The smell of the deep ancient green made her think, and pause, and take in several deep breaths as she crawled through the narrow alleyway to the tree, a space cleared by the huge overhanging boughs. She was deeply, deeply cold, she realized. But here the wind was stilled; the snow could not penetrate the ancient huge branches, the heavy canopy of leaves. It was a cathedral of high green struts, stained green glass, brown-timbered pews. It was a place of worship. She slumped against the thickest of the multistranded trunks.

A noise came, a quiet rustle. A bird? A fox perhaps? There it came again. She froze. A rustling noise. She couldn’t see a thing; it was pitch-dark beneath the tree. She fumbled with her phone, but she couldn’t use the battery life up on the flashlight; she was miles from home and would never get back without it.

“He-hello?” she called out.

“Hello?” came the voice back, slow, steady, assured.

It couldn’t be. Her fevered consciousness was imagining things. Maybe she was becoming hypothermic. Her heart raced. Oh God. She was dreaming. This was awful.

“Carmen? Is that you?”

It wasn’t possible. She stood, stock-still, frozen still, then thinking that she could back away—run, stop any car, grab any bus, just get out of there and away from her stupid, overfevered imagination. She managed to take one step backward.

“Carmen?”

He put on his flashlight. She couldn’t see a thing, completely dazzled by the light. She wanted to shout and run, but was stuck to the spot against the ancient trunk.

“It is you! No way! What are you doing here?!”

Her voice stuck in her throat; she was completely hoarse. “Oke?”

“Of course!” She blinked as he came into focus. “Who else?”

“But . . . but you’ve gone home! You’ve gone!”

He glanced at his phone, turning the flashlight over. “In three hours,” he said. “I was about to start making for the airport. I came . . . I came to say goodbye. To the tree,” he added hastily. “It’s odd—I kept . . . I kept dreaming about it.”

Carmen didn’t hear this. “I . . . I wanted to say goodbye,” she said, her voice low and hoarse. “I wanted to say goodbye to you.”

“I came to the party at the bookshop,” Oke said, and frowned. “Did Skylar not tell you? I came to see you at the shop, but she said you had a thing with Blair.”

“What? Blair?”

“Uh, yes? Then I saw Blair and he said he’d been with you . . .”

“Did he say that? Did he say those actual words?”

Carmen no longer felt cold but was boiling with molten fury. She saw Oke’s face frown again in the flashlight.

“Well, not exactly—”

“No, because it wasn’t me! It’s Skylar who was with Blair! I don’t like him at all.”

“But I saw you speaking to him!”