Holt gave a quick signal, and the officers at the front door moved. Angela heard the first hard blow against the wood. She breathed in, then said into her phone, clearly enough for the neighbors to hear, "Marcus, they're forcing the door. They still haven't shown me a warrant."
For one fraction of a second the neighborhood seemed to hold its breath. Then came the splintering crack of a doorframe giving way, a sound Angela would remember long after the police cars and flashing lights were gone.
The two officers disappeared through the doorway, their flashlights slicing across the living room. One of them shouted that the first floor was clear, although he had hardly been inside long enough to look behind the sofa. Holt ordered them to continue and told a third officer to check the garage. Angela heard the familiar creak of her front hall floorboards followed by a violent crash that sounded like her antique entry table falling over.
"Stop," she said, not because she expected Holt to listen but because silence might later be mistaken for consent. "There is no one in my home except the people you just sent inside. My husband is away on duty. You are damaging private property without explaining the emergency."
Griggs yanked her wrist. "You keep talking like that, we'll add interference."
"I'm not stopping anyone. I'm asking you to follow the law."
A few feet away, a younger officer looked toward the house and then at Holt. His nameplate read Dawson, and his expression was very different from Griggs's. "Captain," he began, "dispatch hasn't confirmed a suspect description. Should we hold until we get the information?"
Holt turned sharply. "You heard my order. Do your job."
Dawson hesitated long enough for Angela to notice. Then he lowered his eyes and moved toward the porch, leaving her with the painful recognition that knowing an order was wrong and refusing to carry it out were two different kinds of courage. She wondered how many other officers were silently troubled and how many had already persuaded themselves that a captain's certainty was the same thing as evidence.
From the sidewalk came Mr. Martinez's voice. "She's standing right there. She hasn't threatened anybody. Why are you tearing up her house?"
An officer pointed toward him. "Back behind the curb, sir."
"I'm on my porch," Mr. Martinez answered. "I'm not interfering. I'm recording."
Other neighbors began speaking at once. Mrs. Thompson asked whether Angela needed medical attention, and Mr. Wilson demanded that a supervisor be called without realizing that Holt was the supervisor directing the scene. The crowd was not trying to storm the police line, but each new voice made the captain's control look less absolute. Angela saw him scan the raised phones with a displeasure he could no longer disguise.
"Nobody here understands the threat we're dealing with," Holt announced. "A dangerous fugitive may be armed. Go back inside before somebody gets hurt."