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"That's the tunnel, where the trailer was waiting."

"Somebody's dragged that service road with a harrow. It's raked as smooth as an arena floor between events, without one tire track on it. Whoever dragged it drove his tractor up through the vine rows to get there and left ruts in the dirt. He smoothed the road and didn't care about the vines."

He looks out at the pasture. "A road gets dragged when it's washboarded or when somebody wants the tracks gone. My brothers have sat on his gates every night since Wednesday and seen nothing go in after dark. Whatever happened on that road in daylight, nobody saw. They're out there again tonight. I think he's erasing the tracks from the last trailer of girls."

"Because my father told him I talked."

"That's my guess. It could be a hired man grading a road. I can't prove it either way."

"Coleman didn't call you down to his dock to talk about gravel."

"He said he'd heard my fight barn's been shut down. He said, 'When a man shuts his gate all of a sudden, his neighbors start wondering what he's got behind it.'"

"And you said?"

"I said the card runs Saturday, every fight on the list, same as always." Knox looks back at me. "If I keep my barn dark, he knows something changed. If I open it, I get to stand in my own barn and see who walks in."

He lays it out one piece at a time. "Ozzie takes the bets at his table and writes down the names. The camera on my barn gate catches the plates in my lot. Hector's on the main gate."

"Those names go in Ozzie's books, right alongside your fights," I say. "If Torres ever wants those books, they put you in front of a judge with them."

"I know what's in Ozzie's books. I'll take that chance."

"Somebody's been telling Coleman about your barn."

"Could be anybody who bets with Ozzie. Every one of them knows the barn's been dark. Saturday I see who shows up."

"Whitlock would also like every man I trust standing in my barn Saturday night instead of sitting on his gates. Jesse's on his back gate Saturday, dark to first light, and Raven's taking the front. I called them before I called a single fighter."

"You worked that out on his dock."

"I worked it out while he was writing the check. Jesse says it's the first thought I've had all year worth a phone call."

I almost laugh, and I set the curry comb on the gatepost instead.

"If whoever's carrying word to Coleman bets at your fights, he could be one of the men from that cigar room," I say. "You won't know his face. Nobody will. I'd know his voice."

Knox straightens off the rail.

"You don't walk into that barn," he says. "Not with a crowd in it I haven't looked over. That part's not up for a vote."

"I didn't ask to walk in."

"Here's how you listen." It's the voice he runs his ring with, quiet enough that I have to hold still to catch all of it. "There's a knothole in the boards by the back door, right where you used to sit on that hay bale. Ozzie sets his betting table under the loft, a few steps inside that wall, and every man who lays money down has to shout his bet across it. I'll test it tomorrow before anybody shows up. If I can't make out every voice, the plan's dead."

He holds my eyes while he gives me the rest. "You stand at that knothole in the dark with Beckett at your back. You hear a voice you know, you squeeze his arm, and he marks the time. You don't make a sound, and you don't move toward the wall. Anybody comes around that corner, Beckett puts you in his truck and drives. When I say you're done, you're done."

"A voice I know doesn't prove he's one of them," I say. "Not to Torres."

"No. It gives her a name to dig on. That's more than she's got."

He leans in over the top rail. "I have a rule. I never touch you on a night I've fought. Saturday I run the card from outside the ropes. I don't step through them for anything, no matter who's in my barn or what he says to me. I don't throw one punch all night. When the last truck's gone, I can put my hands on you."

Heat rolls through me from my throat down. I keep my hand on Sadie's neck.

"Fine," I say.

"Last time you told me fine, you stole my truck."