Carter propped his feet on the edge of his desk and looked at me with his lawyer’s gaze. He said, “Are you in love with that woman?”

I hesitated, then shrugged to deflect the question.

“Sure you are,” he said forcefully. “You always have been, from that first night in Arch’s, the night I told you you would be. You’ve been in love with her, or the image of her, all these years. Maybe it’s something you got from Avrum—the poor, disillusioned bastard—or maybe it’s just something you can’t help. Or her, for that matter. You’ve spent most of your life in a lie, wanting a woman you thought you’d never see again. And now you’ve seen her. You’ve made love to her, and I don’t give a shit whether you admit that or not; I know you did. I knew you were there all night before I asked you about it. I drove by early this morning, just to see, just to be able to bust your balls about it.”

He paused, sighed, shook his head, played with the coffee cup he held in his hand. Then he dropped his feet from the desk and looked at me. “And you’re telling me that you’re going to be leaving in a few days and that’s it? You’re going to leave it all behind you, like you’d just had a cup of coffee with a stranger? Bullshit. You’re not giving it up now, not after all these years. Remember Rene Wallace? Your giving up on Amy would be like me giving up on Rene, and I didn’t, if you remember. I chased that girl all summer, and finally made it. No, Bobo, I don’t believe you’re going to turn away now. I don’t believe it and you don’t believe it. And I also don’t believe you can let something like a painting of her interfere with that.”

I sat for a moment thinking about what Carter had said. I knew he was right, but still I was afraid of the risk.