Sidewinder got his feet under him. He shook off his club brothers and looked at me. That last look: all the possession and the fury, and underneath it something raw and new. Then Scorch was between us, his back to Sidewinder.
He looked at the cut on Scorch's back. At Brim's face. At the twelve Devil's Backbone members behind them.
His club brothers had him by the arms. He went.
The noise came back in, voices first, then the band.
Scorch turned around.
The bruise on his jaw had gone dark. I crossed the distance between us and pressed two fingers to the bruising, checking the bone.
He held still.
"It's not broken," I said.
"Good to know," he said.
I dropped my hand. My eyes were wet. That was happening whether I wanted it to or not, and I wasn't going to do anything about it right now.
He opened his arms. I walked into them. His jacket against my face, his arm around my back, and the afternoon going on all around us like nothing had happened.
After a while he said, "Guessing you knew him before."
"Years ago — I spent a long time taking care of people who took what I gave and left, or made me sorry I did. He was the second kind," I said.
He was quiet. He didn't ask for more.
"Nobody puts their hands on you again," he said. "You hear me?"
"I hear you," I said.
I let myself stand there until my shoulders came down.
That night: ribs and chicken and sausage off the grill alongside the brisket, three bands, a bar with no last call. Scorch kept me close and I let him: a hand at the small of my back through the crowd, his shoulder at mine at the bar, none of it requiring explanation.
When the rally wound down we went to the tent at the edge of the field. He unzipped the door and I went in first. In the dark, his warmth was already there. His hands went to my hips and I turned into him. When we finally settled back I fit myself against his side, his arm around me.
Fireflies moved through the dark where the tree line started. Hill Country stars overhead, the night sky I'd grown up under.
I closed my eyes and allowed sleep to come.
Chapter Six
Scorch
THE SITE WAS QUIETby six, most of the noise gone, the pavilion already half-broken-down. Whitley was standing at the edge of the field watching two Comal Saints work a trailer hitch, a paper cup from the pavilion coffee urn in her hand, the early light coming low across the caliche, a hawk riding the thermal off the south ridge. Good morning to be standing somewhere. Better morning than yesterday had been, which was saying something. I came up beside her.
"So here's what I'm thinking," I said. She turned and looked at me. "You drive back through Bandera to get to Houston. My truck's already there, so that's just geography working in our favor." I kept the drawl warm and reasonable. "And you fed me twice and gave me a bed and I've done nothing about either of those things, which Gran would consider a significant personal failing."
"You're citing your grandmother for this argument."
"She had strong opinions about hospitality." I kept the drawl easy. "Come have breakfast at my place. I make good eggs and better coffee than anything you'll find out here."
"You haven't made me any yet, so that claim is entirely unverified."
"Come verify it." I picked up my jacket from the ground. "Also I'm not done with you, and I'd rather say that out loud than let you drive straight through and pretend I didn't mean it."
She looked at the jacket for a moment. "Your grandmother would be very disappointed to know you used her memory to get a woman to make a twenty-minute detour."
