stream of blood dripping from his nose and mouth. 'Why are you doing this?'
Frank carefully removed the gloves and slid them into his coat pocket. His hands felt light, the tips of his fingers numb. He cracked his knuckles, reached into his coat and produced a revolver.
'Oh, Jesus,' Artie groaned, pushing himself against the wall as if hoping to dissolve through it. 'What the hell are you doing? If it's money you want, there's a safe in – '
'I don't want your money.'
His chin, slick with blood and spittle, quivered like a scolded child's. 'I don't – I don't understand.'
Crouching next to him, Frank noticed the eyeglasses on the floor between them. 'Put them on,' he said. 'I want you to see me clearly.'
'Please, I – '
'Put them on.'
'I-I got a wife and a daughter, I – '
'Now.'
Artie did as he was told and began to cry. 'I've got grandkids. Please – I – just tell me what this is all about.'
Still not certain he could go through with it Frank pressed the barrel against the man's lips. The steadiness of his hand worried him, and he suddenly felt lightheaded. The world had become sluggish and dreamy as reality altered to make sense of what he was about to do. 'Are you afraid?'
Artie nodded, his body bucking as he cried.
As Frank increased the pressure on the barrel, a dark circular stain seeped through the crotch of Artie's overalls, the urine dripping onto the floor and forming a small puddle between them. 'I'm sorry!'
Frank glanced at the mess. 'Do you remember Connie?'
'Connie?'
'Connie.'
'I don't – no – I don't know nobody named Connie.'
'Think back.'
He pawed at the tears in his eyes. 'Connie… Russo?' A look of recognition slowly dawned across Artie's face. 'Jesus,' he whispered. 'Who are you?'
'Her son,' Frank told him. Their eyes met, locked. 'I'm her son.'
Artie opened his mouth as if to say something, and Frank pulled the trigger.
CHAPTER 2
Gus stared at the ceiling; the unattended whistle grating on his already frayed nerves. The water had been boiling for several minutes, how in the name of Christ could his old man sit right there in the kitchen and not hear the kettle?
'One day off a week,' he mumbled, swinging his legs over onto the floor as he forced himself into a sitting position on the edge of the bed, 'and I gotta put up with this crap.' He grabbed a cigarette from the crumpled pack on his nightstand, stepped into the same pair of gray slacks he'd worn all week and staggered out of his room, following a narrow hallway to the kitchen.
Gus was getting too old too fast to spend twelve hours a day on his feet. Everything from his neck to the tips of his toes ached. Things had to change soon; his body couldn't take much more.
The kitchen, like the rest of the apartment, was filthy. Dishes were piled so high in the sink that the window above it was no longer visible. The floors needed to be swept and a greasy film covered nearly everything else.
Gus leaned against the doorframe and shook his head. His father, dressed in a lightweight robe and worn slippers sat huddled at the table. He looked so fragile sitting there alone. 'Dad?' Gus said. 'Dad!'
The old man had his nose buried in a crossword puzzle book. Gus had never once seen the bastard write so much as a single letter in one of those boxes. 'What's a four letter word for outcome?'
'Fate. Are you deaf?'
'Huh?'
Gus walked to the stove and removed the kettle from the burner. 'Christ, Dad, are your ears that far gone?'
His father struggled to his feet, shuffled over to the counter. 'Thought I'd have a mug of hot chocolate.'
'We better get your ears checked.'
'I like hot chocolate.'
'Did you hear what I just said?'
'You want some, Gus?'
'Deaf bastard.'
His father began rummaging through one of the cupboards. 'Did you get hot chocolate the last time you went to the store? I told you to get the ones with the little marshmallows. Did you get the ones with the little marshmallows, Gus?'
The phone rang, and Gus couldn't answer it fast enough.
'Gus?'
'Hey, what's up, Frank?'
'Not much. How's it going?'
Gus took a drag on his cigarette, exhaled through his nose. 'Same shit, different day. The old man's driving me nuts. If he don't die soon, I swear to God I'm gonna kill him myself.'
Frank laughed. 'We're all set for tonight, right?'
'Absolutely.'
'Pick me up at five.'
'I'll be there with balls on.'
Fifteen minutes west of New Bedford, in the quiet town of Angel Bay, Frank Ponte hung up the kitchen phone and hesitantly returned to the bedroom where his wife was getting dressed. Their three-room apartment was relatively new and tastefully decorated, but it was so small their friends often joked that you couldn't get from one end to the other without first turning sideways.
Sandy stood frowning at her reflection in the mirror over the bureau, a wide-toothed brush in one hand and a bottle of hairspray in the other. 'I don't know about this new girl,' she said through a sigh. 'I think I like the way Darren does my hair better.'
'Then go back to him.' Frank shrugged. As far as he was concerned she had too much hair for such a petite woman regardless of how she styled it, but he'd learned long ago that when it came to certain matters his wife was not someone with whom he could reason.
'Who were you talking to?'
'Gus.'
She rolled her eyes, turned back to the mirror and began brushing her auburn mane. 'God, loser-boy.'
'Here we go.' Frank sighed. 'He's not so bad.'
Sandy laughed and spun around to face him again, her red satin robe opening below the waist to reveal a shapely calf, cream-colored thighs and a brief glimpse of light brown pubic hair. 'Oh yeah, he's a regular charmer. That toupee he wears wouldn't fool Ray Charles, okay?'
'It's not his fault he went bald.'
'A lot of people go bald, Frank. That thing Gus wears looks like a knit cap. People literally point and laugh at him on the street. They point and laugh, Frank.'
'If he feels like wearing it, what do you care?'
