“God,” Cal said, shaking his head. “You and Mama. I should have known she’d get there in the end.” He looked up at me, eyes shimmering with tears. “Stay away from her, Evie, if you can. Promise me you won’t let her get too close.”

I gave him a sharp-edged grin. “I think we’ve already established that promises don’t mean shit when it comes to Mama.”

Cal shook off my words, his voice strained. “Promise me. She’ll drag you down to hell if you let her.”

“It doesn’t matter anymore, Cal.” I gestured between us with the gun. “I’m already there.”

I watched as tears slid down his cheeks. He reached out with careful fingers and grasped my free hand. “It’s always been you and me, Evie. Remember? Always.”

I thought of all the nights we spent as kids, huddled together on the edge of our property, waiting out Mama’s drug-fueled parties. We stayed far away, enough that the greasy spill of light from the trailer windows didn’t reach us. We made promises to each other in the inky blackness, hands twined together like the branches overhead. We’ll get out of here. Both of us. I won’t leave you behind. I’ll always trust you. I’ll always keep you safe. Always. Cal’s pale blue eyes glimmering in the moonlight. The breeze sending strands of golden-blond hair skating across his face. We were more than siblings; we were each other’s lifeline. Together, we survived a childhood designed to destroy.

The things we said to each other on those endless nights, against the ugly backdrop of our probable futures, weren’t just words. Each syllable reeked of power, left our mouths heavy with intent. Our promises lifted up into the night air, through wet, humid steam, on puffy clouds of breath, through all the months and seasons. The words didn’t belong to us alone; they had been released into the world. We had been heard. Both of us. Always. The sacred weight of vows.

And yet, they’d been only words after all. Because here we were, destroying each other anyway. And it was so much easier than it should have been. My lips trembled, and my dead heart cracked open. Tempting as it was to lay all this at our mama’s feet, that wouldn’t be fair. She’d shown us the path, but we’d both chosen to walk it. No one dragged that knife across my daughter’s throat but Cal. No one pointed this gun but me.

“I love you, Evie,” Cal said, squeezed my hand and let go. He could have been ten again, tucking me into bed. Trying to reassure me that everything would be okay, even when we both knew that it wouldn’t.

“I love you, too,” I told him. “Always.”

The dying sun lit him up like a corona, glinting off his hair. He smiled at me, small and sad. And then I blew him away.

TWENTY-FOUR

I sat next to him until it was dark, held his hand until his fingers began to grow cold, the same way he’d held my daughter’s while the life drained out of her. The tears I hadn’t shed earlier rolled in a relentless stream down my face, soaking the neck of my T-shirt. I knew I needed to get moving, but my brain seemed disconnected from my body, thoughts whirling and diving and then floating away. I might have sat there all night, I might have sat there for the rest of my life, if someone hadn’t crashed through the underbrush behind me, a slim beam of light cutting across my face. I scrambled up onto my hands and knees, feet slipping out from beneath me, and looked up to see Jenny Logan standing there. She had a shallow scratch along one cheekbone, and her breath was coming in panting gasps.