It got worse in a hurry. Two more victims were inside the vault, a man and a woman. They had been shot several times. The business suits and bodies were riddled with bullets. Had they been punished too? I wondered. What were their sins? Why the hell was this happening?

"This makes no goddamn sense to me," Kyle said rubbing his face with both hands. It was a familiar tic of his and instantly reminded me of the many cases we had worked together in the past. We complained about it sometimes, but we'd always been there for each other.

"Bank robbers don't usually kill anybody. Not pros. "Agent Cavalierre spoke," So why do this sick stunt?"

"Was the family of the manager held hostage as in the Silver Spring robbery?" I asked. I almost didn't want to hear the answer.

Kyle looked my way, nodded. "Mother and three kids. We just got word on them. Thank God, they were released. They weren't harmed. So why were these four butchered, and the family released? Where's a pattern?"

I didn't know yet. Kyle was right: The robbery-murders didn't make any sense. Or rather, we weren't thinking like the killers. We didn't get it, did we?

"There might have been a screw-up here at the branch. If this is connected to the bank in Silver Spring."

"We have to assume it is," said Agent Cavalierre. "The father, nanny, and child were killed in Silver Spring because the manager was warned that the crew had to be out of the bank at a certain time or the hostages died. According to the video monitor at the bank, they missed by less than thirty seconds."

As usual, Kyle had information the rest of us didn't. He shared it now. "An alarm went to the police here in Falls Church. I think that's what prompted the four murders. We're trying to run down where the warning call came from."

"How would the crew know the alarm went to the police?" I asked.

"They probably had a police scanner," Agent Cavalierre said.

Kyle nodded. "Agent Cavalierre is very smart about bank robberies," he said 'and just about everything else."

"I'm after Kyle's job," she said and smiled thinly. I took Agent Cavalierre at her word.

I accompanied Kyle and his first-team entourage to FBI headquarters in downtown Washington. We were all feeling a little sick about the murder scene we'd witnessed. Agent Cavalierre did know a great deal about bank robberies, including several committed in the Midwest that resembled the Citibank and First Union jobs.

At headquarters, she pulled up as much relevant information as she could get in a hurry. We read printouts about a pair of desperadoes named Joseph Dougherty and Terry Lee Connor. I wondered if their exploits might have served as some kind of model for the two recent robberies. Dougherty and Connor had hit several banks in the Midwest. They would usually kidnap the manager's family first. Before one robbery, they held the manager and his family for three days over a holiday weekend, then robbed the bank on a Monday.

"There's a big difference, though. Dougherty and Connor never hurt a soul in any of the robberies," Cavalierre said. "They weren't killers like this current scum we're dealing with. What the hell do they want?"

I made myself go home around seven that night. I had a home-cooked dinner with Nana and the kids: Shallow-fried chicken, cheese grits, and steamed broccoli. After we did the dishes, Damon, Jannie and I trooped down to the basement for the kids' weekly boxing lesson. The boxing lessons have been going on for a couple of years and aren't really necessary for Damon and Jannie anymore. Damon is a clever ten, Jannie's eight, and they can both defend themselves. But they like the exercise and the camaraderie, and so do I. What happened that night came out of the blue. It was unannounced and totally unexpected. Afterward, once I knew what had happened, I understood why.

Jannie and Damon were fooling around, showing off a little, strutting their stuff. Jannie must have walked into a punch from Damon.

The looping blow struck her squarely in the forehead, just above the left eye. That much I'm certain about. The rest was a blur to me. A complete shock. It was as if I was seeing life as a series of stop-motion photos.

Jannie tilted to the left and she went down in a frightening collapse. She hit the floor hard. Her movements suddenly became jerky, and then her limbs went completely stiff. There was absolutely no warning.

"Jannie!" Damon yelled, aware that he'd hit and hurt his sister, though it was an accident.

I hurried to her side as Jannie's body began to shake and spasm uncontrollably. Soft, gagging moans came from her throat. She obviously couldn't speak. Then her eyes rolled way back until only the whites showed.

Jannie began to choke horribly. I yanked off my belt. I folded it and wedged it into her mouth, to keep her from swallowing her tongue, or possibly lacerating it with a hard bite. My heart was pounding as I held the tightly folded belt in her mouth. I kept telling her, "It's okay, it's okay, Jannie. Everything is okay, baby."

I tried to be as soothing as I possibly could be. I tried not to let her see how scared I was. The violent spasms wouldn't stop. I was pretty sure Jannie was having a seizure.

Everything is okay, baby. Everything is going to be fine.

Two or three horrifying minutes passed like that. Everything wasn't okay, though, not even close; everything was as terrible as it could be, as terrible as it had ever been.

Jannie's lips had turned bluish, and she was drooling. Then she lost control of her bladder and peed on the floor. She still couldn't speak.

I had sent Damon upstairs to call for help. An ambulance arrived less than ten minutes after Jannie's seizure ended. So far, there hadn't been another one. I prayed there wouldn't be.

Two EMT attendants hurried down to the basement where I was still kneeling on the floor beside Jannie. I held one of her hands; Nana held the other. We had propped a pillow from the couch under her head and had covered her with a blanket. This is crazy, I kept thinking. This can't be happening.

"You're okay, sweetie," Nana hummed softly.

Jannie finally looked at her. "No I'm not, Nana."

She was fully conscious now, scared and confused. She was also embarrassed because she'd wet herself. She knew something strange and terrible had happened to her. The EMTs were gentle and reassuring. They checked Jannie's vital signs: Temperature, pulse, and blood pressure. Then one of them inserted an IV in her arm, while the other brought out an intubation box," breathing aid.

My heart was still pounding, racing terribly. I felt as if I might stop breathing too.