We were back under the liquor store, and I balled up my fists. Climbed back up the ladder. “You have no clue what you’re talking about.”

“Really?” Remy asked. She followed me up.

“You’re a single person running around, having fun,” I said. “You wanna sleep with a co-worker, you do it. A subordinate at work? Even better. You have no idea what it’s like to commit to someone and make a family and then have that taken away from you.”

“And you have no idea what it’s like to watch someone torture themselves,” she said. “Someone who’s full of regret that they did something wrong—even though they just worked late one night.”

I moved closer to Remy’s face. I was mad enough to chew nails. But I just turned and climbed out the back window. Over the fence and out to my Silverado.

I crossed the dark street ahead of my partner, but sat in my truck for a moment. My body shook with anger, and I heard Remy’s Alfa start up in the alley.

I waited until she was gone, fired up my truck, and drove home.

26

Wednesday, September 11, 1:55 p.m.

Easton Pappas had always been one of the popular kids. A favorite of the girls and envied by the boys. He was picked first in sports. And by now, in eighth grade, he was king of the campus. On the verge of high school cool.

Easton had been known to brag. He talked trash while playing point guard for the middle school basketball team. And at the debate for eighth-grade president, he ran circles around this smart, nervous girl from the honors classes.

Which was why it was odd that Easton had dropped his backpack now and stood, speechless, outside the art class.

“You okay, bruh?” a younger kid asked.

Easton nodded, but didn’t speak. The smaller kid flipped the door open and hustled into math class, two doors down, the bell for the next period about to ring.

The man Easton had seen inside the art room wore a green flannel shirt and jeans. And hiking boots. Expensive ones.

He also held a .38 toward Mr. Tanner.

Mr. T, who Easton had last year for Life Science.

Easton blinked, a wave of nausea rising inside him. The eighth grader who’d won the election in a landslide was suddenly reduced to a gesturing monkey. And no one was paying any attention to him.

“Mrs. . . .” he croaked to a teacher passing by.

“Shouldn’t you be in class, young man?” the teacher asked, heading in a nearby door.

He found the fire alarm then. Smashed the glass and reached inside. Pulled.

A bell walloped into action, and the same teacher from a moment ago emerged from her classroom.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

And Easton finally found his voice.

“Gun,” he screamed. Pointing at the art class. “Man with a gun in that class.”

27

The morning sky across northern Georgia bore a streak of blue, the kind so pure you could paint a nursery with it. Except in the distance, there was an orange band that signaled rain might be coming.