Deck O’Rourke appeared at her shoulder.
“Time to go.”
His voice was low, blunt, absolute.
Eleanor looked at him.
He took one glance at her face and nodded once, as if that confirmed what he already knew.
“You’re done for today.”
That was so precisely Deck that if she’d had one ounce more strength, she might have laughed.
Instead, she nodded.
“Side exit,” Deck said quietly, one hand already at her elbow. “Come on, lass.”
“Okay,” she said.
The side hallway was cooler, dimmer, blessedly free of cameras. At the end of the corridor, she stopped.
Her hand went to the wall.
She did not cry.
But she felt the tears standing behind her eyes like a weather front waiting on permission.
Deck stopped beside her.
They stood there without speaking for a moment, the kind of silence only old loyalty could hold.
“I can’t do this tonight,” she said.
“Good,” Deck replied. “Don’t.”
She let her head tip back once against the wall.
“I don’t mean just him.”
“I know what you mean.”
The corridor hummed with low, distant voices.
Eleanor swallowed hard.
“It feels like Charleston all over again,” she said quietly. “Only worse.”
Deck was silent for a beat.
Then: “No.”
She turned toward him.
“No,” he said again, rough and certain. “Charleston was a fire somebody else set and let burn through your life while people stood around taking notes. This?” He nodded back toward the courtroom. “This was the truth finally running out of places to hide.”
The words hit somewhere low and painful.
She looked away.
