“You in, Silas?” June asked, words blunt as a blade.
Silas blinked and let the motion look practiced. “Cold night.”
“Gods,” she whispered. “What is this—” faro scene crack full
He reached the docks and watched the river swallow the storm. Somewhere downriver, riverboats untied their lines, men argued and made plans in the damp. Inside one of the boats, a young deckhand who’d once believed in easy answers paused to help a woman with her crate, and she smiled at him like gratitude without condition. Small things, Silas thought. Not enough to reclaim what was lost, but enough that the night had not been entirely without purchase.
Silas felt the world tilt. Whatever bets a man makes, some are settled by force. Harlan’s grip found the coat’s edge, tugged. The lining hesitated and, with a seam’s betrayal, the oilskin slipped free and tumbled to the floor. It fell like an accusation, a small white comet that struck the wood and rolled toward the spittoon. “You in, Silas
Silas stood numb, the taste of dust on his tongue. He had come to buy salvation and found a different kind of ruin: the small, irrevocable consequence of a desperate hope. The crack full—so fragile, so final—had meant the same thing to all of them at once: possibility. And when possibility shattered, what remained was a long list of the same old damages.
Across the table, Harlan’s eyes found Silas. “You look pale,” he said, the compliment of the conditioned predator. “A bad hand?” “What is this—” He reached the docks and
June clapped a shaking hand over her mouth. “It’s gone,” she said. “We ruined—”