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out of the gaping hole in the building across the street. More flames spewed from the blown windows, leap-frogging along the outside awnings until a lace of fire strung clear around the corners.
    The moans and darkness took Maggie to another place, a too recent experience. The middle of a forest, thunder and lightning in place of roaring flames. Teenagers injured, two dead. A boy wrapped in barbed wire, bleeding and scared.
    She shook her head, brought her elbows up to raise herself off the damp grass. She closed and rubbed her eyes. Without effort, her fingers found the scar at her left temple.
    Sirens filled the air. She didn’t even see the third fire unit arrive. Black boots stomped by with the rustling of heavy gear. She stayed down on her hands and knees, waiting for the swirl in her headto stop, not pleased when she realized it was simply an aggravated version of her new normal.
    “You okay?”
    Maggie nodded without looking up at Racine. Hadn’t she just asked her that a few minutes ago? She tried to stand. The damn swirl dropped her back to her knees.
    “Stay put for a while.” A new voice.
    She saw the hand on her shoulder before she felt it. When Maggie glanced up at Tully his eyes locked on hers, waiting to find assurance, then darted away, tracking the scene, coming back and pausing at hers for another beat or two before they continued their track again. He turned enough for Maggie to see the bloody back of his head, hair matted and red streaks running down his neck.
    “You’re bleeding.” She reached up. Tried to stand, instinct overriding ability.
    She didn’t wave away his hand from under her elbow. Although for the last several months it was exactly the type of treatment she had resented.
    “Careful,” he said, the concern creasing his brow. “We’re all bleeding.”
    He reached his hand to the back of her neck and brought it back to show her his fingertips, red and slick with her blood.
    “Just take it easy. Are you okay?”
    Her knees wobbled a bit. The swirl inside her head blurred her vision.
    “I might not be okay,” she confessed.
    “I don’t think you are either.”
    Again, she saw his arm around her shoulder without really feeling it.
    “We need a paramedic over here.”
    She heard Tully’s voice through a wind tunnel now.
    The memory flashed in front of her like an old-fashioned film reel caught on a sprocket, jerking from scene to scene. The gun barrel against her head. A blast of light followed by the roar. The pain was intense—a driving pressure, scalding, then peeling off the side of her head.
    Perhaps it really was unrealistic of her to think she could be shot in the head and just shrug it off.
    Tully was still holding on to her. She looked around the chaos and saw Racine with a group of uniformed officers. She was pushing back the crowds while standing tall and strong, legs spread, arms out waving, making room for the paramedics like a traffic cop. From where she and Tully stood, Maggie could see that the back of Racine’s leather bomber jacket had been shredded. And Maggie’s first thought was that Racine would be so pissed. She loved that jacket.
    She tried to take a step but Tully’s fingers tightened their grip, holding her back.
    “Stay put, okay? Let’s have a paramedic take a look at you first.” His voice was quiet, gentle, and certainly didn’t match his grip. “Let the first responders take care of everyone else.” He stopped short of saying, We’ll just get in their way .
    She nodded. She understood. They weren’t trained to take care of the wounded. It was a fact she had to accept, only recently discovering that it didn’t sit well with her. She hated feeling useless, but the truth was, her skills and training couldn’t help the living victims. Her and Tully’s expertise wasn’t needed until the victims were dead and could no longer tell their stories.
    She knew Tully was right on both counts. She did need aparamedic. If she didn’t have someone