Blood, Ash, and Bone

CHAPTER Thirty-three

A little before seven in the morning, I rolled over to find his side of the bed cold and empty. I squinted into gray light—the bedroom was still, but not silent. In the next room, I could hear the soft tap-tap-tap of keystrokes, the dry-leaf rustle of paper.

I dragged on my robe and went in. Trey sat at his desk in his white shirt and black slacks, his jacket on the back of the chair.

I yawned. “What are you doing?”

“Inputting the final data.”

“What data?”

He handed me a piece of paper without looking up from the computer. It was the crime scene report from the shooting.

“How’d you get your hands on this?” I said.

“Sergeant Underwood sent it.”

“Who’s…Oh yeah. Kendrick.”

He nodded. The brotherhood code. Once a cop, always a cop, always privy to cop information. I examined the report. The preliminary findings were not surprising—gunshot wound to the head—but seeing the diagrams of Winston’s sprawled body, the black and white specificity of his murder, was sobering.

I handed the report back. “When did you get up?”

“Five-thirty.”

His desk was its usual patchwork of diagrams and graphs. I recognized familiar names and places—Savannah’s parks and fields, squares and streets.

“So what’s your decision?” I said.

“I don’t know.”

“Marisa wants something in two hours.”

“I know.” He rubbed his eyes and leaned back in his seat. “I’m sorry. This is difficult.”

“Of course it is. You’re running on four hours of sleep.”

“That’s not what I mean. The algorithms run themselves. The roadways, terrain, the specifics of the crime itself. Input those and the conclusion is clear.”

I waited for him to share said conclusion, but he kept staring at the computer screen. He had a pot of tea at his elbow, cool and half empty.

“Trey?”

He exhaled sharply. “The conference center is a low probability strike zone. So is the ballroom. I ran the data set twice to make sure. Limited access, well-controlled population density, high probability of video recording.”

“So it’s safe for me to go to the Expo? For Reynolds to go to the ball?”

“There’s no such thing at one hundred percent safe. But the Expo and ball pose no greater than average risk.”

And yet the shades were still drawn. His desk was a study in black and white, but the room was a palette of gray and shadow, shifting and insubstantial. He put his head back and stared at the ceiling.

I sat on the edge of the desk. “If that’s the case, why are you still bothered?”

“Because it’s not about the equations.” He got to his feet abruptly and started pacing. “The synthesis of the data is clear. The risk is negligible. And yet I can’t think of you walking out that door without…and it’s not rational, it’s not logical, it’s not…but I can’t.”

I moved to stand in front of him, and he stopped pacing, hands on hips. I pressed my fingers against his temples, gently but firmly. He closed his eyes. I kept my voice low and calm.

“Listen to me, Trey. That’s not a box you can live in. The lid locks behind you.”

“But—”

“Shhh.” I pulled his jacket off the back of the chair. I slipped his arms into the sleeves, easing it over his shoulders, smoothing it neatly across his back. “It’s all an illusion, you know. Control. We pretend we have it, and it gets us out of bed in the morning. But it’s not real.”

His eyes were piercingly bright. “I don’t know how to do this.”

“Of course you do.” I buttoned his jacket, then kissed him lightly. He tasted of Darjeeling. “I’ll get a shower and get dressed. Then we’ll find Marisa and tell her your decision.”

“But I don’t know what that is.”

“Of course you do. You’re going to make the logical and rational and sensible one, the one supported by your data. Everyone will be pleased—Marisa, the Harringtons. And then afterward, we’ll go to the Expo, you and me.”

He looked puzzled. “That wouldn’t be overprotective?”

“Not if I ask you.”

I straightened his tie as best I could. He regarded me warily, like I was springing another trap. And in a way, I was. Common ground and compromise, negotiation and ambiguity. I was asking him to stand with me on that uncertain territory, if only for a few hours.

Finally he nodded. “Okay. If you say so. Of course I’ll come.”

I gave up on the tie, patted his lapels. “Good. You can stand in the corner and glower menacingly. The whole thing’s over at five, plus an hour for takedown, which will give us an hour to change for the ball.”

“The ball? But you said—”

“If you can mingle with a bunch of unreconstructed rebels for eight hours, I can manage a hoop skirt for one evening. If you’d like.”

He let out the breath he’d been holding. “I would.”

“You think Gabriella can hook me up with something antebellum on short notice?”

“I’m sure she can.”

“Then it’s settled.” I put my hands on my hips, smiled at him. “We go to the Expo, then we go to the ball, then we go back to Atlanta, and nowhere in there do I investigate a damn thing. The tournament gets planned, the Bible goes into the wind, and the adventure is over. Deal?”

“Deal. Once we go over this, of course.”

He reached behind him and picked up a set of papers stapled into a booklet. I looked at the cover. Sniper Evasionary Tactics: A Primer.

I sighed. “Oh joy. A manual.”

“I printed it out from the SWAT site. You can read it over breakfast.”

I accepted it and pressed it to my chest. “I will.”

He regarded me, eyes unreadable. He’d have to fix his Windsor knot properly before we met Marisa. The room remained in thin half-light, but I knew that on the other side of the heavy shades, the clear new dawn was sneaking into the sky.

“Thank you,” he said.

“You’re welcome.” I patted his chest, right above his heart. “Come hell or high water, boyfriend, I’m with you all the way.”