The German Shepherd smelled him before it saw him.
It had been hanging its front legs over the passenger window of a pink Beetle, barking at the queue of vehicles ahead, when something in the air changed and the dog turned its head. What it found looking back at it was a man with bloodshot eyes, a black leather jacket, an AR-15 slung over one shoulder, and the particular quality of stillness that large predators share with certain kinds of very dangerous people.
The dog was back in its owner's lap before the next heartbeat.
The elderly woman behind the wheel had been touching up her lipstick in a compact mirror. She lowered it and found Soren walking alongside her window, close enough to touch the glass. She opened her mouth. He raised one finger to his lips without looking at her, and
