Vengeance. Mystery Writers of America Presents B00A25NLU4

as he fired the bullet into her head.
    Afterward, he walked around the house for a little bit. He checked out the cars in the garage, the lawn out back so endless you would have thought it was part of the Serengeti. There was a gym and a pool house and a guesthouse. A guesthouse for a seven-bedroom main house. He shook his head as he went back inside and passed through the dining room and the living room into the family room, where she sat in the chair and he lay on the stairs. All this space, and they’d never had kids. You would have thought they would’ve had kids.
    To kill the silence, if for no other reason.

MOONSHINER’S LAMENT
    BY RICK McMAHAN
    Chapter 1
    Goat McKnight’s hands ached for a gun.
    Walking up the mountain path, he yearned for one. The moonlight, where it penetrated the canopy of trees, bleached the open spaces in pools of white and created twisted shadows in the lee of crooked branches. Goat never feared the dark of night. Darkness held no sway over him. Not even while he trudged through the blackest jungles did fear of the dark edge into his heart.
    Goat had never feared the law either, not even after he was caught with a load of moonshine. The judge had given him a choice. Prison or the army. Sometimes late at night, freezing on a jungle trail or facedown in a rice paddy under a hot sun as Charlie zinged rounds at him, Goat had thought he’d made the wrong choice. When he got back home, Goat had two options — go down in the mines or go back to hauling whiskey. The thought of the law catching him running untaxed whiskey didn’t scare him, nor did it make him yearn for a gun.
    A simple smell made Goat’s hands ache for a gun. The thick and earthy scent rose up from the loamy creek Goat and Ralphie had waded across at the base of the hill. The primal smell brought back a rush of memories from the not-so-distant past spent hunting Vietcong. As the aroma filled his lungs, Goat found himself scanning the ground, his eyes searching for trip wires leading to bouncing Betties or scuffed earth that signaled an ambush. Oblivious, pulling the wagon, Ralphie babbled on the whole time.
    When they were halfway up the path, a movement on the opposite hillside drew Goat’s attention. As a figure slipped through a clear spot of moonlight, Goat saw the glint of a belt buckle and a shoulder and arm covered in a tan uniform just before the NVA soldier slipped back into the shadows.
    Goat stopped.
    He knew it was his imagination projecting the picture like a Friday-night drive-in movie. There were no NVA soldiers stalking the hills of eastern Kentucky. Still, he held his breath as he scanned the woods. He waited a whole minute, not taking a breath until his chest was tight, but the soldier never reappeared.
    “Goat?” Ralphie called from up ahead in a low whisper. “Goat.” This time louder.
    Pushing the phantom soldier from his mind, Goat jogged up the trail. He nodded to his young cousin to keep moving. With the wagon wheels once again creaking, Ralphie continued his one-sided conversation. Goat wasn’t sure what made more noise, the banging of the empty wagon or Ralphie.
    “Groovy, I’m telling you,” Ralphie was saying. Even though Goat had zoned out for a bit, he was sure Ralphie was still talking about what all teenage boys talked about. Girls. Ralphie had a crush on his new English teacher. Ralphie thought she was a hippie, even though Ralphie wouldn’t know a hippie if one bit him in the ass. “She drives one of those little German buses painted up like a rainbow with a peace sign. I’m telling you, Miss Love’s a hippie.”
    Goat glanced over his shoulder, searching the trail for the NVA soldier.
    “And you know what they say about those hippies,” Ralphie intoned. Goat wasn’t sure what they said about hippies, but he was sure Ralphie was going to tell him.
    “What do they say about them hippies?” a voice called down.
    Goat grinned. From up ahead, a yellow glow leaked out around the edges of a tarp hung across the trail. Leave it to Luther to pull Ralphie’s chain.
    “Come on, Ralphie,” Luther called, pushing aside the tarp so the glow from the lanterns and fire pit lit up the trail all the way to Goat and his cousin. “Tell me about them hippie gals like Carrie Love.” From farther back in the stand of trees came low laughter.
    Ralphie and the Radio Flyer were quiet.
    Sliding past his cousin, Goat glanced at the younger man’s face. Even in the dim glow of the lantern