She was describing our plan as if we hadn’t already executed it, making me realize that she and Trey had no way of knowing that it was over. They hadn’t sensed Jennie carrying the spirits away with her like I had, and Violet had just given her father a simple way to protect his family—by killing me. I could see in his eyes that he was thinking exactly that. He raised the gun and pointed it at me again, and I backed away, feeling nauseous as I saw Henry’s body lying there, immobile.

“No, no, no,” I murmured. “Don’t do this!”

In my panic, I dropped my phone to the floor, and it yanked the earbud out of my ear on its descent. There was nowhere to run. Mr. Simmons was less than ten feet away from me and advancing as quickly as I was maneuvering around the sofa. He stepped over Henry as if Henry were nothing more than a pile of clothes, and instantly I understood how he was planning to carry this out. He was going to kill me and tell the police that Trey was responsible for my murder and for Henry’s.

“This ends now!” he roared. But as he squeezed the trigger, Trey barreled toward him and knocked him over. Mr. Simmons’s arm shifted just as he fired the gun, and the bullet grazed my shoulder blade as I dashed toward the front door.

“Run!” Trey yelled.

I extended my fingers for the door handle as my feet carried me into the foyer, and Mr. Simmons fired again. The bullet ricocheted off the brass of the handle, missing my hand by centimeters. I snapped my hand to my chest and ran in the only direction my brain seemed to acknowledge: up the grand staircase.

As soon as I began scrambling up the stairs, I knew I’d chosen poorly. The black pumps on my feet were just loose enough to be treacherous when I tried to move quickly. I didn’t know my way around the upper floors of Violet’s house beyond the hallway leading to her bedroom and Mr. Simmons’s office. Doors and windows could be locked. There was a back staircase that led into the sunroom—however, I didn’t know from where on the upper floors I could access it. But there was no time to change my mind. I could hear Mr. Simmons’s heavy footsteps on the stairs behind me, and he was skipping steps to catch up to me. At least he’d temporarily forgotten about Trey and was completely intent on catching me. But as I reached the top of the staircase and stole a glimpse over my shoulder, I saw Trey chasing after us at the bottom of the steps.

A chunk of drywall inches from my eyes exploded, and I realized that Mr. Simmons had fired again, this time at my head. Without another fraction of a second to spare, I bolted down the hallway and ran past the open doorway of Violet’s bedroom, and past the closed door of Mr. Simmons’s office.