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He parked far enough from the house that the engine wouldn’t be heard and shut it off. He opened the duffel and removed the goat mask. Colin took the pig mask, and I lifted the rabbit.

We put on black gloves before lowering the masks over our faces. John checked the pistol beneath his jacket, and Colin did the same. I secured my knife against my side before we walked toward the house.

When we got to the door, I knocked three times.

I listened to footsteps approaching from somewhere beyond the door. The curtain covering the narrow window beside it shifted, revealing Greg’s face for barely a second before recognition changed everything about him. His eyes widened behind the glass when he saw the masks, and then he disappeared from view.

I heard hurried movement inside, followed by the metallic scrape of the lock, but whatever Greg intended to do came several seconds too late. Colin drove his boot into the door beside the lock. The frame cracked but held. He struck it again, and the door burst inward.

Colin drove his boot into Greg’s chest and sent him flying backward into the hallway mirror. Glass exploded around him as his body crashed through it, raining shards across his shoulders and the hardwood beneath him. Several framed photographs fell from the wall and shattered beside him, and Greg landed hard among the wreckage with blood already running from a cut above his eyebrow.

Marie screamed from the living room. She jumped from the piano bench and lunged toward the phone, but John reached her first and caught her. She fought him immediately, twisting hard enough to nearly pull herself free before grabbing the back of the couch with both hands. John tore her fingers loose one at a time and dragged her backward while her slippers scraped against the hardwood. She screamed Greg’s name as he tried pushing himself upright among the broken glass, and I stepped calmly inside before closing the front door behind us.

The house smelled almost offensively pleasant. Cinnamon and sugar drifted from the kitchen beneath the heavier smell of woodsmoke from the fireplace, and something was baking in the oven. Sheet music remained open above the piano, an uncorked bottle of wine sat beside two glasses on the kitchen counter, and family photographs covered nearly every available surface.

Greg and Marie had expected an ordinary evening. They had no idea it would be their last.

Greg staggered to his feet and charged before I could appreciate the thought much longer. His first fist caught my shoulder, but his second never reached me. I drove my fist into his ribs and felt his body fold around the impact before I caught him across the jaw. Blood sprayed from his mouth and spotted the hardwood.

He stumbled backward, nearly falling over the broken frame behind him, but Marie screaming his name seemed to give him another burst of energy. Greg came at me again with blood running over his lips, and I caught the front of his shirt before driving my fist directly into his face. His nose broke beneath the impact with a wet crunch, spilling blood over his mouth and chin. I hit him again before he could recover, then again when his knees started giving beneath him. One of his teeth landed among the broken glass near my shoe.

He was still trying to reach Marie.

It was almost admirable.

I caught him across the mouth one final time and watched his legs finally collapse beneath him. He landed on one knee before pitching forward, his palm coming down directly into the shattered mirror.

Glass disappeared into his skin, and when he instinctively jerked his hand away, several pieces remained embedded in his palm while blood streaked across the floor beneath him.

Colin grabbed him beneath the arms and dragged him toward the dining room, leaving a smeared trail of red behind his shoes.

John had already forced Marie into one of the dining chairs and forced a gag in her mouth. She kicked and twisted while he secured her wrists, screaming for Greg until Colin struck her across the face hard enough to snap her head sideways. Her lip split, and blood sprayed across the polished table before running down her chin.

Greg saw it happen and lost whatever composure remained. He tried wrenching himself away from me and Colin, but there was nowhere for him to go. We forced him into the chair opposite his wife and secured his wrists, ankles, and torso while he fought us with everything he had left. Colin shoved a gag between his teeth and tied it tightly behind his head, and within seconds the fabric had begun absorbing blood from Greg’s ruined mouth and broken nose.

By the time we finished, husband and wife were sitting opposite each other in the middle of their own dining room. Marie trembled so violently that the chair shook beneath her, while Greg’s chest heaved against the ropes surrounding him. Blood covered his face and soaked into the gag.

His right eye had already started swelling, his nose sat crooked against his face, and several cuts from the mirror continued leaking blood down his neck. Marie stared at him as though she could hardly recognize the man sitting across from her.

John rested one hand against the back of her chair.

“Where’s your daughter?”

Greg’s attention moved toward his wife.

Marie noticed his reaction and answered immediately.

“She isn’t here.”

The gag distorted the words, but I understood her. Her voice trembled beneath the fabric. John watched her for several seconds. He knew she was lying, but he stepped away without pressing her.

I wandered toward the stereo while Colin checked Greg’s restraints. A neat stack of CDs had been arranged beside it, and Johnny Cash caught my attention. I selected “The Man Comes Around” and raised the volume until the opening guitar filled the house.

I positioned the camera phone across the room, its small red light glowing above the lens while Greg struggled uselessly against his restraints.

Screaming always sounded better with music.

I returned to the table as Colin grabbed Greg’s right hand and forced it flat against the wood. That was when I noticed the ring. The Collective ring sat on his finger, smeared with his own blood but still recognizable beneath it.