I walked along the footpath in no direction at all, mere meters, before I stopped at the sight of a set of keys shining in the last of the day’s sun. I crouched shakily and took up the keys. I knew without any kind of clue that they had been dropped by Kevin as he was wrestled toward a big black Escalade by Linda and Sharon. I knew this, saw it before my eyes, as though it was being shown to me by a divine force. When I turned, I saw the car the keys belonged to. A dark gray Commodore, parked adjacent to the keys. I walked toward the car, Kevin’s car, and opened the front door. Got in. I don’t know why I did these things. I was operating now on pure automation, my brain filled with thunder and noise.

There was a thin journal and a pen on the front passenger seat. I looked at the book. Didn’t touch it. Gripped the steering wheel and breathed in the smell of him.

My phone, in my lap, rang with an unknown number. I knew who it was before I accepted the call.

“Conkaffey,” Khalid said. “I’m goin’ to give you an address.”

It was faster than she thought possible. Like the crashing of a wave, energy surging upward, tipping, falling uncontrollably. Amanda lifted the gun, turned, scraped her knees on the floor, actioned the weapon as her eyes met Bran’s. He was shocked by what he’d done. The weak one finally having the strength to do what was necessary. His mouth was open, hanging. Amanda fired twice, hit him somewhere in the mid-section, shoving him backward into the kitchen bench, the wall beside it. He slid down. Jay grabbed at her. She butted him hard with the gun, slammed his head with suddenly frantic movements, the uncoordinated fending-off of a wild cat.

Maybe she screamed. Amanda didn’t know. At the edges of her vision she saw something she hadn’t seen in decades. The bare dirt at the rim of a small clearing in the rainforest, the gaping mouth of an open car. For a second, she was back there, back at the site of her first murder. She felt once again the transition from human to animal fighting to survive.

And then it was gone. Jay had slumped against her legs, Bran doubled over by the kitchen, gripping at his stomach, groaning. Amanda went there, took his gun, thought about finishing him off. But the visions were gone now. She was here, in the old lady’s house, one man unconscious, one man dying, two guns in her hands.

She went to Pip. The brand-new detective was lying on her back on the grass, her feet hanging over the edge of the glass door into the living room. Amanda crawled to her side, dropped the guns, put a hand on her partner’s blood-soaked hands, the warm, slick fingers covering the hole in her chest.

“Jeepers,” Amanda said. “This isn’t good.”