I am going to take it to meando not get her killed, Mrs. Clark,and I am going to take it to meando not get her in a courtroom, Mrs. Clark,and I am going to take it to meando this and do it well and do it from a phone that goes out with the trash, Mrs. Clark, and do not make me drive out of the city to find you again.
I do not move.
I wait for Max.
---
She came around the bend eventually.
I see the truck before I hear it. The truck is a county-issued red pickup with a crew cab and a toolbox in the bed and a ladder rack and a roof bar with the lights off.
The truck pulls up behind the Porsche.
The truck stops at six feet.
Max gets out.
She is in her uniform pants and her boots and a dark long-sleeve undershirt with the collar at her throat. There is soot at her jaw under her left ear.
She walks to the driver's side of the Porsche.
She does not knock on the window.
She stands at the driver's-side door and she looks down at me through the glass, and her eyes are the colour of sea glass, and the sun is up over the canyon now, and the light is on the side of her face, and I open the door.
"Evangeline.”
"Get in."
She walks around to the passenger side.
She gets in.
She shuts the door.
She smells of smoke and the smoke on her body is the thing she has been my whole life, and the first time I smelled it was when she saved my life, and I have wanted it on me every day since, and it is in this car now, and the windows are up, and the heater is off, and I can smell her. Smoke and something unmistakably her underneath.
I turn in my seat.
I look at her.
She looks at me.
“Evangeline, I am so sorry for your husband. I had no idea how I was going to feel about you.”
“Shh.” I say, putting a finger to her lips. “Someone would have killed him sooner or later. I think I know that. Deep down.”
"Max, I’m so sorry for making you think I had gone.”
Her hand is on my thigh and it squeezes. We are alone here. I lean over and kiss her.
“I missed you,” she whispers and she holds me close.
I kiss her again and press my tongue into her mouth. I feel heat building between my legs. I pull away slightly.
"I want to ask you for a thing."
"Ask."
