I picked him up by his hair and slammed his back into the driver’s door.

“What do you do for a living, Cody?”

“I…What?”

“What do you do?”

“I’m a restaurateur.”

“A what?” Bubba said.

I looked back over my shoulder at him. “He owns restaurants.”

“Oh.”

“Which ones?” I asked Cody.

“The Boatyard in Nahant. I own the Flagstaff downtown, and part of Tremont Street Grill, the Fours in Brookline. I…I—”

“Sshh,” I said. “Anyone in the house?”

“What?” He looked around wildly. “No. No. I’m single.”

I pulled Cody to his feet. “Cody, you like to harass women. Maybe even rape them sometimes, knock them around when they don’t play ball?”

Cody’s eyes darkened as a thick drop of blood began its descent down the bridge of his nose. “No, I don’t. Who—”

I backhanded the wound on his forehead and he yelped.

“Quiet, Cody. Quiet. If you ever bother a woman again—any woman—we’ll burn down your restaurants and put you in a wheelchair for life. Do you understand?”

Something about women brought out the stupid in Cody. Maybe it was the telling him he couldn’t have them in the manner he’d come to enjoy. Whatever the case, he shook his head. He tightened his jaw. A predatory amusement crept into his eyes as if he believed he’d found my Achilles’ heel: a concern for the “weaker” sex.

Cody said, “Well. Yes, well. I don’t think I can do that.”

I stepped aside as Bubba came around the car, pulled a .22 from his trench coat, screwed on the silencer, pointed it at the center of Cody Falk’s face and pulled the trigger.

The hammer dropped on an empty chamber, but Cody didn’t seem to realize that at first. He closed his eyes and screamed, “No!” and fell on his ass.

We stood over him as he opened his eyes. He touched his nose with his fingers, surprised to realize it was still there.

“What happened?” I asked Bubba.

“Dunno. I loaded it.”

“Try again.”

“Sure.”

Cody’s hands shot out in front of him. “Wait!”

Bubba pointed the muzzle at Cody’s chest and pulled the trigger again.

Another dry click.

Cody flopped on the floor, his eyes screwed shut again, his face contorted into a puttylike mask of horror. Tears sprouted from under his lids and the sharp smell of urine rose from a burgeoning stain along his left pant leg.

“Damn,” Bubba said. He raised the gun to his face, scowled at it, and pointed down again just as Cody opened one eye.

Cody clamped the eye closed as Bubba pulled the trigger a third time, hit another empty chamber.

“You buy that thing at a yard sale?” I asked.