<blockquote>Max spent nearly an hour outside the shop, huddled under an awning that barely shielded him from the bitter rain, smoking one cigarette after another down until he nearly burned his fingers. He was desperate, that much was sure, but how desperate? That was harder to say. Desperate enough to walk into Adriaan Visser’s den was desperate indeed, especially since Visser wouldn’t need any of his family’s fancy weaponry or arcane knowledge. Any one of the guns lining the walls for display would be the end of Max in a single mundane trigger pull.</blockquote>
