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  “Why not in Durango?” I asked, rolling up my window.

  “Because, baby, we’re taking the train.”

  While we waited at the tourist trap otherwise known as the Durango and Silverton narrow-gauge railroad and museum, I felt confident there was no one watching Angus and me. Purchased tickets in hand, I walked by a couple dressed in gold rush–era costumes and shook my head. I looked at Angus as if to say, I can’t believe you actually want to do this.

  “Presidential class, just like you asked,” I said, handing him his ticket. “Was this on your bucket list?”

  “It sounds pretty cool,” Angus said, completely unembarrassed. “I grabbed a brochure from the hotel in Taos. I’ve always had a thing for trains but I’ve never been on one.”

  With my hands on my hips, I surveyed the crowd and the vintage steam locomotive we were about to board. The clock on the wall of the station reminded me that John would be free by evening and he would know something was off if I didn’t call. This whole trip was taking too long.

  “We’re going to get views you can’t see from the highway,” Angus said. “This will be worth it, I promise.”

  “We’re wasting hours. This thing is going to go so slow I’m going to go out of my mind. The slowest fifty-two miles ever. Why do you always get your way?” I asked, half-annoyed that I’d let him talk me into it and partially resigned.

  “Not in all things.”

  The train was already boarding. “Let’s do it,” I said.

  We made our way to the presidential car. I’d given in to Angus on this too, even though two kids buying pricey accommodations was far more memorable. The dangers were so many and so pervasive—to John, to Angus—that they’d paralyze me if I continued to focus on them. All I could do was manage the here and now, just what was in front of me. On this trip, I wanted to fall off the map, just the way Novak could.

  You can’t find me. At least for today.

  Angus and I entered the Old West. The presidential car was formal with wood paneling, patterned carpet, Victorian touches, and berth seating. Both of us went ramrod straight at the sound of the shrill whistle, and even I tried to stop myself from smiling as the train pulled out of the little station.

  Everyone in our car looked to be retirement age, and both Angus and I kept our eyes glued on the window to avoid eye contact with the curious glances in our direction. Then they seemed to forget about us as we began the route.

  “Come on,” Angus pulled my arm once we were on our way. We exited onto the private, outdoor viewing platform—Angus’s reason for wanting the more expensive car. We were at a high altitude in the rocky Colorado mining country, taking in vistas of the canyons and mountains dotted with pines that were inaccessible by car. The track was so narrow, the train felt so rickety, it was hard to believe anyone had ever dared to dream that this would work, that this was how they could connect the mines.

  “Do people use this train to go fishing and hiking? Out here would be a great place to hide,” Angus said wistfully.

  “Who are you?” I asked but I was feeling awe-inspired as well. The route was going to cross southwest Colorado’s Animas River—the River of Lost Souls—five times. “Look!” I cried out, involuntarily.

  Even the people around us followed my finger, pointed at the river. “Bear,” I said to the platform at large when people kept looking, unsure.

  Angus started laughing, mocking me. I was an idiot. He and I could see the eyelashes on the bear while these people had to squint to see a huddled black figure.

  When everyone lost interest, returning to their seats and their own window views, Angus nudged me. “Wasn’t this worth it?”

  “Maybe,” I admitted. Was it possible not to feel guilty that I was taking in every sight and sound, using all the senses I was born with? When would I have this opportunity again? I decided to change course. Once I reached California, that’s when I’d try again to quit. I’d have no choice.

  As I watched the blades of grass rush in the wind and the dust swirl, I’d never felt so alive and a part of this world. And like myself.

  Why would I ever want to change?

  I shoved that thought right back down from where it came.

  “Come on, J.”

  “I shouldn’t.” But it was a very weak argument at this point. It was hard to believe just three days ago I’d been so sick, detoxing from exactly what I was back to using.

  “Whatever.” Angus laughed at my faint protest.

  “Okay, fine. Stand back.” I focused hard on the sheer cliff high above us. It was a reach to use my telekinesis at that distance. I moved a small handful of dirt from above, and we watched it cascade down in a small brown trickle.

  “I want to see a boulder.”

  “Nah, I’m not disturbing things here. That’s a road up there.”

  Standing on the bank of a rushing, narrow stream, I surveyed the alpine valley, carpeted in wildflowers, situated below mountains that had once housed mines and were now abandoned ruins. We’d managed to secure a decrepit jeep in Silverton, and Angus had convinced me to go off-roading. We followed one of the old mining trails to explore the San Juan Mountains of southwest Colorado.

  “Now’s your chance to test yourself,” Angus had said. “When have we been alone like this—with this amount of space?”

  What ensued was a game. Angus would call out the name of an object that I had to move with my mind.

  I had edged a decaying log into the middle of the narrow, winding stream, sending it down current. Like a sharpshooter, Angus watched for the individual pine needle that I moved apart from the rest. My all-time best was skipping a handful of rocks deep downstream.

  Angus picked up felled trees like they weighed only as much as a heavy log. At first it was an effort for both of us, but in the fifteen minutes we dominated our surroundings, it got astonishingly easier and easier. We alternated, trying to outdo and show off to the other person, laughing like lunatics. Both of us were filthy from off-roading, with dirt in our hair and ears. But we stood there high on ourselves, thrilled by our own power.

  “Imagine backpacking out here? We could do this shit all day,” Angus said.

  On the return ride to the San Juan highway, on our way to Ouray, another Victorian mining town nestled in the mountains, we had the attitudes of people satisfied after a great outlay of energy.

  “You know what the best thing is?” Angus asked.

  “What?” I said loudly. The open-air jeep made it hard to talk. My hair whipped around me as I took in the mountains, trying to make myself realize I was here and this was real.

  “Novak couldn’t take that away from us after all.” He paused. “What do you think it’s like?”

  It took me a second to understand what he was asking. “Where they are now?”

  Angus nodded.

  “I don’t know what Novak meant by paradise. Maybe it’s like this? Playful? The freedom to use your powers all day long?”

  The mood in the car changed at the mention of the group, a sadness bringing us down from our high.

  Angus suddenly brightened. “What if you and I bought a cabin out here? I think we’d be safe.” He said it like he’d just found the answer we’d been searching for.

  “I can’t, Angus,” I said automatically. The light in Angus’s eyes dimmed.

  But then I imagined it. Falling off the face of the earth with Angus, in this most beautiful place, free from prying eyes.

  The seed of this idea took root. It also meant John would be free to live a normal life.

  AUGUST, one month later

  JOHN

  During the tour, my brother was as annoying as hell. Blaring his music, kicking up into handstands in our small motel rooms, asking me to check shit out on his phone. I’d lie down on my bed and put my forearm over my eyes and hope he’d get the hint. He reminded m
e of Spirit, how he followed me everywhere. He was with me All. Of. The. Time. But I also never wanted him to leave the room because it was something that felt normal. After all the subtle changes that had taken place over the past year, Alex and I were still the same together. Mostly. Now he was being careful with me, like he was worried about me.

  When Alex finally blew up at me, I felt sorry for the guy. “You know this is our last summer together, right?”

  After that, I made more of an effort.

  Alex never talked about his injury. Which I should have known was a sign that he hadn’t let it go.

  JULY

  Chapter Fourteen

  We finished our journey in the dark, Angus driving full speed.

  We pulled over at a roadside motel. Leaping from the open-air jeep in unison and walking side by side, I knew if anyone saw us, they would think we were trouble—dirty, deeply browned from the sun, acting like we owned the place. If only they knew one of us was an actual outlaw.

  We walked the short distance to the motel office. “I’m getting my own room,” Angus said evenly, as if he had a new resolution to distance himself from me. He had been acting cold toward me ever since he thought I’d rejected his proposal. I hadn’t let on that I couldn’t stop turning over the possibility in my head.

  “Okay,” I said slowly. “What about food?”

  “I don’t need it.”

  “Fine.” I changed my tone to match his cold one.

  Angus surprised me by reaching out and righting a strap of my tank top that had slid down my shoulder. I met his eyes.

  “I’ll still be on lookout,” he reassured me, as if he were my protector.

  “I got it,” I said. It was true. When I used all my senses, I could take care of myself again.

  We went into the dingy and slightly frightening motel office and came out with two rooms. Angus nodded to me, and disappointed, I watched him walk to his room at the other end of the row from mine.

  Opening room number one with my jangling key, I let myself into the room. I tossed my duffel in the corner and then quickly picked it up off the floor. I found my phone and perched on the very edge of the thin, brown polyester bedspread wishing I didn’t feel so nervous.

  John answered on what felt like the last ring.

  “Hey! It’s me,” I said, with butterflies in my stomach.

  “Hey,” he said, sounding groggy.

  “Did I wake you up? I’m sorry!”

  “Let me call you tomorrow. I don’t want to wake Alex.”

  “Of course,” I said softly.

  “Bye,” John whispered.

  I put down the phone, disappointed but relieved I wouldn’t have to lie to him. It was confusing; when I was with Angus, it was easy to be logical about the dangers confronting us, almost like I had a sharper sense of the importance of keeping John safe. But when I heard John’s voice it made me remember how much I wanted him and how badly I wanted to keep the promise I’d made.

  A string of disgusted profanity resounded just outside my window. A child cried in response, then a slap and the crying abruptly stopped. I opened my motel room door.

  Right outside was a woman standing next to a Mercedes SUV and a girl, maybe two years old, with wispy, tangled blond hair in a yellow sundress beside her. Before them on the ground was an iPad with a cracked screen.

  The woman snapped her head in my direction and gave me a dirty look, not having the decency to look ashamed. The toddler swayed, trying to remain standing after the slap.

  It was the little girl’s helplessness that triggered it. Something in me couldn’t take it.

  “What are you doing?” I asked the woman.

  I crossed to the little girl, bending so that we were eye to eye. By some instinct, I let down my guard. The worst was feeling her confused fear.

  “Get away from her!” the woman shouted.

  I whipped around. “No.”

  The woman glared.

  “You’re okay,” I said and tentatively reached out to touch the top of the girl’s head. If I were Novak, I would have been able to influence the tiny girl’s feelings. Temporarily flood her with a different emotion besides fear. For once I didn’t want to block out someone else’s pain, I wanted to feel it. But staring into the eyes of the little girl, I hated that I didn’t know what to do. And I understood what John had meant when he’d said that it was hard to walk away.

  The woman reached down and snatched the child.

  “Don’t ever hit her again,” I hissed the empty threat as the mother loaded her child into the car.

  After they drove off, I decided to take a walk to cool down. I traveled two blocks north to the small, shabby main street I’d seen when we’d driven into town. I could sense Angus inside a bar. He hadn’t told me he was going out. He just couldn’t seem to lay low.

  Like something out of an old Western, two swinging doors led me into the town saloon. It was part tourist trap, part drinking hole, and one of the very few restaurants in the smaller, much less hospitable looking tourist town in which we’d found ourselves.

  Scattered with peanut shells, the scratched floorboards were warped, and there was an etched glass mirror behind a long mahogany bar.

  “Sit where you’d like,” an older gentleman manning the bar called. “As long as you’re not underage.” This last bit was said without any real force behind the words. He had an extremely long beard, wore a yellowed white button-down shirt and suspenders in a seemingly reluctant effort to look like an old-time barkeep. The player piano in the corner had a piece of white paper taped to it that read, “Do not touch.”

  The entire bar was on edge—I could feel it. It was Angus. He had his back to me. He was sitting at a table in a corner, minding his own business like a good boy, or so it seemed. Then I saw the two young women sitting at the table next to his, leaning over and chatting with him. From the thick tension in the air, it was easy to tell that at least one young man sitting at the bar didn’t like what was taking place.

  “What’s going on, Tyler,” I said, sauntering up and using the name from Angus’s fake ID.

  “What’s up,” he said, dissing me publicly by keeping his eyes on the two women, who on closer inspection were either barely twenty-one or younger. One, with brown hair that hung stick straight past her shoulders, wore a red tank top and white shorts. The other had a short blond bob and wore a sundress and cowboy boots. From the pheromones dancing around them, it wasn’t hard to see that they were very excited for a young stranger to drop into their bar on a Saturday night. I’d never seen Angus charm outsiders before. He’d watched them mostly, sometimes interfered with them from afar for entertainment, but I’d never seen him get this close.

  I decided to mess with Angus. “Tyler, why did you leave me? I came back from my walk and there was no note!”

  Angus looked both amused and annoyed. “Melody, you know me, I need to roam.”

  The name on my ID was Allison. He was going to get me kicked out if they checked. I tried to keep a straight face, rising to the challenge. “Seriously, Tyler, we can’t go on like this.” Now, the whole bar was watching. I belatedly realized Angus and I were both being ridiculous and cocky.

  “She’s so desperate,” one of the girls murmured to Angus, shaking her head.

  “Melody, go home.”

  Now I was getting pissed. “Tyler, let’s go,” I said in my normal voice, startling the girls out of their embarrassed laughter.

  Angus had barely glanced at me since I walked in. Now he craned his neck to look at me. His glare said that he wanted me to leave him alone.

  I heard a barstool scrape the floor and a heavy footfall behind us. I already knew which patron it would be. The young man with the longish, dishwater-blond hair who was attractive and knew it. His back had been bristling when I walked in, obviously possessive of one of these girls.
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  I faced him. “I’ve got this,” I said gently to the stranger, trying to make him disappear. I could smell the alcohol on his breath.

  I turned back to Angus. There wasn’t any playfulness in his eyes when he looked at me. Intentionally trying to aggravate the young man further, Angus said, “I said, go home.”

  “You should both go.” The young man grabbed Angus by the back of his T-shirt, holding it in one fistful, trying to yank him up. Angus didn’t budge and rapidly chewed his gum.

  “Let him go,” I said sternly.

  “Nick!” one of the girls said sharply.

  With two hands, Nick moved me aside and grasped the back of Angus’s chair, trying to dump him over.

  Angus leapt to his feet and Nick was halfway across the bar before anyone could blink. Even I hadn’t seen exactly what happened. The whole bar was silent, trying to figure it out. Nick was out cold.

  One of the girls and a couple of guys from the bar ran over to Nick. Three others descended on Angus. I placed myself in front of him.

  “Move,” Angus said in a whisper-soft voice. I didn’t know why but I listened. I moved to the side and watched while one man took hold of Angus’s T-shirt by the collar and Angus let himself be hoisted to his tiptoes.

  “Let him go,” I said. “Now!”

  No one paid attention to me. The man and Angus stared at each other. I watched as Angus’s eyes began to glow a light, light blue. I realized Angus was out of control, that he was going to use these people as punching bags to let out whatever pent-up emotion he’d hidden beneath the surface. The whole time we’d been together, since we’d reunited, he hadn’t seemed like he was this angry.

  In an attempt to save Angus, I did the lesser of two evils but still an evil. I sent the girls’ wine glasses flying off their table. They landed on the floor in a spray of glass.

  It would have better if I had actually touched the glasses before making them soar. The man holding Angus let go and backed up several feet. The girls slowly stood and scooted around their table, moving farther away from us.