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“While we take care of these pieces of shit,” North said.
“They messed up. This is Wahredua; they attacked you here. That means this is my investigation now, and that means I can bring the whole department to bear on the Cottonmouth Club. I’ll talk to the sheriff, too; he might have contacts I don’t. We’re going to work this piece by piece, starting here and following it straight back to the club, and then we’re going to take that place apart.” He paused, and he said to Theo, “I want to apologize again for earlier. And I want to tell you that you and Auggie did a good job.”
Theo nodded. He was too tired for anything else.
“It’s like a scene fromBad Boys,” Shaw said. “Oh, do you think Martin Lawrence ever got a sunburn in his ass crack because he was trying to tan for this Chouteau bro who was going to toss his salad—”
North didn’t even hide it: he just twisted one nipple savagely through the ruffled shirt, and Shaw squealed.
“One of you say something,” North said to the rest of them, red in his cheeks. “I fucking dare you.”
“North,” Shaw wailed, both hands over the wounded nipple. “What if I’d been lactating?”
Tean opened his mouth like he might respond to that, but he stopped when Jem elbowed him. Instead, he said, “Theo and Auggie need to go home. They need rest. Lana needs to be in her own bed.”
Theo nodded again. He remembered the emptiness of the burn. Coming out of the green of hickory and pine, the smell of the duff warming up under the sun, and then the reek of old smoke and char. The emptiness had been big enough, he remembered thinking, to swallow him up.
“Come on,” Auggie whispered, touching his arm.
Theo nodded, and they went home.
13
The house was dark, and Jem tried to go first.
“Just in case,” he explained.
Theo tried to say no politely. He tried to say that it wasn’t necessary. Jem kept insisting, until finally, Theo said, “It’s my goddamn house.”
Jem nodded, but the corners of his eyes tightened as he stepped back.
While Auggie carried Lana upstairs, Theo led Jem and Tean to the living room. He turned on lights as he went. For a moment, as they stepped into the living room, before he found the switch, they could see out through the sliding glass doors to the deck. Everything was dusted with silver: the patio furniture Auggie had spent so much time deliberating over; the grill Theo needed to clean; the maples bent over the creek; the water, like someone had drawn a line with mercury. Theo thought, in that moment, he could hear the babble of the creek. And then the lamps sprang to life, and the doors became a mirror, and Theo saw himself in the glass.
He told Jem and Tean to help themselves from the fridge while he checked on Auggie. He went upstairs and reached the second-floor hallway as Auggie was emerging from Lana’s room. Auggie held a finger to his lips and shut the door, and then he led Theo into the guest bedroom. He shut that door too, and then he turned on the light and began to check everything: the bedding, the closet, the dresser drawers.
“They don’t need to stay over,” Theo said.
Auggie glanced up, and something changed in his face. He nodded.
“Nothing is going to happen to you or Lana while I’m in this house.”
Auggie sat on the edge of the bed. He smoothed the blanket, his gaze turned down. Then he looked up again. “What about you?”
“I’ll be fine.”
Auggie nodded.
The silence stretched out between them.
Theo broke first. “So, I’ll tell them they can go.”
“I’d like them to stay.”
Theo thought he could hear the creek again. His jaw cracked when he said, “Ok.”
“You haven’t slept in two days, Theo. We were literally just talking about this. You need a good night’s sleep, and you can’t get that if you’re worried about staying awake and keeping us alive.”
“I said ok.”
