Chapter Three #4
We moved down the main hall in a staggered line, shoulders to the wall, eyes sweeping doorways. Classroom doors had been pulled shut, some with chairs wedged under their handles, others with copy machines or trash cans used as barricades.
“Police,” one of the officers called through a door, voice low but clear. “Stay where you are. Do not open this door unless an officer with a badge tells you face-to-face it’s secure. Do you understand?”
I heard muffled confirmations from inside. A small, thin sob. Whispered shushing.
Although it broke my heart to leave them behind, we kept going.
“Basement stairwell’s at the far end,” Thomas murmured.
My phone buzzed once in my pocket. I slid it free with my support hand, keeping my weapon steady as I checked the screen.
The dot hadn’t moved.
“Still there,” I said, tucking the phone away. Relief, terror, and a wave of numbness hit all at once.
We passed an open door on the left. The officer closest to it sliced in, weapon up, then stepped back.
“Clear. Keep moving.” He called it in quietly over his radio as we moved toward the stairwell in unison.
The building felt wrong. Classrooms were supposed to be full of noise and boredom, kids half-listening, chairs scraping, pens tapping. Instead, every footstep sounded louder than it should have, and the corridors seemed to hold their breath with us.
At the stairwell, we stacked along the wall. The officer in front of me cracked the door just enough to see through the narrow window.
“Clear visual,” he whispered. “No movement.”
“Basement first,” Thomas said, frustrated. “These rooms have already been swept.”
We filed down, one at a time, keeping tight to the rail, weapons angled down until the landing, then up again.
The air cooled as we descended. It smelled like cinderblock, industrial cleaner, and a faint undercurrent of something metallic from the radiator system.
My chest tightened the lower we went. Our point stopped, then hesitated without explanation.
Somewhere under our feet was that pale-haired blue dot.
Somewhere under our feet, our kid was curled on a hard floor, trying not to breathe too loud.
Something in me snapped, hot and immediate, leaving no room for anything but fury. Suddenly, we couldn’t get to her fast enough.
“Let’s move,” I hissed, pushing forward without bothering to check if anyone followed.
At the base of the stairs, the door to the basement hall was shut. Coleman caught up to me, listened with his ear close to the wood, then tried to ease the door open, muzzle first.
“We instructed them to barricade,” Thomas said.
I reached into my pocket, pulling out my phone. “Livvy? Are you still there?”
“Still here,” she whispered.
“We’re right outside the door. Come clear it for us.”
For a second, nobody moved. After a few seconds, one head peeked out, then another. Soon, nine college students were slowly crawling from the closet they’d been hiding in.
Livvy’s eyes found mine in the dim light, wide and red-rimmed. Her hair had half fallen out of its bun, strands stuck to her damp cheeks.
Three tables, six chairs, and one ping pong table later, the door swung open. I holstered my weapon and wrapped Livvy in my arms. She wept quietly into my chest, and I held her, finally exhaling when Thomas encapsulated us both.
Coleman directed two of his men to pat down the students, but I stopped him, silently gesturing that I’d pat down the girls, leaving the boys to one of Coleman’s officers. He directed the rest of his team to clear the room, calling it in once his officers gave him confirmation.
“Are they your parents?” one of the students asked.
“Is it over?” another one interjected before Livvy answered.
As if coordinated, a distant gun shot rang out somewhere above us, and then three more. The kids ducked, gasped, and whimpered, cowering behind us.
“We need to move,” Thomas said.
We climbed the first set of stairs to the main level, the hallway stretching out in both directions and lit by a row of humming fluorescent fixtures. Bulletin boards full of flyers that suddenly looked ridiculous lined the walls. Study abroad. A cappella auditions. Yoga in the quad.
I pulled back enough to see Livvy’s face. Her mascara was streaked down her cheeks, her eyes bloodshot, but there was color there. Life.
I cupped one side of her jaw with my palm. “We’re taking you home, okay? Follow me.”
She nodded, even though her legs wobbled when we eased forward. She clung to my blazer with a shaking fist, as if loosening her grip would drop her straight back into the dark where she’d been waiting to die.
I looked past her at the others. They were all some level of traumatized. One girl still had both hands pressed over her mouth. A kid in a hoodie stared at the floor, unblinking, as if seeing something that wasn’t there.
“I’m Agent Lindy,” I said. “This is Agent Maddox. We’re going to walk you out to the east lot.
Stay between the officers, listen to every instruction a uniform gives you, and under no circumstance do you break away from the group.
Stay off your phones. Keep your hands where everyone can see them. Understood?”
A shaky chorus of confirmations followed.
Thomas moved to the mouth of the hallway in an angled posture as he checked that it was clear. “We’re moving,” he spoke into his radio. “We’ve got nine students. Basement lounge stairwell to staging.”
At the stairwell, we stopped to regroup. One officer went ahead to clear the landing. My pulse climbed with every step. We took them up in a slow, controlled line. Out of the dark, away from Hell, and into the sunlight.
Coleman gestured that the hallway was clear and for us to move.
As we obeyed, Livvy stayed glued to my side, her fingers hooked on my sleeve.
Every sound made the students flinch—a radio crackle, a shout from upstairs, the squeak of a shoe on the linoleum.
I didn’t blame them; fear kept them alert, but it also slowed us down each time they paused.
I had no time to coddle them. The only way to help was to keep them moving and get them outside, alive.
As we made our way down the hall and to the exit, the light felt too bright. Voices spilled toward us, frantic whispers were layered and chaotic. Orders, questions, someone crying somewhere to our right.
“Keep your eyes on the ground,” I murmured to Livvy.
She nodded into my shoulder.
We passed another classroom full of students pressed under desks. One of them saw us and began to scramble up, panic and hope battling it out in his eyes.
“Stay,” the officer hissed. “Don’t move until an officer with a badge comes to your door. You hear me? Stay down.”
The kid nodded and sank back into the dim light, his eyes wide.
At the side exit, the world exploded back into sirens, shouting, and wind. We stepped out into it, shielding our eyes from the sun and squinting.
The instant our feet hit the concrete outside, a sharp, fast barrage of gunshots cracked across the campus from the far side.
The sound bounced off the buildings, rolling over us and beyond the parking lot.
The students flinched as one, one even crying out before one of the other students covered her mouth.
I pulled Livvy closer, my arm instinctively wrapping around her head, tucking her against me. Thomas pivoted toward the sound, weapon up, body turning just enough that he put himself between us and whatever might come next.
Radios flared on every hip around us.
“Shots fired, shots fired, north side, repeat, north side!”
A breathless second. Then two… three.
“Shooter down! Shooter down! Suspect is down! Maintain perimeter, begin secondary sweep. Shooter is down!”
The words hit my ears before my brain believed them, but I knew better than to let my guard down just yet.
“Have they ruled out a secondary shooter?” Thomas asked.
“Not yet, but we’re moving,” Coleman said.
Livvy’s shoulders shook once, a great shuddering release that came from somewhere deep.
“We’re almost there,” I whispered into her hair, although I knew the aftermath would be equally complicated. “We’ve got you.”
She nodded against me, her fingers still locked around my sleeve. Now, after facing death twice, I wondered if she’d ever let me go.
Selfishly, part of me hoped she wouldn’t.