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“Don’t lick it,” she warned.

“I wasn’t going to.”

“You were thinking about it.”

I was.

Then the dress. Sofia’s three options came down to one, a deep green wrap dress that dipped at the waist and clung exactly where it was supposed to. When I stepped out of the bedroom, nobody said anything for a second.

Brielle put her hand over her heart.

“Girl.”

“Is it too much?”

“It’s exactly enough,” Imani said.

She fastened a thin gold chain at the back of my neck. A small lioness hung from it, no bigger than my thumbnail, and it settled in the hollow of my throat as if it had been waiting there.

“For luck,” she said quietly. “Line sisters never go out bare.”

I turned to the full-length mirror propped against the wall.

Auntie’s puff sat high and soft, the twists at my temples sleek. Gold hoops. Pearl studs. The gold ring I wore on my right hand, the one my mother had given me before I left Nairobi. Long nude nails. Bronzed cheekbones. Dimples when I tried to hold back a smile.

The woman in the glass looked like someone who had everything figured out.

My phone buzzed against the counter.

Adrián: Leaving soon. Can’t wait to see you.

I picked it up. My nails clicked against the screen, strange and glossy. In the mirror behind me, my sisters were watching with a hope so bright it made my chest ache.

I smiled back.

Chapter 2

Tau

The humidity hit me the moment the airport doors slid open.

It wasn't heat so much as weight. A wet blanket of air that settled on my collar and clung. Every country had its own scent, but humid ones were the most insistent. Jet fuel, hot tarmac, wet earth, and something faintly sweet rotting beneath it all.

My first time in Houston, and I already missed the dry bite of Chernograd's cold. I missed what sat inside it too, though I did not let the thought finish.

I followed the signs to the taxi rank. I had barely reached the front of the row when the first cab's trunk popped open and the driver sprang out to take my luggage.

“Good evening, sir.” A heavy accent, possibly Indian.

I handed over my suitcases reluctantly and watched each one disappear into the trunk before I climbed into the back. The vinyl was sticky under my palms. The air conditioning wheezed. The cab smelled of old coffee and cheap pine, and a string of prayer beads swung from the mirror, ticking against the glass.

I gave him the motel's address and slid in my white headphones. No music. They worked like a locked door whether anything played or not.

Night had settled over the city, and the lights seemed sharper for it. Green freeway signs. Billboards for personal injury lawyers. Taillights smeared red along the lane ahead. Far off, a refinery flare burned orange against the dark.

I used to enjoy this part. The landing, the unfamiliar city, the way a new assignment sat in my chest like a lit match. Over the past months the flame had guttered. I had put it down to age. Or to Chernograd. Or to a woman I had no right to think about.

The cab picked up speed as the driver looped onto Beltway 8. I had already memorised the route and checked each exit against the map in my head. He stayed on it.