“NOW!” MAX GAVE the command that ended Charles “Chas” Sefton’s life the instant Shannon jerked free and there was a window of opportunity.

Red bloomed.

Three bodies went down in a tangle of arms and legs. And red.

Max would never forget the sight of all the red.

It was the first time he’d ordered a shot be taken; he would never forget that moment.

Hopefully, he would never have to give it again.

Chalmers should have been the one to make that call. Or Mal Brockman. But it had been him. They’d insisted that it be him in charge.

He understood with Chalmers. The guy was her direct supervisor. It was too risky. Chalmers could have hesitated at the last minute.

But it had been Max.

Damn it. He never wanted to do that again.

“Get in there!” He yelled the command into his radio, even though everyone was already moving.

Jac wouldn’t be moving. Someone would have to collect her and her weapon. Photograph her positioning.

Someone would have to help her deal with what she had just had to do, too.

Taking a life was never going to be easy. For any of them.

He reached the body of Chas Sefton first.

Jac hadn’t missed.

Max rolled the much smaller man onto his back. Normally, he wouldn’t move a body until photos could be taken and procedure followed. Stephenson was already filming everything with his phone. Standard procedure was for the third-in-command—in this case, Stephenson—to capture evidence if someone else was attending to assisting victims.

Ezra was moving. Cursing.

Lifting himself off Shannon.

Max focused on her.

Shannon was pulling herself into a sitting position. Poor kid’s pale pink blouse was covered with red.

And growing.

“She’s been hit!” He yelled at the responders and strategic response agents flooding the building. They’d been held back at Chalmers’ insistence. But now...

“Again? The weasel never fired. We have got to talk about me being a magnet for friendly fire, here,” Shannon looked at him. “Hey, Jones. I’m really glad to see you tonight. Jac around?”

“Yeah. But... I think she may have been the one to shoot you tonight. From a treehouse, of all places. Unless Sefton fired off a shot we missed?”

“No. He didn’t fire.” Ezra was pawing at her blouse. He pulled a knife free and sliced open her sleeve. He grabbed both sides of the thin cotton and ripped. “It passed through.”

Max pulled his own T-shirt over his head and gave it to his colleague. They needed to get that blood stopped. Fast. “Use this. It’s probably cleaner than anything else in this shithole.”

“It’s not that bad. But I’m sure property value just plunged. At least in this house. Hope Agent Lorcan’s parents don’t plan on moving out of the neighborhood for a while. At least until the blood is gone.”

Chalmers ran in, straight to Shannon Toliver’s side. He must have gotten held up outside the building by the response units from the local field office. “How badly has she been hit?”

“I’ve had...far too many hits in the arms lately, Ken. Can we start wrapping my arms in bubble wrap from now on?”

“Might not be a bad idea. Hahn, get her street side. Ambulance is out there already. Get her taken care of. We’ll deal with procedure later. Everything else can wait.”

Max thought that sounded like a damned wise decision.

He watched as that lucky bastard Ezra scooped his girl up into his arms and carried her—even though she was protesting that she could walk—right out of that damned two-story brick home forever.

He looked at Chalmers. “I’m going to go find Jac. Handle things on that end.”

“You do that. Keep her contained. Only let her speak to PAVAD: IA. Kyra’s outside with Leina now.”

“Understood.”

“Good. You did well, tonight. Brought our people home. Well done.”

Max nodded. “I didn’t do anything except make the call to Jac. Because I had the best visibility. That was all. Shannon is the one who kept her head. That fake puke idea was ingenious.”

“She’s a smart woman, I can say that.” How Chalmers felt about the only woman on his team was clear for Max to see. No surprise, Chalmers’ wife and Shannon were good friends.

He put thoughts of Shannon and Ezra out of his head.

It was time to find Jac. Make certain she was okay.

What she had had to do would weigh on her forever.

Every life counted.

Something Chas Sefton had apparently missed over the last six years.

They still had a long night ahead of them all.