Part 35 (1/2)

And in her mind's eye she saw them together.

Running.

Panting.

Warm.

Wet.

Lucas

Waiting out the downpour, he showed her some of the pictures he'd taken-of Opus 6, of Miranda and Ryan, of nothing at all.

”Wait.” She reached out for the camera, stared at the display. ”I remember your brother, I think. From when we were little. I think he was with me when I chipped a tooth once.”

”Yeah? Was I there, too?”

”I don't remember. And that's his girlfriend?”

Lucas nodded. Then he leaned back as far as he could toward his door and snapped a photo of Scarlett: her face pale and angular, the raindrops streaking the windows and blurring the world behind her into a fuzzy kaleidoscope of grays and red and blue. The brown of her eyes like wet dirt in spring, almost black.

”Can I see?” she said.

He leaned toward her, their shoulders touching over the console.

”I like it,” she said. ”So do you think you used to do this? Take pictures? That that's what the tattoo has to do with?”

He lifted the camera, looked through the finder. ”I held it like this in the store and the salesperson noticed it and said only people who are like real photographers do that?” He lowered the camera. ”So maybe.”

Then he said, ”It just feels easy. It feels comfortable. To hold the camera.”

Same way it had to hold the gun.

He had to tell her.

Had to trust her.

Had to trust her to trust him.

He said, ”I know how to load a gun.”

”What?” she said. ”How did you even figure that out?”

”My father has-had-one and when Ryan showed it to me, I just . . .”

CLICK HISS UP AND.

CALM.

”I just picked it up and loaded it. Without even thinking about it.”

She turned away from him and stared at or out the winds.h.i.+eld, where rivers and streams were cutting their way down. He thought he saw her hand move to the door handle, thought that maybe if it weren't pouring she might open the door and run.

”Why would I know how to do that?” he asked, trying to lure her back, trying to make her his ally in this.

”I don't know,” she said, and it got quiet.

He hadn't actually realized how loud the rain had been until it stopped.

”Do you think we were trying to escape?” she asked. ”Plotting it?”

”It seems like with the penny, and my tattoo, it's like we knew what was happening, like we knew we were forgetting or were going to forget?”

CAROUSEL.

HORSE.

CLICK. HISS.

SHUTTER. TRIGGER. KISS.