“Give me something, here, Frank.”

“I’ve given this department everything I have,” Farman said, his voice cracking under the strain of his emotions.

“Then let’s try to salvage some of that,” Vince suggested. “You’ve done a lot of good, Frank. Credit where it’s due. Let’s don’t fuck that up now.”

He risked taking a full step toward Farman, angling away from the door.

“Don’t come closer,” Farman said.

“I just want to help you out here, Frank,” Vince said, lowering his voice so Farman would have to concentrate a little harder to hear him. “Let’s end this in a good way.”

Farman shook his head. “It’s too late. It’s done. You don’t know.” “What don’t I know, Frank?” Vince asked. “Tell me. I’ll help you any way I can.”

“It’s too late,” he said again, his eyes filling. “She’s gone.”

“I know your wife left. We can find her, Frank. We can bring her here. You can talk.”

Farman shook his head. “It’s too late.”

Oh, shit, Vince thought. She’s dead. The risk of the situation going totally wrong multiplied by a hundred times. If he had killed his wife, there really was no going back for him. He would go to prison. Prison would not be an option for Frank Farman. He would choose death.

Vince took a deep breath and let it out. “I understand,” he said quietly. “I get it, Frank.”

“I didn’t mean to,” Farman whispered, a terrible pain carving deep into the lines of his face.

“Let’s not make it worse,” Vince said, taking another half step toward him. “Let the man go.”

He kept his eyes on Farman, not flicking so much as a nanosecond’s glance at the door easing open behind him.

Mendez slipped into the room, holding his breath. Three quick strides and he was behind Frank Farman, gun to the back of his head, just as Farman said, “I can’t go to prison.”

“Drop the gun, Frank,” he said. “Right now. It’s over.”

Three things happened simultaneously: Cal Dixon dropped, dead weight, straight down to the floor; Vince Leone shouted NO; and Frank Farman put the barrel of his .38 in his mouth and pulled the trigger.

The bullet traveled on an upward trajectory through the roof of his mouth, through his midbrain, and exited out the back of his skull, two inches right of center, slicing a shallow groove along the outermost edge of Mendez’s cheek and traveling on to bury itself in the wall.

Farman dropped where he stood like a sack of bones, falling across Cal Dixon’s legs, the entire back of his head shattered like an egg.

Chapter 82

82

According to the handsome reporter from LA, THE SIEGE AT THE SHERIFF’S OFFICE was coming to some kind of conclusion. Shots had been fired. The sheriff’s department tactical squad had stormed the building.