But the silence in the room told me I was wrong. I couldn't. Aubrey's arms were crossed, his face set in stone. I could see the pain in the way he held himself. Ex's raised eyebrows told me that he agreed with Karen. Only Chogyi Jake was unreadable.
"I appreciate everything you've tried to do," Karen said. The softness in her voice was worse than the anger had been. "But I think I'd better run this operation solo from here on in."
I looked for words, didn't find any, nodded, and walked out. My knee didn't bend the way I was used to, and the staples in my arm itched. A gentle breeze stirred the branches. I felt like the trees were talking about me. I stood by the small statue of the Virgin, looking away from the house with her. The door opened and closed behind me. Aubrey's footsteps came close.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
"I'm fine," I said, and he put a hand on my shoulder. I leaned into him, then flinched as my ribs reminded me that I'd been injured. He had been too. Probably worse than I had.
Somewhere there had to have been a place where I could have done it right. A decision that would have kept Aubrey out of Charity Hospital when Amelie Glapion's cult opened the way for Marinette, a question I could have asked Karen that would have put everything in context. I felt like my head was filled with cotton ticking; my throat was thick and heavy with the aftermath of shame.
Karen was right. I was flailing in the dark, and if I did anything right, it was only happy coincidence. I had let them all down, not just Karen. I'd put Aubrey in harm's way. Chogyi Jake had put his faith in me, and when I'd gone out to investigate for myself, I'd blown it. Ex... well, he'd been spending his nights with Karen, so maybe he at least was having some fun.
"I think they're on the same side now," he said.
I pulled myself back to the present. "What?"
"I was thinking about it back there. Mfume and Karen must be on the same side, since they're both trying to protect Sabine. I just wonder why he would be."
"Well, maybe they can hook up and work it out," I said. And then a moment later, "It doesn't matter."
Aubrey stepped in behind me, his arm draped gently around my collar to keep from pissing off my ribs. When I leaned back into him this time it hurt less. The door opened behind us, then closed again, but no one came to disturb us.
"Whatever you want to have happen," he said. "You know I'm going to back your play, right?"
"It's what I love about you," I said. I felt him react to the word love. A bird called, shrill and trilling, from the trees behind the house. Near our little prison. Its voice was high, complex, and beautiful as jazz. Months of nosebleed-busy work, days of trauma and danger and injury and failure, and years of the day-to-day struggle of just being me all folded together. I let a couple of exhausted tears escape the corners of my eyes.
"I just want to go home," I said.
Chapter 15
FIFTEEN
We left New Orleans that night, packing everything into the rental minivan and driving to the airport even before I'd bothered to make a reservation. Chogyi Jake checked our database and found a four-bedroom house I owned in Savannah. I called the lawyer, arranged for someone to drop keys off at the house, got four first-class tickets online, and walked up to the Delta counter to let them divest us of our luggage.
Going through the ritual humiliation of security, I felt like a piece of candy someone had put in a tin can and shaken. I was all chips and rattle. We got to the gate just in time for boarding. The flight crew were all professionally thoughtful, getting us bedded down in our flying Barcaloungers before letting the hoi polloi in coach shuffle past.
Once we were in the air, Aubrey curled up against the window and slept. When Ex headed up to the bathroom, Chogyi Jake leaned forward.
"You seem tired," he said. "You should sleep."
"I should," I said. "I will. It's just... I really screwed that one up, didn't I?"
"I don't know," he said, but he wasn't smiling. It was odd to see him looking somber, and it did exactly nothing to improve