They watched life. Children evading parents, only to be caught and lifted skyward in their mother or father’s arms, giggling hysterically or wailing in protest or doing all the things that children do without regret. Then they drove south to Morro Bay, walked along the seafood restaurant–lined Embarcadero and out to the giant haystack rock that sits at the entrance to the harbor like an ancient monolithic temple from a lost religion. They smiled and nodded at the people they passed—tourist couples, families, college students from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo who’d made the short drive to the coast to ride some waves with their surfboards.

And occasionally as she and Luke sat quietly on benches and at outdoor tables at restaurants, she thought, We are strangers here. We have seen more darkness than anyone else on this sidewalk or at this restaurant or possibly in this tiny, quaint town, and that means we don’t belong. But it was a lie. They belonged. How could she bring light to the darkness if she cut herself off from light altogether? And who’s to know what seas of darkness lay in any stranger’s memories? How many war veterans had she passed on the street in her lifetime who were locked in a near constant struggle with their painful memories of combat? How many criminals whose crimes were still undiscovered?

This is who I fight for, she reminded herself. Not just the woman traveling alone. I fight for the right of a family to remain unbroken by the perversions of a human monster. I fight for the ones who stay vulnerable by risking connections with other humans, and so I can never withdraw from them again, no matter how tempting.

Their bed-and-breakfast is one of many that line Moonstone Beach. They are on the second floor, and each night they’ve opened the double doors to let the cool ocean air blow through their cozy little room. Tonight is no different, with the exception that they’ve made love for the first time since leaving Texas. They’d made the agreement before the operation started that their first time after they got back she’d have to initiate. And something about the sight of Luke shaving in the mirror ignited a hungry urge. She thinks it was the combination of the boyish furrow in his brow as he studied his reflection and the slow military precision with which he drew the razor across his shaving cream–covered jaw. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen him do this. Luke shaved as if the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel were at stake in his every razor stroke. Most nights it made her laugh, but tonight it was something else. It was familiar. Something from before that had easily survived all they’d been through. Cyrus Mattingly’s truck, Marjorie’s last wheezing breath, her unexpected reunion with Noah. Something as untouched by those things as the happy children they’d spotted on the street outside Linn’s Café that day.

She’d slid up behind him, crossing her arms over his chest, surprising him into sudden stillness. Then she grabbed the nearest rag and used it to wipe the remaining shaving cream from his face before pulling him to the bed. It wasn’t the right moment for his best alpha routine, not after the hours of confinement she’d recently suffered. He realized this as she mounted him, taking him inside. As she pressed their foreheads together, he gripped her waist firmly and forcefully, his eyes working to meet hers as he let her maintain control. By the time she finished, he’d risen to a seated position, his arms wrapped around her. When the sound of her release tore from her in a cathartic, unguarded cry, she felt something beyond the physical unclench.

Life. More life.

Now they’re in their bathrobes, sitting on the small balcony of their room, watching wind-wiped fog blow through the branches of the bent Monterey pines lining the shore, listening to the roar of the ocean waves, sipping wine like something out of a commercial featuring people who’ve never killed anyone. Somewhere out there, Graydon security guards are monitoring their every move, possibly even staying at this bed-and-breakfast. She spotted a few that afternoon on Main Street. But that, like so many other strange and extraordinary things, is a fact of their lives now. And security’s probably a good thing, given the feud Cole’s decided to start with his business partners over her defiance. More importantly, just for the length of this trip, she and Luke have agreed. No shoptalk.

Shoptalk. That’s how they’ve encircled and walled off the horrors they witnessed a few weeks before. Let’s see how long that works.

“I feel bad for your grandmother,” Luke finally says.

“That’s the thought sex leaves you with?”

“No, silly. Wine. We’re drinking wine.”

“Oh, ’cause she was sober?”

“She never got to do this.”

“She could do this; she just couldn’t do the wine part.”

“I know, but it’s probably not the same.”

“You know what she used to say to me?”

“Stay away from that Luke kid ’cause he’s dog shit.”

“She didn’t have to say that. We all hated you when I was in high school.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“And confessed. Anyway, she said to me that after she first quit drinking, she’d look at somebody having a glass of wine in a restaurant and she’d kind of feel . . . I don’t know, like, she’d grieve it for a second. Then she’d realize, I never had a glass of wine the way that person’s having one right now. Just one nice, pleasant glass of wine. She’d say, if I had one, I’d have ten and wake up the next morning with no memory of what happened. So when I looked at the woman having a glass of wine in the restaurant and mourned for it, I was really mourning for something I’d never had at all. So I stopped.”

“Profound.”

“She could be that, for sure,” she says.

“So, um, not sure that was the best lead-in, but I brought a bottle of your favorite Cakebread Cellars. It’s in that canvas tote bag from the Copper Pot.”

“Yeah, what a lead-in. You want to open it now?”

“Yeah, this one’s empty.” Luke upends the open bottle and pours so much into his glass it fills almost to the rim.

“Well, it is now,” she says.

“Just get the Cakebread. I don’t feel like going out. If we get hungry, I’ll go grab us something.”

“Fine.”

Even though she could swear she didn’t see it earlier, the canvas tote bag he just mentioned is on top of the television. When she goes to grab the neck of the bottle, she notices something off about the shape. That’s when she sees the ring box taped to the outside of the bottle’s neck, right below the cork. Her heart is racing as she tears it free. When she looks up, she sees Luke is on his feet, standing in the deck door, his eyes as wide and alert as when he first stepped into the back of Cyrus Mattingly’s truck.

“What a lead-in, right?” he asks.

But there’s piano-wire tension in his voice, and he’s watching her every move as if he’s afraid she’s going to bolt from the room.

“Luke . . .”

“Open it.”

She does, and the ring that glints back at her is simple and elegant. Is it the engagement ring of her dreams? There’s no telling because she’s never allowed herself the dream of even being engaged, not until recently, and so she’s never rehearsed this moment in her head, never expected it. And suddenly all the negative voices she’s held at bay during the course of this little vacation are on her in an instant, and they’re insisting her suspicions are right: she’s not meant to walk among the normal, the living. This is a gift for a normal girl who confines herself to a normal world.