A THREADBARE STUFFED RHINOCEROS NAMED ALBO CUT through the air and smacked Hector Amira in the face. He recoiled from the impact and peeled his eyes open in a panic. "Whuh de fuck!" he said.

A squat, angry figure stood over him, breasts and chins and elbows sticking out in every direction. "Get up," she said, and Consuela Maria Gonzalez Amira stomped off toward the kitchen.

Hector sucked in a few deep breaths and tried to get his bearings. He'd come home to shower and change clothes, but he'd gotten undressed and had lain down on the bed for a minute, and he must've passed out. "What time is it?" he asked, but nobody answered.

Hector found his glasses, and he pulled on a T-shirt and a pair of gym shorts. He stumbled out of his room, rubbing his eyes, and said, "Ma, I'm sorry."

"Sorry for what? Sorry for being out all night? Sorry for not being home for your boy? Sorry he had to call me to come up and get him fed and to school and then I miss work? Is that what you sorry for? Or you sorry for making a mess of your life? Or being a disgrace before God? What exactly you sorry for, Hector?"

"Ma, I—"

"There's no food in this house, you know that? How you expect this boy to live? He hungry, he lonely. Nobody make him dinner. He don't brush his teeth. What kind of father are you? What kinda man are you? He sit on that phone all day and come home to a empty house. What you think gonna happen to him? Little Joshua." She bit back a sob.

"Ma, listen—"

"Listen to what? Lies? Excuses? Blasphemy? Let me tell you something, Hector: Your boy get home from school around three today, and you better be here to see him, you understand me? Otherwise, you find somebody else to get him to school in the morning, and make him dinner, and wash he clothes, and read and do he studies with him. You get me?"

"Yeah, Ma, I get you."

Consuela cleared her throat and wiped a tear from her eye. She picked up her purse and walked to the door with perfect posture. She opened it, and then she turned back and looked at Hector. "Take a shower," she said, "you smell like gunpowder."

Hector collapsed in a chair and put his head in his hands. He was wired, and his head was all over the place. What was he supposed to tell her? He was working hard to earn money to try and be a good provider.

The shit wasn't supposed to go down like this. All they were supposed to do was pick up a guy named Loomis who rented in one of the company's buildings and take him to a nice, quiet place for a talk: the carrot or the stick. That's all.

But as you know, it went bad.

Hector and Torque had been holed up in the Crown Vic outside the bar. Hector was playing music through his earphones when Roberta got in, all smiles and big white teeth. "Everybody ready to party?" she said.

Kevin got in the backseat, reeking of booze and fried food. He was smiling too, until he got a look at Torque.

"Drive," Torque said.

They go maybe a couple of blocks, Kevin and Torque exchanging words that Hector couldn't hear cause Roberta was jawing at him.

Hector had never met her before. He thought she was hot, but she also looked and acted like a user. Twitchy, dark circles, and kind of drawn, even in that light under the makeup.

Hector's driving steady and listening to her talk about some party, probably something the boss told her when he hired her to get Kevin out to the car.

Then, all of a sudden, Torque kicks open the door while the car is rolling, grabs Kevin by his jacket, and flings him howling out onto the street, just like that.

Hector says, "What da FUUUUCK!"

Roberta loses her shit: "Oh god! Oh god! Jesus! Jeeeeesuuuuus!"

Torque says, "Woman, shut up!"

Roberta goes, "He gonna die! You kilt him! You kilt him! Oh, god! Oh, Jeeeeesssuuuus!"

Torque says, "Tell bitch to shut up NOW!"

Hector's trying to drive and keep things cool. He can't hear Torque. He says, "WHUT?"

Torque grabs her by the hair. "Shut up, woman! Quiet!"

Roberta screams. She's flopping around now like a hen in a box, waving her arms and trying to pull her head free, and she smacks Hector in the face and knocks his glasses off.

Hector can't see. He looks down, grabs the glasses, and sticks them back on his face.

Roberta says, "Whaaaaahhhh, look ouuuuuut!"

Hector looks up at a van coming right at them. He's on the wrong side of the street. He jerks the wheel, hard, misses the van by a hair. Another car swerves. Hector yanks the wheel left to avoid it. Roberta's head slaps the window. Hector cuts hard right, gets them to the right side of the street, and slams the brakes.

Roberta pops the door. Torque yells something in Czech. Roberta's half out the door going, "Heeeelllllp! Heeeelllllp!" She tries to run and trips on her heels. Torque yanks her into the backseat and slams the door and says, "Go, idiot! Go!"

Hector punches the gas. The car takes off. Torque says, "Stupid! Who tell you to stop the car?" Like all this was Hector's fault.

Hector says, "Fuck you up in my face for? This your show, muthafucka!"

Torque pulls Roberta close and says something to her. She finally stops screaming, but she's still sobbing, sniffling, and shaking.

Hector takes them to the original spot where they were supposed to talk to Kevin, a garage in the back of an auto shop out in Ozone Park. It takes forever to get there.

Torque has a key. The three of them go inside. It's a big machine shop. Concrete floors, equipment, tools, parts, lifts. Nobody's around. Exit signs glow like neon beer ads in two corners, and a few dull fluorescents spill watery light into the place from above a filthy counter in the back.

Roberta's sobbing and mumbling to herself.

Hector says to her, "Easy, yo. Cool it out. Jes be cool, you gonna be OK."

But Torque takes her arm and says, "Come with me," and she starts again with the screaming routine, and then out of nowhere she hauls off and cracks him across his big, ugly mug.

Torque turns around with a terrible look in his eye. He brings up his brother's Glock, and *SNAP!*, she falls down with a thud on the cement floor, one arm in an L shape like she's hailing a taxi, the other stuck behind her back. Both her shoes are blown off.

It's quiet now. Hector's standing there next to Torque, dazed, stunned. Acrid smoke from the gun swirls around them.

Torque says, "Stay here. I get a bag."

Hector always carries a burner phone on him, and when Torque stalks off, he pops out a quick text out to his boss:

*boss wegotta big problem ya lady she dead an renter prolly in the hospitl*

Now, I've known guys like Hector and Torque my whole life, and I can tell you, it's not like what you see on television. From my view, what happened that night impacted Hector in a couple of different ways.

For one, you see an innocent woman get her brains blown out right in front of you, that shit's gonna stay with you. Don't get me wrong. Hector was professional. He'd seen guys get beaten and stabbed and worse when he was locked up, and it's strange to say this but to him, that's all just part of the game. They're regular players, see? But not that lady. Maybe Hector was thinking about his kid that night, I don't know. But what happened changed something inside him for sure.

Second, Hector was clear when he signed on to work with this crew that there were all kinds of things he was willing to do but he didn't want nothing to do with the heavy stuff.

That's great, the boss told him, they weren't that kind of an outfit anyway.

OK, so what the hell just happened?

It made no sense to Hector, but he knew for sure he was ass-deep in it, and he knew exactly how it could go. Wind blows the wrong way, and little Hector Amira goes back into the system for twenty years. Accessory to murder, etcetera, etcetera. That broke his trust with his boss and that crew for good.

Well, he told himself as he sat there in his kitchen, he did the best he could under a bad situation, and he'd held up pretty well, all things considered. But still, Hector couldn't shake this nagging feeling like maybe he was being left out of the loop on purpose. Like maybe there were plans he didn't know about. Maybe even somebody was trying to set him up.

He looked at his watch: Almost noon. He was exhausted but there was no more time for rest. He needed to shower and then head down to see the boss. But first he was going to get rid of the gun.