Pellam felt the cold wet touch of the gravel, smelled the sour earthy-oily scent of the stone. He saw Billy coming closer. He lowered his head and heard the crunch of the gravel under the man's loafers.

Pellam grabbed for the Colt. He hit the butt with his fingers and knocked it out of reach.

He heard the man's breathing. Pellam looked up, opened his eyes. He saw the bore of the gun in the man's hand, six feet away.

Billy stopped.

A good day to die…

Billy stopped.

He looked behind him as if he'd heard something.

Then he was flying through the air.

Sailing, the way stunt men did, off springboards mounted on either side of black powder charges in the war movies.

Billy sprawled on top of Pellam, knocking the wind out of him with a high, love-making grunt. The twin rolled over, uttered, "Bobby," then studied the gravel an inch away from his face. "Son of a bitch." He closed his eyes. "Son of a bitch." He shuddered once and was still.

Pellam pushed himself up, fainted for a few seconds. He came to then sat up again.

In front of him, on the porch, Meg was crying, clutching the smoking Springfield. She dug frantically into her pockets-for more ammunition, he guessed.

"Meg!" he called. "It's okay. They're gone. They're both gone."

But she paid no attention, dropped to her knees and slid a new shell into the gun, cocked it with both hands. She stood once more, wiped tears and scanned the yard like a sentry then returned to the house, calling to her son.

25

"You all right?" Keith asked. Pellam nodded, gasping at the pain. And Keith continued into the house, following Meg.

Pellam made sure that Billy was dead then staggered inside.

He found them in the living room, Keith's arm around Meg, standing over Tom, the sheriff. He was dead.

Meg looked toward the front door, at Pellam, with eyes wide in terror.

Keith was on his knees, hugging Sam. Who glanced at Pellam but said nothing. He was crying. "Did they hurt you?" Keith asked.

The boy shook his head.

Meg, crying too, gasped. "He was going to… He took him in there…" She nodded toward the living room. "But then they heard the horn and he went outside to see who it was."

"Oh, honey…"

Keith stood and Meg lowered her head to Keith's shoulder.

"What happened?" Keith muttered

"Honey, your phone, in the car. We've got to call the police."

"My phone?"

"In the car. They cut the line here. The phone doesn't work."

"I left it at the factory," he said. He seemed numb, unable to say any more than a few words at a time.

"Then drive to the Burkes, use theirs!"

"What happened? I don't…" He looked around the house. "I don't understand."

"It was so terrible…"

"Why was Tom here?" Keith asked.

Meg glanced at Sam and whispered something to her husband. He frowned. She nodded. "Then one of them shot Tom. They got in somehow. I don't know why. I have no idea why."

Keith said nothing for a moment, just stared at the sheriff's body. He glanced at Sam. "I'm going to take you up to bed. Your mother and I have to talk."

"Keith…" Meg started after him. But Pellam, wincing at the pain in his shoulder, stepped forward, touched her arm. "Meg, wait."

Father and son disappeared up the stairs.

She turned. "You're hurt…"

"Sit down."

Meg hesitated.

"I have to talk to you. I have to tell you why I came back tonight…"

She was staring at Tom. "Keith has to call. He has to go to the Burkes."

"Meg… Listen to me. Tonight I went to see your friend."

She stiffened and her attention on the body in her living room vanished. "My friend?" she asked.

"Ambler."

She considered this, then asked, "How did you know he was my friend?"

"We had a talk." Pellam paused, looking at the stairs. But Keith was still with Sam. He added, "He likes you. He likes you a lot."

She wasn't sure what to do with this information. She found an afghan, placed it over the sheriff's head and chest. Pellam wanted to put his arm around her but he would probably have fainted; any motion was pure pain in his shoulder.

"Why did you go to see him?" Meg asked.

"I thought he might've been the one who had Marty killed."

"What?"

Pellam shook his head. "He didn't. But he did plant the drugs and he had me beat up."

"Wex wouldn't do…" But her voice faded and she obviously concluded that, yeah, he could very easily do that.

"The reason he did it was that he was afraid I was going to take you away with me."

"He did?"

She looked troubled but he wondered if he wasn't seeing a little pride in her face too. There probably isn't a woman in the world who isn't thrilled by a man who goes to those kind of lengths to keep her for himself.

"We decided it was probably the twins who were behind the shooting. I went to their junkyard. That shack of theirs. I found the gun they killed Marty with. Some other things too. I found-"

Footsteps nearby. Keith walked slowly down the stairs. He caught Pellam's eyes and paused. Then continued. "Sam's okay. I gave him something. He's sleeping."

Meg ignored him. Said to Pellam, "Why are you telling me this?"

But Keith preempted her. He'd overheard Pellam and he asked, "What else did you find in the shack?"

Pellam said to Meg, "I found some of that stuff, the drugs Sam got."

"So they're the ones?" she blurted. "They're the ones behind it… But why would they come here? Because Sam was a witness?"

"They weren't after Sam."

Keith had stopped walking. He sat down. Pellam said to him, "They had five or six thousand vials there. All packaged and ready to go… So, Keith, tell me: Were they distributing? Or were they skimming from you?"

Keith's eyes swam around the room. "Both, apparently."

Meg stared at her husband. "What do you mean?"

"Your partners came here to kill you," Pellam said. "And your family."

"Partners?" Meg gasped.

Pellam said to Keith, "Would they have enough information to make the drugs themselves? Could they do it without your factory?"

Keith didn't say anything.

Both, apparently.

Keith looked at the wall beyond which two of his employees lay. "I paid them enough."

"There's never enough."

"How'd you find out?"

Pellam said, "In one of the bags in their shack were notes from you. Some of your letterhead. Some cash." He nodded. "I came here to tell Meg."

She turned to Pellam. Wanted to say something, it seemed, but couldn't.

Keith said, "They were just punks but they had contacts in New York, New Jersey, Brooklyn. I needed them."

Pellam asked, "What is it exactly? The drug."

Keith explained. "It's an oral synthetic narcotic."

To her husband Meg whispered, "No. This isn't happening."

Keith took a breath and Pellam could see he was running through the inventory of lies he might choose from. A boy in front of a broken window. He looked at both Pellam and Meg and said, "It's not what you think."

"No, no, no…" She shook her head.

"Meg, it's just a product. I-"

"Product!" Meg said. "This shit is poison and you call it a product?"

"You don't understand, Meg," he snapped. "It's not like that."

"What is it like, then?"

"It's a fantastic discovery! It took me two years to perfect it."

"Discovery?"

Pellam said wryly, "State of the art. Normally, heroin you have to shoot up to get the best rush. This stuff, all you do is chew it."

Keith said, "What I developed was a new vasodilator. It's brilliant. The narcotic goes into the blood cells under the tongue in milliseconds."

Pellam continued. "A new Yuppie drug of choice. No need to shoot up. No needles. No AIDS risk…"