I’d like the pleasure of your company for dinner to apologize and to talk with you. Choose anywhere you wish and call me on my cell. Please give me ...a chance to explain. Gale. Three o’clock. Four o’clock. Five o’clock. The hours passed and still no response. He called the florist and was told that yes, the bouquet had been delivered and that yes, a woman accepted it. How did she look when she saw it? Surprised. And how did she look when she read the card? I don’t know, sir. She closed the door. "Is she in with Bozo now?" I said."Uh huh."Jack rolled onto his side, his front up against Laurie and his arm across both of us. I heard her gentle, even breathing soon after and his light snoring a moment later. I fell asleep, tired, relaxed and contented. It had been a busy evening but a good one.The alarm went off in the morning, a little earlier than normal. Laurie glanced around, realized where she was and curled back into me, ready to go back to sleep."Uh, uh, Little Girl. Time to get. ” Johnny smiled as he walked proudly astride his best friend. “One of the captains of the football team just hit on me.” He jumped and skipped a little as his smile grew brighter. After school, Johnny made a bee line to the dugouts at the park's baseball diamond. Tentatively, he stepped down into the concrete bunker. “Lance?” He said as his eyes adjusted to the darkness. He was alone. He looked out the opening that looked over the diamond and saw him coming in from the other side of the park,. A blazing fire had been lit in Matti’s side, and he found himself falling to the floor, with the gunman standing about 10 feet away from him. The man had on a hoodie that was framing his face, and a thin scarf, perhaps originally wrapped to conceal his lower face, was hanging loose below his chin. All that Matti could see as he heard the gun fire again was a familiar face with a black eye-patch over its left eye. It was the last thing he saw, as everything immediately faded to black.There was a.