The hard lines and planes of the teenager’s face collapsed. It was like watching a burning tower go down. She was a pyre of vengeance and lone justice, and then it all fell in on itself, and Sofia Pieraro was a little girl in a room full of dead men and shredded bodies.

She gasped and dropped to the floor.

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON

Jed grunted as his face struck the wet tiles of the bathroom. His arm was on fire, burning as though held in a furnace. A great crushing weight bore down on his chest as he gagged and struggled to draw air into his lungs. With his good hand, he raked at the breast bone, as though he might be able to tear through and wrench out his own heart. Fling it from his body before it betrayed him completely.

It was killing him, just when he needed to be at his strongest.

Another pile-driver slammed into his chest and he moaned as bubbles of spit foamed on his blue lips. The phone was close. He could see it, as though through a long tunnel. But in his rational mind, as clouded as it was by a descending premonition of doom, he knew, he absolutely knew, that it was within reach. If he could just get to it. Dial emergency. But he couldn’t move. Giant rubber clown hands had seized the base of his spine and started to squeeze. The grotesque sensation felt like a python running up his back, accelerating as it raced for the base of his neck. He felt the spasms close up his throat as though he were being strangled. Jed worked his jaws, as if to protest, but no sound came out, save for a gurgling moan.

Even in this extremity, his reptilian cunning did not desert him. For as dark wings folded over Jed Culver, he wondered, should he survive, whether having suffered a massive heart attack might count in his favour, win him a few sympathy points, when Kipper was deciding just how high to hang him.

*

Caitlin held up her cuffed hands where Sofia Pieraro could see them. She advanced, slowly, cautiously, even though every nerve in her body compelled her to turn and chase after Baumer.

‘It’s okay, honey. He’s gone. They’re all gone. You did well. You just need to put the gun away. Or give it to me. There’s another man here we need to get. Somebody working with Blackstone.’

The carnage and destruction were hellish. The girl had unloaded the better part of two clips into her targets at close range. The fresh, barnyard stench of slaughter, so familiar to Caitlin, was still so dense and surprising it caused her to gag. Blood, chunks of flesh, bone shards and viscera were all mixed in promiscuously and sprayed around the room as if thrown from buckets.