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“Where?” She’s scanning the trees.

“I mean, he’ll be here in a minute.”

A kernel goes in her mouth, slow enough to let me know she’s paying attention.

I have to be more careful. She’s whip-smart with a relentless curiosity, and this town runs on people not asking.

Luca parks behind the van and bounds over with far too much energy for a human at two in the morning.

“Kettle corn?” she offers, like they’re already friends.

“Swap you.” He hands her a coffee in a takeout cup and she gives him the bag.

“You’re the literal best.” She clutches it in her gloved hands.

“You’ve met?”

“Yeah, we go way back,” my brother chimes in around a mouthful of popcorn. “You told me not to fraternize. I’ve been very good.”

He’s been waiting all week to say that. Whatever she knows about me now, she got from him.

“The oldest of friends,” Ellery adds.

Somebody help me. “I’d like to be home before sunup.”

“Fine.” Luca rolls his eyes, hands the popcorn back to Ellery, and gets the toolbox from the truck.

“I’ll be taking a nap while you do your thing.” She gets into the passenger seat.

“You’re remarkably chill.” Luca leans into the engine, wrench in hand. “For you, anyway. What gives?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“My brother, the one I know and love, would be fuming by now. Bus full of disappointed passengers, stranded on a dirt road.” He points the wrench at me. “You’re not even scowling.”

“I’m scowling on the inside. Fix the damn van.”

Luca has Lucille roaring back to life in under ten minutes. “Split in the upper hose. Coolant’s been leaking.” He wipes his hands. “Told you she needed a proper service, not me patching her up every other week.” Dropping the hood, he peers through the windshield at Ellery, bundled in my jacket, lit up by the glow of her phone.

He slowly turns to me. “You like her.”

“No. I don’t.”

Luca looks at her, then me, his mouth gaping like a trout. “You do.”

“She’s a pain in my ass like you are.”

“Sure, whatever you say.” He’s grinning while he packs up the toolbox and gets in the pickup.

We follow Luca out of the forest. As I reach the intersection to turn toward Ravenslight Creek, he messages to say he’s going to a friend’s place and will be home later. Probably some townie girl he’s seeing. I don’t ask about his personal life so he won’t ask about mine. It helps that I don’t have one.

“You don’t have a problem with me and Luca being friends, do you?”

That’s unexpected.

Most of the time, Ellery doesn’t give a shit what I think, which I enjoy and resent in roughly equal measure. But I’ve watched her apologize to Judith for losing her own phone. I’ve seen her thank a guest for taking the blanket she offered him. She does it with everyone except me, and I’d like to know why.

“You don’t need my permission for anything,” I say. “If you want to fraternize with my annoying little brother, that’s for you to regret later.”