“Yeah, he finally got his wish to get the hell out of Texas. He’s there overseeing the interviews of Fox Uno. They’ve got him stashed somewhere, getting treated for chronic myeloid leukemia, and Garrison said he’s talking. Really talking. He’ll live, for a while longer. Long enough. The best damn medical care money can buy.”

“Is Joe seeing his daughters?”

“That I don’t know, babe. I assume so.”

“Is he coming back?” Mel asked, leaning hard into Chris as they both stared up at the sky.

“I don’t know that, either, but I don’t think so. There’s nothing out here for him anymore.”

Mel seemed to think about that, as she pulled Jack’s blankets around him more. He’d fallen asleep again as they’d walked around the Far Six, and Rocky was at her feet, head on his paws, just as tired from racing around after them.

“But is there something here for us?” she finally asked.

“Well, the good citizens did reelect me sheriff,” Chris said.

She punched his arm. “Against your goddamn will, almost kicking and screaming. You didn’t want it then, Chris—is this really what you want now?”

And that was the question . . . What did he want?

He thought he had wanted his own version of America’s freedom.

But what he really wanted were moments like this, with Mel and Jack and Rocky the dog. All of them safe and warm, and the hard truths of the world at arm’s length; or even farther, as far away as the sun and moon above them now. Although he wanted to believe he could have those moments anywhere—that he’d finally earned them, by honoring his promises to America Reynosa—he’d tried twice now to leave, and both times had found himself right back here anyway.

Even if he didn’t need the Big Bend, maybe it still needed him.

He thought about all his chalk marks still etched across the rocks and trees of El Dorado, that language all his own that spoke so plaintively of his search for Evelyn Ross.

The futility of it, but also its importance.

It was another promise he’d made, this time only to himself, and one he wanted . . . needed . . . to keep.

Because when the rains and the snows washed away all those marks, he’d start again. And again. As many times as it took.

He’d never ask so much of Mel again, but he couldn’t ask any less of himself.

He bent down and scratched Rocky behind the ears and then wrapped his arms around his wife and son, careful that the badge and gun on his belt didn’t get in the way.

“Ya tengo lo que quiero, aquí mismo,” he said. I have everything I want, right here.

And although Mel didn’t know all the words, he knew she understood what he was trying to say anyway.

IV