THE SOUND OF FRANK’S raised voice makes my heart beat faster and my shoulders tense. I dart down behind one of the rocks with the.45 raised and listen.

I hear Frank shout again over the wind. The murmur of Allen’s response. A growl and the whining stops. I ease into the space between two of the rocks and look down.

Frank looking at papers. Allen with a gun. Frank tosses an envelope away, then prods the man he shot toward the edge. When he kicks him over, my gut twists, but I hold tight. He’s still got that gun and I’ll be an easy target if I show myself with the glow of the rest area lights behind me.

Allen is crying, and then Frank’s greed takes over. Instead of leaving one of the bags and keeping the gun in his hand, he holsters it, picks up one bag and the suitcase, and heads snarling toward the grassy slope.

I could kill him now, but that wouldn’t do. Not after all I’ve been through. Capozza’s men-the thing that really terrifies Frank-are on their way. He needs to suffer. I stick the.45 into the waist of my pants. When he’s close, I jump up onto the rock I’m hiding behind and launch myself down on top of him. In midair, I am illuminated by headlight beams that swing over the top of me from behind.

I strike him and roll to the side, rising to my feet and drawing my gun.

Frank crabs his fat frame backward toward the ledge, leaving the money behind. The lights from whatever car has just arrived stream over the top of us, broad blue beams that stab into the darkness above the pitchy river.

“Stop!” I yell.

Allen stands off to the side, between us. He has a revolver in his hands, pointed my way now, wagging it back and forth. My gun is aimed steady at Frank’s head. His shoulders heave up and down from the effort to breathe. His hands go in the air and he gets up on one knee. He glares at me, blinking, those empty blue eyes piercing beneath the eaves of his heavy brow.

“Seth,” he says, the name slipping from his bared teeth. “Where’s Raymond?”

“You’re looking at him,” I say with a tight smile.

Frank looks at Allen and screams, “Shoot him!”

My eyes never waver from the snake.

“Allen,” I say, “I came to take you back to your mother.”

“Do what I say!” Frank screams. His face is red and flecks of white spittle fly from his small chubby lips.

“He’s not your father, Allen,” I say slowly, relishing the shade of purple that blooms in Frank’s face. “That’s why you’re nothing like him. You’re my son.”

“You fucking liar,” Frank snarls. “I’ll kill you…”

He starts to lower his hands. I shake the gun at him.

“Move, Frank, and you’ll die right now.”

“Kill him!” Frank shouts at Allen. “Pull the fucking trigger!”

“Genetics, Allen,” I say. “You took biology. Two blue-eyed parents can only have blue-eyed kids. You have brown eyes… like mine.”

I hear Bert call my name from behind. That low rumble. His giant shadow confuses the headlight beams. I see Allen spin and the flash of his gun. The shadow disappears and Bert cries out.

My eyes flicker. Frank dives. Allen goes down with him. My gun follows Frank, but I can’t pull the trigger. His head is behind Allen’s.

I see the glint of metal. Long and thin. From his sleeve, Frank has drawn a blade that now rests against Allen’s throat. A fishing fillet knife. Like the one used to frame me in another lifetime.

“If he’s yours, then you don’t want me slittin’ his throat,” Frank says in a growl. He raises himself up behind Allen, pulling him up too, using him as a shield.

Allen’s eyes are wide. He gropes for his neck.

The knife licks his skin and his limbs freeze.

I see those deep brown eyes. I see myself.

“Seth,” he says, begging me.

“See?” Frank says, sneering from behind Allen’s dark head of hair.

“He’s mine, Frank,” I say. “The whole game is mine. They’ll find you.”

“They’ll find you dead first,” Frank snarls. “Put the fucking gun down, or they’ll find him too.”

My hand lowers and my fingers go loose. The.45 clatters to the rock floor.

“Get down,” Frank says. “Put your hands on your head. Now! Him or you.”

I feel the energy drain quickly from my body. I kneel and lace my fingers over the top of my head, but I’m watching.

“Good,” Frank says. He pushes Allen aside and draws his Glock.

He limps over to me and touches the pistol to my forehead. I can hear his ragged breath. I can smell his cologne and garlic wrapped in mint. He moves behind me where I can’t see him, dragging the metal barrel across my scalp and up over my fingers until it comes to rest in the soft tissue beneath the back of my skull.

Allen’s face is white, his hair a tangle from the wind. Behind him the big city blazes, floating.

“I’m gonna do what that jury shoulda done,” Frank says in a husky whisper. “The death sentence.”

I close my eyes and the gunshot explodes in my ears.

Frank crashes down on top of me and I see a burst of lights. When he rolls off, I am covered in blood.

Helena is standing in the beams of the headlights, her shadow like a dark angel, hair pulled back, faded jeans, the smoking three-inch Chief’s Special in her hands. She crouches, hops over the edge of the rocks, and slides down the grassy bank with her gun raised.

I pull my legs out from under Frank’s bulk and step back. Allen is on his knees, shaking, his head in his hands. Frank’s gut protrudes up out of his dirty jacket, stretching the buttons of the white shirt that is now crimson with blood on the left side. His chest heaves up and down and as he wheezes blood foams at his lips. His eyes are wide with fear and he stares up at Helena. His fingers twitch and claw around the rocky ledge in search of his gun.

Helena’s eyes are glassy and narrowed, and when I call her name, she doesn’t react. The Chief’s Special is trembling, but well aimed at Frank’s face.

“Helena!” I shout. “Don’t.”

“Do you remember me?” she says to Frank.

She drops the gun from his face to his crotch and fires three quick 9mm rounds.

The only thing I can hear through the hot smell of powder and the smoke and the ringing in my ears is the symphony of Frank’s piercing screams.

Another car shrieks to a stop above us and I hear the slamming of doors. Capozza’s men are soon beside me with their guns drawn. They grin like jackals as they haul Frank up the hillside by his ankles. His agony is mixed with fear now. Sobs punctuate his shrill moaning as his head bumps along the stony ground.

Allen’s face is blank. I tell him to come on. I take Helena’s hand and tug her up the hill. Bert is dusting himself off, bleeding from a nick in the upper arm from Allen’s gun. Under the glow of the streetlights I can see Frank twisting and hysterical in the trunk of an old Lincoln Town Car. Capozza’s men slam it shut and go back over the edge for the money. They heave the heavy duffel bags into the backseat and then climb into the front. The doors slam.

Inside the trunk, Frank’s muffled squealing pitches even higher. The car’s gears clank. The tires yip. Off they go.