When he squeezed, I rolled my hips, wrenching a low groan from his chest. His lips parted around ragged breaths. I panted, about to lose control. The chemistry between us was explosive. Combustible. If he ached even half as badly as I did . . .

But if this went any further, I’d only want more and more of him. Already I yearned for his hands cupping me all over, for just one last lick of flames.

Soon I’d reach a point where it was too late to pull back—because I would already be burned.

He must’ve sensed my hesitation. “But I woan rush you, no.” He shuddered as he lifted me off his lap. “I’m in this for the long run.”

I was half-dazed when he set me down. He tugged me close to his side, draping his arm over my shoulders to hold me tight. “Just rest your head against me.”

I was helpless not to, hypnotized by the drum of his heart.

“I’m goan to tell you about a day we once had in the bayou—when there was no Flash. The day we should’ve had. Our first date.”

Still catching my breath, I said, “What’d we do on this date?”

“We started out early . . .” He switched to French, murmuring in that deep voice, “. . . because I wanted as much time with you as possible. We packed food, beer, and a radio. Then we paddled a pirogue to a cypress stand I knew, one right in the middle of the water. The surface was so still, it mirrored the trees. The cicadas would go quiet whenever we drifted too close.” He pressed a kiss against my hair. “We decided it was our place. No one else’s. Because that was where we became Evie and Jack.”

I snuggled in closer, letting his low, rumbling French wash over me.

“You were wearing a red bikini that made me hiss ‘mercy’ every time I saw you from a new angle. Um, um, UM, Evangeline, you about brought me to my knees.” I remembered I’d worn one in some of the pictures on Brandon’s phone. Apparently Jack had appreciated it. “When the air got spiced with honeysuckle, I felt about ten feet tall.”

He described the foods we ate, the sultry rhythm of the blues we listened to, the feel of a southerly breeze—which no longer called to him because he was right where he was supposed to be.

He engaged all of my senses, until I could feel the warm wind playing with locks of my hair, and I swayed to the strains of music. Relaxation stole through me, and my lids grew heavy.

As I drifted off to sleep, he rasped, “Bébé, I’ll bide my time. Because in the end, it’ll always be Evie and Jack.”

Through dreams, I relived another one of his memories.

Jack stood in front of a mirror in the courthouse bathroom, about to be arraigned for beating a man who’d attacked his mother. He looked so young, not more than sixteen. His skin was tan and smooth, his eyes storm gray. He tightened his tie, then loosened it, uncomfortable to wear one.

So much rides on today, and nerves are getting to me. I grip the edge of the sink and frown when my hands doan pain me. No new injuries mark my scarred fingers. Somehow Clotile has kept me out of fights until this court date. She and Lionel are the only ones here. Maman is . . . unwell.

My court-appointed lawyer lurches through the bathroom door with bleary eyes. The man drinks like a fish—something for me to say. He’s from Sterling and despises “lowlife” Basin folk, made that crystal clear in our sole meeting. “Oh. It’s you,” he mutters as he makes his way to the urinal.

For Maman’s and Clotile’s sakes, I force myself to be cordial. “How we looking today, podna?”

He jerks a glance over his shoulder—like I was goan to knife him in the back. The movement and his drunkenness . . .

Oh Christ, my life is in the hands of a man who just pissed on his own shoes.

And didn’t notice.

He zips up, then turns to me. “You’re in luck.” He’s almost slurring. “State’s got a new cage-the-rage program, for violent offenders with hair-trigger tempers. You’re perfect for it.”

Hair-trigger? I’d warned the fils de putain who hurt Maman. Told him never to touch her again. Next time I saw him, he was dragging her across the floor by her hair.

“Some are calling it the Rage Cage Program ’cause the inmates are still beating the living tar out of each other—just learning new ways to do it.”

I want to show him the ways I’ve already learned. “Doan do me no goddamned favors.”

He squints his bloodshot gaze. “As your lawyer, I’m going to enlighten you on a few matters. I’ve seen your type over and over, and I can spot a future lifer. When you’re old, staring at the bars, you’ll remember this talk. You’ll remember how right I was. Unless you get shivved before then.” He swerves out the door.

I slam my fist into the mirror, fracturing the glass, reopening every scar on my hand.

Over and over, blood-spattered shards reflect the pain in Jack’s eyes.

Because part of him believed the man.

26

DAY 375 A.F.

We heard their agony long before the misty rain allowed us to see it.

For hours today, Jack, Aric, and I had ridden hard, slowing only for this: the plague colony Jack had warned of.

Before us, a valley was filled with the dying, hundreds of men. Blood poured from each one’s eyes, nose, and mouth. The disease had contorted their bodies at the joints—as if their bones had been fractured.

Their screams merged into a din as loud as a stadium of fans. Jack had to raise his voice to say, “They’re calling it bonebreak fever. Because of how it makes folks look—and because the pain is supposed to be unbearable.”

“There are so many of them.” The sight dumbfounded me. All day I’d been unsettled by my dream of Jack, but this . . .

“The colony’s grown,” he said. “It used to be tucked into a corner.” Rows of haphazard tents spanned the clearing. “Some say this place’ll keep expanding, like a tick, till there are no Flash survivors left.”

Along the perimeter, bodies had been discarded in piles. They differed from the corpses we occasionally passed—or rode over. Plague bodies were so misshapen they wouldn’t lie flat. “How does it spread?”

“Par le sang.” Through the blood. “Maybe the air too. I’d planned for us to ride past this—not through it.”

“Have all these men been abandoned here?” I didn’t see women or children. “With no one to take care of them?”

Aric lifted his visor. “It’s too contagious.” Death had no worries about infection. “Once there’s a blood show, they’re doomed to a harrowing demise. No cure, no survival. I imagine the pain is nearly in league with your poison.”