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He went to the edge of the pond on the west side of the grounds. In a few more minutes, we’d be walking through mud.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “Don’t let my brooding take you down with me. I’ll get over it. You’re right. This was good news we heard today.”

He shook his head. “I’m the one who’s sorry. I made light of your feelings. I don’t know why you put up with me. You should go inside. I’m not fit to be around.”

I took his hand and rested my head against his arm. “Come inside with me. We’re both being ridiculous. It’s just all of it, Lock. My work. Your work. I wanted the baby-making to be easy. Well, it’s not going to be. So what? You’re right. It’ll be what it is.”

I tried to pull him along with me. It was like trying to move a slab of granite. “Lock,” I said. “Please.”

I saw his jaw clench. The whites of his eyes went red. I was losing him to that dark place. And it was my fault.

“Lock,” I whispered. I placed his palm on my chest. “Look at me. Feel me. We’re in this together, remember?”

He blinked. “You won’t go away?”

“What? Of course not. How could you even think that?”

“It just keeps getting so much harder not to think about everyone I’ve hurt.”

I bristled, worrying, but decided to stand firm. I was his everything, I had to believe him. “You’ve hurt no one. You’ve only ever tried to help people. And you can’t save the world.”

He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. “I just wanted to save them all.”

“Them?”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”

“You didn’t hurt Bennett.” The photo of the boys Eli showed me in Lock’s office floated up in my mind. I couldn’t remember their names now. “And you’re not responsible for the choices any of the boys from Bennett’s Place make.”

I went up on my tiptoes and kissed him. Slowly at first, then I felt starved for him. I needed him. His touch. His strength. Finally, he responded to me as I stirred the same need in him.

The rain fell in earnest. Within a minute, we were both drenched. But it felt good. Cathartic in its way.

He took me there. Right at the edge of the pond. It was quick. It was rough. And it was exactly what we both needed.

Afterwards, he talked me into calling in sick. I made him lunch. He cooked me dinner. We took a shower together and Lock finally fell asleep in my arms.

He was right about almost everything. We would be okay no matter what happened. I was looking for clouds in the bright, sunny sky. The only thing he was ever wrong about was himself. Someday, I wished he would be able to see himself through my eyes. And I knew he thought the same thing about me.

We slept like the dead. When the sunlight finally stabbed through the windows, my ringing phone jarred me awake. Lock moaned beside me, looking wicked as he stretched out, one arm above his head. He held me tightly with the other. “You’ve been bad, Mina,” he whispered, pointing his chin toward my ringing phone. I’d broken a rule and forgotten to leave it in the kitchen. “You know what happens when you’re bad.”

I did. He would deliver delicious punishment for that later. A shock of need jolted through me as I imagined it. Sometimes, I was bad on purpose.

“Roy,” I answered the phone, clearing my throat.

“Are you sick or something?”

“No… I… I thought I was coming down with something. I feel better now.”

Lock stirred beside me and acted similarly surprised when he saw the time.

“Good,” Roy said. “I need you down here. We’re only about a quarter of the way through Palicki’s house. It’s a house of horrors, Mina. They videotaped everything. I need you to go through it with me.”

“Of course,” I said. The bubble of serenity Lock and I built last night burst as jarring reality set in. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

“Everything okay?” Lock asked.

I didn’t know how to answer. “Not really,” I said. “I have to go to work. And so do you.”