For half a second no one moved. Then the alarms multiplied below us — real alarms now, sirens, shouting, the city waking to fire.

Elias used the distraction to slam his head into my jaw. I staggered, and he bolted for the door.

He didn’t get far. Victor Moreno appeared in the doorway with a fire extinguisher and drove it into Elias’s stomach like he’d been waiting his whole legal career for that exact moment.

Elias folded. The younger officer came in behind him and took him to the floor.

Anna dropped to her knees by the bed and pulled both children into her arms. “It’s okay,” she kept saying, though her face said nothing was. “It’s okay.

Mama’s here.” Samuel sobbed into her uniform; Sophia clutched her neck so tightly her small hands turned pink.