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"Because of me."

"Because the night before Hector found you in my barn, a woman came to my gate and asked Ozzie who runs the fights and how to get in." Knox watches my face. "Dark hair, about your age. She wouldn't give her name."

I go still, the same way I froze every time boots came down those cellar stairs.

On a transfer night in the cigar room, a masked man had his fist in my hair and a crop in his other hand, and I bit his wrist until I tasted his blood. Then the rest of them pinned me facedown on the stone floor and took turns raping me, while the man in the corner sat silent through all of it.

Afterward Dutch dragged me back to my cell and kicked me in the ribs and the face for the bite. I was out of my head most of the next day.

When I half came to, I was on the concrete with one eye swollen shut, and every breath stabbed my ribs. Dutch was crouched at the bars, his cigar glowing in the dark.

'Who's Knox?'

I was too far gone to follow the question, and it didn't come back to me until right now. I must have said Knox's name on that concrete while I was out of my head, and I've never heard of another Knox in this county. Dutch heard it.

He must have sent that woman here to look this place over, and it's because of me. On the road to Devil's Acre, I told myself I wouldn't let anybody die for me, but I never once thought Dutch already had Knox's name.

"You know something about her," Knox says.

"No. I've never seen her in my life." It's true.

"Didn't ask if you'd seen her." His voice stays even. "On a card night, when I've got fights lined up, nobody gets through my gate the first time unless somebody I know brings them and vouches for them. Nobody brought her. She came asking about my fights, and the next night you're in my hay. Tell me you don't know who sent her."

I don't answer. He sets his load on the top step and pulls his phone out of the vest. "Hector. Put your truck across the main gate and stay with it. Anybody parks on the county road, get me the plate number, and I'll go ask him what he's selling. Tonight too. Beckett will spell you long enough to eat and sleep a few hours, and I'll take over at dawn."

When Knox hangs up, I ask, "How many ways onto this place?"

He answers right away. "The main gate, and Hector's on it. The back gate past the fight barn, and it's padlocked. And anywhere along the fence, if somebody's willing to cut wire."

"I came in over wire."

"I know. Hector walked the back fence at first light and found that spot."

Knox gives me one more look, one last chance to tell him who sent her. If I say Dutch's name, Knox will go looking for him tonight, and Dutch won't be alone. I don't say it. If Dutch comes up that drive first, Knox won't even know his name, and that's on me.

He lets it go, gathers his things, and goes down the steps. I shut the door and turn the new deadbolt.

Early in the afternoon, Knox sets something on the step and knocks. I wait until his boots reach the far end of the porch before I unbolt the door. A fresh bowl of stew steams on the doorstep.

I carry it inside, bolt the door, and eat every bite with two of Nell's pills.

Then I lie down with Royce's knife on the bedside table, meaning to rest a minute.

When I open my eyes, the light through the curtain has gone orange. I slept straight through the afternoon. I can hear Knox walking the porch again, slow and heavy, end to end.

At dusk he knocks twice. "Flip your porch light on. I'll be in the kitchen at the main house, and with that light on, I can see your door from the window over the sink. You holler, and I'm here before you're done hollering."

"You need to sleep," I say.

"I've gone longer."

I get up, flip on the porch light, and hear his boots go down the steps. I pull the curtain back. Across the yard, the main house sits dark. A minute later the kitchen light comes on, and it stays on. I let the curtain fall and lie back down.

In the dark, I hold the new keys in my fist and listen for an engine on the county road.

The men in that cellar used me as if I belonged to them. In the cigar room on transfer nights, my body responded to what they did to me while I hated every one of them. Since I got out, I can't tell if wanting a man to take control of me is still mine or something they trained into me.

I wanted Knox Hollister at nineteen, before any of them touched me. I still want him. I'm scared that if he puts his hands on me, I'll be back in the cigar room in my head while he does it.