CHAPTER 2
Forty miles might as well be four hundred as the Montana summer sun beats down, hot and merciless. It doesn't care who you are or what you've done—it burns everyone the same.
My jeans hang loose after three years of prison food and too much time to work out, but the white t-shirt sticks to my back, filled out with muscles I never even knew existed before pull-ups became a ritual. My brown biker boots still fit and feel like home, but not meant for walking.
So this walk gets old fast.
The first mile passes in a blur of numb thoughts and burning skin.
By mile three, my throat feels like I swallowed sandpaper.
By mile five, I've gone through two cigarettes, saving the rest. Not much else to ration.
By mile seven, I'm thinking about all the ways to kill a man with a Stetson hat.
The sun climbs higher, past merciful and into cruel. I pull my shirt off, using it to wipe sweat from my face before tucking itinto my back pocket. The ink across my chest and arms drinks in the heat—the archangel over my heart, the bone court on my left pectoral, the scorch line climbing my ribs. Prison art layered over older work, a history of bad decisions written in permanent ink.
Three hours in, I figure I've done about ten miles. Only thirty more to go.
I almost laugh at that.Almost.
A distant rumble builds behind me—the first vehicle I've heard since Cash's truck disappeared. I don't bother turning or sticking out my thumb. No one stops for men who look like me.
But the semi slows anyway, air brakes hissing, wheels kicking up dust as the truck slows down next to me, coming to a stop. The passenger window slides down. I have to take several steps back to see the man inside. "Where you headed?" he calls out. Older guy, maybe sixty, with a beard gone mostly gray and eyes that have seen enough highway to circle the earth.
"Drybone.”
He nods once. "Hop in."
I hesitate, just for a second. In prison, nothing comes free.
"Ain't got all day," he says, not unkindly.
But even if this old man was a serial killer, I’d still accept the ride. Be stupid not to. So I haul myself up and the AC hits me like salvation, cold enough to raise goosebumps on my sun-baked skin.
"Name's Earl," he says, putting the rig in gear.
"Legion."
He gives me a look. "That what your mama called you?"
"That's what everyone calls me."
Earl nods like that answers more than his question. "Only thing out this way is Whitefall," he says, eyes back on the road. "How many years did ya do?"
"Three."
"Could've been worse, then."
Yup. That’s my philosophy too. It can always get worse.
I turn toward the window, watchin’ the land roll by at sixty-five instead of three miles an hour. Earl doesn't push for conversation, just reaches into a cooler between the seats and hands me a bottle of water without comment.
The cold plastic feels unreal in my hand. I drink half in one go, forcing myself to cap it before I make myself sick.
Then… well, now that I’m not fixated on dyin’ of heatstroke on a barren highway, my mind drifts to Savannah.
Always Savannah.
