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to forget the future that would never be. Christ.
    Rainie had to take another deep breath. Only three more doors. All near the epicenter of violence. All dark and waiting. Time to get on with it.
    Rainie backed up against the wall and sat in a crouch until her hands stopped shaking.
    Only the teacher had a head wound, she thought. A single-entry shot, dead center, delivered with a great deal of precision. The two girls sported a multitude of wounds, high, low, left, right, as if they had walked into a firestorm. But the teacher . . . the teacher was different. Perhaps the intended target? Shooter went for her first, then encountered the two girls walking down the hall?
    Or maybe he started with the girls in the hall, and upon hearing the noise the computer-lab teacher opened her door. She would’ve been right in front of the killer. Had he gotten up his courage by then? Decided it wasn’t that different from a video game? Figured why waste bullets if he could do it with a single shot?
    Either scenario bothered Rainie. For the little girls to have so many wounds and the adult victim only one. There was something to that. She just didn’t have the time to think about it now.
    Suddenly, she heard a noise. The faint screech of a metal chair slowly being pulled across the floor.
    Rainie scrambled across the hallway. She threw herself against the wall next to the classroom door just as the metal handle turned and the door eased open.
    “Don’t do this,” a man said. “We can still fix everything. I swear to you, son, there’s nothing that happened today that we can’t handle.”
    Shep O’Grady came into view, tan uniform stretched tight over his burly frame. His buzz-cut hair glistened with moisture, while his bulldog features were unnaturally pale. From her angle, Rainie could see that he’d managed to unsnap his holster, but he’d never had time to draw his weapon. Now his hands were held in front of him in a gesture of submission. He worked frantically to plead his case.
    “I’m sure it’s all a big mistake. A misunderstanding. These things happen. Now we gotta work together, clear things up. You know there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”
    Shep took another step back, his hands still up, his gaze focused ahead. Being forced into retreat? Rainie didn’t know. Then she glanced fifteen feet behind Shep, where the three bodies lay. Shep was being herded into the scene of carnage, she realized. And when he got there . . .
    It was amazing how steady her hands felt, how calm her nerves had become. Shooting was something she’d done all her life. Never in the line of duty, but Shep was her boss, her friend. They went way back, had a history together few could appreciate. Everything felt natural after all.
    One last thought: commit to the shot, for hesitation was the number one killer of cops.
    Rainie pivoted sharply away from the wall and simultaneously shoved Shep out of the doorway. Her gun went level, her legs braced for recoil, and her fingers found the trigger just as Shep screamed,
“No!”
    And Rainie found herself face-to-face with thirteen-year-old Danny O’Grady, pale as a sheet and bearing two handguns.

FOUR
                                                                                                                                                                                                               
    Tuesday, May 15, 2:43 P . M .
    O REGON STATE HOMICIDE DETECTIVE Abe Sanders had just sat down to a late lunch, a big Italian sub with double pepperoni and double cheese. His wife would yell at him if she saw him, lecture him about jeopardizing his health and turning her into a cholesterol widow. Most of the time he agreed with her, and at the ripe old age of forty-two, he had the trim