"Look, Mickey, I'm sorry. I didn't think it through. You're right. I'll tell the DNC no. We'll put it back the way it was." Arquette was frantic.

"Yeah, but Paul, that still leaves me with a problem. Once a guy rats me out, I can't ever trust him again. What if we get you in the White House and I ask you to do me a favor and you tell me to fuck off, like this afternoon? What'm I gonna do to you once you're the President?… See the problem?"

Paul swallowed, sweat formed on his forehead.

"You don't get a second chance," Mickey continued. "This was a one-chance kinda deal. Now we gotta get you changed." He picked up the trunks and flipped them at Warren and Paul. The trunks hit their legs and fell to the deck. "Untie 'em, Tony."

"Why do we need trunks?" Paul whimpered.

" 'Cause I said so, okay?"

"I'm not gonna do it," Paul said.

Tony jerked Paul up onto his feet and hit him lightly in the stomach. "Okay, okay," Paul gasped, and Tony untaped his wrists so Paul could unzip his pants and get into the swimming trunks.

Warren was pleading in a singsong voice. Mickey couldn't even tell what he was saying.

"Shut the fuck up," New York Tony yelled at Warren.

In a few minutes, both were wearing swim trunks.

"Bring me some ropes," Mickey ordered. Little Pussy scrambled to find them. Mickey looped rope under Paul's armpits and knotted it under his breastbone, stuffing towels underneath so there would be no rope burn.

Then Mickey shoved Paul hard in the chest and Senator Arquette jackknifed off the transom of the boat into the bloody water. Mickey looped the end of the line over the stern cleat. New York Tony fastened another towel-padded rope around Warren, threw him overboard, and cleated him off on the port side.

Paul was yelling. "Let us in!… Why are you doing this to me?"