the crowd insolently. It passed over Ryan’s table without pausing. Clearly he sized up the travelers as the lowest-threat bunch in the room.
Momentarily. Then his eyes snapped back. Two silver eyes locked up briefly with Ryan’s blue one.
Unlike everyone else in the room, Ryan wasn’t looking away from the Sea Wasp Posse.
The golden-dreaded man’s smile widened about a half inch. He nodded just a little more. Ryan returned the gesture.
Smart enough to be dangerous, Ryan thought, availing himself of the chance to take a sip of his now-flat beer without appearing to submit. That was another reality of the world: authentic hardcases knew how to spot each other on first glance. And generally they steered well clear, unless circumstances required them to tussle. You didn’t live to get case-hardened that way, as opposed to just rabid-weasel vicious, without having a well-developed sense of survival.
He allowed himself to relax fractionally. The Sea Wasps’ leader was willing to look for easier prey, if looking for prey was on his mind. The only question was how quick his pack would get the message.
They had obviously been into the weed, which Ryan knew sometimes took the edge off. But these guys lived edgy, and from their manner they’d been hitting the booze pretty hard, and maybe even jolt. Betting on their being made mellow by their smokes was another quick road to a shallow hole in the beach. Or just the harbor, without the necessity of being hung up, which Ryan was fairly sure was where Lumpy was destined, if he wasn’t bobbing facedown already with the ’cuda nuzzling his exposed face and fingers.
The back door opened. Krysty and Mildred came in. They made for their companions’ table without glancing at the Sea Wasps, who were smoking vast cone-shaped spliffs and joking among themselves. Also without obviously steering clear of them, except to Ryan’s keen blue eye.
Even so, one of the Sea Wasps suddenly blocked their path. He was a wiry mocha-skinned dude, with a single-braided black goatee and tattoos of women with big bare boobs and snake bodies twining up bare, muscle-cabled arms. He had two machetes slung crosswise over his back with the hilts sticking up over his shoulders, and two Smith & Wesson autoblasters in hip holsters decorated with bright beadwork. The weapons Ryan could see were peace-bonded, which didn’t much comfort him.
“So what have we got here?” the pirate asked. He had a Spanish accent. “You getting a higher-quality slut in this gaudy of yours, now, than that taint cocksucker daughter of yours, Fish-face?”
“She’s not a taint,” McDugus Fish said stubbornly. “It’s a birth defect.”
“You got smarter,” the pirate said. “Figured out I got a soft spot for the redheads, huh?”
And he reached out and grabbed Krysty’s left breast.
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