When I first came to you, Meg, I never thought that there would be any reason for my curiosity about your letters to cross paths with the numbers work I have been doing regarding this case. I told myself you and I would speak once, and I would get some answers, and we would go our separate ways. But of course I should have known this was a mistake, too. The first time I ever saw you—when I was sitting next to a woman I was supposed to marry—I knew I felt something for you, something for the way you smiled and talked and drew. I deluded myself thinking I wouldn’t feel the same way when I saw you again this spring. When you found my card and e-mailed me, I should have said no. When you walked away from me in Midtown, I should have let you go. I should have known that every time I let myself get closer to you, you were getting closer and closer to the risk for this exposure, this scandal. But I suppose I got greedy, and given what I have accused some of my colleagues of, I certainly see the irony. I wanted—even for a little while—to be around your smile and your conversation and your talent, and eventually, your way of seeing this city. And then I wanted everything else. Your kiss, your body close to mine, your love. I wanted your forever.

Last week, when we saw Avery on the street—I know what you must’ve thought then, and I dread what you certainly must think now. I know that my reaction to seeing her, my shock at seeing her, must be confirmation for you of everything that’s now in the papers about me—that I am a scorned party in a relationship that went wrong, that I could not let her go, that my feelings for her are what led to my involvement in this case. It is true, as I have always told you, that I cared about her, that I still care about her. When I saw her, I was reminded, in a concrete way, how she would be hurt by all this, how her life would change because of her father’s crimes. I was reminded of how I would be, at least in part, responsible, and I hated and still hate to know this. I hate to think that she is suffering because of what I have helped reveal about her father.