Then I draw.
He hears me and turns the way a man with a hole in his side turns. Carefully. His hand is already moving toward the place his service weapon is not. He stops it before it gets there.
Two-handed grip. The stance she taught me. Lower, wider, weighted into the back leg. Not the stance an FBI agent takes.
He sees it. His eyes change.
"Nadia."
"Sean."
"You found me."
"You weren't hard to find."
"I wasn't trying to hide."
"I know."
He waits. His face does the thing it does. The half-smile he comes within a quarter-inch of and chooses against. The choice is hotter than the smile would be.
I cannot afford for it to work tonight.
"Hands."
"Already up."
"Higher."
"Bleeding hurts when I do that."
"Higher."
He raises them. I close the distance. Put the gun close enough to his sternum that he cannot talk himself out of the math.
"Why did you come to this bar?"
"You first."
"I am holding the gun."
"You are. And we both know you're not going to pull the trigger."
He delivers it the way he deliveredI had timeback in his kitchen. A man stating a thing he has decided is true.
Bastardo. Stronzo. Cazzo — bastard, asshole, fuck.
He is going to stand there with his hands in the air and let me hold a gun on him until I make the next decision. Because he understands the decision is mine. And the decision is not the trigger.
"You went home."
"You followed me home?"
"Not personally. I have channels. Channels answer to me. People answer to the family."
"Interesting."
"It is not for you to find interesting."
