“So the head deputy sends these men to kill me. But why?”

“For his own share. With a nickel to the senators. And a penny for the pope.”

“No,” said Zanche. “Gasparo knew nothing of this.”

“You lie.”

“No.”

“Then you were deceived. Gasparo betrayed you. He obeyed the head deputy’s instructions and sent you here, so my sister would be murdered in this country. Because here there’ll be no investigation. And as Gasparo’s reward, they chopped off his hands and dumped them in the ocean for the fish to chew away the prints.”

She called Johnny a name in Italian. It was a foul name, for a man who makes his living by lying facedown and letting a rich man fuck him up the ass.

My brother didn’t say anything.

He smiled that sweet smile of his. He held the revolver in his palm. Zanche’s lip trembled, but she still had that haughty look. Johnny stepped forward and struck her head with the butt end of the gun.

I cried out.

“Hush,” said Johnny.

Zanche lay bleeding. She moaned. I couldn’t tell whether she was conscious, but the way she looked up at me—with that wide, black face of hers—some part of me, down in my own darkness, took satisfaction in seeing her humbled. But it was only part of me. Johnny went to the desk and gathered up the valise. Then Dazio and his girl appeared at the other end of the hall. At the sight of us the girl tugged at Dazio’s hand, trying to pull him back. Her instincts were right, but Dazio ignored her. No, I thought. Run. But Dazio wouldn’t run, I knew that, or he wouldn’t run fast enough, and Johnny would beat him the way he had just beaten Zanche, only more. He would break Dazio’s face into pieces, shattering it like so much fine glass.

I reached behind the clay planter and turned to face my brother.

I held the gun in my hand, my pistola para mujer.

“Sister,” he said.

His eyes sparkled in the way I’d seen a million times. He had that hunger in his eyes, that debonair glint, as if he could persuade me to do anything.

It was true, maybe, but only if I let him speak.

He lowered his hand, imploring me—a funny gesture I remembered from when I was a kid.

I was damp with sweat, and the film was all over me.

I fired.

It was a small-caliber gun, with small-bore bullets. He raised his hand, the one with valise, eyes wide, too wide, and reached with the valise to the spot, below the gut, where the bullet entered. He clutched the valise in one hand and Zanche’s gun in the other, and there was an instant in which he could have fired back. The instant passed. I fired again. Then twice more. The bullet holes made a tufted pattern on his chest. He dropped the gun and fell.