She didn’t hear them enter, but they had subdued Stenson and Mickey tying them to wooden chairs. Their feet and chests were bare and their bodies immobilized with rope and wide clear duct tape. They both had dirty, blood- stained towels stuffed in their mouths and had been severely beaten. Open cuts covered their faces and heads. Fleetwood lay motionless at their feet, with a stream of blood running briskly from the back of his head.

The three men in the room looked familiar. Melanie had seen one of them at her home the previous night, the one whose fingers Mickey had cut off. His hand was wrapped in a bloody dressing. The other two men resembled Adam Wellington and Franciose Baptiste. They were all dressed in black, standing at the foot of the small bed where she huddled.

Sunlight from a small window appeared to create a halo around Stenson and Mickey; in one motion, without hesitation or stimulus, Adam turned and placed a gun to Mickey’s head and pulled the trigger. Brain matter and body fluid covered the wall as the impact pushed Mickey’s head back when his body fell to the floor. He lay motionless but remained in the chair, the towel falling from his mouth, his eyes empty.

Stenson sat upright in his chair, rigid but not shaking, his soft brown eyes connected to hers and closed as he fell backwards, his splattered brain matter created a similar pattern on the wall as Mickey’s. Melanie screamed but it was inaudible and her eyes were tightly shut. The persistent barking of Kitty filled her ears, but she could not see him in the room.

Her clothes were drenched with perspiration but the room was cold from the breeze of the window air conditioning unit. She continued to hear the barking dog and a voice calling her, which sounded like Stenson.