I could still feel the touch of her fingers on my hair, the warmth of her body pressed against mine, the taste of her on my lips. My heart, a muscle I had long ago taught to beat with the cold precision of a metronome, was still thrumming with a wild, desperate rhythm. Just a moment ago, I was on my knees, a posture I had not assumed for anyone, not even my mother, since I was a child. I had knelt for her. For Isa. For the only woman who had ever looked at me with anything other than fear, ...