“I suck at this,” I told him. “I suck at words when they count.”
He smiled at me. “I know.”
“I understand,” I told him. “I understand why you have to go and why I have to stay. I think that you are doing the right thing, the only thing you can do. I wish…” My stomach hurt and it would have been kindness to put me out of my misery, but I wasn’t going to share that with Adam.
I know, he said.
“You weren’t supposed to get that,” I told him.
“I know that, too,” he said, his voice tender. “You should know that you can’t hide things from me.”
“Good,” I said, my voice fierce. “Good. Then you know, you know I love you.”
We showered the sweat off our bodies in Honey’s shower, wordless. His hands were warm, and he was patient with my need to touch and touch. I wished futilely that this time would last forever, but eventually he turned off the water and we dressed.
“Willis asked you to call the police if you figured out where Juan Flores was,” I said, jerking a comb through my hair.
Adam took the comb away and took over the job. His touch was gentle and slow, as if there were all the time in the world to do the job properly. As if untangled hair mattered.
“He did,” Adam said. “And I saw enough cannon fodder in ’Nam to last me a lifetime.”
He saw my flinch and paused in his combing to kiss me. Neither of us talked again until he set the comb aside.
“I love you,” I told him rawly. “And if you don’t come back, I will spit on your grave.”
He smiled, but not enough to bring on his dimple. “I know you do, and I know you will. Mercedes Athena Thompson Hauptman, if I have not said it, you should know that you brought joy into my life when I thought there was no joy left in the world.”
“Don’t,” I said, tears spilling over as I frantically scrubbed them away. “Don’t say things like that when I’m going to have to go out there and face all of them. Don’t you make me cry.” Again.
He smiled, this time with dimple, and mopped my face with the shirt he hadn’t put on yet. “You’re tough, you’ll deal,” he said. “And at least I didn’t leave you a letter.”
13
They left at dusk. Ariana had only managed to magic the wolves through Mary Jo, so Alec was with those of us who waved them out. When they were gone, most of the pack dispersed to their own houses. Lucia busied herself cleaning up the havoc that the pack had made of Honey’s house, and Christy and Jesse helped her. I understood the need to do something.
“Mercy.” It was Ariana, but it was something more, too, so I was careful to move slowly when I turned around.
“I have to go,” she said. “I wish … but I cannot stay with my magic depleted and so many wolves about.”
I wrapped my arms around myself. “I understand. Thank you, Ariana. You gave them a chance.”
She looked down. “I hope so,” she said in a low voice. “I hope so.”
I didn’t know what to say to her fear, not with mine so wild in my heart. So I watched her get into Samuel’s car and drive off, and tried not to remember that I knew the address.
I went back into the house through the back door. Christy was cooking with Lucia and Auriele. They looked like they were making enough food for an army, even though everyone was gone.
“Where’s Jesse?” I asked.
“Upstairs with Darryl,” Christy said. “She doesn’t want to talk to me, but maybe you’ll have better luck.” Christy looked tired and worried. Her eyes were red. I hoped mine weren’t. “If I had stayed here, where I was needed, everyone would be safe now.”
I wiped my hands over my face to cover whatever expression might have crossed it. She wasn’t trying to shut me out, she was trying to save Adam and the rest.
“If I had married a doctor, like my mother told me to, then I wouldn’t have Joel to grieve over,” Lucia said unexpectedly. She was good at being quiet and unobtrusive. “And that would be a waste. If you had stayed here, this might not have happened, but maybe you’d have gotten in a car wreck and died.” She shrugged. “It does no good to play with what-ifs.”
“Well said,” Auriele told her. “‘Play the hand you have,’ my papa liked to say.”
I left them to their conversation and trotted up the stairs, where I could hear a movie running quietly. Darryl sat on one side of the couch nearest to the TV and Jesse on the other.
I sat down in the middle. “So,” I said to Darryl, “do you think Korra is going to be as good an avatar as Aang?”
“Who’s Aang?” he asked.
“You started him with Korra?” I accused Jesse. “That’s not okay. It’s like reading the last chapter of the book first.”
“Honey doesn’t have The Last Airbender series,” Jesse said in a low voice. “It was Korra or bust.”
“I think I should check on the cooks,” Darryl said. He left with cowardly haste.
I reached over and turned up the volume of the show until I was pretty sure we had privacy.
“I like Korra,” Jesse told me in a melancholy voice. “She’s not perfect, but she tries hard.”
“Like your mom,” I said.
She nodded. “I love her.”
“And she loves you back,” I said.
She nodded. “She does. She’s not perfect, but she’s my mom, you know?”
“You’ve met my mother,” I told her, and she laughed. I loved my mom, too, but I was very glad she lived in Portland.
“I’m glad I have you and Dad,” she said. “That way, it’s okay that Mom is…”
Flaky? Selfish? Horrible?
“Mom,” she concluded.
We watched Korra for a while longer. Darryl rejoined us as soon as we turned the volume back down.
“I am not wanted in the kitchen,” he said. Darryl loved to cook. “Christy says that men can’t cook.”
“You’re a great cook,” Jesse told him.
He smiled at her, a gentle smile he saved for Auriele and Jesse. “I know. I’m better than any of them, but they won’t listen to me.”
“I think I like Korra better than Aang,” I said after we’d watched another five minutes. “She gets to go do things instead of waiting around for other people.”
“I hear you,” agreed Darryl.