The chair screeched against the concrete floor of the garage where the man had been dragged from his bed in the middle of the night, eyes wide with fear, muffled pleading just barely audible through the duct tape across his mouth. The boy watched him, one eye on his father, who attached the silencer, then took it off and had him do it, hovering over him, wheezing from the beginning of emphysema that would have killed him had he lived long enough. The fourteen-year-old did it well, silencer on, off, hands moving deftly, trying to ignore the guttural sounds from the man in the chair.

“More tape on his mouth,” his father said.

The boy tore off a strip, pressing it over the existing tape, felt the man’s lips move under his fingers like worms. A smell too, heat and sweat and something sour, which he would only later come to identify as fear. He looked down, saw the wet stain spreading across the man’s pajama bottoms.

“What if someone comes home?” the boy asked.

“No one’s comin’ home. Wife’s away. Children—who knows where—and who cares? They don’t tell me the guy’s life story, just when and where.”

“What if someone hears?”

“That’s why the gun’s got the suppressor, stupid. Won’t make it silent, but not loud enough to wake the neighbors—and when the hell did I give you permission to ask questions?” His father pressed the gun into his hand. “Put these on,” he said, handing him a pair of plastic glasses, at the same time pressing foam plugs into the boy’s ears. “Don’t want you going deaf or blind. What good would you be to me then?” He wheezed a laugh. “Closer,” he said. “This ain’t no shooting gallery.”

The boy took a tentative step.

“I said closer!” He gripped the boy by the nape of the neck and pushed him forward.

The man jerked in the chair, head whipping from side to side.

“Do it,” the father said, steering the boy’s hand and gun toward the man’s chest. “Pull the damn trigger already.”

The man’s eyes were blinking wildly, lips contorting below the tape.

“Now! Goddammit! Now!”

The boy fired, gun recoiling in his hand, the sound a muted putt.

“Goddammit! You hit his fuckin’ shoulder.” He grabbed hold of the boy’s hand with his own, aimed the gun at the man’s chest, and squeezed the boy’s finger. Another putt and a spot of red appeared in the center of the man’s T-shirt, expanding and blurring before he squeezed the boy’s finger again, and another red spot appeared.

“Never take chances,” his father said.

The boy watched as the man slumped to the side, taking the chair with him, crashing to the garage floor, everything about the scene, the moment, etched into his brain, though when he thought about it later, he realized he had felt nothing.

“Good boy,” his father said, a rare moment of affection, patting him on the shoulder.

The wine-red lips of Munch’s seductive Madonna came back into focus and he grew calm again, shifted his gaze to the prize, to her soft lips and enigmatic smile, the only painting in the vault to have its own wall. He leaned one way, then the other, her eyes following, then moved closer, fingertips grazing the cracked paint of her cheek, believing he felt flesh and warmth where none existed. He leaned in, his lips an inch from hers, painted features blurring, dizzy from the spell she cast. He took a step back, breath caught in his throat.