Amy had found racks and drawers of white and pink silk and satin gowns and robes, some of them trimmed with the kind of feather boas and rare antique lace she had seen only in those old black-and-white art deco-designed movies of the thirties when sex had sass and class and girls were women and men could peel them a grape. New silk stockings, too, of course, insanely smooth and expensive, and shoes to match. Amy’s first thought was that she wanted all of it, back up a semi and take it all, and her second was that that was Chino’s idea. She was supposed to flip out over this stuff.

Maybe, but what she really had to do was keep something else in mind, if she wanted to keep Sam and her alive. The monster wanted to win her, at least temporarily. Chino wanted to see the moment when Amy surrendered to what was monstrous in herself. And he knew he could not have that moment — or her — if he broke her heart killing Sam. He knew it. Afterward Chino would be able to kill Sam easily. In Chino’s view of the world, it would make no difference to Amy then. She would be his queen – if she were good enough.

What was in the closet was Chino’s own most personal fantasy. The way he resented America, he probably loved those old movies as much as anyone. Who were the Latino’s in Hollywood’s golden era anyway? Cesar Romero. Zorro. Guitar players in wide sombreros who said things like, “Si, senorrr!” Zorro got the girl, but it was always clear that he was Spanish, not a campesino. If Romero got a girl, she was always the second lead, the second choice. The rest, shouting, “Ay, caramba!” never made it to the fade-out.

He wanted her to make herself pretty?

No, he wanted the best.

And that, Amy remembered, always took a little longer.

But he’d said they had the time.

She stepped out of the shower and pulled at the towel, wrapping it around herself in a continuous gesture that would give anyone on the other side of the mirror only the quickest glimpse of her body. She leaned toward the glass, studying herself, hoping she was being watched. She almost wanted to wink. But let anyone watching see her making peace with herself, even giving herself a little smile of satisfaction.

And let him wonder what it meant.