Rake was downstairs. The radio in the kitchen poured out lyrics steeped in blood and vengeance. The house’s frame was cracking in the first real heat of the year, under the weight of the slate roof. The smell of attic dust seeped down from the cracks in the ceiling. Steadily, day by day, Hank had drawn himself into the role of Old Hank until she began to wonder if he had slipped into his old ways completely. Lying in bed one morning she imagined that Rake would take her away one of these mornings, before dawn, when the rest of the house was asleep, shaking her awake and telling her not to say a word. The gun he waved around when the evening card games didn’t go his way would be against her forehead, a cold kiss to her brow as she rose up from her dream. She’d be only half-surprised, because she had woken before to that feeling, down in Alpena, in other places. It was a game he played, to see her startled eyes going from side to side. Rake said he liked her when she slept, but he’d warned her never to sleep too deeply.
