No time. There was no time.

No other option.

He readied his gun and leaped forward, kicking out his right leg and driving the heel of his boot onto the inner portion of the deadbolt. The steel was strong; the lock remained secure. But the frame busted inwards with a loud wooden snap!

‘Vancouver Police!’ Striker yelled.

He used his momentum to push forward through the opening, getting out of the fatal funnel as quickly as possible. He collided heavily with the wall, balanced himself, and got his first true look at the shooter.

Red Mask was standing to Striker’s right. In the living room.

Without the mask on.

The sight was almost startling. He was an Asian male, with narrow hard eyes and a face much older than Striker had expected. Definitely not a student from St Patrick’s High. Instantly Striker knew he had been right.

He was dealing with a trained killer.

The expression Red Mask wore was not one of surprise or fear or even anger, but one of acceptance. His body was in a semi-crouched position, ready to bound. In his hand, he held a glistening black pistol. It blended in with the darkness of his kangaroo jacket.

‘Red Mask,’ Striker said, the words falling unexpectedly from his lips. He raised his Sig to open fire, but before he could get a shot off, the gunman spun away from the slumped woman and leaped into the adjoining dining room.

He was quick, Striker thought. So goddam quick.

Before Striker could reposition, shots rang out. Loud, rapid-fire: bang-bang-bang-bang-bang! Bullets rained through the walls, spraying chunks of wallpaper and gypsum into the air.

The years of training took over; Striker dropped low and spun left. More gunfire thundered through the room and the front-room window cracked. One of the rounds tore through the mirror to his left, shattering it into hundreds of shiny splinters. Another bullet hit the metal frame of the door and let out a sharp ziiiing as it ricocheted somewhere down the hall. Others punched into the floorboards, the loud thunk-thunk-thunk of the breaking oak filling the air.

Striker remained low, weathered the storm.

In the living room, the woman was clambering to her feet. ‘Help! Someone help me!’

‘Down!’ he yelled to her. ‘Down! Stay down!’

But she wasn’t listening. She climbed to her feet, turned around as if in a daze, and Striker saw the patches of red that splattered her neck and arm. She’d been hit. And by the looks of it, she was bleeding out bad. She spun around as if she didn’t know where she was, ran left, bumped into the ottoman and toppled forward.

‘Stay DOWN!’ Striker yelled again. He kept a low stance, edged forward and peered into the room.

There was no sign of Red Mask.

The gunman had vanished.

Striker inched out further, until he could see around the bend of the wall, into the dining room. Through the back window, he caught a glimpse of the gunman. Red Mask was outside, running down the back porch steps.

Escaping again.

Striker raced across the room, up to the window, and spotted the man running between a giant pair of maple trees at the far end of the lot. He took quick aim and opened fire, shooting right through the living room window until his mag ran out of bullets.

Through the cracks of glass, Striker could see he had failed. Red Mask had already reached the lane.

Striker reloaded while running through the kitchen. The door to the backyard was open and rocking from the incoming wind. He ran up to it and scanned the narrow trail where the gunman had fled towards the lane.

It was empty.

Striker swore. The gun felt heavy in his hand, and hot. He kept it aimed ahead, his finger alongside the trigger as he made his way down the back porch steps, onto the wet grass of the lawn. He circled the garage, cutting past the small vegetable garden. By the time he reached the lane, the weak wail of faraway police sirens filled the night. Their long undulating cries were heaven to his ears.

Help was near.

Thoughts of Patricia Kwan flooded Striker’s mind, the splatters of blood that painted her arms and chest and neck. Her clothes had been damn near saturated with blood. An arterial bleed, for sure, the most serious kind. He tried to push the thought from his mind and focus on the lane, on all possible escape routes Red Mask might have taken. But three steps later, the image of Patricia Kwan returned to him.

Only he could save her.

He took another hard look around the alley, saw dozens of places the gunman could have fled, and knew he was out of options. A woman’s life was at stake. He turned around and raced back inside the house. Hopefully, the coming patrol units would set up containment, get a dog track, and find Red Mask.

Before he killed again.

Fifty

By the time Courtney had gotten over the shock of what had happened and come to terms with the fact that some of her friends had been killed, her head was full of depressing thoughts and she was fighting to get herself back into that wonderful state of denial – the same one she had made use of when Mom had died. She made the decision to never think about the shootings again, if it were possible. And to divert her mind, she did what she always did.

She looked through all of Bobby Ryan’s pics.

And the more she looked at pictures of him, the more she managed to drown out the depression that was creeping in. Soon it was gone altogether – or at least suppressed to the point where she could ignore it – and a low-level excitement ran all through her body as she imagined herself and Bobby together. A nervous dread filled her, too, as she flicked from photo to photo to see if he was cuddling or kissing any other girls.

When she saw that he wasn’t, she felt better, but her anxiety stayed.

She right-clicked on a few of her Bobby favourites, then saved them to the folder on her desktop. When done, she opened up the one she loved most – the one with him smiling and holding a Starbucks cup – and made it her screensaver.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, she let go of him. She clicked off of the Friends tab and returned to her Home tab. She needed to add her own personal blog for the day, but all she could come up with was a big fat zero. She slumped in her chair, looked at her tagline, and felt dismayed. So far, all it read was:

The Court is . . .

She finally finished it honestly with:

Missing Mom.

But then she thought it might make her look sappy – God, what if Bobby looked at it, or even worse, that bitch from English class, Mandy? She’d laugh at her, tell all their friends. The thought was agonising, so Courtney quickly deleted the words, then changed them to:

Tired of living here with Dad.

She looked at it. Grinned. That definitely sounded better. Tougher. More angsty. A twinge of guilt fluttered in the corner of her heart, but she drowned it out, thinking that Dad wasn’t even on Facebook, so what would he know? Besides, all he cared about was work and investigations and that goddam Felicia Santos.

But Felicia . . .

She would be on Facebook. No doubt about it. She was into all the cool things. Which was kind of weird, really.

Courtney typed her name in the search bar and found her in seconds.

Felicia wasn’t added as a Friend yet – not that she ever would be – so all Courtney got was her main picture. But that was enough. There she was, Felicia Santos, staring back with her big pretty eyes and long beautiful brown hair brushed over her shoulders. In some ways she reminded Courtney of Raine. So confident. So alluring. And as much as Courtney hated to admit it, Felicia was pretty cool in her own right. She was hot and Spanish and had big boobs busting out everywhere and a perfect smile – all the things men liked.