The cop with the largest headphones was narrating her movements into a wire microphone, communicating with other cops. One high-angle view indicated snipers in position on the rooftops across the street.

“She’s mumbling again,” the man relayed. “Teller number three is sobbing and the suspect is running out of patience with her. Wait a minute…she’s got some other object. It’s a can.”

Odessa saw the canister in the manager’s hand. It looked like cleaning solution, or a can of air freshener from the bathroom.

The man continued. “She’s dumping out customers’ handbags on the counter…looking for something…oh man. I see it now…”

Odessa saw the manager flick a butane lighter. The woman walked over to the pile of cash.

“I don’t believe it,” he said. “She’s burning it. She’s burning it all.”

The manager lit the spray, igniting the product, then turning the improvised flamethrower on the paper currency.

“Roger that,” said the man, receiving other transmissions. “She’s backing off now. We’re going to get smoke alarms. She tossed the canister away. Still mumbling in a very strange voice. Over and over again. Something like, ‘Blackwood…Blackwood…’”

Odessa was a moment processing these words. Blackwood. She said loudly, “What?”

Heads turned her way. Then another screen came on, a new video source, a body camera having been activated. The jerky perspective made it difficult to understand what was being seen at first. Odessa made out officers being strapped up in tactical gear, buckling helmets and performing weapons checks on assault rifles. It was the NYPD Emergency Service Unit, their SWAT team squad, preparing for a breach assault on the bank.

“You’re going to do a dynamic entry?” said Odessa. “Hey, guys, listen to me. She’s going to force a shoot.”

One man pulled his phone away from his ear in aggravation. “Who the hell are you again?” he said.

“She’s drawing you in,” said Odessa. “She wants this.”

“Holy Christ,” said the man with the headphones. “Who is this now?”

Odessa scanned the monitors until she saw what he was referring to. A person was walking down the middle of the street from the barricade heading toward the bank. A person wearing a finely tailored dark suit.

“Shit—”

Odessa burst out of the police van, racing around it, cutting between two blue sawhorses, running toward Blackwood before the police gunned him down. She waved her credentials wildly, hooking Blackwood’s arm and yanking him back.

“What the hell are you doing?” she said. “They’re going to shoot you.”

“I’m the only one who can stop this,” he said.

“I know that,” she said, tugging on him, though he wouldn’t budge. “She’s asking for you. It’s asking for you.”

Blackwood was not surprised. “Yes,” he said. “It drew us here.”

“Drew us…?” said Odessa. And then, further refining her confusion, she clarified, “Drew us?”