Clint wasn’t sure that was entirely true: Lila had gotten as far as unsnapping the top button of her uniform pants before flopping on the bed. She hadn’t even climbed under the blankets.

“You must be exhausted. I’ll be right out. Everyone all right on Mountain?”

The previous night she’d texted that there was a crack-up on the Mountain Rest Road—Don’t stay up. While this wasn’t unheard of, it was unusual. He and Jared had grilled steaks and polished off a couple of Anchor Steams on the deck.

“Trailer came unhitched. From Pet-Whatever. The chain store? Went over on its side, blocked the whole road. Cat litter and dog food all over. We ended up having to bulldoze it out of the way.”

“That sounds like a shit-show.” He bent down and put a kiss on her cheek. “Hey. You want to start jogging together?” The idea had just occurred to him and he was immediately cheered. You couldn’t stop your body from breaking down and thickening, but you could fight back.

Lila opened her right eye, pale green in the dimness of the room with the curtains pulled. “Not this morning.”

“Of course not,” Clint said. He hung over her, thinking she was going to kiss him back, but she just told him to have a good day, and make sure Jared took out the trash. The eye rolled closed. A flash of green . . . and gone.

4

The smell in the shed was almost too much to bear.

Evie’s bare skin pebbled up and she had to fight not to retch. The stench was a mingling of scorched chemicals, old leaf smoke, and food that had spoiled.

One of the moths was in her hair, nestled and pulsing reassurance against her scalp. She breathed as shallowly as she could and scanned around.

The prefab shed was set up for cooking drugs. In the center of the space was a gas stove attached by yellowish tubes to a pair of white canisters. On a counter against the wall there were trays, jugs of water, an open package of Ziploc bags, test tubes, pieces of cork, countless dead matches, a one-hitter with a charred bowl, and a utility sink connected to a hose that ran away and out under the netting that Evie had pulled back to enter. Empty bottles and dented cans on the floor. A wobbly-looking lawn chair with a Dale Earnhardt Jr. logo stamped on the back. Balled up in the corner, a gray checked shirt.

Evie shook the stiffness and at least some of the filth from the shirt, then drew it on. The tails hung down over her bottom and thighs. Until recently, this garment had belonged to someone disgusting. A California-shaped stain running down the chest area reported that the disgusting person liked mayonnaise.

She squatted down by the tanks and yanked the yellowing tubes loose. Then she turned the knobs on the propane tanks a quarter inch each.

Outside the shed again, netting drawn closed behind her, Evie paused to take deep breaths of the fresher air.