That was probably the heart of it . . . Ben’s death. The deputy had been Amé’s friend, her mentor, and it was his murder that had drawn her and Danny together. Ben had been killed by that piece of shit Jesse Earl way out by the Murfee Lights—trying to save Danny’s life—and during Danny and Amé’s long walk back to town together carrying his body, they had talked. Or Danny had talked, sharing secrets with her he hadn’t spoken out loud for years. She’d listened, never judging, and somehow, out of all those horrible hours, they’d discovered something about each other. They’d found each other out there. But it also meant a part of their relationship might always stay in that place, far beyond the Murfee Lights.

Now they lived this weird, shadow life. A constant twilight, like it had been that night in the desert. Amé had taken up Ben’s old apartment, and Danny found himself spending more time here than anywhere else. They saw each other first thing most mornings, and the last thing at night, and on many of those nights, one of them would fall asleep within a hand’s reach of the other on her couch. Close, but not touching. It was a joke that everyone thought they were together, when they themselves couldn’t say one way or another, or explain exactly what they did mean to each other.

They were inseparable, and somehow still separate.

But Danny was fine with that, just like he was fine spending all his free time with her in Ben’s apartment above Modelle Greer’s garage—although enough months had passed that it was properly Amé’s place now. There was nowhere else he’d rather be, and no one else he’d rather be with. He wasn’t wasting his time, because the only hours that mattered were the ones he shared with her.

Hours like those at the Lights.

—

A TRUCK SLID BY OUTSIDE, lights leading the way, as Danny turned his back to his reflection, to where Amé lay curled on the couch. Her gun was unholstered on the table in front of her, always within reach, whether he stayed the night or not. That was something Ben had taught her, or something she’d learned in her past. That past, before Danny had come to Murfee, before Ben and the Earls, was another thing she didn’t talk about. He knew about her brother’s murder, and the rumors that Sheriff Cherry—when he was a brand-new deputy himself—had implicated the former sheriff and his then chief deputy, Duane Dupree, in that killing, but no one had all the details. Just whispers and local Murfee gossip, some of it bitter, since there were still plenty of people in the county who fondly remembered Sheriff Ross and wished he was still alive.