There were not six or seven as she’d expected from the dog’s cries and the destruction of the fence. There were two. They were little more than slight shadows standing just beyond the bushes there, watching. Stiles stood in the middle of the lawn facing them, and his whispered taunts were so angry they reached even her ears. “C’mon, fuckers. Let’s see how bad you are.” He even lowered the carbine as invitation but still the figures would not move.

Billie looked around the rest of the neighborhood. Stiles’s curses, like the dog’s yelps, should have awakened everyone in the immediate vicinity. But there were no lights on in the Citozzi’s­­­­ house, or the Schloesser’s or the Ingrams or the Chastains or any of them. “Somebody, help!” she yelled. “Call the police!”

“Shut up!” Stiles barked at her, turning. “Do you want to get someone else killed?”

With his back turned, the dark ones in the bushes came rushing on.

She tried to shout a warning. But the sight of those dark figures scurrying like human spiders across the lawn stole her voice. But Stiles was already turning, expectant. The sighting beam swept across the figures at waist level and the H & K played another riff. One figure reacted like a movie stuntman and pitched backward as the rounds slapped into its gut. Just as quickly it was back on its feet and running, this time in the opposite direction. The other figure was caught at waist level and the shock of impact made its feet dig in and skid to a stop. The rest of it, however, kept on going and the cleanly separated torso spilled onto the lawn like a crab thrown from its perch. It flailed about before finally righting itself and scrambling back into the darkness of the hedge, an obscene insect leaving its lower limbs to writhe alone on the moonlit grass.

Stiles hobbled to the van while he changed magazines and forced the stunned Billie inside with the kids. He climbed into the pilot’s chair with obvious discomfort and gunned the engine. “Charlie’s in trouble,” he told them. “Hold on and we still might make it.” He stomped on the gas. The van jolted away from the curb and careened down the sleepy neighborhood street, then squealed around the corner and headed toward the middle of town.