Adam Weiss leaned back against the tree, his ear still warm from the cell phone.

How could Tiff have done that to him? She knew damn well what she meant to him; didn’t they have an (unspoken) agreement that they’d be faithful over the summer? He’d known there’d be temptations—more for Tiffany, in DC, with its clubs and bars, while he was out in the middle of some stinking fields, knee-deep in cow shit, ministering to a bunch of fucking wetbacks. But still—that she’d do it in less than a month?

And with Andy Willet? It didn’t make any sense at all!

Maybe if Adam hadn’t answered the phone, if Tiff had had more time to think about it, she’d have realized it was just some dumb mistake. After all, they’d been to an embassy party, then fucking Willet had taken her out to a club with some of his other embassy buddies, and somehow, miraculously, they’d ended up at Andy’s place, with Tiff too drunk and tired to get in a cab, too drunk to offer any resistance as Andy’s fat fingers dropped the zip on her Zac Posen party dress.

And what was killing Adam—no, really, just killing him—was that she sounded happy. She’d called him at ten thirty a.m. on a Sunday, sounding happy, to tell him she’d just fucked Andy Willet, and that Adam was the only person she could talk to about it. What the hell was she even thinking?

The line at the taco stand was shorter now. Adam looked to see that his bike was still okay over against the tree. He was behind a couple of Guatemalans, next to a battered hand-lettered sign that read DESAYUNO MEXICANO: PAPAS CON CHORIZO $1, then, in English, BRKFST TACOS $1 EA.

Tiffany had picked up on his silence, had tried to prod him into a response, but Adam had remained stoic and mute. Finally she’d said she just didn’t understand him, she’d thought he’d be happy for her because he knew how much she liked Andy (that last bit just about blew his mind). Then she’d hurried off the phone, saying sharply, “Okay, talk later, buddy,” hanging up before he could think of a smart or cutting reply.

Then it occurred to him: she was probably still drunk! It was ten thirty a.m. now, they’d probably got in maybe three thirty or four a.m., some drunken fumbling, then The Act, fall asleep at five a.m., wake up at nine thirty a.m. for her little Walk of Shame…Yes, she could very well still be drunk.

The thought buoyed him, and, by the time he was pedaling down his street to his little white shack in north Bel Arbre, he was imagining how their make-up conversation would go that night.

Adam braked sharply, let his bike drop.

Someone had smashed in his door. The flimsy slab of fiberboard hung lopsided, buckled around the doorknob by multiple kicks, canting steeply into his living room.

The events of the night before—the fucked-up campesino who’d disappeared into the storm, the fears he’d laughed off when he woke safe and sound in his own bed—all came flooding back.

They’d come for him.

Too late he heard the soft clink of the gate behind him, turned to see two stone-faced men blocking the path. One held up an arm, and motioned Adam forward, gesturing into the shadow of the doorway, the house now a ghastly white face, the door a mouth gaping to swallow Adam whole.

The man pointed into the shack again. He had a cane machete at his hip, a long, wicked blade, curved on one side, gaping saw teeth on the other.

Adam did as he was told.