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France,” he said as he drew his Colt .45 from his belt.
    “That’s because last time you were there you were running alongside a tank,” Delilah said, slowly raising her hands. “It isn’t polite to shoot a lady.”
    He snorted. “You’re no lady, and you’re mostly bulletproof, but this place is surrounded by thirty bulls with choppers, and you ain’t that bulletproof.” He swiped the thumb safety off and aimed at Delilah’s chest. He could feel his Power scattered. It was going to take a moment to gather enough to use it again. Good thing he always packed a heater. “So I guess you’re coming with me.”
    She tried to look innocent, and failed miserably. “Come on, Jake, let me go, for old time’s sake. I’ll make it worth your trouble.”
    “Tempting, but I’ve got the law outside. It’s over.” For both of us.
    “Yes, it is over,” the German stranger said, materializing as he placed the muzzle of a pistol against the back of Sullivan’s head. “The policemen will not be a problem. My crew made sure of that. Don’t try anything stupid, Heavy. Magic is always slower than a bullet.”
    The Spiker calmly raised his big .45, put the safety back on, and let it dangle from his trigger finger. “I never did like you guys that could walk through walls. That don’t hardly seem fair.”
    “Life isn’t fair, friend,” the stranger said. A wooden nightstick slammed brutally into Jake’s skull, hard enough to knock any normal man senseless, and he flopped to the floor.
    “Hit him again. He’s got a real thick head,” Delilah suggested. The stranger complied. The last thing Sullivan saw was a torn red dress towering over him and a finger shaking disapprovingly.

Chapter 2
     
     
    The learned gentlemen from the university have asked me if I relied on Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity or if I used the simpler rules of Newton’s Law of Universal Gravitation on the evening in question when I accidentally took Sheriff Johnson’s life . Shit. I don’t know. I just got angry and squished the fucker. But I’ve gotten better at running things and I promise not to do it no more.
    —Jake Sullivan,
    Parole Hearing, Rockville State Penitentiary, 1928
     
     
    El Nido, California
     
    The old Portuguese farmer sighed in frustration, ankle-deep in cow shit, as a panicked Holstein ran past, flinging shit in every direction, with his adopted girl on top trying to ride the animal like a horse.
    “Off the cow!” he bellowed, but it didn’t matter anyway, because people rode horses instead of cows for a reason, and a thousand pounds of beef slipped and landed on its side in a great grunting heap. The girl Traveled at the last second to avoid getting hurt. She appeared next to him, still in forward motion, and her rubber boots slid through the muck until she stopped.
    She was taller than he was now, so he had to stand on his tiptoes. He smacked her hard on the back of the head as he shouted in English. “Mean to cows? You don’t be mean to cows!”
    “Sorry,” Faye said sheepishly. “I wanted to see what would happen . . .”
    The farmer just shook his head. He’d tried that himself once a long time ago, with similar results, but she didn’t need to know that. “You upset the cows. Upset cows don’t give so much milk. No milk, no eat.” Times were hard, and they were paid by the hundred weight. There was a 1,000 gallon tank in the barn, and if it wasn’t full when the milk truck came, then that meant less money from the creamery, and they would be eating cows to stay alive instead of milking them.
    The cow got up and trotted away, shaking her head and snorting. Its ear tag told him it was Number 155, and she was a pain in the ass anyway. In the barn, she was a kicker, so it served her right. His hand still hurt from the evening milking when that cow had kicked him again.
    “Sorry, Grandpa,” Faye said again. “I was done putting grain out for the night and she was just looking at me like she