The sound of splintered wood came from outside, and then the breaking of glass. Heavy footsteps rushed across the room.

“Stay down!” Rudd yelled.

“What’s happening?” Neve asked, yanking open the bathroom door.

Rudd had his hand on his forehead, breathing loudly as he leaned against the wall.

“The cop. They shot the cop.”

“Who shot the cop?” Neve demanded.

“They’re outside. They must have heard the cop on the scanner. How’d they get here so fast? They’re gonna make it look like we shot through the door at the cop and he fired back. Shit … Kevin…”

“What about Kevin?”

“Stay in there, Neve—”

She pushed her way past him and then gasped. “Kevin!”

“Neve, don’t—” Rudd rushed after her.

“Now,” Quincy said, pointing to the window. “We’ve got to get out now.”

William nodded, reaching for Lily. “Come on.”

She immediately came to him. He began to lift her up when the sound of more bullets riddled the front room, along with the crashing of glass, followed by a scream.

“Lift her out!” William said, sliding to peer around the doorframe.

The front door was splintered with holes, the window nearly shot out. Kevin lay in the sunlight streaming through, covered in blood. Neve slumped, unmoving, on the floor in front of the bed, where she clearly had run into the line of fire.

“My God,” William whispered. Bodies on the floor. Bodies at the airport, in the field.

Rudd kneeled in the back corner with a AK-47, sweat pouring down his shaved head.

“They’ve got to have snipers out there,” Rudd gasped. “We can’t get out. Where’s the damn SUV?”

Neve’s hair was a matted dark red. Kevin’s clothes were stained the same color, his neck tilted unnaturally to the side.

William thought of Lois and her unblinking eyes in the headlights. The agents’ faces as they died, their skin turning yellow, their cheeks sinking, their bodies convulsing in pain.

He turned to Quincy. “Get Lily out that window and run.”

“William—!”

“I’m in here!” William yelled, coming to stand before the window. “I’m not hurt! Don’t shoot! I’m coming out!”

“William!” Rudd was standing now, running for him.

But William got to the door quicker, ripping it open and immediately shutting it. Fighting back the bile that rose to his throat at seeing the dead officer–-more bodies—he stepped over it and lifted his hands into the air.

The heat from the deserted Memphis street was immediately oppressive, rising like smoke as if the pavement were on fire. The blight was everywhere, from the outdated apartment complex across the street to the abandoned gas station next to it. On the roof of the complex, William could see dark figures, their guns pointed at him.

He slowly walked out and then took a sharp right, heading down the street.