The two of them had been undone not by luck, but by their own defining flaw, the contempt that made them underestimate me.

Valerie had spent a lifetime deciding I was nothing, and she had persuaded Julian of it, and that shared, comfortable, lazy contempt was the exact crack through which everything they had built came pouring down.”

Chapter 18 — On the Ground

Before Julian could reach the side exit, the heavy oak front door, the same door that had groaned open to admit him an hour before, was kicked inward with a deafening crash.

Four armed King County Sheriff’s deputies burst into the foyer, weapons drawn and low, flanked by two plainclothes detectives and, behind them, an emergency medical team with a stretcher.