I saw the chief’s Audi pull up, and I exhaled loudly. Everything had been running perfectly at the stakeout, until it wasn’t. Until I’d crapped in the oatmeal real good.

The passenger door to Senza’s Audi flipped open and out came Gary Cavendish. The police shrink.

What the hell was he doing here?

In Mason Falls, the officer-involved protocol kicks in when one of two things happen: one, an officer discharges his or her weapon. Or two, when someone, a cop included, is injured or dead.

But neither of those things had occurred.

“Doc,” I said, but he barely looked at me. He headed over to talk to Gattling.

I looked over at Darren. As the shrink talked to him, he nodded, wiping at his face. I wondered whether this is the reaction I should’ve had after the school shooting.

Chief Senza was by my side, and I hadn’t realized he was talking.

“Do you know Timothy O’Neal?” my boss said.

I blinked. The name was familiar. A patrolman. Older. Near retirement.

“I think,” I said. “Why?”

“The dead boy is Officer O’Neal’s son, Jacob.”

“Christ,” I said. A cop’s kid had been killed. On my stakeout.

And Gattling must’ve known.

“I need some air,” I said, and walked away from Senza. When I came back, I made my report to Abe, who’d come by to help. I was tired and asked for a ride home from patrol.

But before I got in the car, Cavendish met me by the cruiser.

“Did your gun jam out in the forest?” he asked.

“I didn’t have a shot,” I said.

“You know, Paul.” Cavendish used my first name. “You were having so much fun earlier today in my office. Quoting me back to me.”

I stared at him.

“I guess it threw me,” he said. “I didn’t think until now about how impersonal it was.”

“I don’t follow,” I said.

“You taking that shot,” Cavendish continued, “at that school from a hundred feet away. It’s almost like target practice. Or some video game. It’s not like when a guy’s ten feet from you in a forest and threatening your partner.”

I looked over at Remy, who was talking to the chief.

Her shoulders were turned up, unable to answer a question that I couldn’t hear.

“I thought my problem was that I shot too many people, Doc?” I said. “Now I’m not pulling my gun enough?”

“Oh, you don’t have any problems, Detective,” Cavendish said. “In fact, I’m considering this our second session. So go on—just do what you wanna do. We can all see what’s coming for you. You’re the only one who can’t. But you’re the smart one, right? The clever guy, quoting someone’s article to the one person trying to help him.”

“Doc,” I said. “I’m sorry that—”

“Oh, don’t worry about me, Marsh. I’m just the one who’s gotta counsel a cop’s family tonight about their dead son,” Cavendish said. “Straight-A student on scholarship to Vandy. Came home to surprise his dad for his birthday.”