Agnes and the Hitman

saturday

cranky agnes column #116

“Sedate Your Family with Love and Gravy”

In an attempt to bring health to the holidays, I adapted a recipe for dressing using olive oil and high-fiber whole-wheat bread, and ended up with a pan of something that had a definite this-is-good-for-you vibe that lacked the all-right-I’ll-go-to-hell flavor of true celebration food. But it doesn’t matter, because while I like dressing a lot, it’s really just a delivery system for the gravy. In fact, the Cranky Agnes Theory of Holiday Cooking can be summed up in two words: More Gravy.

You son of a bitch.”

Shane turned to look at the door to the hallway and saw Lisa Livia dressed in white pajamas with baby chicks on them, looking ready to kill as she stared at Doyle, two high spots of color on her cheekbones.

“Top of the evening, lass,” Doyle called out, but his heart obviously wasn’t in it

Shane looked closer at him, seeing past the beard now, the white hair, the smashed nose, the different-colored eyes, the fake accent, the extra weight, twenty-five years of damage and disguise.

“You son of a bitch.” Lisa Livia said, her voice close to breaking. “Now, lass-” Doyle began; then he sighed as Shane took a step toward him, and gave up the pretense and the accent. “All right, all right, jeez, I’m sorry already.” Frankie Fortunato looked back at Lisa Livia. “Hi, Livie. Daddy’s home.”

“Fuck you,” Lisa Livia said.

Shane looked at Joey. “How did you figure it out?”

Joey looked at Frankie, murder in his eye. “He told me.”

“And you drew down on him?”

“He’s got some explaining to do,” Joey said.

“You took off and left me,” Lisa Livia said, still standing in the doorway, as if she were afraid to come in the room. “My daddy. The one who loved me, the one who’d never leave me, you left me with Brenda. You son of a bitch.”

“She tried to kill me,” Frankie said, as if that explained everything. “She hit me right in the face with that frying pan, broke my nose, look-”

“Now why would she do that?” Agnes said, her hands on her hips, lightning in her eyes, and Shane thought, Oh, hell, here we go.

“She thought I was cheating on her,” Frankie said, rolling his eyes.

“You were,” Joey said, keeping his gun hand steady.

“Son of a bitch,” Lisa Livia said, and leaned on the doorframe.

“I’d have hit you with the frying pan, too,” Agnes snapped.

“You listening to this?” Frankie said to Shane.

“I’m not planning on cheating,” Shane said. Especially on Agnes.

“Oh, but if you could have seen Maisie back then,” Frankie said, shaking his head.

“Maisie Shuttle?” Agnes said, distracted for a second. “Well, that explains why Brenda threatened her with death.”

“You son of a bitch,” Lisa Livia said weakly, evidently stuck in second gear.

Carpenter appeared in the doorway to the porch, a body bag over one shoulder and-when he saw the firepower at the kitchen table- a gun in his free hand.

Everybody turned to look at him and there was a moment of silence, and then almost by mutual consent everybody turned back to Frankie as the more interesting option.

Frankie sighed. “Brenda saw the necklace and yelled, ‘Is that for that bitch Maisie?’ and swung that pan and knocked me cold, and when I woke up I was locked in that shelter covered in blood, left for dead-”

“Totally understandable,” Agnes said, and went around the counter toward the fridge, as if she’d given up on him completely. Shane sympathized but kept his eyes on the guns. “-and I almost did die in the river, getting away. I even got a plate here.” Frankiepointed to his head. “Shoulda been dead, but us Fortunatos, we got thick skulls.”

“Jesus,” Joey said, shaking his head but still keeping his gun steady. “You sure fooled me. You musta put on fifty, sixty pounds, you tub o’ lard.”

“Used to have black hair, too,” Frankie said, scowling at him. “Look at this.” He popped a blue contact out of one eye with his free hand, then out of the other, revealing the Fortunato trademark: shark black eyes. “You were a lot lighter twenty-five years ago, too, Joey. We all changed.”

“Son of a bitch,” Lisa Livia said again, but she sounded tired now, and when Shane pulled a chair up to the table for her, between the newly scrubbed Venus and Joey, she came in and sank down into it and just stared at her father, sad and lost.

“I’m sorry, Livie,” he said, but he sounded more uncomfortable than sorry.

“Between you and my mother-” Lisa Livia just shook her head.

Shane cleared his throat. “I suggest we put the guns away. There are a lot of secrets here. And I’m tired of them.”

Frankie nodded at him, keeping his gun out. “So, you know about your parents?”

“What about my parents?” Shane frowned as Frankie looked at Joey. He caught Joey glaring, raising the gun a little, and he stiffened, but Frankie spoke again.

“You know. That I’m your uncle Frankie. Your good uncle, not your lying snake of a shit-head rat-fuck uncle, the Don.”

“Jesus, you’re a bad liar,” Shane said, and Frankie started to swing the gun his way, and Joey raised his even more, and Carpenter said, “Guns away, gentlemen,” from the doorway, in that deep voice that brooked no argument, and then Agnes came around the counter, her arms full of food, looking like she had every dish in the refrigerator, and dumped it all on the table between them.

“This is my kitchen,” she said, an edge of hysteria in her voice, “and enough goddamn people have been shot in it. You are my family, you’re the only family I’ve got, so you’re going to put those guns away and eat something right now. Or there’sgonna he hell to pay.”

She slapped a loaf of bread down on the table and looked at them both, blood in her eyes, and Joey and Frankie both hesitated. “You do not want me angry,” Agnes said, and they both nodded once and, like the unhappy, dysfunctional family they were, they put the guns away together.

Rhett sighed and went to sleep.

“And now you’re gonna eat,” Agnes said.

“What’d you come back for, Frankie?” Shane said as Joey began to help Agnes take the covers off the dishes.

“My granddaughter’s wedding, of course,” Frankie said, craning his neck to look into the bowls. “I read about it in the paper and I thought it would be nice. Hey, are those ribs-?”

“Cut the crap,” Shane said. “Where’s the five million? And what score are you settling with the Don?”

“I was wondering about the five mil myself,” Agnes said as she slung plates around the table like she was dealing cards, clearly still mad as hell. “And the necklace. That was a lousy thing to do to me, Doyle.”

“Aw, Agnes,” Frankie said.

“I mean it. I worried about you, I fussed over you. I fed you-” She smacked the container with the ribs down in front of him hard. “Darlin’, I know it-”

“And you put a necklace on my dog and almost got me killed.” Agnes finished almost throwing his plate at him. “What the hell was that about?”

Frankie looked shamefaced but relieved, Shane thought. Doesn’t want to talk about the Don.

“That was just a joke,” Frankie told Agnes. “Justice for Brenda. I been knocking around all over the world while she stayed here livin’ the good life, never paying for half-killing me, never losing one night’s sleep over it, so I thought, ‘That bitch needs some payback.’ So I put the necklace on Rhett so she’d see it and start to worry-”

“Jesus.” Lisa Livia sighed and look the cover off the turkey bowl. “You are a piece of work.”

“What?” Frankie said, picking up a rib. “I just-”

“Because of you,” Agnes said, her voice like cut glass, “Four Wheels sent his grandson here to die. Because of you, Four Wheels came here and died. Because of you, Brenda thought there was five million dollars here and hired hitmen to kill me.”

“What the hell?” Frankie said, jolted. He looked at Joey, who nodded. “That bitch hired those hairballs?”

“Because of you, she got so desperate, she killed Taylor tonight with a meat fork,” Agnes went on savagely. “I don’t even know what the collateral damage is, what happened when Shane went to Savannah that got blood all over my fondant, or if that body bag over Carpenter’s shoulder is part of this-”

“No, no, this is professional,” Carpenter said.

“-but your joke killed at least five people-”

“Six,” Shane said, thinking of Rocko.

“-so forgive me if I’m not slapping you on the back right now.”

“Aw, hell,” Frankie said, waving the rib at her. “I didn’t kill them, Brenda did.”

“You’re missing the point, Frankie,” Shane said, thinking it probably wasn’t the first time. “But I’m a lot more interested in your first lie.”

“Hey,” Frankie said, and bit into the rib.

“The one about how you came back for Maria’s wedding.” Shane met the old man’s dark shark eyes, hooded now as he bent over to demolish the rib. “You didn’t come home for the wedding; you came home to turn state’s evidence. You came home to roll on the Don. Which means you’re the one he hired Casey Dean to hit.”

“Ah, fuck.” Frankie dropped the stripped rib bone on his plate, annoyed. “Goddamn Wilson must be getting old, he leaks stuff like that.”

Silent Carpenter got more silent as Shane shut down any reaction he might have had, to say, “He is.”

Frankie reached for another rib, shaking his head, and Lisa Livia got up and headed for the microwave with the entire bowl of gravy.

“Save some for me,” Agnes said, dropping into the chair on the other side of Joey.

“Get two straws,” Lisa Livia said, and slung the bowl into microwave.

Shane turned to look at Carpenter. Fucking Wilson knew. Carpenter met his eyes for a long moment and then nodded and headed for the basement with the body bag, moving past Frankie without looking at him.

“That means that body bag over Carpenter’s shoulder is your fault,” Shane said. “In fact, we can pretty much trace the entire body count back to you.”

“Now wait just a fuckin’ minute,” Frankie said, trying to look indignant with barbecue sauce on his face.

“So now you make it up to us,” Agnes said quietly from her seat beside Joey.

Frankie said, “Huh?” and Shane almost did, too, but Joey just put his hand on the back of her chair, one hundred percent behind her as always.

“We have many problems, Frankie,” Agnes said, calmer now. “I need this wedding to happen tomorrow. Shane needs to take out Casey Dean. Lisa Livia lost everything she had and more when Brenda emptied the accounts she managed.” Frankie turned to LL as she sat down with her hot plate and heated gravy, but Agnes kept on talking. “And Brenda needs to go down for Taylor’s murder. So you’re going to help us with all of that.”

“How?” Frankie said, mystified but not unwilling.

“You’re going to give the bride away tomorrow,” Agnes said.

“Yeah?” Frankie brightened. “Yeah. I’d like that.”

“That should slow Brenda down long enough that with any luck she won’t kill anybody during the ceremony,” Agnes went on. “If we get real lucky, she’ll have a heart attack.”

“Hell, yes.” Frankie wiped his fingers on the napkins Lisa Livia had dumped by his plate. “You got a tux for me?”

“You can use the Don’s,” Joey said with an undercurrent in his voice that Shane knew was important, but not as important as the fact that Wilson was lucking them over for some reason.

The son of a bitch had known all along. What else had he known? What other games was he playing? And why was he playing games at all?

“Plus if you show up in the open as Frankie Fortunato,” Agnes went on, “that’ll draw Casey Dean out in the open, too, so Shane can care of him, so that’ll finally be done.”

“Good,” Frankie said, nodding as he reached for the turkey. “That’s good.”

Agnes was on a roll. “Of course you might get shot, but you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs.” She handed him a plate of deviled eggs. “Have one.”

“Hey,” Frankie said, frowning.

“And as for Lisa Livia, what did you do with the five million, Frankie?” Agnes asked, an edge in her voice Shane had never heard before. Maybe something about fathers lying to daughters, he thought now, maybe something about too many lies. “Because Lisa Livia needs some of it and you’re going to give it to her.”

Lisa Livia sat very still across from Frankie, watching, her fork poised above her plate.

“The five million. Oh, that’s a sad story,” Frankie said, mixing Irish and Jersey and sounding like a lying bastard.

Rhett lifted his head and barked at the back door.

“Already I know you’re lying, Frankie,” Xavier said from the doorway.

An hour later, Agnes looked at the group crowded around her kitchen table stuffing their faces on a week’s worth of leftovers and thought, The Gang That Could Shoot Straight. One cop, two hit men, two mobsters, a mob princess, and a food columnist, plus an ancient bloodhound for a mascot; if Evie showed up, they could do Eight Is Enough. Without Evie, lucky seven. Please God.

Shane pushed his plate away and then caught sight of her face. “Agnes?”

My team. My family. “You okay?”

“I’m thinking.”

Frankie had spun them the sad story of how he’d lost the five million trying to swim across the Blood River in his escape from Brenda and her frying pan. He tried to make it an epic story of one man’s struggle against the flood, but it was basically one cheating goombah’s story of how his wife tried to kill him and he hit the road with five mil, which he lost because he couldn’t swim very well. The only thing that kept Agnes from killing him was that he was eating the entire time. You couldn’t kill somebody who was eating your food. There were rules about things like that.

When Frankie was done with his tall tale, Agnes looked across the table to Lisa Livia. “So. How are you doing?”

“I liked him better dead.”

Agnes nodded. “I’m starting to be grateful to mine for staying dead.”

“So, Frankie, the five million is gone,” Xavier said, shaking his head as she tried to offer him a deviled egg. “And you’ve just come home because you were so homesick.”

“He’s come home to roll on the Don,” Agnes said, and Shane winced.

“Could I talk to you for a minute?” he said, and she handed him the scalloped potatoes, figuring that would hold him for a while.

“No,” she said. “Xavier isn’t stupid and he’s going to notice I’m missing from his jail and he’s not going to buy any ‘she has to put on a wedding’ garbage. In fact, I’m willing to bet that’s why he’s here now, to arrest me for breaking out of jail and probably to take you in, too, just from sheer exasperation. So I think we tell him what the hell’s going on.”

She looked at Xavier. “Shane works for the government. He’s trying to keep Frankie alive to testify against the Don. Frankie wants to see

Maria get married and then he’s going into the Witness Protection Program. He won’t testify until the wedding is over, so the wedding has to go off tomorrow, then he testifies, then the Don goes to jail and Frankie disappears, and Palmer and Maria go off to wedded bliss. Since Frankie is here, we’re going to use him to rattle Brenda. Nobody’s managed to make a dent in her so far, but Frankie showing up alive should do it. That might help you get a confession out of her that she killed Taylor, which you know she did.” She stopped for a minute, pretending to think, and did a quick survey of the assembled team. They were all looking at her with various degrees of admiration and relief. What, she thought You thought I was going to tell him that Shane was a hitman? Am I nuts? “I think that’s it,” she finished. “Any questions?”

Xavier looked at Shane. “And you’ve known all of this from the beginning.”

“National security,” Shane said.

“Fucking FBI,” Xavier said.

“Not quite,” Shane said. “But close enough.”

“So why didn’t I get a visit from men in black suits telling me that I had to let Agnes go?”

“You did,” Shane said. “I just don’t own a suit, and I don’t talk much.”

“I’ll need to see some identification,” Xavier said, and Agnes thought, Oh, hell, but Shane took him aside while Joey and Frankie exchanged one of those glances again.

Agnes poked Joey hard in the side. “What aren’t you telling Shane?”

Joey pushed his plate away. “He don’t want to know.”

“I have news for you,” Agnes said. “He wants to know. You explode one more bomb under him, he’s going to explode. I’ve never seen him lose it, but I’ve seen him when he doesn’t lose it, and he’s scary as hell. You tell him everything now, or-”

“Okay,” Xavier said, coming back. “I’ll hold the arrest warrant.” He looked at Agnes. “You will not leave the jurisdiction.”

“Hell, Xavier,” Agnes said. “I won’t leave Two Rivers. Do you have any idea what tomorrow-no, today, it’s Saturday already-is going to be like around here?”

Xavier looked grim, which meant he had a good idea, and picked up his hat. “Good luck to you.” He turned for the door.

“Hold it,” Agnes said, and he turned back. “You’re not going anywhere. I want Brenda arrested and in an orange jumpsuit by Sunday. We need you on this. Sit down and eat.”

“Agnes,” Shane said.

“We need a plan,” Agnes said. “And we need the law in on it. What do we need to nail Brenda Fortunato for good?”

Xavier hesitated and then said, “Proof.” He sat down beside Frankie, next to the Venus, and took the bowl of ribs away from him. Frankie looked like he was going to protest and then shut up and reached for the coleslaw instead.

Agnes passed him a fork as Shane said, “Okay, we need a plan. So part A is, Frankie walks Maria down the aisle tomorrow and scares Brenda so that she confesses all to Xavier. Good luck with that. Part B, Casey Dean sees Frankie, makes his move, and I… arrest him.”

“Casey Dean is Shane’s bad guy,” Agnes said to Xavier.

“And Shane’s going to arrest him,” Xavier said around his rib. “Would that be cardiac arrest?”

Okay, Agnes thought, and reached for the deviled eggs. They were all eating and talking. She could eat now, too.

“And then part C, Frankie and I discuss Lisa Livia’s inheritance,” Shane said, fixing Frankie with a look that said, You and me, Uncle Frankie.

Frankie tried to look old and frail and innocent. “Ha,” Agnes said, and he gave up and passed the coleslaw back to her.

“And if Brenda doesn’t freely confess to murder?” Xavier asked.

“She’ll fuck up something else,” Shane said. “You be ready for it.”

They all began to talk at once, arguing out the best plan, overlapping each other’s words as they reached over each other to get to the food, arguing and eating, Lisa Livia finally joining in as Carpenter pulled up a chair next to her, making Joey and Agnes scoot over, which brought her close to Shane.

Right where I want to be, she thought, and watched to make sure everybody had enough food. When the table was pretty much cleared she said, “Okay, here’s my last word: Nobody shoots anybody tonight. We’re a team now, one big happy family. We need each other. If everybody shows up here tomorrow breathing and with all working body parts, and I do mean everybody, I’ll make breakfast. Anything you want. But if anybody hurts anybody else on the team, I’m going to be upset. Understand?”

Joey and Frankie looked in different directions.

“And nobody wants Agnes upset,” Shane said.

Joey and Frankie nodded.

“Good.” Agnes shoved her chair back. “Now let’s all get some sleep. And somebody check on Garth, please.”

“I’ll check on the lad,” Frankie said, getting up. “You’re not fucking Irish,” Joey said, getting up to go with him. “Family,” Agnes said, steel in her voice.

“I can’t wait for the holidays,” Xavier said, and left them to their slumbers.

Shane followed Agnes up the stairs to the second floor as she said, “Do you think any of this is going to work?”

“It’s a place to start,” he said. “We’ll play it by ear-what’s wrong?”

Agnes had stopped at the top of the stairs. “Maria and the bridesmaids are in three of the bedrooms up here, and Carpenter and LL are in the other one. We’ll have to use the housekeeper’s room again-”

“Nope,” he said, and steered her toward the attic stairs, his hands on her waist.

She hesitated and then went along, saying, “I suppose you’re right,” sounding exhausted. “That whole saving-the-attic-bedroom-as-commitment thing was dumb.”

“Nope,” he said, letting his hands slide down to her hips, patting her beautiful round butt as she climbed in front of him. His world was going to hell, but Agnes still had a great ass and right now that was enough.

She opened the door at the top of the stairs and then went into the bedroom on the right, and the moonlight flooded the room from the low windows, making it feel almost underwater, peaceful. The big low bed had looked inviting before, but now Agnes said, “Oh,” with an ache in her voice that was almost a moan, and he felt the same way.

Shane looked at her in the dim light, round everywhere. “Long day.”

“I need a shower first,” she said. “I was in jail.”

“Been there,” Shane said, and watched her pad across the hardwood floor to the half-finished bath on the other side, telling himself that she was exhausted and they were both mind-fried from thinking about the next day until he heard the shower go on, and then he gave up being the Sensitive Guy and stripped and went in to join her.

She hadn’t turned the lights on in the bathroom, either, so he found her by the moonlight coming through the skylight, making the soap blue on her wet skin. “Hey,” she said, but it was a soft welcome, not a protest, and his hands slid on her soapy lush curves, and he forgot the next day and lost himself in Agnes and in the feel of her hands as she stroked the soap over him, and the soft sound of her giggle and sigh under the water, and the taste of her as she tangled her tongue with his, the way her body yielded to the shove of his, the way she shivered against the scrape of his beard, drew breath at the slide of fingers, and urged him on, hungry for him as he invaded her, but mostly the way she wanted him, wrapped herself around him and demanded him, and by the time they fell onto the bed, she was so hot, so desperate for him, and he was so insane for her, that he drove into her, into the shock and the need, into everything she was, obliterating himself in her, nothing but him in her, rolling in those satin sheets, until they both exploded, and when he came back to the cool blue room and the moonlight and the quiet with Agnes shuddering in his arms, holding on to him as if she’d never let him go, for the first time in his life he thought, Don’t let go, and held on.

The sunlight woke Agnes up because it came in at such a funny angle, and then when she realized where she was, she sat bolt upright and said, “Oh, my God!” and Shane sat up, too, and said, “What?” reaching for his gun, which, probably for the first time in his life, wasn’t within reach because she’d kicked it last night, flailing around. Even Rhett jerked awake under the windows and looked around.

“I overslept. I think.” Agnes looked around for a clock, but there wasn’t any. “Do you have a watch? What time is it?”

Rhett gave them both a dirty look and went back to sleep. Shane reached over her, which felt so good that she didn’t fall back against the pillows until he pressed her down there with his body as he grabbed his gun and his watch out of the pile of clothing next to the bed. “Six,” he said to her, keeping her pinned down.

“Oh, good,” she said, nestling back into the pillows. “I still have to get up, but it’s not a complete disaster. How’s your gun?” She grinned at him, and he put the gun on the bedside table and rolled her to him so that they lay side by side.

“My gun is fine,” he said, and pulled her leg over his hip so she could feel him hard against her.

“I guess it is.” She settled in closer as he began to kiss her neck. “This was a good idea, sleeping up here. I should have been up here a long time ago instead of saving this place for some dumb commitment idea.”

“Nope,” he said, and kissed her, and she settled into the kiss the way she’d settled into his body as his hand slid down her stomach, practically following a path by now. She started to giggle at the thought-Shane blazing a trail-and he said, “What?” but he grinned against her mouth.

“You’re going to wear a groove there,” she said, and then stopped smiling. “Not that I’m assuming you’re staying-”

“I’m staying,” he said, and kissed her again.

When she came up for air, she said, “You don’t have to say-”

“Can we have this conversation tonight?” he said, and she looked up at him, not sure. “I think a lot of things are going to happen to both of us today. But I know I’m going to be back in this bedroom with you tonight. Can we talk about this then?”

Agnes swallowed. “Sure.” He knows he’s going to be back here tonight. She wriggled a little with happiness, and he grinned and pulled her closer.

“Because if we keep talking, you’re going to have to leave to go do wedding stuff,” he said, letting his hand drift lower, “and I’m not going to get laid.”

“Right,” Agnes said, and sighed against him, but she thought, God, I hope we’re both still alive to be back here tonight.

Then he kissed her, and she stopped thinking at all.

An hour later, the buzz of Shane’s sat phone woke him up.

“I hate that thing,” Agnes murmured, buried under the blanket, her head resting on his chest

Rhett lifted his head from his place on the floor and communicated his displeasure with a long look before he collapsed back onto the pillow Agnes had put there for him.

“Yeah, I’m starting to feel that way, too,” Shane told them both as he checked the phone.

DOCK-FIFTEEN MINUTES

“I’ve got to meet Wilson,” he told her. “I hate him, too.”

“Yeah,” Shane said, his mind reluctantly turning to things he didn’t want to face.

Wilson had kept information back, vital information. That could have been part of his fucking No Need To Know, part of the whole responsibility of the guy who’s in charge the reality of taking Wilson’s place suddenly swept over him, ensconced in Washington, sending others out into the held to do the dirty work, others like Carpenter-but it could be something else, too, and his gut was telling him it was something else and it wasn’t good.

He sat up, hating to move away from her warmth. “I’ll tell you about it later.”

“Can you?” She raised herself up a little, wide awake now. “Because if you can’t, just say you can’t. Please.”

Shane paused and looked down at her. He’d always seen her as capable, angry-definitely angry-and in charge. But right now she just looked vulnerable. He leaned over and kissed her. “Right. I promise.”

Another promise. “I’ll be back tonight.” Getting to be a habit.

Agnes sighed and nodded and rolled out of bed in all her naked splendor. “Okay, then. Breakfast to make. Maria’s wedding day. I’m sure everything will go well.” She crossed her eyes at him and went into the bathroom, and he sat looking at the space where she’d been for a second, just in case she came back.

“Yeah,” he said, and got dressed and went outside into the early morning quiet. The sun was behind him, shooting over the trees and lighting up the far shoreline of the Blood River. The only sound was the quiet lap of water against the pink sand and the honking of Cerise and Hot Pink as they greeted the new day. For a few minutes, he could pretend it was peaceful. Until he heard the boat engine.

Shane looked toward the dock and saw Wilson’s boat pull up to it. The old man stepped onto the floating dock and the boat pulled away to a holding position. As Shane went to the long walkway, Wilson made his way slowly up the metal gangplank to the high dock.

Shane heard a car door slam and looked over his shoulder. Frankie Fortunato had just gotten out of his pickup and was stretching, his white hair now dyed black, his beard gone. He was still fifty pounds heavier, but now he looked like Frankie. A second pickup was coming down the drive: Joey. Shane imagined the two had spent an interesting night talking over old times. And threatening to shoot each other, Good thing they were both afraid of Agnes.

Shane stepped onto the wooden dock and began the long walk out.

As he neared Wilson, he could finally see how old his boss was. Older than Joey, older than all the others involved in this. Shane wondered how that felt, how tired Wilson was. How done he was with what he’d been doing for over sixty years. Or was he really done?

Wilson was already seated when Shane arrived at the high dock. Glancing over at the Brenda Belle, Shane saw no sign of the boat’s owner. Brenda must be biding her time to make her grand entrance. Or sleeping in so she’d have plenty of energy to let loose the dogs of war.

Shane sat down across from his boss. “Good morning.”

Wilson nodded. “Today’s the day. Casey Dean will-”

“You knew about Frankie Fortunato.”

Wilson hesitated for a fraction of a second and then nodded.

“It would have helped if you had informed me,” Shane said.

“Doubtful,” Wilson said. “You had more than enough intelligence on Casey Dean to do your job. As you might learn, if you achieve my position, less information in the field is preferable most of the time.”

“I don’t agree.”

Wilson shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. Given your recent failures, it will be difficult to convince my associates to have you replace me.”

“It might be difficult to convince me.” Wilson looked at him, displeased.

Shane stared back at him. “I took out Casey Dean’s girlfriend last night.”

Wilson stared at him, startled. “Why didn’t you or Carpenter report this? And where is she?”

“We were busy.”

Wilson’s lip curled. “Breaking a suspected murderer out of jail.”

“Yes.”

“I have allowed you a great deal of latitude here,” Wilson began, “and-”

Shane interrupted him. “You’ve been testing me.”

“Very good,” Wilson said, practically patting him on the head. “And the girlfriend?”

“We have her. You knew Casey Dean used a woman as his front.”

Wilson shrugged. “There were suspicions to that effect.”

“That was also part of the test.” Shane tried to keep the bitterness from his voice. Carpenter and Joey had almost died so that Wilson could test a job applicant.

“Flexibility of thinking is critical for my job.”

Shane sat silent for several moments, staring at the old man. Finally he looked away. He could see Joey on the back porch now, a mug of coffee in his hand, looking out at them. Frankie was moving chairs around in front of the gazebo, getting it ready for the ceremony. Agnes was at the kitchen window, at the kitchen sink, making breakfast for the crowd again. Upstairs, Lisa Livia walked past her bedroom window in her bra, talking a mile a minute, probably to Maria. Even the flamingos were honking as usual.

“The test isn’t over, is it?” Shane asked, knowing that Wilson still held all the cards.

“No.”

“Yesterday I thought I might be Casey Dean’s target.”

“Why is that?” Wilson asked.

“Because my real name is Fortunato. My uncle Joey told me my father was the Don’s older brother, Roberto.”

“You were not Casey Dean’s target,” Wilson said. “No.”

“But your uncle told you only half the story.”

There was something snakelike in the way Wilson said the words, almost as if his tongue were flicking in and out. He savored the words, and Shane realized he’d savored a lot of the information he’d been dropping recently.

Behind that desiccated mask, Wilson was enjoying this.

Shane made himself still. “And the other half?”

“Torcelli told you that your parents died in a boating accident, correct?” Wilson’s lips twitched, almost imperceptibly, too little to notice unless you were watching for it.

Shane was watching for it. He nodded.

“Not true.” Wilson lifted his chin, watching Shane from under lizardlike eyelids. “They were murdered by Don Michael Fortunato.” Shane was perfectly still.

“Your father, the eldest brother, stood in Michael’s way, so he rigged their boat to explode. They went out on the water, and he blew it up by remote control from a nearby cruiser.” Wilson watched Shane.

Shane sat, unmoving.

“They say your father tried to save your mother even though he was horribly wounded.”

Shane looked past Wilson to the Blood, beautiful in the early morning.

“They say he screamed her name as he died.”

He was aware of the sound of the water lapping against the floating dock and the slight creak of metal on wood as it moved against the steel gangplank.

“They say she cried out yours.”

Shane turned back to Wilson. Look for what he wants.

Wilson was sitting, looking impassive, but that light was behind his eyes. “I believe she drowned, according to intelligence. There was no coroner’s report. The Don let the bodies go down with the boat.”

What does he want?

“You don’t believe me? Ask your uncle Joey. Or your uncle Frankie. They’ve known for years.”

Frankie and Joey at the table last night. Joey shaking his head. Shane felt heat now-it had been rising the entire time, filling his head, blanking out his brain, but now he could feel it-the old heat from when he’d been a kid, fists flailing. Don’t go there, that’s what Wilson wants, do not go there.

“The real question,” Wilson was saying, “is what do you intend to do about it? Because you have a job to do, Mr. Fortunato. One that does not allow for distraction because of personal issues. Can you still do your job and protect the Don?”

He sat back and allowed himself a small complacent smile.

Shane got up and began the long walk down the dock to Joey.

Agnes tipped a pan of pineapple-orange muffins out onto the counter, wiped her hands on her Cranky Agnes apron, and then stepped back beside Carpenter to look out the kitchen window toward the dock, where Shane was meeting with his boss. She felt a little ridiculous baking muffins in a cherry pink halter dress covered with a promo apron, until she saw the man she loved standing like the Grim Reaper, staring down the wizened old goat he worked for. Then she forgot the dress. There was something definitely wrong down on that dock.

“He said something about getting a better job.”

Carpenter nodded. “He’s in line for a promotion.”

Agnes’s heart sank. So much for hoping for a new line of work. “So that would be good?”

Carpenter turned his head and looked down at her. “Not for Shane. Shane has been finding his way to the light this week.”

“Oh, hell,” Agnes said, watching Shane stride back from the dock. He looked tense. As he got closer, she realized that was too tame a description: He looked white with rage, something she’d never seen before.

Carpenter went rigid beside her, as if he, too, knew something was very wrong, beyond the kind of wrong he’d seen before.

Lisa Livia ambled into the kitchen in her pink halter dress and said, “What’s new?” She threw an arm around Carpenter’s waist and then stopped smiling to look up at him. “What?”

“I don’t know,” Agnes said, but Carpenter walked away from both of them, as if neither of them were there, out through the porch and down the steps to meet Shane.

“What the hell?” Lisa Livia said, and Agnes went out onto the porch, where Joey was standing, also watching Shane, who was striding toward Frankie in the gazebo.

“This is bad,” Joey muttered.

“What?” Agnes asked, but she didn’t wait for an answer as she went down the back stairs and across the lawn to meet Shane. She was vaguely aware that Joey was right behind her, but all she cared about was Shane.

Frankie had climbed down and was waiting for him.

“My parents.” Shane said it with a fury Agnes had never heard. He was glaring at Frankie, who said nothing, and, as they came up, he burned Joey with the same look.

“That bum Wilson tell you?” Joey asked.

“It’s true?” Shane said.

Joey nodded.

“What?” Agnes asked.

Shane met her eyes, the cold, controlled man she’d met five days before obliterated by rage. “We’ll be back.” He looked at Carpenter. “You take care of things here.”

Carpenter nodded once.

“What’s going on?” Agnes said, but Shane was already crossing the lawn to the van, Joey and Frankie following him, their shoulders squared with the same determination. “What the hell-” she began, but Lisa Livia touched her arm.

“Let it go,” she said, and Carpenter nodded, too, and Agnes swallowed and thought, Well, he didn’t lie to me, and said, “Pineapple-orange muffins for breakfast,” and went back to the house, praying that nobody was going to die, especially Shane.

“Do you know where the Don is staying?” Shane asked, working hard to keep a cap on his anger. He was driving Carpenter’s van, Frankie and Joey in the captain’s chairs behind him, looking like two old extras for some mob movie. Except they were the real deal.

Joey nodded. “Yeah. The Rice Plantation B-and-B. The Don likes quiet, classy joints. The rest of his men are at the Victory Motel with the hookers.”

Shane looked back at Joey. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“If I’d of told you, you’d have gone after the Don and gotten yourself killed.”

“I’d rather have heard it from you than Wilson,” Shane said.

“I was more worried about keeping you alive,” Joey said. “Wilson tells you stuff to control you.”

“Give me the short version,” Shane said as they turned onto the main road out of Agnes’s driveway.

Frankie had been talking into his cell phone, and he turned it off before saying, “I just talked to the broad who runs the B-and-B. She says the Don and another guy, most likely his consigliere, are just wrapping up breakfast. So that’s good. They gotta come this way for the wedding.”

Shane nodded and drove to the B amp;B, following Joey’s terse directions. Half a mile from the place, he pulled the van off the road, then backed into a narrow dirt trail.

“We’re gonna stop the Don’s car and I talk to him.” He climbed between the seats, opened one of the lockers, and grabbed a platter-shaped device and a remote that went with it. Then he opened the side panel and climbed out. “You guys stay here,” he told Joey and Frankie.

He went out to the narrow road and lay the platter down in the center, then grabbed a piece of Spanish moss and covered it.

When he was back in the van, he pulled out his Glock and checked the round in the chamber. Then he said, “Tell me what happened.”

“We came down here for vacations every year,” Frankie said. “Roberto, Michael, me, and Joey. And the families. Your parents went out fishing one day on a small boat, never came back. We got the call from the rental place that the boat hadn’t come back; we went out looking, nothing. No one ever found your parents or the boat.”

“But we know Michael did it,” Joey said with loathing. “He was supposed to be in Savannah when they went missing, but when he showed up again he was different. Confident. Cocky. The son of a bitch.”

“You let him get away with it?” Shane said, disbelief in his voice.

“What was we gonna do?” Joey said. “We had no proof. Everyone suspected, but nobody could say for certain, ‘cause nobody knew nothin’ about it. And I mean, nothin’. And where would a guy like Mikey get that kind of bomb on his own? He had to have help, smart help. And not just that snake of a consigliere of his, although he was down here then, too. We couldn’t figure it out. And we couldn’t whack Michael, or Don Carlo would be all over us. And you were in danger, you were his next hit. So we made a deal.”

“To stay in Keyes,” Shane said. “And keep me in the dark. Give me a different name. Tell me you didn’t know who my father was.”

Frankie and Joey nodded once more, two grim, bobblehead old goombahs.

“That’s how we ended up staying down here,” Frankie said. “Brenda was pissed as hell about that. But I always thought she knew. She offered to babysit you that day, and she never did that before.”

Joey jerked his head up.

Frankie nodded. “Yeah. I never said nothin’ because she was my wife, but that bothered the hell out of me. We fought about it, and she cried, big hysterics, but you gotta wonder why she wanted to take care of a baby just that one day. She didn’t like babies much. But just that one day, she said, ‘Give me the baby,’ and they handed you over and went off for a big romantic day on the water.”

Shane could see them, his dad and his mom on the boat, both of them laughing, probably the first day they’d had alone since he’d been born, a day on the water-

The heat in his head made him dizzy for a minute and then he heard Joey say, “Jesus, she knew. Why-?”

“I think she thought it was gonna move me up in the Family,” Frankie said. “She was gonna be Our Lady of the Fortunatos, open the doors in a big house and invite everybody in, sit at the head of the table, queen of New Jersey.”

The scene played again, but this time it was him, taking Agnes aboard a boat, her laughing up at him… What if I couldn’t get to her? What if she was screaming, in agony, and I couldn’t get to her?

“Maybe we don’t leave her to Xavier,” Joey said.

“No,” Shane said, and Joey shut up. He took a deep breath. “You told me you never saw the consigliere before.”

Joey shrugged. “I was just trying to protect you.”

Thirty-five years ago, Joey was a thirty-year-old widowed mobster looking at a baby he was going to have take care of. Considering his limitations and what he was up against, he’d done a pretty damn good job. The fact that he couldn’t stop now was possibly understandable.

“Okay,” Shane asked. “Wilson. How does he play into all this? How does he know?”

Joey frowned. “I don’t know. But he’s a spook, and spooks and the Organization have worked together before, ever since the big war when the government needed help in Italy. So you’re talking over sixty years. Wilson’s probably got people wired in.”

Literally, Shane thought, remembering the transcript of Don Fortunato’s phone call with Casey Dean. Sixty years. About as long as Wilson headed the Organization.

He heard a car coming and slid out of the van into the shade on the side of the road.

A black Lincoln Town Car came rumbling down the road. Shane waited until it was over the platter, then pressed the remote. The platter sent out a massive electromagnetic pulse that fried all the electronics in the car. The engine died and the car rolled by, slowing to a halt about forty feet down the road.

The driver’s door opened and the consigliere got out, cursing. Shane’s jaw tightened as the passenger door opened and Don Michael stepped out, dapper as all hell. The years had been damn good to him. The consigliere popped the hood and both men disappeared around the front of the car as they tried to figure out what had happened. Shane stepped onto the road, Glock at the ready. He walked to car, then edged around to where he could see the two men. “Don’t move,” Shane said.

They both swiveled their heads and stared at him. Then the Don smiled. “Shane,” he said. “Am I correct?” Shane nodded. “Uncle Michael.” The Don and his consigliere exchanged a glance. “Who told ya?” the Don asked. “Joey?”

“You killed my parents.”

The Don laughed, and Shane’s hand tightened so much on the gun, he realized the barrel was shaking. Not good, he thought.

“You ain’t gonna shoot me,” the Don said. “Not in cold blood. Your father wouldn’t, and you can’t.”

“I want the truth,” Shane said. “About how they died.”

“Wasn’t me,” the Don said. “I was in Savannah. Got witnesses to that.”

“Then who was it?” Shane asked. “Him?” He nodded at the consigliere.

The consigliere’s eyes slid left, almost a twitch.

“Better yet,” Shane said. “Where did you get the bomb? Remote detonated, right? Who gave it to you?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the Don said, his face smooth.

“And why did he give it to you?” Shane said. “Did he think you were such a dumb fuck, you’d be easier to manipulate than my father?”

“What?” the Don said, looking rattled for the first time.

“Did he figure that since you are the dumbest fucking Fortunato to ever draw breath, he wanted you in charge of the Family so he could use you like a two-dollar whore, something he knew my father would never allow?”

“Hey,” the Don said, his face darkening, “nobody uses me, I use him-”

“And did he know my mother was on that boat when he blew it up? Did you tell him that, you murdering bastard? Or did you tell him it was just another mob hit?” Shane heard his own breathing, saw the landscape in a red mist, and some small part of him said, Walk away now. “He still thinks you’re a dumb fuck, you know. That’s why he just told me. He thinks I’m going to kill you, which is good with him because he’s finished with you. He wants me to take your place. Consolidation. Government hitman and mob boss in one person. Easier. And then he thinks he can control me. All I have to do is kill you and I get it all.”

The Don’s eyes widened.

Shane shook his head. “But I’m not going to.”

The Don let out his breath and nodded. “You’re a good boy, Shane. You’re a good Fortunato. My heir. Next in line. You can put the gun down now.”

“I’m not going to kill you because I don’t have to,” Shane said, and turned and walked away as Frankie and Joey walked past him, their faces like stone.

The last thing he heard was the Don saying, “Frankie?” and then a fusillade of shots ripping apart the Saturday morning as he began the long walk back to Two Rivers.

He never looked back.

Agnes had fed Carpenter and Lisa Livia and Maria and the bridesmaids and a dazzled Garth-all that beauty in bathrobes and curlers stunned him-and then sent Garth off to help that floozy Maisie double-check the flowers, and to make sure everything for the wedding was in place, including the flamingo pen place cards, and to keep an eye out for Butch, who was late to pick up Cerise and Hot Pink. She also cleaned raspberry sauce off the pantry door, which had been locked the night before to prevent anybody getting at the cakes, Downer and his damn practical jokes, in particular. The raspberry sauce there made no sense, but then it was hardly the only incomprehensible thing in her life, so she let it go to step over Rhett, clean up the rest of the kitchen with Lisa Livia and Carpenter, and try not to wonder if Shane was lying in a pool of blood somewhere with two old mobsters dying beside him.

It was about nine when they heard Maria scream. Again.

“If she thinks Palmer is having sex with another stripper somewhere, I’m going to be annoyed,” Agnes said, but Lisa Livia shook her head and headed for the hallway calling, “What’s wrong, baby?” as Carpenter took the dish towel from her hands and said, “Go upstairs and do the bride stuff. I’ll hold the fort down here.”

“He’s okay, right?” Agnes said, not able to stand it anymore.

“He’s fine,” Carpenter said. “Somebody else isn’t, but he’s fine.”

Agnes nodded. “Okay, then. Do you think there’s any chance he’s going into a new line of work soon?”

“I think he could be persuaded,” Carpenter said.

“Yes, but would it be fair if I did that?” Agnes said. “I mean, it’s his work-” and then Lisa Livia yelled, “Agnes, get up here!” and she said, “Oh, just hell, Carpenter, what should I do?” and he said, “Get up there,” and she went.

When she followed the sounds of outraged female babbling, she found them all-Lisa Livia, Maria, and three bridesmaids all in slips and curlers-staring at Maria’s white wedding dress, now covered with purply red stains, the worst of which were two purply red handprints over the breast cups on the bodice. Small, Brenda-sized hands. She’s completely out of control, Agnes thought. She’s just destroying things now, anything to screw up the wedding.

“It’s ruined!” Maria wept, and her bridesmaids clustered round her and wept with her.

“Yep.” Agnes looked at it as she listened for the van. A car door slammed outside and she jerked her head to see out the window, praying it was Shane, but it was just the first wedding guests, complete with a little girl who was probably going to cry through the whole ceremony. Damned early birds, stay home and give your kid a nap.

“What is that horrible stuff?” Maria wept.

“Huh?”‘ Agnes said. “Oh, that’s the raspberry sauce from dessert last night.”

Maria looked at her, horror-struck. “That’s all you can say? It’s dessert? My God, Agnes, it’s my wedding dress!”

Another car door slammed, and Agnes looked again. Still not Shane. What was it with all these people coming early? It wasn’t like you got extra cake.

“Look, honey,” Lisa Livia said to Maria. “You-”

“And you stay out of this,” Maria said, turning on her, with her acolytes around her. “You and your mouth, butting in all the time, that’s what got me that damn flamingo dress and that’s what I’m going to have to wear now and it’s all because of you-”

“Hey!”Agnes said, seeing Lisa Livia flinch.

“I know,” Lisa Livia said to Maria, miserable. “Really, I know I screwed up-”

“That’s not good enough,” Maria snapped. “You swear to me that you won’t say anything today, not one word at my wedding besides polite conversation, you will not interfere in any way, you swear it to me now.”

Lisa Livia swallowed and nodded. “I swear I won’t say a word all day that isn’t ‘Hello, how are you, beautiful day for a wedding.’ I will not screw up anything else, I promise.”

Another car door. Agnes looked out the window. Not Shane. Damn it. He wasn’t dead. Other people died, not Shane-

“I don’t believe it,” Maria was saying, the bridesmaids nodding. “Like you could stop talking or interfering. This is like the worst thing that could happen-”

“Okay, that’s it,”Agnes said.

Everybody turned at looked at her.

“I know this is wedding nerves,” Agnes said to Maria. “I know you’re a good sweet girl and you’ve had a terrible week, I know you love your mother, I know this isn’t you, but you just crossed the line.”

“Oh, please,” Maria said, looking put upon.

Agnes looked at the bridesmaids. “You should go get dressed.

Now.” When they hesitated, she added, “Go!” and Maria nodded, and they went. Agnes took a step closer to Maria. “Now listen, you. Taylor died last night with a fork through his throat. I know in the excitement of getting married you probably forgot that-” Maria flushed. “No, but-”

“-but he died in pain and terror choking on his own blood, so the fact that you’re going to have to wear a pink dress sewn in one night by a woman who makes a fraction of what you’re going to be spending on lunch once you marry this very nice boy who loves you-a woman, I might add, who stayed up all night to fix a dress that you dyed pink to play a joke on the mother of that boy-well, I just can’t get too worked up over your tragedy, Maria. You’re nineteen, you’re marrying a man who adores you, you’re going to be filthy rich, and, oh yeah, you’re going to have everything your mother never had because she worked her ass off to make sure you got it, and now your fucking grandmother just took all of it and her future from her, which is something you don’t seem to have much sympathy for. So while you’re screaming and moaning, you might want to look around and notice that you’re the luckiest person in this damn place and the rest of us have zero sympathy for you. Now go get those dumb curlers out of your hair and put on your pink dress and don’t give me any more tragedy about how you’re not sure Palmer loves you. If he’s been putting up with this drama princess act and he still wants to spend the rest of his life with you, he loves you.”

Maria looked at her, outraged, and then looked at her mother for support.

Lisa Livia shrugged. “Hello, how are you, beautiful day for a wedding.”

“Oh, well that’s just fine,” Maria said, and flounced off, but there was a wavering edge to her voice that gave Agnes hope.

Lisa Livia looked back at the dress. “Brenda did that.”

Agnes said, “Yep, and if she was nuts enough to do that, then she’s going to do some more stupid things today and get herself caught.”

She heard a door slam below and this time it sounded like a van, but when she looked out, she saw only Joey and Frankie getting out of Carpenter’s van.

“No,” she said, her blood going cold, and ran for the stairs.

Shane was surveying the backyard when he felt somebody sack him from behind, her arms going around him so tightly, his air went out with an oomph. He turned around, not easy as tightly as Agnes was clinging to him, and said, “Hey,” as his arms went around her. She said into his chest, “I thought you were dead, I didn’t see you come back with Joey and Frankie,” and he said, “Nah, I told you, I’ll always come back.” Then she lifted her face, and he saw how terrified she’d been and he kissed her hard, and she held him a little longer than he’d intended, and the longer she held on and kissed him, the more the ugliness of the past receded, and all the good that was Agnes and Two Rivers washed over him.

When she broke the kiss, she said, “I want you to quit that damn job,” and he nodded. “Okay, then,” she said, and kissed him again, and then he let her go and realized she was wearing something very un-Agnes, a low-cut, tight pink dress that made her look like Jessica Rabbit.

“Nice dress,” he said, trying not to laugh, and more of the ugliness went away. It was never all going to go away-there was too much of it, and some of it still had to be dealt with-but Agnes was a pretty good antidote for right now.

“Lisa Livia picked it out,” Agnes said, starting to grin, too, which was good; he hated it when she was worried. Another reason to stop killing people for a living.

“Well, it looks great,” he said, because it did. Kind of.

“She bought one for Evie, too,” Agnes said. “I don’t believe Evie’s going to wear it, but it was kind of a mother-of-the-bride thing. Or something. Sometimes I don’t follow Lisa Livia’s thought processes.”

“I don’t follow Carpenter’s either sometimes, but it’s always good,”

Shane said, holding her away from him to look at the dress again. “It’s not the kind of dress yon could run in.”

“That’s very practical of you, dear,” Agnes said, and turned to go back to the house, which was when Shane saw that it was really tight through the rear and had no back at all.

“I really like that dress,” he said, and her laugher floated back to him.

Shane grinned, thinking, That’s my girl, and she turned and smiled back at him, and just for that second before she went on he imagined that she looked like his mother might have, smiling back at his father, and the need for vengeance rose up again like a knife. But vengeance had been Frankie and Joey’s to take, not his. And his father and mother had found each other in the beginning, had had each other for a while, had had a life together for a while.

It would have been so much worse never having found each other.

Agnes stopped at the porch door and looked back at him again in her Jessica Rabbit dress, so much love in her smile, so grateful he was back, and he grinned at her and she went inside and he walked down to see what was going wrong at the wedding.

Because everything was just fine at the house.

Agnes walked into the kitchen, trying not to beam, but it was hard. He was going to quit. Maria was mad but she was going to marry Palmer. If Butch would just show up with his van and pick up Cerise and Hot Pink, and Frankie would cough up the money, and she could get her column done-

“Uncle Michael isn’t here,” Maria said, her hands on hips, splendid in her pink wedding dress.

Agnes blinked at her. “What?”

“Uncle Michael. The Don.” Maria folded her arms. “The guy who was giving me away. He’s not here.”

“He ain’t gonna be here,” a brand-new Frankie said from the doorway as Rhett padded past him, oblivious to the drama going on around him. “And you ain’t gonna miss him.” He straightened the jacket of his tux and lifted his newly shaven chin, and he looked every inch a Fortunato.

“Oh, God,” Agnes said. “What happened to the Don?”

“I’m giving you away, Maria,” Frankie said, offering Maria his arm.

Maria blinked at him. “Doyle?”

“I’m your grandpa Frankie, honey,” Frankie said.

Maria looked at Lisa Livia.

“This is my daddy,” Lisa Livia said. “Frankie Fortunato. Your grandmother tried to kill him twenty-five years ago, so he swam the Blood River and got away from her, but now he’s come back and he’s going to walk you down the aisle.”

Maria sat down on of the kitchen chairs.

“Want a drink?” Agnes said. “‘Cause I’m thinking I’m going to need one after the next question.” She looked at Frankie. “Where’s the Don, Frankie?”

“He’s sleeping with those he did wrong to,” Frankie said.

“Oh.” Agnes got out the bourbon. “Did Shane kill him?”

“Nope,” Frankie said while Agnes poured herself a shot. “Don’t ask no more questions, Agnes,” he added with affection.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, Frankie,” Agnes said, and knocked back her drink. “Maria?” she said, offering her the bottle.

“No, I’m good,” Maria said. “So. Grandpa. You’re going to walk me down the aisle. Okay.” She looked at Agnes. “You find out who ruined my dress yet?”

“Oh, that was Brenda,” Agnes said.

Maria’s nodded. “So when she sees me coming down the aisle in her dress with Grandpa Frankie…”

“Could be a coronary,” Agnes said. Maria stood up. “Hello, Grandpa.”

“Wonderful,” Agnes said. “And you really do look beautiful, Maria.” When Maria didn’t look at her again, she thought, Well, I have to earn that, and started for the door, almost toppling over as her knees met the hem of her pencil skirt, a problem she’d been having all morning. Small steps, she told herself, and tried again.

To Do List, she thought as she minced her way down the porch steps. Take back Maria’s wedding from the clowns. Get Brenda to incriminate herself. Get Lisa Livia her money back. Get Shane a better job. Write column.

Burn this damn dress.

Shane surveyed the wedding party. There were about a hundred people gathered. The Don’s goombahs were clustered together on Maria’s side, and they were going to be surprised when Frankie walked down the aisle instead of the Don. Brenda was not there yet. Probably waiting to make an entrance. That should be good, too.

He checked off the players on the groom’s side: the groom, best man, ushers, preacher, musicians, and photographer were in place, and yes, there in the front row was Evie wearing something in that same pink that Agnes had been slinking around in. Evie had a jacket over hers, though. Good plan, Shane thought. Then he frowned as he looked out past the lawn: Wilson’s boat was back, anchored just off the dock and to the left of Brenda’s yacht. Coming to watch the hit?

Had he watched a hit before? Shane wondered. Had the consigliere reported to him so that he knew the details of the deaths-the words they say echoing in his mind-or had Wilson known firsthand? What the fuck was the real deal?

Shane walked across the lawn to the photographer, an attractive woman with several cameras dangling on straps around her neck. “Could I borrow your camera with the best zoom for a second?”

The woman turned to him and smiled. “Sure.” She pulled one off and held it out for him.

Shane took it. “Thanks.” He took the camera and zoomed in on the yacht. Wilson was on the bridge with another old man Shane recognized from intelligence briefings: the head of the mob in New York City. Another of Wilson’s puppets, Shane thought. Come to see the coronation of the successor in New Jersey. He handed the camera back to her.

“Appreciate it,” he said.

“No sweat.” She went back to the guests, and Shane walked over to Carpenter at the edge of the gazebo.

“You do what you had to?” Carpenter asked.

“Joey and Frankie handled it,” Shane said. “There’ve been some changes in the plan. Let’s find Casey Dean first.” He pulled out the pink cell phone he’d taken from Abigail’s bag the night before and hit number 1 on the speed-dial.

Shane stiffened as a woman’s voice answered: “Where are you, sis?”

He was still processing that when Carpenter nudged him and pointed. “Over there.”

Shane looked across the cluster of guests. The photographer had a cell phone in her hand, and she tossed her hair away from it as she listened in a way Shane remembered.

“Princess,” Shane said into the phone. “What’s your sign?”

He saw the photographer turn her head and stare right back at him.

“Where’s Abigail?” she said into the phone

“I’ve got her,” Shane said. “Casey Dean, I presume? We met before. In a bar in Savannah.”

“What do you want?” Casey Dean asked, glaring at Shane. “The Don’s dead, so your contract is, how should I say, defunct.” Shane could see her go rigid. “Bullshit.”

“You see Don Fortunato or his consigliere anywhere around?”

There was silence. Shane continued. “When the grandfather of the bride escorts her down the aisle, you’ll know I’m telling the truth. You do anything, I’ll have your ass.”

There were several seconds of silence; then Casey Dean spoke. “Where’s my sister?”

“We have her, along with the five million.”

“What do you want?”

“For now, the wedding to go off without ahitch. Are you clear on that?”

“Yes.” The word was a hiss. “But you’re fucking up, big-time.”

“Make sure to take some good pictures.” Shane hit the off button, but paused, thinking about what Casey Dean had just said. He looked at the pink phone, then hit 2 on the speed-dial and listened as the phone was answered.

“Yes?” Wilson said.

Shane turned the phone off, cold all over, and looked at Carpenter. “That thing we’ve been missing?”

“Yes?”

“I just found it.”

Fifteen minutes earlier, Agnes had met Lisa Livia in the kitchen and found her wearing not only the Bon Ton pink-hearts dress, but also the pink-heart necklace that had started the whole mess as Rhett’s collar.

“You’re kidding,” she said, and started to laugh.

“My daddy gave it to me,” Lisa Livia said, holding it out with one finger. “He said he’d had it appraised and it was worth about ten grand and he wanted me to have it”

“Ten grand?” Agnes said doubtfully.

“He’s wrong,” Lisa Livia said. “It’s worth at least thirty. The big hearts are pink quartz, but the spacers are pink diamonds. Good ones, too. He probably went to some fence in Savannah who low-balled him.”

“Oh, my God,” Agnes said. “And he put it on Rhett.”

“Here,” Lisa Livia said, and held out her hand, and when Agnes put out her palm, Lisa Livia dropped a pink ribbon onto it. “It’s one of the hearts and a couple of the diamonds. It’s not much, probably only five grand, but it’s a thank-you and a souvenir. In case you ever forget Maria’s wedding. Or need some quick cash.”

Agnes held up the ribbon to see the heart sparkle in the sunlight, the diamonds sparkling brighter. It was godawful ugly. “I’ll never give it up,” she said truthfully.

“We gotta wear them,” Lisa Livia said, and helped her tie it on. Then she stood back and smiled happily. “Brenda’s going to have a heart attack.”

They made their way down to the gazebo with Rhett, the flamingos honking in the background because that idiot Butch had not shown up, and they both stopped, stunned, when they saw Evie, dressed in the same cherry dress and wearing a pink jacket and a pink straw hat with a giant pink daisy on it, looking cute as all hell, sitting beside her husband, Jefferson, in all his grayed Dynasty dignity.

“I don’t believe it,” Agnes said as they sat down in the front row, Rhett collapsing at their feet. “Evie wore the dress.”

“She cheated,” Lisa Livia said. “She’s wearing a jacket.”

“Yes, but it matches,” Agnes said, impressed. “I bet she had that made. I bet it cost ten times what the dress did. And the hat is killer.”

“She’s gonna outshine Brenda,” Lisa Livia said. “I just love Evie Keyes.”

Garth was sitting right behind them with a pretty girl in her Sunday best named Tara, who was looking around wide-eyed at everybody. He looked serious, sitting straight in a very nice suit jacket that Palmer had helped him pick out and then paid for, and Agnes thought, Good for Palmer. She turned around and whispered, “You’ve done a great job here, Garth. I don’t know what we would have done without you.”

The girl looked at Garth with awe. Garth blushed brighter than Cerise.

Agnes turned around and grinned.

Palmer and Downer took their places next to Reverend Miller, a big man who looked extremely unhappy to be there. Downer, on the other hand, looked ecstatic, which meant he probably had something horrible up his sleeve. And Palmer looked like death, or at least hung-over to the point of death, staring off into the distance with that If I Don’t Move, My Head Won’t Fall Off look in his eyes.

The reverend nodded to the band, which immediately struck up very fast Latin dance music that spooked Cerise and Hot Pink into wild honking.

“What the hell?” Palmer said, turning on Downer, who was laughing his ass off.

“Don’t you get it?” Downer said, holding on to Palmer now, he was laughing so hard. “It’s flamingo music.”

“What?” Palmer said, completely confused.

“Flamenco music,” Agnes said grimly, but at that point the entire assembly was looking the other direction, and even the band slowed and then stopped playing as the musicians gaped.

Brenda had arrived.

She’d probably been expecting the wedding march and intended to slide in front of Maria, so the flamenco music took her by surprise, but she carried on anyway, walking down the aisle in a black lace dress, holding a black lace handkerchief to her lips at intervals and nodding to anyone who murmured their sympathy to the widow as she glided to the front. By responding only to those who said something, she stayed just this side of good taste, but Brenda in black lace was always going to be hot, and the black lace mantilla she had added had an unfortunate Bride of Dracula effect that threatened to topple the whole thing over into comedy, except that Taylor was really dead.

“Morticia Addams does Seville?” Lisa Livia whispered.

“She’s a widow,” Agnes whispered back. “Show some respect.”

“She ain’t as much of a widow as she thinks she is,” Lisa Livia said.

Brenda reached the gazebo and gave a sad smile to the groom’s family in the front row and then turned to her side of the aisle to take her seat.

Lisa Livia waved to her.

Brenda saw the necklace and went rigid. Then she saw Agnes and went berserk. “We can’t have this wedding,” she said loudly, and pointed to Agnes. “That woman is a murderer. Detective Xavier, I saw you back there, why isn’t this woman in jail?”

Xavier took a couple of steps out from underneath the old oak. “I believe Miss Agnes is on a recreational furlough. Don’t you worry, Mrs. Beaufort. I got my eye on her.” He nodded to Reverend Miller. “You can go on, Reverend.”

“Well, I’m making a citizen’s arrest,” Brenda said, rigid and righteous in black lace.

“You can’t, ma’am,” Xavier said. “She’s already under arrest. Now let’s just all sit down and get started on this nice wedding.” He came strolling over to the chairs on the bride’s side, looking more relaxed than Agnes had ever seen him. On his way, he tipped his hat at Evie Keyes and gave her a roguish grin, and she smiled back at him, dimpling under her pink daisy.

Jefferson Keyes looked startled.

“I demand an arrest!” Brenda said, her voice growing sharper.

“If you don’t sit down,” Xavier said, his voice growing softer, “that arrest is gonna be you for disturbing the peace.”

Brenda drew a deep breath, which did amazing things for her cleavage, and sat down next to Lisa Livia. “Where’d you get that necklace?” she spat.

“It was a gift,” Lisa Livia snapped back.

Xavier sat down behind Brenda, next to Garth, who clearly wished he hadn’t.

Up at the front, Reverend Miller was now conferring with Jefferson Keyes. Jefferson finally shook his head and sat back down.

Reverend Miller drew himself up to his full rotund height. “I’m sorry,” he said, clearly not. “But I feel the irregularities present at this ceremony make it impossible for me to continue.”

Lisa Livia tensed, but Brenda smiled, showing her teeth.

The reverend flared his nostrils. “I don’t know what’s going on, but there are undercurrents here that make this wedding less than the holy occasion it should be.”

Agnes drew a deep calming breath, the way Dr. Garvin had taught her. I’m going to kick your pompous ass into the Blood River and let the flamingos and the gators fight over it, you dickless wonder.

Reverend Miller bowed his head. “Let’s all close with a prayer-”

“Let’s not.”

Agnes looked at Lisa Livia, thinking for the moment that she’d broken her promise to Maria, but then she realized that Evie Keyes was standing up, pink daisy quivering with repressed emotion.

“If you don’t feel you can perform the wedding ceremony of my son, who will someday inherit a significant portion of the Keyes land and fortune,” Evie said, very distinctly, “then I understand. I’m just not sure he will.” She fixed the reverend with the iciest blue eyes since the Snow Queen, and the reverend froze. Understandably.

Go, Evie, Agnes thought.

“What the hell?” Brenda murmured under her breath, leaning forward.

The reverend turned and smiled weakly at Palmer, who did not smile back, which wasn’t surprising since Palmer hadn’t smiled since Thursday, but Agnes wasn’t about to tell Reverend Miller that.

The reverend turned back to Evie. “Can you assure me that nothing untoward is happening in occasion with this wedding?” he said, trying to work some sternness back into his voice.

“No,” Evie said, having no trouble at all lacing her voice with a lot of fuck you and earning Agnes’s undying respect in the process.

“Perhaps I was hasty,” the reverend was saying, going down in ignominious defeat.

No doubt about it, Agnes thought as Evie took her seat again.

Brenda made a little shrieking sound beside her, full of rage and frustration.

“Very well.” Reverend Miller nodded to the band, which struck up that goddamned flamenco music again, setting off Cerise and Hot Pink all over again.

“Stop that,” Agnes said, standing up, and the whole wedding now looked at her as she scowled at the band. “You, classical music from now on. If you can’t play that, you don’t get paid. You know the wedding march?”

“Of course we know the wedding march,” the bandleader said. “We had to learn the damn flamenco for this gig.”

Downer burst out laughing again.

“Grow up,” Agnes said, and he stopped. Then she nodded to the band, and it began the wedding march. “Jesus,” Lisa Livia said.

“If we’d had this at the country club-” Brenda began.

“Shut your thieving, murdering mouth,” Lisa Livia said, and Agnes thought, That’s fair, and turned to watch Maria come down the aisle.

Maria appeared at the top of the porch steps, unsmiling but lovely in flamingo pink, and Frankie paused beside her, too, beaming and majestic in tuxedo black, and they walked across the lawn together until they reached the edge of the chairs. Then somebody said, “Who the hell is that?” and Brenda turned, and gasped, “Frankie?” rising to her feet on the word as her face went paper white, and Frankie waved to Lisa Livia, and then made a gun out of his thumb and forefinger and shot Brenda.

She fainted dead away and the wedding march trailed off.

Agnes looked at the bandleader. “Don’t make me hurt you.”

He nodded to the band, which struck up the wedding march again, and Maria began her walk down the white cotton runner, her chin up, her long dark hair ruffling in the breeze, and Frankie on her arm, still beaming.

Lisa Livia uncapped a bottle of water and poured it over her mother’s head, ruining her hair and makeup and making Maria smile, and Brenda came to sputtering. Lisa Livia grabbed one arm and hauled her into her seat. Maria and Frankie reached the end of the aisle as a lot of the guests on the bride’s side of the aisle suddenly developed a pressing need to be elsewhere.

Maria gave her maid of honor her flowers, Frankie patted her hand and gave it to Palmer, and then they both turned to Reverend Miller, Maria’s smile fading as she saw him.

Frankie sat down beside Agnes and said, “Damn fine wedding, Agnes.” Then he leaned forward so he could look past her and Lisa Livia to the dripping Brenda and said, “Hello, Brenda. I’m back. Miss me?”

She gazed hack at him with such loathing that both Lisa Livia and Agnes pulled back a little.

“Hello, Frankie,” she snarled. “Maisie’s in the back row if you want a quickie.”

“A marriage is a lifetime bond,” Reverend Miller intoned loudly, gazing sternly at Maria, who stepped back a little. “One that should not be entered into lightly.”

“I saw her,” Frankie said. “She hasn’t held up like you have, baby. What’d you do, kill a virgin and drink her blood, you murderous bitch?”

“They were a hell of a lot easier to find once you left town, you cheating bastard,” Brenda said.

“Shut up,” Lisa Livia hissed. “This is my kid’s wedding.”

“Much soul searching should be done to ascertain that the two souls seeking to be joined forever are indeed soul mates,” Reverend Miller said to Maria, whose shoulders slumped, “coming from the same kind of communities, speaking the same language-”

“Hey, I was just trying to find a little fuckin’ warmth” Frankie said. “Which I sure as hell wasn’t gettin’ at home.”

“You weren’t gettin’ it at home because you were gettin’ it everyplace else,” Brenda said. “Fuckin’ everyplace else.”

“Shut up,” Lisa Livia whispered savagely, and Agnes smacked Frankie on the arm and nodded toward Maria and Palmer.

“-because those who come from different backgrounds, from different cultures, may never truly find a common ground to bond upon.” Reverend Miller looked sternly at Maria while Palmer continued to look off into the distance for a hangover remedy, having missed the entire speech.

“What the fuck is that minister saying to my little Maria?” Frankie said, startled.

“You let the goddamned minister alone,” Brenda said. “Did he just say my kid wasn’t good enough for Palmer?” Lisa Livia said.

“Oh, for the love of God.” Agnes stood up to face Reverend Miller.

“I don’t know what ‘celebrate’ means in your vocabulary, but in mine, it doesn’t mean making the bride feel like an outsider and everybody else want to kill themselves. You’re done here. Go away.”

“I tried to leave before,” Reverend Miller snapped.

“I know,” Agnes said. “But you were a real putz about it, so I’m not giving you any points for that.” She looked around for Carpenter but saw only Shane, who was standing next to a large black trunk on a dolly. That’s new, Agnes thought. “Carpenter?” she called.

“Right behind you,” he said, and when she turned around, he was there, straightening his tie.

“Saw this coming, did you?”

“Didn’t everybody?”

She leaned closer and whispered, “You swear to me this will be legal?”

“Yes,” he whispered back. “I’m legal everywhere except Utah, North Carolina, and Las Vegas.”

Agnes closed her eyes. “Okay,” she whispered. “The bride and the groom are a little depressed. That hag from hell Brenda has convinced Palmer that Maria is marrying him for his money and convinced Maria that Palmer only wants her because she’s beautiful and that he’ll cheat on her. One of them might even say, ‘I don’t.’“

“Got it covered,” he said, and moved to the front, majestic in his black suit.

“Welcome friends of Maria and Palmer,” he said as he took his place in the gazebo, moving Reverend Miller out of the way at the same time by the sheer force of his bulk, and his voice rolled over them, rich and warm. “Many of you have made long trips to come here, some of them fraught with difficulties, and we are grateful to you for that. Maria and Palmer’s trip to this moment has also been fraught with difficulties, and their willingness to surmount those challenges will speak to their hope for the future.”

Palmer still looked as though he wasn’t listening, but Maria turned to Agnes, giving her a What the hell? look.

“Six M amp;M’S,” Agnes whispered. “Swear to God, Maria.”

Maria took in a deep breath, nodded, and turned back to Carpenter.

Carpenter cleared his throat.

“Dearly beloved,” he said. “We are gathered here today to honor a couple who have shown that they truly know the meaning of love through adversity, of staying the course no matter what life brings. Maria, a lovely girl who could marry any man she chose, is giving her hand to Palmer, a young man of great promise, in spite of his recent losses due to the disastrous lawsuits at the Flamingo Golf Course-”

“What?” Maria said, startled.

“-that have left him penniless-”

“Dude,” Downer said, taking a step away from Palmer.

“-and virtually unable to support her-”

“What?” Palmer said, finally waking up to frown at Carpenter. “What are you talking about?”

“Palmer,” Maria said, leaning closer to him.

“Really, Maria,” Palmer said stiffly. “You don’t need to worry about the money.”

“I’m not,” Maria snapped. “I work, you know. I’ve worked since I was fifteen. I was raised to work. Have you met my mother? You think she’d raise a daughter to rely on a man for money?”

Palmer blinked. “I didn’t mean…”

“I love you, you moron,” Maria said, looking like she wanted to kill him. “And now that you’re broke, I can prove it to you. In fact…” Her face cleared. “Palmer, this is good. We can make a fortune together.”

“I’m not broke,” Palmer said, scowling at her.

“You’re not listening,” Maria said. “You’re a genius at golf courses, but you’re not so smart at practical things. I am. I have my mother’s brains, and I’m here to tell you, my mother is something else. With your creative brain and my street smarts, we’re going to be millionaires in no time. And we’ll do it together, Palmer. It’ll be better this way.” She reached out and grabbed his arm. “We’ll be broke for a while, but not for long. You have no idea how smart I am.”

Palmer looked exasperated. “Of course I know how smart you are. Why do you think I’m marrying you? You’re the smartest woman I’ve ever met. I knew that on our first date when the car broke down and you fixed it and then we got lost and you figured out the GPS system. I knew damn well that you were the perfect match for me.”

Maria’s mouth dropped open. “Palmer?”

“Well, it’s great that you’re hot, too, of course, but it’s not important And I love you. I don’t know what the hell’s been going on this week.” Palmer squared his shoulders. “But I’m telling you now, if you’re marrying me for my money, I don’t like it much, but I’m marrying you anyway.”

“I’m not,” Maria said. “I never was, that’s what I’m trying to tell you, I don’t care if you’re rich. I want money, but we can make it together. We’ll make lots of it. I’m good at it, you’ll see. You design the golf courses, and I’ll make sure we get lots of money for it and that it gets invested and we have retirement and our kids have college savings, I’ll take care of all of it. We’ll be rich again. We’ll do it together. It’ll be better this way, Palmer, we’ll do it together.”

“No, we won’t,” Palmer said. “I don’t know what he’s talking about. I didn’t lose my money. The Flamingo is fine. I’m still rich.”

Maria looked at Carpenter.

Carpenter nodded. “I was just checking.”

“We’re rich?” Maria said.

“Sorry,” Palmer said.

“Oh, thank God,” Maria said, and fell into his arms. “So what I need to know right now is that the two of you really do want to get married,” Carpenter said. “Yes,” Palmer said.

“Absolutely,” Maria said, clinging to him.

“And do you each really believe that the other loves you and wants to marry you?” Carpenter said. “Yes,” Palmer said. “Yes, Ido,” Maria said.

“And do you promise to live together in contentment with the past, happiness in the present, and hope for the future?”

They both looked taken aback, but Palmer said, “Yes, I do,” his voice strong, and Maria said, “Yes, I do, too.”

“Then I now pronounce you man and wife,” Carpenter said, his voice ringing out.

“You can do that?” Maria said. “Just like that?”

“Yes, I can,” Carpenter said. “Do you want to kiss the bride, Palmer?”

“Yes, I do,” Palmer said, and kissed Maria. Agnes looked at Lisa Livia, who was crying.

“Did you hear what my daughter said about me?” Lisa Livia said. “Yes, I did,” Agnes said, putting her arm around her. “Damn fine wedding.”

“Damn fine minister, too,” Lisa Livia said, sobbing. “Tip him well for the ceremony,” Agnes said, “as only you can,” and turned to see how Brenda was taking it. Brenda was gone.

Shane had been so busy watching Casey Dean that he missed what happened in the gazebo, although it was evidently good because people applauded and Maria and Palmer came down the aisle looking like they were in love again, and Agnes was up in the gazebo kissing Carpenter, which meant Carpenter had probably saved the day. You can count on Carpenter, he thought, but his focus was already back on Casey Dean.

He pulled out Abigail’s cell phone with one hand as he began to roll the trunk down the dock.

“Hey, Princess,” Shane said when Casey Dean answered. “Come join me. I’ve got the money.”

“Where’s my sister?”

“One thing at a time,” Shane said.

“Fuck you.”

“Funny, that’s what Abigail tried to do.” Shane turned the phone off. He saw she was coming toward the dock, despite her outrage. He could see Agnes now talking to Xavier as they headed with the wedding guests for the reception in the barn.

Shane rolled the trunk down the gangplank and onto the floating dock. He looked out at the boat and saw the shadowy figures on the bridge. He punched in speed-dial 2 on his phone.

Wilson answered on the first ring. “Yes?”

“I’ve got Casey Dean.”

There was a slight pause. “Terminated?”

“No, she’s coming this way right now. I can deliver her to you for questioning.”

“All right.”

“And I have the five million.”

There was a short silence. “All right. I’ll be there in a minute.”

The phone went dead.

No “Atta-boy, good job.”

No “You mean Frankie had the five mil?”

No “Wow, you mean Casey Dean’s female?”

No shit, Shane thought.

Casey Dean arrived, leading with a large-caliber automatic pistol that was aimed right between his eyes. “Shane. Nice to meet you again. Come here often?” She sounded tough, but Shane could tell she was off-balance in more ways than one as she came down the metal ramp, keeping the gun pointed at him.

“I plan on it.” Shane watched as she reached the bottom, easily recognizing the blond princess from the bar, now that she’d lost the dark wig. “So you’re Casey Dean.”

She smiled. “What’s that mean to you, Shane?”

“I heard you were for hire to the lowest bidder.”

“You’ve heard wrong.”

Shane shook his head. “You’re supposed to say, ‘Prove it’“

“Not all of us live in movie-land, Shane.”

“Want a dose of reality? Your client is dead, and your contract is void, so I’m thinking I’m better.”

“You’re not thinking at all,” Casey Dean said with a smile. “I’ve got the drop on you, dumbass.”

“Yeah, but you’d rather have Abigail than shoot me.” Shane smiled. “Plus, my team is still intact. Look behind you.”

“Nice try-” Casey Dean began, but Carpenter’s deep voice cut her off.

“I’d lower the gun, miss.” He was at the top of the ramp, gun pointed at the back of her head.

Casey Dean sighed. “Fuck.” She lowered the gun.

Shane nodded toward the Wilson’s boat, which was approaching. “You’re leaving with my boss-”

Casey Dean laughed. “You really are stupid.”

Shane smiled. “Not anymore.”

Agnes had followed the wedding party to the barn, which wasn’t easy in her mother-of-the-bride dress, and made sure that everything had started well there. Garth had everything hopping, dazzling his date, Tara, with his expertise and general command, and Agnes stopped long enough to say, “Garth, you’re amazing, what would we do without you?” which probably set him up for the next school year. Frankie dominated the room like a father of the bride, charming the hell out of everybody, and Maria and Palmer were so dazzled with each other that it would have been almost embarrassing if they weren’t the bride and groom. Jefferson Keyes was embarrassing, no almost about it, but after Xavier told Agnes that a morose Hammond had taken Brenda into custody for questioning, he’d picked up two flutes of champagne and gone over to Evie, and Evie’s sad face had blushed and brightened as she’d taken her glass from him, so Agnes was fairly sure that Jefferson’s payback was coming at him shortly. Lisa Livia was beaming happily at her baby girl, forgetting for right now that she was broke, even forgetting for the evening that Frankie had deserted her for twenty-five years, patting his shoulder when he stopped to kiss her cheek, so it looked like for the space of the afternoon, everybody in her family would get their happily ever after. Only Carpenter and Shane were missing.

Shane, she thought, and felt the chill again. She looked around the reception hall one more time and then left and went down the path to the house. He was standing on the dock talking to Wilson on the boat, and if she stayed by the porch steps, it was too obvious that she was watching, but if she went into the kitchen, she could see from the window, even from the open door. And maybe finally finish her damn column. That would be a real sign that things were back to normal: meeting her deadline tomorrow.

She opened the porch door and went in, trying not to think about everything that could be wrong down on the boat, and at the last minute, as she went into the kitchen, she turned back to look at him, only to jerk back as she felt a cast-iron skillet miss crushing her skull by inches.

Shane saw Joey walking down the dock from the reception as Wilson’s boat bounced against the bumpers. He grabbed the rope Wilson threw and secured the boat as Carpenter held his gun on Casey Dean.

Wilson stepped onto the dock and nodded. “Good job.” He glanced at the locker. “The money?”

“Yes,” Shane said as Joey came down the metal walkway.

Wilson motioned to Casey Dean. “Take care of her and let’s go.”

Shane heard her suck in her breath. Yeah, he’s not much for loyalty, he thought. Sorry about that, babe.

“Shane, you can’t go with this guy, he’s got no soul,” Joey called out. “You’re not like him, you’re like me.”

“That’s touching,” Wilson said to Joey. “But you’re his past. I’m his future. And it’s a very lucrative and rewarding future. What can you give him? A diner? He’s not your heir, he’s mine.”

“The hell he is.” Joey pulled his gun from his waistband and held it on Wilson.

Shane thought, Another gun. I’m sick of guns.

“I had to take family away from him once to save him,” Joey said. “If I have to kill you to give family back to him, I will.”

“No,” Wilson said. “I’ve got you covered from the boat. You’ll never make it off this dock alive.”

“You can’t just shoot him down,” Shane said to Wilson, his voice tired.

“Of course I can,” Wilson said. “In the interests of national security, I can do anything. You have to understand this if you’re going to take my position. You must weigh the benefits of the many against the needs of the few. I’ve been doing it for decades. When you are National Security, you are the ultimate power. You are above the law. You must grow comfortable with that, making the difficult decisions easily and quickly. People are expendable; security is not.”

“This might be that aspect we’ve been uneasy about all week,” Carpenter said mildly from beside him.

“Difficult decisions,” Shane said to Wilson. “Like murdering my mother and father in order to make my uncle the power in the family.”

“Ah,” Wilson said, staring at him. “You’re letting personal feelings cloud your judgment again.”

Joey growled and raised his gun, and Shane reached out and took it away from him.

“Enough.” He looked between the two old men. “I’m not either one of you. If I ever have a kid, no, when I have a kid, nobody will ever take him away from me. I’ll kill any son of a bitch who tries.” He stopped. “Not that I’ll have to. Anybody who wants him will have to come through his mother first, and God help that poor bastard.”

Wilson’s eyes grew even more wintry. “I gather you’re refusing the promotion.”

Shane prodded Casey Dean forward, her slender body rigid with fury now as she stared at Wilson. “Yes, but I’m giving you your Princess back.”

Wilson blinked at her. “You’re leaving her alive? Knowing that she’ll come after you again? That makes no sense. You’ll be looking over your shoulder for the rest of your life, which for one of you will be short. Is that what you want?”

Shane looked into his uncomprehending eyes. “What I want, when I’m done here, is to go back to the house and tell Agnes about my day, find out what happened during hers. That’s always interesting. After that, I don’t know. We’ll think of something.”

He slung Joey’s gun out into the river, and Joey said, “Hey!” and Carpenter deposited the trunk onto Wilson’s boat and escorted Casey Dean on, too, where she glared at Shane and said, “This isn’t over.”

“I know,” Shane said.

Wilson got back on his boat, ignoring Dean, quivering with rage beside him. “You could have had it all. You’re throwing away immense power.”

“I know,” Shane said. “But nobody is above the law.”

“I am.” Wilson cast off, and the mobster on the bridge backed the boat away.

“Wait a minute, where’s my sister?” Dean snarled. “In the trunk,” Shane said, and she ran to it and began to flip the latches open.

Shane gave the boat time to make some separation, then hit 2 again on his phone even as he heard Dean scream, “Abigail!”

“What?” Wilson sounded distracted as he answered.

Shane could see his former boss on the bridge of the boat, staring at him. “One question,” he said as the boat drew even with the Brenda Belle.

“What?” Wilson said as Dean came running to the prow of the boat, her gun drawn even though she was out of range.

“How far away was my father’s boat when you pushed the button?” Shane said, and held up the detonator from the bomb Dean had put on his truck, the bomb now under Abigail’s body in the trunk.

Wilson’s jaw went slack, Casey Dean screamed again, and Shane pushed the button.

“Stop it!” Agnes yelled, trying to duck under Brenda’s skillet, and getting a glancing blow for her pains that made her head ring. She shoved her away and put the kitchen table between them, saying, “Ouch. Damn it, Brenda, stop it. You’re finished!”

“No.” Brenda started around the table. “You took my life and you’re gonna die!”

Agnes kept moving, trying to buy some time for her head to clear, the damn skirt making it hard to move sideways around the table. “Jesus, that hurt. What the hell are you doing? There are people everywhere, you’re not going to get away with this-”

“You killed my clock,” Brenda said.

“You killed your own clock,” Agnes said, trying to gauge how far it was to the back door. “I told you, one of those whack jobs you hired to kill me shot it up.”

“You ruined my wedding dress!” Brenda circled the table, cutting her off from the back door.

Agnes tried to edge toward the hall door, and Brenda switched directions and cut her off there, too. “Look, the dress was Evie’s idea-”

“You stole my husband!”

Agnes stopped. “Hey, I was engaged to him first.”

“You stole my family,” Brenda said, breathing hard, her eyes narrowing as she came closer.

“You ran your family off,” Agnes said. Maybe if she shoved the table at Brenda and-

“You took my house-”

“I bought your house, Brenda,” Agnes said as calmly as she could. “You took everything: Lisa Livia was mine, Taylor was mine, this house was mine-”

“Uh, Brenda…”

“-those were my goddamn black shutters!”

“You have excellent taste,” Agnes said, trying a different route.

“It’s my damn house,” Brenda shrieked, and swung the pan again, missing by a mile because the table was between them.

“Brenda, it’s over. The wedding is over. I keep the house.”

“Not if you’re dead,” Brenda snarled, and started around the table, frying pan raised.

Agnes gave up on talking her way out and screamed, “Hammond!” as she backed around the table.

“Forget him,” Brenda said, circling the table as Agnes circled, too. “Cops go down when you hit them with a frying pan just like any other man. You know that, Agnes.”

“No,” Agnes said, keeping the table between them. “Oh, God, is he still alive?”

“How should I know?” Brenda snapped. “Is it my day to watch him? No. Stand still, damn it.”

“Brenda,” Agnes said, kicking off her heels to make moving easier. “This is not a good plan. If you kill me, you don’t get the house. You’re not married to Taylor, you’re married to Frankie. You won’t inherit anything.”

“Fucking Frankie,” Brenda said, still circling, and Agnes decided her only chance was the back door. If she threw a chair in Brenda’s way and then sprinted for it, she might be able to attract enough attention from the dock that somebody down there would shoot Brenda before she got brained with the frying pan.

Except Brenda wouldn’t let her on the side of the table toward the door.

Damn it, Brenda, Agnes thought. Be nuts or cunning, not both, you bitch. She edged closer to the door, and Brenda moved to cut her off.

“You killed my clock and you stole my daughter,” Brenda said, literally spitting as she said it. “She thinks you’re family and I’m not. You helped that bitch Evie ruin my wedding dress. She wouldn’t invite me to a pigsticking, but she’s friends with you, she’s wearing the same dress you are. You’ve got my house. My husband was leaving me for you. You stole my life, you damn Yankee.”

“Brenda, you’re from fucking New Jersey!” Agnes yelled, and then

Brenda swung the pan again, and Agnes said, “Oh, my God, look!” and pointed to the housekeeper’s room.

Brenda looked and Agnes shoved a chair at her and lunged for the back door, only to scream as Brenda threw the frying pan, and caught her in the small of her back and knocked her to her knees. She rolled and grabbed for the pan as Brenda flung herself at her to get it back and then they were both rolling on the floor for it, claws and knees flying to the sound of ripping cloth. Agnes wrenched it away, and Brenda leapt to grab for another pan hanging too high above her head as Agnes scrambled painfully to her feet, trying to get out the back door, only to see Brenda fling herself across the counter for a knife instead.

Oh, fuck, Agnes thought and then screamed as Brenda came at her with the knife, deflecting it with the pan at the last minute.

Brenda slashed again and Agnes realized that she was going to have to kill her, that there was no way to run without getting the knife in the back, no way to defend herself without losing. Even as she had the thought, Brenda slashed again and the knife laid Agnes’s arm open, blood spurting all over the black-and-white tile, and she lost her breath and staggered back and slipped to one knee, and Brenda’s eyes lit up as she came at her.

Then a boom shook the house, and Brenda looked past her out the screen door, and yelled, “My yacht!” and Agnes gritted her teeth and swung the frying pan into Brenda’s knees as hard as she could.

Brenda went down in the blood on the floor, and Agnes got to her feet, ignoring whatever hell was breaking loose outside, and said, “Stop it, Brenda, we’re both hurt, just stop,” but Brenda got up, her eyes insane, and said, “You killed my yacht! My money was on that yacht, my passwords, you ruined my life!” and came for her, knife over her head, and Agnes swung the frying pan with everything she had right into Brenda’s crazy-eyed head, connecting and making her stagger back. She swung the pan again before Brenda could lunge again, driving her back toward the wall, and then Brenda slipped in Agnes’s blood and fell back hard into the basement door, grabbing for the

Venus, her hands slipping off the shiny surface of the unforgiving plastic, and then she disappeared without even a scream into the basement.

Agnes stood there holding the frying pan, waiting for the scream. There should have been a scream. How fucking crazy do you have to be to die without a scream? she thought, and then she realized that she was light-headed, which could be from catching the edge of a cast-iron frying pan on the temple or it could be from all the blood that was on her floor that used to be in her veins.

She dropped the pan and tried to stagger out the back door, but she slipped again and fell, the world looping around her, and she thought, Oh, God, I’m going to die alone in my kitchen, and then as the light narrowed down and she gave up, she heard the screen door slap and saw Shane bending over her, looking like he was shouting except Shane never got upset, so she was hallucinating, maybe it was her future flashing before her eyes, and then he picked her up and Carpenter was there and she thought, I’ll be okay now, and passed out cold.