Open to the public during the day, with a nearly one-mile trail of sand and scrub and even a freshwater bog. Steep, sandy hills accessed by narrow paths with a huge drop-off at the first dune, and a spectacular view of the water and Northwest Harbor up top.

  The Walking Dunes is an area where I love to take Rip the dog or do a lot of reading. Back in 1921, a production company based in Astoria filmed some of the desert scenes in Rudolph Valentino’s classic silent movie The Sheik there.

  The wind has risen to a howl. I know from experience the way hard winds, if you encounter them here, can funnel through the dunes, creating the feeling of being caught in a sandstorm.

  “How do we know this isn’t a trap?” Jimmy asks after we’ve parked at the end of Napeague Harbor Road.

  “He could be anywhere,” I say. “A million places to hide. If he’s here, that’s why he’s here.”

  “Makes it a perfect place to ambush somebody,” Jimmy says. “We don’t know this isn’t a setup.”

  “We don’t,” I tell him. “But we’re both armed and extremely dangerous.”

  “He said he knows things?”

  “And that he can only tell if we save him from the bogeyman. Or men.”

  “My new pal Len Greene told me he knows things, too.”

  “How come everybody knows things except us?”

  I lead the way up the narrow trail, past the helpful sign that tells you to enjoy the view before you descend into the wind tunnel. Branches occasionally slap against us, a few catching me in the face and making me curse. The wind seems to have picked up even more since we got out of our car. The moon is very bright and high in the sky.

  We both have our guns out as we slowly climb and stumble our way to the top of the first dune, the approach so steep you can put your hand out and touch the sand. You’re supposed to stay on the path when you come here in the daytime. I tell Jimmy I won’t tell we’re breaking the rules if he won’t.

  I fall a couple of times. So does he. Now we’re both cursing quietly.

  We finally make it to the top, staying low when we get there.

  I know how steep the drop is in front of us, the distance down to an open area of sand always looking to me like it’s the length of a football field.

  “McKenzie!” I yell. “I’m here.”

  Underneath the wind, from down below, I hear a voice now.

  “Here.”

  I look at Jimmy. He nods. We circle back to the trail, staying low until we approach the bigger open area of sand and scrub facing north. Something to behold in the daytime, the whole sweep of this place.

  Just not tonight.

  We still may be walking into a trap. We both know that. But we’ve come this far.

  And maybe McKenzie was telling the truth about the things he can tell me.

  “You wanted to talk,” I yell. “Show yourself and we can talk.”

  “Let’s talk,” a voice from behind us says. “But first let me see you turn around and toss those guns behind you. It will make our conversation much more relaxing.”

  Jimmy and I slowly turn, and toss our guns into the sand. When we turn around, we’re staring at the long revolver held by Anthony Licata.

  He touches the top of his head.

  “Had to get a new Rangers cap after I died,” he says. “Like it?”

  ONE HUNDRED ELEVEN

  “AND IF YOU’RE THINKING about getting cute and going for your guns,” Licata says, “take a look behind you.”

  A small woman has come up out of the dunes to our left, maybe fifty yards away, maybe closer, pointing her own gun at us. She has to be the one whose voice I heard, unless there’s more than just the two of them.

  “That’s Mei,” Licata says.

  “I believe we’ve met,” Jimmy says, looking over his shoulder.

  “Where’s McKenzie?” I ask.

  “Probably in a bar someplace by now.”

  “I thought we were all going to live together in peace,” I say.

  “We were,” Licata says. “But the two of you just would not stop, no matter how many times you got warned.”

  “I hear somebody still owes my father a favor.”

  “Unfortunately, that deal is now off the table. I got my orders to end this.”

  “From Sonny?” Jimmy says.

  “That old fool?” Licata sadly shakes his head. “You two still don’t know what you don’t know.”

  I’m reviewing our options, limited as they are. Maybe nonexistent. I’m sure Jimmy is doing the same. The clock is running, and it’s clear Anthony Licata and the woman didn’t just bring us here to talk. But Licata is dragging things out now, maybe just for the fun of it, as if he needs us to know that he’s gotten the better of us, and that we both could choke on it.

  Ours guns are behind us in the sand. Theirs are pointed at us.

  “How’d you survive your boat trip?”

  “I never took the boat trip,” he says. “Well, my hat did. Does that count? Bobby didn’t even notice I left it in the cabin before I wished him bon voyage.”

  “Who wanted Bobby dead?” Jimmy asks.

  “Who didn’t?”

  Then, just like that, he’s tired of talking.

  “Enough,” he says.

  “One more dying request,” I say. “You’d grant a girl a dying request, wouldn’t you?”

  “You never fucking stop talking, do you?”

  “I need to know who killed those two families.”

  He hesitates. I see him nodding, as if ending a conversation with himself.

  “Aw, why the hell not,” he says. “What does it matter if you know which one of them did it?”

  We hear the first shot then, from our right, maybe from the second dune, even if that would be some shot.

  The bullet thuds into the sand wall behind Licata.

  As Licata tries to find cover, another bullet hits the dune behind him. Out of the corner of my eye I see Mei running toward the second dune, firing in the direction of the shooter.

  The next shot from the second dune puts Mei down in the sand, face first.

  “Mei!” Licata screams, as if the bullet had hit him and not her.

  Then there’s another shot fired out of the night, and another. Jimmy and I are flat on the ground then, reaching for our guns. As I roll to my side I make out the figure of someone scrambling into the sand at the bottom of the second dune, stopping just long enough to raise a long gun and fire another shot at Anthony Licata.

  Who the hell is that?

  I look the other way and see Licata running for cover, sliding down the dune in the direction of the ocean.

  Jimmy and I drop to the ground.

  “Who’s that?” Jimmy asks.

  “Dunno—is he on our side?”

  “Or wants to take everybody out,” Jimmy says, “one by one.”

  Then he adds “Fuck it” and tells me to go after the shooter.

  Then he’s on the move in the night, going after Licata to end this once and for all.

  ONE HUNDRED TWELVE

  TOO MUCH SAND AND slope and distance between the shooter and me. I wait for him to turn and fire at me, but he doesn’t, and I can almost make him out as he runs into the woods, heading south, in the general direction of the parking lot.

  A man, tall and slender, wearing dark clothes. Maybe black clothes.

  Eric Jacobson was dressed in black when he came to my house.

  I’m the one sprinting back to where I left Jimmy.

  I slide down the dune. I spot Licata moving in a crouch of his own along the thickest woods over there, as if he’s after Jimmy now, and not the other way around.

  In the light of the moon, I see the blue cap and the glint of Licata’s gun.

  The only shooter I can worry about in the moment is him.

  Licata isn’t looking in my direction as I crawl, gun in hand, slowly through the sand in his direction.

  Where is Jimmy?

  I know I’m finally close enough to take the shot if I want it.

  No time to wait for Jimmy, or for Licata to take the first shot if he spots me.

  Just Anthony Licata and me now at the bottom of the dunes.

  “Drop it, Licata,” I shout at him now. “Or I will shoot you dead.”

  He freezes.

  “Okay,” he shouts back. “Okay.”

  I see him turn, slowly raising his hands, until he’s facing me.

  But as I move toward him, the world begins to spin.

  I’m dizzy again, the way chemo makes me dizzy sometimes, the way I was dizzy that night at the restaurant before I fainted.

  As I struggle to maintain my balance, I lower my gun to my side.

  As my arm drops, Licata raises his and fires.

  But I’m already falling as he does.

  Going down again.

  Just not down and out this time.

  I may be dying, but not tonight.

  Licata’s bullet sails over my head as I hit the ground.

  His second shot misses, too, but not by much, the bullet spraying sand against my leg. Then I’m rolling away from that spot, expecting another wave of dizziness as I keep rolling in the sand.

  It doesn’t come.

  I won’t let it.

  I’m Jane Effing Smith.

  I pull out of the roll and am already running for cover, through the scrub, as soon as I have my legs back underneath me.

  I’m waiting for Licata to take his next shot when I hear Jimmy.

  “Licata!” he yells as he comes out of the trees to my left, from the water side of the dunes.

  Licata turns and fires at Jimmy now, sending Jimmy diving for cover.

  Licata’s the one caught in a crossfire now and he has to make a decision.

  Jimmy or me.

  He turns back to me.

  Too late.

  I’ve stopped running, squared up, and raised my Glock.

  Just me and the target now.

  Like all those nights on the trail.

  Stop, aim, shoot.

  I hit Licata high up on his chest and spin him halfway around. He turns back to face me once more and raises his gun for the last time. I hit him again in the chest and he goes down and stays down as Jimmy comes running out of the woods.

  Jimmy takes off his own windbreaker as he kneels down next to Licata and tries to stop the bleeding. When I get there and see how much blood there is, I know Jimmy’s too late to contain the wound, or the blood. He has to know, too.

  So does Anthony Licata.

  But he’s still looking to deal, all the way to the end.

  “Help…” he croaks.

  A bubble of blood comes out of his mouth.

  “Trying here,” Jimmy says grimly, pressing down harder with his windbreaker, now soaked in blood.

  “I… can help you…”

  “How?” Jimmy asks.

  “Proof…”

  “What kind of proof, Licata?” I can hear the urgency in Jimmy’s voice, both of us knowing Licata is running out of time.

  “Insurance… case he ever tried to screw me…”

  Licata’s eyes are rolling back.

  Jimmy leans down closer to him and speaks so softly I can barely make out what he’s saying under the wind roaring louder and harder than ever through the Walking Dunes.

  “Proof on who?” Jimmy says.

  I hear Licata say “The…” His voice trails off. Everything nearly gone now, like his life is spilling out into the dunes along with all the blood.

  Then all I can hear Licata saying back to Jimmy is this:

  “Who.”

  Jimmy leans down close to Licata now and I can see Licata trying to say something more, but nothing comes out, and then his head falls back and his eyes close and he’s still.

  “Shit,” Jimmy says.

  He sits down next to Licata, still holding his gun. I step away and make the call to 911 on my phone. Maybe ten minutes later, we hear the first sirens in the distance.

  We’re still sitting there when we hear Licata’s phone.

  While Jimmy goes into the side pocket of Licata’s down vest for the phone, I walk back to where the woman, Mei, was shot.

  But she’s disappeared.

  ONE HUNDRED THIRTEEN

  Jimmy

  THEY DON’T FINISH WITH the town police and the county police until it’s past four in the morning. Jane and Jimmy drive into East Hampton after that to formally give their statements. Chief Larry Calabrese is waiting for them. Jimmy tells Calabrese what he needs when he and Jane are finished.

  Calabrese says he’ll do his best.

  Jimmy doesn’t tell him about the phone but promises Jane he’ll hand it over to the police later.

  Jane drives Jimmy back to her house. Jimmy gets into his car and heads back home to Sag Harbor and wakes up Detective Craig Jackson. Craig Jackson: who has turned into the kind of wingman that Mickey Dunne was. Another old dog with a bone.

  Jackson and Jimmy commence working the phones, starting with Anthony Licata’s burner. Jackson says he’s going to wake some people up, screw ’em, this shit matters to him now, too, and get as many phone logs as he can, both numbers, at this time of the morning.

  At seven thirty, time to put a bow on this before word of the shootings gets out, so Jimmy drives over there.

  He’s clearly shocked to see Jimmy standing there when he opens the front door, looking as if Jimmy woke him up. But then he told Jimmy he likes to sleep late.

  Jimmy uses the same raspy voice he’d used when he answered Licata’s phone at the Walking Dunes, and had done a damn good impression of Anthony Licata, if he did say so himself, his voice muffled just enough by the wind and bad cell service out there.

  “You asked me over the phone if it was done,” Jimmy says to retired lieutenant Paul Harrington. “Well, you are.”

  Harrington opens his mouth and closes it.

  It’s a caught look that Jimmy knows well. A look that all cops know. Harrington has just never been behind it, until now.

  “You probably wondered why he had the call on speaker,” Jimmy says. “But when I saw it was you calling him to ask if Janie and me were dead, I wanted her to hear it too, her being an officer of the court and all.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Harrington says.

  Harrington’s not moving. Neither is Jimmy. Harrington’s wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt. Nowhere to put a gun. But Jimmy’s is handy if he needs it.

  “Funny thing,” Jimmy says. “Before Licata died, Jane thought he said ‘Who,’ when I asked who sent him. But that’s not what I heard. I heard him say ‘Lieu.’ Rhymes with you. What you said he used to call you. And probably still did, since he was still working for you, you sonofabitch.”

  Harrington tries to shut the door now. Jimmy is already through it, shoving Harrington back into the foyer with both hands, knocking him sideways into a small antique table against the wall, as pretty as his flowers. Then Jimmy has his gun on him, just in case.

  The guy was a cop once, if maybe the dirtiest one of all.

  Jimmy uses his free hand to take out Licata’s burner phone.

  “You’ve been out of the game too long,” Jimmy says to him. “Phones like this have memories, too.”

  “I’m not saying another word,” Harrington says. “You only have what you think you have.”

  “I have a call that we’ll prove came from your phone and that I answered,” Jimmy says. “One that Jane Smith heard. The aforementioned officer of the court. ‘Is it done?’ you say. And I say, ‘You mean, did I kill them?’ And you say, ‘Of course that’s what I mean, what the hell did you think I sent you there to do?’ She figures we got your ass. Accessory to attempted murder, conspiracy. The state cops have probably already gotten a judge to sign off on an arrest warrant.”

  “Good luck with that,” Harrington says. “You need to tie a rock to this shit before it floats away.”

  Jimmy watches Harrington give a little shrug to his shoulders now, straightening, like a boxer Jimmy has hit with a straight right hand in the old days, trying to gather himself even after his bell has been rung.

  “Licata could barely talk at the end,” Jimmy says. “But he said he had proof. And you know what the cops found on his laptop, not even password protected? Some of the phone calls he taped with you over the years. The insurance policy he talked about before he closed his eyes for good. No honor among thieves, am I right, Lieu?”

  Harrington doesn’t acknowledge what Jimmy just said. He’s smiling to himself now, nodding, as if there’s no problem here, he’s still in charge.

  “You know what I think?” Harrington says.

  “That you’re screwed about twelve ways to Sunday?”

  “I think that if you’re not going to use that gun, get the hell out of my house,” Harrington says.

  “Have it your way.”

  “You’re not a cop anymore, Cunniff,” Harrington says. “You can’t arrest me.”

  The door opens then and Danny Esposito comes walking in, warrant in one hand, handcuffs in the other.

  “I can,” he says, and then starts reading the former commander of detectives, 24th Precinct, his rights.

  ONE HUNDRED FOURTEEN

  “WE’VE ALREADY GOT PEOPLE doing one of those deep dive things into his phone records,” Danny Esposito says. “His dead wife didn’t pay for that house. But I got this funny feeling Sonny Blum might have.”

  “Lot of calls on Harrington’s phone to Sonny’s house,” Jimmy says. “Turns out that Sonny isn’t just old. He’s old school. Still uses a landline.”

  The three of us are at a table at Jimmy’s bar on Tuesday night, the night before jury selection begins. Lieutenant Paul Harrington is in custody at the same jail in Riverhead that once housed Rob Jacobson.

  “The way I see it laying out,” Jimmy says, “is that Sonny had Harrington in his pocket, all the way back. He worked for Sonny, and Licata and Champi worked for him. The rich guys called Harrington first, not them.”

  Jimmy goes quiet now. I see him staring at the Yankee game on the TV set over the bar, but don’t think he’s looking at baseball.