“Now there’s a view,” said Phil, so smugly I felt like putting my hands around his neck and throttling. Easter Sunday and we were on the concrete deck at the Swampscott home of his best friend under house arrest with bail in excess of a million dollars. It would be the last time they would break bread, the two most feared men in the New England Cosa Nostra. The tide was low; the air charged with the rich, dank smell of home. As complaining seagulls swooped and soared above the deserted beach and the dark, gray Atlantic, I breathed deeply, tried to relax the muscles around my narcissistic heart. The family inside was in crisis. I was always in crisis. Would it never end? Adrenaline coursed through my veins like an out-of-control locomotive, clickety-clack, drowning…

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