“You know how, in the movies,” Blake continued, “when someone is threatening to shoot someone else in order to get information, perhaps to try to get him to confess to something or to give up his secrets, whatever it might be—my point is—he has the gun near that man, but as the scene escalates, he brings it closer and closer to frighten or intimidate the person even more. Sort of like this.”

He aimed the gun at Aaron.

And began to walk toward him.

“Please,” Aaron begged. “I didn’t do anything.”

“See?” Blake said. “Amazing. That’s exactly how it works in the movies. Then the person starts sweating and worrying, just like Aaron here is. They get more and more unsettled the closer the gun comes, until at last, the end of the barrel is pressed right up against the person’s forehead—like this . . .” He demonstrated. “Or even angled up into his mouth. It’s time, Aaron.”

“No. I’m begging you!”

“Honey,” Sasha said. “You made your point. Don’t hurt him.”

“It’s okay. It’s okay.” Then to Aaron: “Open up.”

“I’m sorry, I—”

“You’re sorry?”

“I heard about the Matchmaker. I just wanted to find out for myself. I was just curious. I didn’t pay anything. I didn’t see anything.”

“You wanted to watch.”

“I . . . Yes, but—”

“Open up, now. Go on.” Blake eased the barrel into Aaron’s mouth, and the man began to tremble. A tear squeezed out of his left eye.

Sasha took Blake’s arm. “He’s scared. You’re scaring him.”

“It’s alright, sweetheart.” Blake held her hand reassuringly for a moment, then lifted it aside. “It isn’t any more dangerous, any more deadly, than being shot from six inches away or a foot away or even five feet away. It’s silly, really, when you think about it—this whole bit with getting the gun closer, insinuating that it’s more of a threat. But I suppose that’s what you have to do in a film to make things more dramatic.”

He carefully removed the gun barrel from the man’s mouth and backed up.

Aaron let out a huge breath of relief. “You’ll see. I’ll fix things. I’ll—”

“I mean, watch.” Then, without another word, Blake shot Aaron Jasper directly in the forehead.

Aaron’s head snapped back, and the momentum carried the chair backward. It crashed heavily to the floor, where his body slumped limply across it, a dark, seeping circle indicating where the bullet had entered his skull, no doubt a larger, more pronounced hole in the back where it had exited.

Eyes and mouth open in surprise.

Everlasting surprise.

Sasha stared aghast at the body, hands clamped over her mouth.