Opening a locker, Patrick ripped a tiny square of mirror off with his hands and set it face-up on the floor of the shower, just where the scuff mark was. Then he turned off the lights and took out a laser pointer. He stood where Peter had been apprehended and pointed the beam at the mirror, watched it bounce onto the far wall of the showers, where no bullet had left a mark.

Circling around, he continued to point the beam until it ricocheted up-right through the center of a small window that served as ventilation. He knelt, marking the spot where he stood with a pencil from his pocket. Then he dug out his cell phone. “Diana,” he said when the prosecutor answered. “Don’t let that trial start tomorrow.”

“I know it’s unusual,” Diana said in court the next morning, “and that we have a jury sitting here, but I have to ask for a recess until my detective gets here. He’s investigating something new on the case…possibly something exculpatory.”

“Have you called him?” Judge Wagner asked.

“Several times.” Patrick was not answering his phone. If he was, then she could have told him directly how much she wanted to kill him.

“I have to object, Your Honor,” Jordan said. “We’re ready to go forward. I’m sure that Ms. Leven will give me that exculpatory information, if and when it ever arrives, but I’m willing at this point to take my chances. And since we’re all here at the bench, I’d like to add that I have a witness who’s prepared to testify right now.”

“What witness?” Diana said. “You don’t have anyone else to call.”

He smiled at her. “Judge Cormier’s daughter.”

Alex sat outside the courtroom, holding tight to Josie’s hand. “This is going to be over before you know it.”

The great irony here, Alex knew, was that months ago when she’d fought so hard to be the judge on this case, it was because she felt more at ease offering legal comfort to her daughter than emotional comfort. Well, here she was, and Josie was about to testify in the arena Alex knew better than anyone else, and she still didn’t have any grand judicial advice that could help her.

It would be scary. It would be painful. And all Alex could do was watch her suffer.

A bailiff came out to them. “Judge,” he said. “If your daughter’s ready?”

Alex squeezed Josie’s hand. “Just tell them what you know,” she said, and she stood up to take a seat in the courtroom.

“Mom?” Josie called after her, and Alex turned. “What if what you know isn’t what people want to hear?”

Alex tried to smile. “Tell the truth,” she said. “You can’t lose.”

To comply with discovery rules, Jordan handed Diana a synopsis of Josie’s testimony as she was walking up to the stand. “When did you get this?” the prosecutor whispered.

“This weekend. Sorry,” he said, although he really wasn’t. He walked toward Josie, who looked small and pale. Her hair had been gathered into a neat ponytail, and her hands were folded in her lap. She was studiously avoiding anyone’s gaze by focusing on the grain of the wood on the rail of the witness stand.

“Can you state your name?”

“Josie Cormier.”

“Where do you live, Josie?”

“45 East Prescott Street, in Sterling.”

“How old are you?”

“I’m seventeen,” she said.

Jordan took a step closer, so that only she would be able to hear him. “See?” he murmured. “Piece of cake.” He winked at her, and he thought she might even have smiled back the tiniest bit.

“Where were you on the morning of March 6, 2007?”

“I was at school.”

“What class did you have first period?”

“English,” Josie said softly.

“What about second period?”

“Math.”

“Third period?”

“I had a study.”

“Where did you spend it?”

“With my boyfriend,” she said. “Matt Royston.” She looked sideways, blinking too fast.

“Where were you and Matt during third period?”

“We left the cafeteria. We were going to his locker, before the next class.”

“What happened then?”

Josie looked into her lap. “There was a lot of noise. And people started running. People were screaming about guns, about someone with a gun. A friend of ours, Drew Girard, told us it was Peter.”

She glanced up then, and her eyes locked on Peter’s. For a long moment, she just stared at him, and then she closed her eyes and turned away.

“Did you know what was going on?”

“No.”

“Did you see anyone shooting?”

“No.”

“Where did you go?”

“To the gym. We ran across it, toward the locker room. I knew he was coming closer, because I kept hearing gunshots.”

“Who was with you when you went into the locker room?”

“I thought Drew and Matt, but when I turned around, I realized that Drew wasn’t there. He’d been shot.”

“Did you see Drew getting shot?”

Josie shook her head. “No.”

“Did you see Peter before you got into the locker room?”

“No.” Her face crumpled, and she wiped at her eyes.

“Josie,” Jordan said, “what happened next?”

10:16 A.M., The Day Of

Get down,” Matt hissed, and he shoved Josie so that she fell behind the wooden bench.

It wasn’t a good place to hide, but then, nowhere in the locker room was a good place to hide. Matt’s plan had been to climb out the window in the shower, and he’d even opened it up, but then they’d heard the shots in the gym and realized they didn’t have time to drag the bench over and climb through. They’d boxed themselves in, literally.

She curled herself into a ball and Matt crouched down in front of her. Her heart thundered against his back, and she kept forgetting to breathe.

He reached behind him until he found her hand. “If anything happens, Jo,” he whispered, “I loved you.”

Josie started to cry. She was going to die; they were all going to die. She thought of a hundred things she hadn’t done yet that she so badly wanted to do: go to Australia, swim with dolphins. Learn all the words to “Bohemian Rhapsody.” Graduate.

Get married.

She wiped her face against the back of Matt’s shirt, and then the locker room burst open. Peter stumbled inside, his eyes wild, holding a handgun. His left sneaker was untied, Josie noticed, and then she couldn’t believe she noticed. He lifted his gun at Matt, and she couldn’t help it; she screamed.

Maybe it was the noise; maybe it was her voice. It startled Peter, and he dropped his backpack. It slid off his shoulder, and as it did, another gun fell out of an open pocket.

It skittered across the floor, landing just behind Josie’s left foot.

Do you know how there are moments when the world moves so slowly you can feel your bones shifting, your mind tumbling? When you think that no matter what happens to you for the rest of your life, you will remember every last detail of that one minute forever? Josie watched her hand stretch back, watched her fingers curl around the cold black butt of the gun. Fumbling it, she staggered upright, pointing the gun at Peter.

Matt backed away toward the showers, under Josie’s cover. Peter held his gun steady, still pointing it at Matt, even though Josie was closer. “Josie,” he said. “Let me finish this.”

“Shoot him, Josie,” Matt said. “Fucking shoot him.”

Peter pulled back the slide of the gun so that a bullet from the clip would cycle into place. Watching him carefully, Josie mimicked his actions.

She remembered being in nursery school with Peter-how other boys would pick up sticks or rocks and run around yelling Hands up. What had she and Peter used the sticks for? She couldn’t recall.

“Josie, for Christ’s sake!” Matt was sweating, his eyes wide. “Are you fucking stupid?”

“Don’t talk to her like that,” Peter cried.

“Shut up, asshole,” Matt said. “You think she’s going to save you?” He turned to Josie. “What are you waiting for? Shoot.”