In 1950 there was no town called Patty in Nevada. There was just two long stretches of quivering black tar crossing one another, going nowhere for hundreds of miles.
That year a World War Two veteran by the name of Willie Sparks was driving a beat up old truck he had borrowed from his brother George to a promise made on a boat in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The promise was made on the return trip by Charlie Schultz to Willie as an attempt to repay the debt of saving his life during a particularly bad day of shelling they took from German artillery. Willie had pulled Charlie out from under an overturned Jeep moments before the gas tank caught fire and blew the whole thing twelve feet in the air.
Charlie had told Willie that he would have a job and a whole new life waiting for him in California, if he wanted it.
By 1950 Willie had been back in Wisconsin for three years, living next door to his brother's family. He had tried to get back into his old life, even taking a job working in the family garage, fixing old cars and sitting in a red leather lounge chair out front. But everything had changed. His brother's wife hared him, because he enjoyed a beer or two while at work. His childhood sweetheart hadn't waited for him, instead choosing to marry a train engineer. His old friends had either moved away or never came back on the boat from France.
So Willie decided to take the old beat up Ford that sat rusting at the back of the garage and head for his promise of a Californian dream life. And that's how he found himself, in August 1950, broken down about half a mile from the boiling tar crossing.
He had little water and no supplies to fix his truck, but seeing the crossing from his vantage point on a slight rise, he started walking and hoped for the best.
Four hours sat at the crossroads under the blistering Nevada sun was a new kind of hell for Willie, but eventually he was picked up by a grey haired old coot who used his new found passenger to complain about everything he could think of, from Germans to gas prices to the sandwich in his glove box. Apparently it was ham again.
In between griping and spitting tobacco juice out the window, the old man told Willie how there were no mechanics within a hundred miles of that crossroads, no matter what direction you went in.
That's when the Californian dream evaporated in the dry desert heat, and a new dream took its place.
Eventually he was dropped of in a one bar town and Willie Sparks set forth the actions of his new plan.
It took a few years, but by 1952 Willie Sparks was the proud owner of a brand new gas station, complete with a mechanical garage on the side. He built it in the north-east square of the crossroads, and sat a new lounge chair out front, under the shade of the overhang, in almost the exact same spot he had waited two years before.
Business was slow at first, but transcontinental trucking was picking up, and soon the little bell above his head was ringing constantly as trucks and cars pulled in for gas or a cold soda from the ice box next to the till.
By 1955 the once deserted crossroads had spouted a diner with a neon sign above the door reading Patty's in the north-west square. South-west got a motel in 1956 that offered discounted rooms to the waitresses in Patty's and over priced rooms to the dirty truckers. Late 1956 saw construction begin on a bar in the south-east square, and it held a grand opening in May 1957 in time for Memorial Day. Willie Sparks was already at the bar by the time the doors opened, after striking up a friendship with the owner David 'Mini' Orton during construction.
The crossroads still had no name, but had come to be known as Patty, after the diner, among truckers and bikers wishing to arrange a meeting place over their radios, and the name stuck.
By 1994 Patty's Diner had been renamed every time a new owner took it over, and sported a new neon sign above the door and in the windows. The motel had gone into liquidation in 1979 and been abandoned for nearly a decade before being bought by a Texas realtor called Kellor Gough, who had put as little money into it as possible to get it open. But by 1997 it was still open for business and it was in the parking lot that a truck carrying chickens pulled to a stop. The passenger door opened and the sizeable frame of Jack Reacher stepped out into the baking noon sun.
Reacher felt the sun on his face, but it didn't cause him the level of discomfort most people felt. He grew up in places hotter than Nevada with his military family, and served in places just as hot during his own career. He shrugged his army issue backpack over his shoulder and headed for the check in desk.
The room was musty and smelled of dust and nicotine. The desk looked like it had been there since the 50's, and the mess of greasy grey hair behind it smelled like he had been there just as long.
Reacher tried to engage in some polite conversation, but found the old man to be lacking in customer service. So he signed his name, Hank Harrison, and took the key for room 9 without another word.
The room was basic, a bed and shower and something Reacher assumed was a TV, although it seemed to be too small and yet too bulky at the same time. He tried a few knobs and dials on it but nothing happened, so he abandoned it and headed out to see what the town of Patty had to offer.
Directly opposite his motel room stood a bar. It looked open and Reacher could see a few motorcycles parked out front. There was a sandwich board near the door that offered 'The best hamburgers for 100 miles'. He wondered how bad the hamburgers in the diner next to him must be.
Diagonally opposite the motel was an old gas station with a mechanics next to it, with an old man sitting on a beat up lounge chair out front.
Deciding against the diner, which appeared to be called Kitty's, he walked across to the bar. It didn't seem to have a name, just a sign saying 'Bar' and an arrow pointing towards the door.
Inside it was just as musty and stifling as the motel check in. There were enough people to give the buzz of conversation an exclamation point when it stopped and every head turned and stared at the newcomer. Reacher was used to this and figured he still gave of a cop vibe. Something this room would certainly notice.
He ordered a beer at the bar, instantly regretted his choice and followed it up with a water. Another decision he regretted immediately as the slow build of conversation died away again.
The problem with being 6ft 5' and build like the proverbial brick shithouse was that bikers and truckers and anyone who fancied themselves the town bully wanted to test themselves against you. He was suddenly glad he had ordered the glass bottle of beer, just in case he was required to put someone in their place.
But the conversation rose again and Reacher drank his beer and water slowly. When he finished he left a small pile of bills on the bar and moved outside, planning to get as much sleep as he could in the heat before getting the first ride out of Patty.
Standing at the edge of the bar's parking lot, thumb out and yellow sun dress billowing, was a girl of about 25. Reacher let his eyes glide over her firm legs, slender body and blonde hair and allowed himself a smile at the way she stood, confident of getting herself a ride out of this nowhere town.
She didn't see him, but she did see the red open top Jeep Wrangler fly past and slam on the breaks, kicking up sand and dirt all over the road before reversing back along side her.
Reacher couldn't hear what was being said but it didn't look like the girl wanted to get into the Jeep, which had three muscle shirt and trucker cap wearing men inside. Wondering if he still had the cop vibe to him, Reacher started walking over.
By the time he got there it was no time for conversation. One of the men had her arm in his sweaty grip, sinewy muscles rippling like snakes under a heavily tattooed forearm, and just as Reacher was about to speak she screamed. High pitched and horror movie-esque, it caught Reacher in the ear like a hammer blow and his instincts kicked in. An open handed straight punch to the elbow of the sweaty man and the girl was free, the tattooed arm was broken and she was running.
And Reacher was in a fight, so soon after leaving the army, and the fighting, behind.
The tattooed man was useless now, but he had two friends who were quicker than Reacher would have thought. They were out and on top of him before he knew it, thunderous blows coming from both sides and he raised his arms high to protect himself. Five seconds later and he had the situation under control, twisting away from his attacker on the right and delivering a accurate body blow that burst the wind from the man's lungs, before stepping into the oncoming assault and finishing it with a swooping head-butt to the nose of the man, he now noticed, with the tattooed eye.
A broken nose, a broken arm and a man vomiting and heaving into the dry Nevada desert. All in fifteen seconds or less.
Reacher guessed now would be a good time to leave, and he looked for the blonde girl with the sun dress and long legs, but couldn't see her anywhere. The only person he could see was the old man outside the gas station. He was standing up, one hand on his chair to keep his balance and the other beckoning him over.
Reacher walked over, and saw the old man held a rusted key in his hand which he pushed into Reacher's huge paw before moved his head towards an old Ford that sat in the shade of the garage, rusted and worn down by years of neglect. That's when he notice the medals pinned to the skeletal chest of the old man, and realised he didn't carry a cop vibe, just a soldier vibe. He nodded a thanks and ran for the rusty truck which started first time, and as he drove past, the old man stood up straight and saluted quickly, and watched a young soldier and an old Ford travel down a little used road to California.