Chapter 8
The sun hung low over the 7th District, bleeding orange and red across the sky like a wound that refused to close. Elijah pulled the car onto their street, the familiar row of modest houses glowing in the dying light.
He parked in front of their home, a two-story building that sat at the edge of the district's better neighborhoods.
Amy was already out of the car, stretching her legs after the drive. "I'm starving," she announced. "I'm going to cook something. You want rice and beans, or should I make something more interesting?"
"Rice and beans is fine," Elijah said, his eyes catching something by the front door.
Three boxes sat stacked against the entrance, wrapped in brown paper and twine. None of them were particularly large—the tallest was maybe three feet long, narrow and rectangular. The others were smaller, ordinary. They looked like packages that had traveled a long way, the edges softened, the paper slightly worn.
