A layer of clouds had rolled through during the afternoon but had cleared out, and the sky was burning with Van Gogh stars when they loaded into their cars and headed for the Apels’ house. For no other reason than the random arrangement of parking spots, Virgil’s group got out first. And because they didn’t have to go around a block, they arrived at the Apels’ house before Jenkins’s group got to Osborne’s.

Ann Apel was lying on her bed with a laptop, reading a Cosmopolitan article about “7 Things to Know Before You Start Dating a Friend,” when she heard too many cars in the street. She was still dressed but barefoot. She put the laptop down and looked out her bedroom window and saw the line of cars pulling to the side of the street.

She froze for two seconds, watching, then panicked.

“David! The cops are here, the cops are here . . .”

She grabbed her shoes and ran for the stairs.

—

Davy Apel was sleeping in the home office, where he’d dragged his bed. He heard Ann scream and he rolled over. He heard her scream again; this time, he sat up, still not comprehending, heard her thundering down the stairs, heard her, clearly this third time, yell, “David! David! The cops are here, a whole bunch of them. They must be coming to get us . . .”

He heard her running through the house, and as he got his feet on the floor, the back door slammed. Still confused, he pulled on his jeans and hurried through the house to the front room to look out the window at the street. As he got there, he saw Flowers, Zimmer, and a woman deputy walking up the porch steps.

Then he heard some shouting, from the yard, and Flowers ran back down the steps, leaving Zimmer and the deputy standing there.

Run, hide, or . . . what?

Running and hiding would be pointless. The cops were all over the place. If he resisted, they might shoot him—you heard about that all the time, on the TV news, and Apel made a snap decision: he didn’t want to die that night. He walked to the front door, unlocked it, and looked out at Zimmer. “Karl? What’s going on?”

Zimmer said, “Davy—Mr. Apel—you’re under arrest. Step out here, and keep your hands where I can see them.”

Apel heard more shouting from behind the house, and asked, “Under arrest? What for? And what’s going on back there?”

But he thought he knew: Ann had panicked. They’d talked about what to do if the cops, looking at the accumulated circumstantial evidence, had come for them. They’d keep their mouths shut, get a lawyer.

But Ann had panicked. Was she going for the gun?

—