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I watch as he unbuttons my dress, as his fingers slide down my collarbone, then dip to the base of my breasts. There’s the smallest sound from his chest—a quiet groan, full of need.

“What if Marie comes back early?” I ask, but I make no move to stop him.

He laughs. “Then she will learn not to come back early.”

A snap of pain between my shoulder blades jars me. The blank-faced women surround me again and something presses hard against my spine.

“Eat,” a man grunts behind me. “Been here a month. Shouldn’t need to be told.”

My pulse jumps at the words. Even hazy and half-asleep, something inside me panics. I’ve been here a month? It’s not possible. I don’t even remember how I got here in the first place. I pick up the spoon, glancing quickly at the faces nearest me. Beautiful faces, with eyes only time travelers possess. They don’t seem to notice me or each other—they only care about the stew. My head is too foggy to make sense of it, but I know something’s wrong. I force myself to put the spoon back down, sweating with the effort.

I want this too much.

Thick-fingered and clumsy, fighting every impulse, I exchange my bowl for the empty one beside me. The woman sitting there begins to eat greedily, sending droplets of it flying.

Evil, says my mother’s voice in my head. Whatever’s in that bowl might kill her.

It’s not evil, I argue. If I don’t figure this out, it might kill us all.

Such convenient logic, my mother replies.

And I have no response to that, because this time she’s right.

* * *

By the time the meal ends, the pounding in my head is worse and my skin is clammy. We are pushed down a long hall, into another gray, windowless room lined with cots, which the women move toward as if this is home. I know mine too, somehow.

My head hurts so much that my stomach rolls in response. I lie down, waiting for it to pass. When my eyes open, the room is dark, but I can make out the face of the woman on the cot next to mine.

Marie.

I whisper her name. My throat does not seem to work right. The word is garbled, and she doesn’t respond. “Marie,” I repeat. Nothing.

I close my eyes, sick again, longing to be anywhere else, longing for Henri. And then I am with him, watching as he slides into the bathtub, lean-muscled, still tan from summer. He holds his hands out for me. “Give me the pitcher,” he says. “I’ll wash your hair.”

I climb in and sit between his legs, my back to his. “That’s very Out of Africa of you.”

He raises a brow. “What’s African? Washing your hair?”

I laugh. “No. It’s this movie with…never mind. You don’t know who they are. Anyway, the guy washes the woman’s hair. It’s very erotic.”

His hands slide around me to cup my breasts. “I’m glad you think so.”

The water sloshes as my knees fall open. “Do you want more?” he asks, his hand sliding down my torso.

“Yes,” I groan, but suddenly I begin to shake. I’m hot. Sick. This is not the way this is supposed to go. Not the way it happened the first time.

“Sarah?” he asks, his voice urgent. “What’s wrong?”

I flail in the water, sending it spinning over the lip of the tub. My insides are twisting. “Don’t know,” I murmur. “Make it stop.”

This is all wrong. I remember the afternoon vividly. I remember how Henri used his hands on me in the tub until I came, with my head pressed to his chest, and how he carried me to the mattress afterward, too impatient to even let us dry off.

But instead I am curled into a ball against him, hot and shivering at once, and I’m hearing that noise again, that awful noise. “Henri, make it stop,” I beg, clutching my hands to my head. “I don’t know where I am.”

My eyes open and I’m back in the dark room with the shrieking noise, sweating, breathing too fast. My shift clings to me, twists around my legs. No, I think. I don’t want to be here. Please don’t let me be here. Let me be back with Henri.

And then I am. He’s perched beside me on our bed with his hand on my brow. “It came out of nowhere,” he’s saying. “She was fine and now she’s like this. It’s been hours.”