“Dr. Cage is right,” Viola said. “Jimmy, please talk some sense into Luther. If ya’ll stay in Natchez, you’re going to die. That Frank Knox is bad all the way through. He’s a killer.”

“She’s right,” Tom concurred, straightening up and surveying his handiwork. “I know the breed. This time, discretion is the better part of valor.”

“Freewoods,” Jimmy said thoughtfully. “We’ll go to Freewoods till things cool down.”

“What’s Freewoods?” Tom asked.

“Nothing,” snapped Luther. “Nowhere. He talkin’ crazy.”

As Tom washed the blood from his hands and forearms, he noticed Jimmy Revels staring at him. “What is it, Jimmy?”

“You don’t mind getting black blood on your skin?”

Tom laughed. “I learned one thing fast as a combat medic: we all bleed the same color.”

Jimmy smiled. “You didn’t learn that being a medic. You learned that from your parents.”

Tom stared back at the serious young man and shook his head. “You’re wrong about that.” Opening a cabinet, he took out some antibiotics a drug rep had left him and handed them to Luther. “This will keep your wounds from getting infected. Viola can tell you about dosage. Now, you guys get out of here.”

“I’ll get the car,” Viola said. “I’ll pull into the garage, then you both get down in the backseat.”

“Backseat, my ass,” said Luther. “We gettin’ in the trunk.”

Tom waited in a darkest corner of the freezing garage while Viola carried out her plan. He watched the two men fold themselves into the trunk of the Pontiac, quite a feat considering Luther’s bulk. After Viola slammed the lid shut, she didn’t walk around to the driver’s seat, but into the corner where Tom stood. She was only a dark shape in the shadows, but he knew her scent as well as any on earth. She stepped close and took his hand.

“I don’t have words,” she murmured. “You saved my brother’s life.”

“Viola,” he whispered. “This isn’t just dangerous. This could get you killed. All of us.”

“I know. And you shouldn’t be any part of it.”

“What’s Freewoods?”

“A place where people don’t care what color you are. White, black, Redbone, it doesn’t matter. It’s safe. Not even klukkers go back up in there.”

“Then get those boys there tonight.”

He sensed more than saw her nod in the dark.

“Will you be all right?” she asked, squeezing his left hand.

“I’m fine. You’re the one at risk. You—”