"She's smart," Dexter whispers, from the bed next to me. "Not like you are," he adds quickly, shooting me a self-assuring yet sarcastic smirk. "The way Grace is smart is like . . . sometimes, she just looks at me, you know? And it doesn't matter if I'm dying and that I can count on one hand the number of months I have left and that I'll never see her spine curl from gravity's kiss. And I think that's brilliant."

He's lying on the bed next to me on the motel room. Moonlight is spilling onto my skin and my making it glow as its origins do, and I hear Dexter breath.