She does the journey in slow stages, the way she does everything.

First, taking a few days to check over the Rabbit’s tires and engine with her dad, then driving from Apple Creek to Columbus, then to Cincinnati and Nashville, then onward, farther south. She sees a lot of beautiful country that way. Red skies above the mountains outside Louisville. Snow glistening in the Ozarks. A full moon over San Antonio, where she stays a night.

Emma Lewis enjoys all of it, drinks it in. She doesn’t want to miss anything anymore.

In Encinal, she stops to tank up at a little mom-and-pop Chevron station, and when the kid comes out for the money, she tries her halting Spanish. She sticks to English at the border, where they check her passport and inside the trunk of her car. Maybe she looks suspect, she thinks after driving on, because her hair is still so short: Five weeks of growth has only given her the equivalent of a pixie cut, and she looks pale in the rear-view mirror.

But her eyes are clear and she’s alert. She’s recovered. Recovering. She doesn’t think she’ll really feel better until she gets to Guanajuato, and that was the argument she used to convince her mother to let her go.

The drive is long, but she’s always liked to drive. Her sister gave her a bunch of cassette tapes to listen to on the road; she’s mostly been playing an old album by Edgar Froese. She checks the route maps she bought, concentrates while navigating the toll lanes. On the country roads, she rolls her window down and watches the horizon undulate around her as the desert gives way to mesquite and pasture. The landscape is unlike anything she’s used to.

Ten hours past the border: Water and snacks are in the car, but she takes rest stops to use the bathroom and stretch. Lots of grime on the Rabbit. She was hoping to avoid San Miguel de Allende, because the city is busy with Dios de los Muertos preparations, but she has to stop for directions. The address she has is twenty minutes out of the city, to the north.

Finally, well after sundown, she reaches a dry dirt road and a farm gate. Night is a blanket, and dust swirls in her headlights. The approach to the house is wide, with wooden horse-yard fencing at the right and a few old sheds. At the end of the driveway, a stand of saguaro near the lights of a broad, low house behind more fence and some big trees. Another gate closer to the house; Emma parks before it in a sandy patch on the left, gets out. Cool gloom, and the smell of limes.

Squinting, Emma sees a flashlight: A slim woman in pants, with a beige apron, walks toward her, surrounded by a crowd of excited dogs. In her wake, backlit by the illumination from the house, another figure, taller. Emma keeps her eyes on the tall figure as he gets closer. She pulls on her jacket and takes her backpack out of the car, shuts the door, walks to the gate.

Even in the dark, Travis looks different. Emma tries to remember if she’s ever seen him in anything but an FBI suit, or law enforcement sweats. There were the nightclub clothes for the Paradise sting, and his hospital gown, but those don’t count. Now he’s in his home clothes: a chambray shirt over jeans, with a brown Harrington jacket. The jacket seems familiar.

His shirt hem is loose and he’s smiling, although he looks tired. ‘You made it.’

 ‘Javi, let the girl in the yard,’ the woman in the apron tuts.

She is old; as she waves the flashlight, her wrinkles become visible. She moves with the fluttering rapidity of a bird, dogs yapping as she opens the gate. ‘Come in, come in. Do you have many bags?’

‘No, just this,’ Emma says. ‘Gracias, Senora –‘

‘Mariana – I am Mariana. Come through, come through.’

Mariana pushes doggy faces away with her knee, ushers Emma forward and shuts the gate. Emma holds still as the dogs start snuffling around her. One is a black Labrador, one is a pitbull, and three are of indeterminate heritage. The woman makes shooing noises, takes off one chancla and waves it around.

‘They like visitors,’ Travis says, wading toward Emma through the dogs.

‘They are ridiculous,’ Mariana declares. ‘Javi, you should be laying down.’

‘I’ve been laying down for five weeks, abuelita.’ His dark hair is longer, messy. He’s looking right at Emma. ‘I’m glad you came.’

‘Me, too.’ Emma smiles. They’re standing within inches of each other as the dogs weave through their legs. If they hug right now, she’s not sure what will happen – she’s been thinking about it a lot. Better to wait. She glances down, and the spell is broken. ‘This is quite a welcome.’

‘It is nice to meet you, Emma.’ Mariana puts her chancla back on her foot and snaps her fingers for canine attention. ‘I’m taking these silly dogs to the stables.’

‘Good idea,’ Travis says. He looks back at Emma. ‘Long drive, huh?’

‘About thirty-three hours.’ She hitches her bag higher.

He nods. ‘Come on up to the house.’

A dirt path leads up past the saguaro, eventually turns to gravel. Mariana has gone off to the right with her pack. Travis doesn’t offer to take Emma’s bag and she doesn’t ask him to, unsure what he’s capable of physically since his injury – she’s not the only one recovering. He walks slow, and she wonders if that’s because he’s unable to walk fast or if he’s allowing her to get her bearings in the dark.

Under the moon, it’s possible to see some details even at night; the long, one-story house is stone and wood, surrounded by lavender bushes. Terracotta barrel roof tiles. Small lanterns are set at intervals along a wide front patio and strings of marigolds are everywhere, for the coming celebrations. A century plant stabs toward the dark sky.

‘Thirty-three hours – phew,’ Travis says, leading past a mesquite tree to the right. ‘You must be sick of sitting down.’

‘It was okay,’ Emma says. ‘I like driving.’

His lips quirk on one side. ‘Guess I’m the one sick of sitting down.’

‘You’ve been doing it longer.’ Emma grins. She gets a split-second flash of memory: Travis in front of her, blood spilling from his mouth and a gory length of rebar protruding from his torso while she screams. She blinks and the image is gone, but her expression gets more sober. ‘I feel like I should’ve stayed with you.’

‘Hey, no,’ he says. ‘Don’t worry about that. I told you on the phone not to worry about that. You stayed with me ten days. It was a long time for your folks to wait.’

Emma watches the gravel at her feet. ‘It felt weird, walking away with my parents while you were still in the hospital.’

‘Yeah, but I checked out four days later.’ Before them now, two wide shallow steps onto the patio of the ranch house. Travis’s face – his olive complexion, strong cheekbones, the warm brown of his eyes – is lit by a wall lantern. ‘My mom and my sisters looked after me. It was good. I needed to go home.’

Emma looks up at the stars. ‘This isn’t Texas, though.’

Travis shrugs, faintly abashed. ‘Yeah, well. I tried to stay until Christmas, but after three weeks with my mom, I needed a break.’

Emma understands that. She looks again at the house. Bougainvillea climbs the stone arch above them; ahead, a set of wicker patio furniture. ‘Your uncle’s place seems nice.’

Travis expression is soft and happy. He lifts his chin forward. ‘Let me show you inside.’

Up the steps onto the patio, past the wicker furniture, a series of arched windows and bracing posts. The smell of lavender and peppers. Further along, a wide wooden door with iron rivets – there is a decorated altar beside the door. The warm inside of the house: dark walnut vigas, thick adobe walls, whitewash, flagstones, globe light fixtures. A big kitchen and open-plan dining area in classic Spanish colonial style. Travis leads her through a living room with a couple of big couches, one with a plastic cover, then along a hallway.

‘Where is everyone?’ Emma asks.

‘My aunt and uncle are in San Miguel, at a wedding. They’ll be back later. Mariana – my aunt’s mom – has probably gone to check the horses.’

‘Uh, I don’t mean to impose –‘

‘Emma, you’re not imposing. I invited you.’ He stops at the open door of a room. ‘Will this be okay?’

Lamps with soft shades beside the bed, a cowhide rug on the floor. Her own bathroom – blue and green painted adobe. A wooden study desk and chair in a small alcove with curtained windows.

Emma turns back, her mouth open. ‘Are all the rooms in this house amazing?’

Travis grins, gestures to a door near the end of the hallway on the right. ‘I’m just down there. The rest of the family lives on the other side of the house.’

‘Why does your aunt’s mom call you Javi?’

‘It’s my middle name – Javier.’ He waves a hand. ‘Go on in. Set your stuff down and take a minute, wash up. I’ll be out on the patio when you’re ready.’

She drifts into the room, marvelling. Takes a minute to use the bathroom, wash her face, unpack a few things to find a change of shirt. For a moment she wishes she had something more fancy than just long-sleeved T-shirts and jeans. But that’s not how she and Travis Bell are with each other: They don’t do fancy. They’re just themselves, and that’s how she likes it. She pulls on her warm white thermal and her jacket and leaves the room.

Out on the patio, Travis is occupying the wicker patio couch. A low coffee table in front holds an earthenware plate with peanuts, cucumber slices. There’s one bottle of Estrella on the table and one already in Travis’s hand. He’s reclined against the arm of the couch with his legs stretched across the well-used cushions – the first real concession she’s seen for his injury since she arrived.

Seeing her approach, he sits up a little and slides his boots off the couch. ‘Sorry, I just had to lay down a second –‘

‘Don’t apologize. And don’t move your feet.’ Emma collects her beer from the table and plonks herself in the vacant spot. Hauls his boots back up into her lap. ‘I can sit this way.’

Travis blinks at her. ‘Okay.’

‘How’s the healing going?’

‘Slow.’ He relaxes, sips his beer. ‘I hate going so slow, but I’m getting there. The scar doesn’t hurt so much anymore, and I can drive and stuff. I went for my first horse ride today, which is cheating, so I’m a little sore. Self-inflicted. How’s your leg?’

‘Good.’ The beer is refreshing. Emma takes another swig. Travis’s boots are heavy in her lap, but she’s comfortable. ‘There’s still tenderness when I run, but it’s improving. It’ll leave a mark, but that doesn’t bother me.’

Travis examines her, his eyes soft. ‘Your hair’s grown out.’

Emma ducks her chin, her free hand lifting to the nape of her neck where the hair is smooth and dark. ‘Yeah. I just…got tired of clipping it.’

The lantern on the stone wall behind them glows enough for comfort, without disturbing the view of the stars beyond the patio roof. Where the flagstones end, a hedge of lavender makes a low border. The night is cool. She sips from her bottle, leans for some peanuts.

‘You hungry?’ Travis asks. ‘You want dinner or something?’

‘Nah, this is good,’ Emma says. ‘I had a burrito in Matehuala.’

‘All right.’ Travis slips his left boot to the flagstones and moves his right boot off her lap and onto the couch, so he can sit up more. He leans forward with an open hand. ‘Then gimme some of those peanuts and tell me how your folks are doing.’

Emma obliges. ‘My folks are doing fine. Columbus Day was…interesting.’

‘How’s that?’ He shells peanuts onto the couch cushion. His jacket is open and his shirt falls away from his collarbones.

‘Remember I told you my sister’s room-mate came for Columbus Day and October break?’

‘Yeah.’ He nods as he works on the peanuts. They’ve been calling each other with more and more frequency over the last five weeks. ‘Julie…Julia. Something like that.’

‘Julia, yeah.’ Emma tries a cucumber slice, washes it down with the beer. ‘So she came over for the break, and Robbie’s invited her for Thanksgiving as well.’

‘There’s a reveal here I’m missing, right?’ Travis alternates peanuts with beer.

Emma passes him her empty shells. ‘I was missing it, too, until I went to the barn to get my dad’s socket wrench set and saw them kissing.’

‘Your sister and her room-mate.’ His eyebrows go high. ‘Okay.’

‘I knew Robbie was dating someone, but she wouldn’t tell me who. Now I don’t know what to think.’

Travis pauses. Shrugs.

‘What?’ She stares. ‘That’s it? You just shrug?’

‘I mean, what else is there? They’re dating.’ He sips his beer. ‘Is your sister happy?’

Emma thinks about it. ‘Yeah, she’s happy.’

He shrugs again. ‘Then that’s it.’

Emma snorts in the beat. ‘Okay… Yeah, okay.’

‘Hey, it’s nineteen eighty-two, we’re making social progress.’ He makes a wry grin around the lip of his beer bottle as he takes another sip. ‘And it could be worse. Your sister could be dating a known juvenile delinquent from San Angelo.’

Emma sucks in a breath. ‘Oh no. Lena or Connie?’

‘Lena.’

‘Jesus.’

‘He has a motorbike.’

‘Oh my god.’ Emma rolls her eyes. ‘How’s your mom taking it?’

Travis grimaces. ‘She’s not thrilled. But she’s…philosophical. Says she dated this roughneck blond white boy and it turned out okay.’

‘Your dad, right?’

He nods, smiling. Emma laughs, finishes her peanuts, brushes her hands off on her jeans. ‘So tell me again what the deal is with you staying here?’

‘The house belongs to my uncle Luiz, my mom’s brother.’ Travis washes the remains of his peanuts down. ‘It’s just him and my aunt Sofia, and her mom, my abuelita.’

‘And they don’t mind me coming to visit?’

‘Hell, no.’

Emma takes that in. ‘So…how long are you planning to stay?’

He shrugs. ‘Long as I need to. How about you?’

Emma bites her lip. ‘Long as you’ll let me.’

‘Okay, then.’ Travis puts the shells on the table, wipes his hands on the sides of his jacket, like that answer settles things. ‘I mean, it’s just the horses, ranch stuff. Orange picking now and next month. Swimming in the river, when it’s warm. It might get boring.’

‘I could handle a little boring,’ Emma says, dry.

‘Fair.’ Travis finishes the dregs of his beer, looks out beyond the lavender hedge. ‘But it’s pretty quiet here. Not many people. My cousins are all grown up, they mostly live around San Miguel. They come by sometimes.’

‘That doesn’t sound so bad.’ She studies Travis’s profile. Studies the label of her half-finished beer. She killed a man five weeks ago. Does that disqualify her from living? She doesn’t know. Her therapist, Audrey, says no.

Emma makes her decision. Leans and puts the beer on the table.

‘There’s a rancho guy, Mateo,’ Travis continues. ‘He’s sixty, he lives here with his grandson, Elias, who’s thirteen. They’re in one of the outbuildings off thataway, I’ll introduce you in the morning. And a bunch of charro guys help out with the horses, but none of them live on the property.’

‘Okay.’ Emma reaches over and plucks the Estrella bottle from his hand. ‘You done with this?’

‘Uh – yeah.’ Travis watches her set it on the table. ‘You want another one?’

‘Nope,’ Emma says, and she shifts to kneel on the cushion between his legs. She puts one hand on the wicker couch and another hand on the top of his chest, near his collarbone, easing him back.

Travis is suddenly very still, except for his heart, which drums through the chambray under her palm.

‘Okay,’ he whispers, swallows hard. Their faces are a lot closer now. He’s searching her eyes with his own. ‘Emma, I didn’t invite you because –‘

‘Shh. I know you didn’t. But I want to.’ She wets her lips. ‘I’m just not very…’ Her breaths are shaky. ‘I’m not sure how all this works.’

His expression goes impossibly soft. He reaches up between them and traces the backs of his fingers over her cheek.

‘I think,’ he says, voice husky, ‘it mostly works like this.’

He strokes down the side of her neck. Her breath catches at the sensations and at the look in his eyes – all wonder. He hooks a finger into the collar of her thermal shirt and gently pulls, until they’re inhaling together. Their lips greet one another, make friends.

Emma feels warmth spread through her, rich and dark and slow as molasses. This is kissing, part of her thinks, this is kissing, then she switches the thinking part off.