Even as Amity reached for Falkirk’s ankle, Daddy stooped to retrieve the pistol he’d put on the floor. Staggering off balance, Falkirk fired one wild shot, and Daddy squeezed off two. Because a girl couldn’t hide from the hardness of the world forever, because she had to grow up sometime, and because Amity was going on twelve, she didn’t look away, but saw the head shot, the chest shot, and knew that what had happened was as terrible as it was right and good.
Amity brave and an intelligent girl
