Instead, Jake could count on the fingers of one hand how many times he had seen someone open carrying in normal, day-to-day life. Everyone he knew who had been carrying concealed continued to do so, as he himself did in the places where he was allowed to . . . and where, technically, he wasn’t allowed to. With an inside-the-waistband holster and the comfortably fitting shirts he wore, nobody had to know he was armed unless it was necessary.

He also had several small but deadly combat knives he carried on occasion. He knew some older men, including his grandfather, had carried at least a pocketknife every day of their lives for fifty years or more, until the rise of the nanny state and its metal detectors had created too much of a hassle for them.

Jake had a couple of guns in his dorm room. They weren’t supposed to be there, but he wanted to have them handy anyway. He didn’t try to take one of them with him tonight, though. Instead, as he slipped his jacket on, he felt the comforting weight of the folding knife in one of the pockets. The blade, when it was opened, was a little less than three inches long, but in the hands of an expert—and Jake was an expert—that was more than enough to be deadly.

- Chapter 12