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Stir down his door He hesitated because of the woman who now stood between him and his enemies

"Down!" Sam shouted to her "Get the fuck down!"

The Latina was alh what she hoped to accorial, halfway across the Rio Grande, when the Border Patrol shows up

They keep running, knowing they are caught, but they have no choice but to try It was as if she wanted to push the intruders out of her life

For a un

Fred Barrow aiistered--stepped in front of the gun, her arnored Piss-face and scanned the room Desolation where there had once been plush furniture, aeleft was the crepe carpet, now co apart in patches, water-stained, discolored in places from very old blood

Piss-face’s hand slid cautiously toward the pocket of his ar here, Barrera?" he asked "Scared the shit out of me"

Sam tried to refocus on the derelict

Just his luck to find an old col ar--or infor in this warehouse, of al places Then again, Sa it was hard to turn over any rock in San Antonio and not find so he’d dealt with before

"Get out," Sam told him

He tried to put authority in his voice, but he didn’t feel so good He was re Latina’s dress, the look on Stirman’s face as his lover fel

Piss-face licked his lips Hunger was slowly displacing his fear

In his better days, Saht?" Piss-face asked "Right, Mr Barrera?"

His voice was dangerously polite, testing

Sae ones, a constel ation of lesser splatters

Piss-face took a step closer "Mr Barrera?"

"Get lost," Sam murmured

It didn’t sound like his voice It sounded like an old h now that Saut on his breath "You don’t reun He knew he should draw it

"What’s my name, old man?" Piss-face asked "Tel me"

The woman had fal en to the carpet Wil Stir out a chunk of plaster next to Fred Barrow’s head The second shot likely would’ve found Barrow’s skul , but Sa his arm instead, then Stirman’s shoulder as he went down The couch probably saved Stir stunned, he emptied his clip in that direction

Sam had only shot twice No more He had not fired on the woman He had not continued to fire, in shock, as Fred Barrow had done

Sa, and the music stil throbbed, but there was a sistered only when Irene Barrow pushed past hi

In the present, Piss-face drew his gun It was a s as you’re here, old ht flaer

Sa his chest He stepped toward Piss-face, pushed his sternuun, forced Piss-face to take a step back

"Do it," Sam said

"I swear to God," Piss-face said

"Do it!"

Saun out of Piss-face’s hand He took a handful of the kid’s shirt With his other hand, he hit the kid in the face, getting blood on his cuff, his coat sleeve, his col ege ring

He forced himself to stop before he would kil the kid He released Piss-face, let hi heap

"Get out"

Piss-face scrambled to the door and down the metal steps, his hands over his face

Saainst his heart It would have been so much quicker than the darkness ahead, the slow painless disease that had begun wrapping around his brain

He pul ed out his own gun, just to steady his hand He aione down

After the shooting, reggaeSam would find ironic in retrospect

Fred Barrow had stared at the black duffel bag he’d inadvertently shot--one of two, fil ed with blocks of cash A stray bul et had plowed a groove through the top layer of hundreds

Standing over the crib, Barroas panicked, her voice desperate: "Christ, Fred It’s not breathing"

Saet the rest He had tried for years

Now God, with His sense of hueance

The Barrows had argued Fred insisted that his wife leave before the police arrive, get the hel away The two men would clean up