‘I’m curious. Why didn’t you kill me ten years ago?’

‘Honestly? You were too beautiful to kill.’

‘And now?’

Deacon actually smiled. ‘You’re still beautiful.’

He pointed the gun at her lovely face.

She thought: So it’s like this.

A voice from the broken window interrupted them. It was Cab’s voice, calm and deadly. It wasn’t in her head, it was real. ‘Deacon, put your gun down right now.’

*

Cab stood in the window between the sharp jaws of glass. Clouds of rain swarmed around him. He had both hands on the butt of his gun, his finger on the trigger. The wind made it hard to aim, but he fought the gales as he stepped through the wreckage of the window into the sunroom. He didn’t blink as he stared Deacon down. Behind him, silently, Lala slid inside the house too, her own gun also directed at Deacon’s face. Two against one.

Deacon eyed them quietly, but he didn’t lower his weapon.

‘It’s over,’ Cab told him. ‘Kneel down, and lay the gun on the floor.’

Deacon still didn’t move. He was a game-player, analyzing his options, deciding if there was a way to win.

‘That’s my mother,’ Cab went on. ‘If you kill her, I’ll be forced to kill you.’

‘Maybe that’s what I want,’ Deacon said.

‘No, I don’t think so. I don’t think you’re suicidal.’

Lala spoke to Deacon. Her voice was soft. ‘We already found Frank Macy’s body. We know you were planning to frame him. The plot’s done. You’ve lost. More killing won’t change that.’

Deacon gave the barest shrug. He turned away from Tarla and squatted and laid the gun at his feet. When he straightened up, he lifted his hands in the air. ‘What now?’ he said.

‘Lace your fingers on your head,’ Cab told him. ‘Turn around. Walk backward toward me slowly.’

Deacon did as he was told. He turned around. He took a step backward.

At that moment, with wicked timing, Chayla intervened.

The locked patio door shuddered. The sixty-mile-an-hour wind knocked on the door and then smashed it in, throwing the door on its hinges. It swung like a missile into Cab’s back, kicking him sideways into Lala like a bowling pin. They both toppled; their guns skidded along the wet floor.

Deacon immediately bent down to scoop up his gun. He pivoted to aim at Cab, but Caprice dove across the short space, colliding with Deacon, who tumbled backward and rolled. Dizzied, he scrambled to his feet with his gun in his hand. Caprice grabbed Cab’s gun from the floor, and together, simultaneously, they pointed the weapons at each other.

Deacon backed toward the open window. He held his side, which was bleeding profusely. ‘Have you ever fired a gun?’ he asked Caprice.

‘No.’