Over his shoulder I could see my boss’s daughter, Avis, at the front of the pack. She put out her hand, palm facing him, as if to say no.

“P.T.,” Remy’s voice chirped.

I took aim. Inhaled and squeezed.

2

Wednesday, September 11, 2:52 p.m.

A gunshot rang out. And the three seventh-grade girls who’d bunched together in the corner of the art room shrieked.

“Stay down!” Kelly Borland yelled.

The art teacher dove across the room and landed atop the girls, her arms pulling them into a clump of hair and tears and uniform blouses.

Keep the girls safe, Borland thought. That’s your only job right now. Keep them safe.

The room went silent then, and Kelly Borland’s eyes found Leaf Tanner. “Mr. T” to the kids. “Beloved” is how the thirty-one-year-old science teacher was often described.

But today, his body lay still against the far wall, his five-foot-ten-inch frame propped up on a pile of painting smocks. The fabric of the smocks was soaked in the same red that coated Tanner’s shirt.

Kelly Borland glanced down at her hands. A spatter of blood covered her forearms. Hers? One of the girls?

She looked across the room.

The gunman who had been threatening them was on the ground. His body, motionless.

Kelly stood up. Ran her fingers along her blouse and skirt to confirm she wasn’t hurt.

Then she stumbled over to the window.

Something moved outside, and she stared through a hole in the glass.

A snow goose emerged from the trees and lifted its head. Stared at Kelly Borland.

Was the ordeal over? she wondered.

Was it over that fast?

3

Shooter is down,” I hollered. “I repeat. Shooter is down.”

The walkie immediately sprung to life.

“Ten-one-oh-one,” Remy hollered. Asking my status in a way that the media would be slow to follow if they were listening.

“Ten-one-oh-six,” I answered, letting her know I was safe.

I used my binoculars to scan the art room. The female teacher was staring out the window, which now had a hole the size of a peach pit in it.

“Hold your fire,” I said. “Three students and one teacher are clear. Imminent danger occurred, and the shooter is down.”

“Ten-four,” Remy said.

I watched as the teacher pushed at the gunman’s body with her high heels. He didn’t move, and she glanced at him funny, as if surveying an animal found hit by a truck on the roadside. She motioned for the girls to get up.

A moment later, three SWAT officers dressed in black entered the art room. They moved the teacher and the girls out in a single huddled mass, their guns on the dead man at all times.

I clicked the walkie again. “I discharged,” I said. “So I’m gonna wait here for Fuller.”

“Copy that,” Remy responded.

Cornell Fuller was the single police officer who’d worked every Internal Affairs case in Mason Falls since I was a rookie detective. He’d recently rebranded his “department” as “Force Investigation Unit,” or F.I.U., and demanded that we all use that acronym now. Most of us refused.