Snake felt a little twinge of pride at his son’s marksmanship. Blood always tells, Frank used to say. “You can have the next one through your eye, if you like,” Snake said.

“You made your point,” Lars muttered. “Who you planning on killing tomorrow?”

Snake wasn’t about to answer this question. “That’s my business.”

“Not the way things are going. We’ve got the FBI shaking us down from here to Texas. I don’t want you using my men to hit FBI agents.”

This ponytailed bastard has good instincts, Snake thought. “I may not be killing anybody. I just need to remove a certain threat.”

“And for that you need shooters?”

“Have you got ’em or not?” Snake snapped, hoping his exasperation would forestall further inquiry.

After a long look, Lars nodded. “You’ll get your men. Where?”

“Here. Tomorrow, eleven a.m. I’ll need them for twelve hours.”

“No problem. But let me ask you something. That trial. How come the mayor isn’t defending his father? I heard he was a hotshot prosecutor when he lived in Houston.”

“His daddy don’t want him,” Snake said.

“Why not?”

Snake considered how much to tell Dempsey. At length, he said, “Daddy’s got secrets he don’t want his boy to know.”

Lars nodded. “Don’t we all. Do you know what his are? The doc’s?”

Snake smiled. “Good night, gentlemen.”

Dempsey reached out and tapped Toons on the shoulder. “Let’s go.”

Lars turned and started back to the turnaround, but Toons didn’t follow. He remained rooted to the ground, scanning the tops of the great columns for any sign of a sniper. When he failed to find one, he jabbed a finger at Snake.

“You and me ain’t finished, old man.”

“You’re begging for a bullet, retard. Take some advice. Don’t be with the group coming tomorrow. You’re not cut out for real action.”

Snake turned his back on the VK security chief and walked between two plinths into the darkness.

Chapter 48

Serenity and I are sitting up in the kitchen, drinking tea and waiting to hear from Quentin. Jenny just went upstairs with a migraine; Mom and Mia are watching television with Annie in the den. I’m trying to decide whether they smelled liquor on Tee and me when we came in from our meeting with Kaiser in the Corner Bar. I know Annie smelled smoke, because she mentioned it. If anyone smelled alcohol, it would have been Mia.

“What’s the deal with Jenny?” Tee whispers, twirling her forefinger in her mug, from which she has not removed the tea bag.

I shrug, my mind on the likelihood that the FBI will allow Devine to testify in Dad’s trial—and in time. “She gets migraines.”