Today he has a beautiful wife, four children, two grandchildren, and a ten-thousand-square-foot house with a swimming pool surrounded by potted kumquat trees. He owns a Honda dealership in Simi Valley. We talk on the phone every Sunday night. I miss him.

Hard things, if they don’t kill you, make you grow. Sometimes they even make you lose your fear. I never backed down again. A week after the funeral, one of the hoods bullied me. It took two teachers to pull me off of him. He and his friends never bothered me again.

I became a serious student with good enough grades to get accepted to Stanford Law School. After graduation I returned to Utah and at the age of twenty-nine I was made assistant prosecutor at the Utah Attorney General’s Office. At thirty-four I was appointed the youngest prosecutor in the state’s history. I have spent my life hunting down and prosecuting people like Grace’s stepfather. I carry Grace’s locket into every trial. I’ve earned a reputation as a fierce courtroom combatant who takes every case personally. What Grace saw in the candle was true of me as well. I am feared.

A reporter once asked me what drove me. I looked down for a moment, then softly replied, “Grace.” She wrote it down but she didn’t understand. I wouldn’t have explained anyway.

I don’t know what happened to Grace’s mother; all I know is that she moved out of Utah. A part of me hopes she’s in Hawaii. Grace would have liked that.

Stan is still alive, or he was the last time I checked. He got out of prison after seventeen years for “good behavior.” I’ve seen him. I paid him a visit after his release to a halfway house. I needed to know for myself that he wasn’t still a threat. I also wanted to let him know that I was, and that I was watching him. My visit wasn’t necessary. He was a broken shell of a man; nothing but a shadow and a stain. I thought of the line from Isaiah: They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble?

I don’t know if he paid his debt—that’s up to God to decide—but he took something beautiful from this earth. He took something that no one could ever give back.