Cindy knelt at her bedstand, clutching a rosary.

She whispered a prayer for the downtrodden,
and for the Sisters of Mercy who'd raised her
in the Angel Guardian Orphanage.

Light flickered, the kitchenette's fluorescent tube,
bleeding through the gaps in her bedroom door.

She yanked a shade string, her eyes narrowing
as a patrol car's lamps strobed the window.

Outside the murk of her Greenwich Village flat,
neon reflected in rain puddles; a rat scurried
down a gutter drain.

Twenty years before, she'd slept with Artie Shaw.
She was a moll with a mouth full of pearls,
walking where she pleased, shopping 5th Avenue:
her flaming red hair, a smatter of freckles
on her porcelain broach complexion.

Cindy touched her face, reliving the horror
of the shotgun stock that ruined her looks.
She'd known better than to toy with a mob boss's son.
But she'd let him pursue her until a love triangle
ended his life and brought the father's revenge.

She brought the crucifix to her lips,
whispered goodbye, then reached for
the pistol in her bedstand's drawer.