“Which is why you need to leave, Brent. You and Mel need to get away. I’ll do what I can to make sure you’re protected, but once this hits the fan, it’ll be out of my hands.”

“I’m getting away. Believe me.”

“What are you going to do with the money?”

“I’ll tell you one thing—Mel and I are going to have one hell of a honeymoon!”

“Good,” Jeremiah said, “that’s a good idea.”

“So, I suppose this is goodbye.”

“I suppose it is,” Jeremiah said. “And, as I understand it, I won’t be able to contact you again. They’re setting us up with entirely new lives, new names, everything. Very cloak and dagger.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I have no idea. Write, maybe, or travel. After I take care of the evidence, I just want to go somewhere with Parker and be a dad. That’s all I really care about right now. That’s all I want to do.”

“I won’t even know your name,” Brent said. “I wouldn’t be able to find you if I tried.”

“Maybe I can get word to you somehow. Maybe, if they ever finally release the update of that damn game, you can look for Clyde.”

“Clyde is a badass. So are you. How’s the hand, by the way?”

Jeremiah shrugged casually and looked at his bandage. Dr. Pike had seen to the wound—made a cleaner cut, this time under heavy anesthesia, sutured it and put him on powerful antibiotics to guard against infection. Brent’s boxing glove bandage had been replaced with something slightly more manageable.

“Sit down, Brent. Let’s have a drink—one for the road.” He got two beers from the fridge and they sat down in the kitchen. “I don’t know how to say thank you,” he said.

“You don’t have to.”

“If it weren’t for you, I’d be stuck here another six months. God knows what would have happened to Parker, the way things were going. I might have gone back to nothing. You gave me a second chance. And you risked everything to do it.”

“You gave yourself a second chance,” he said. “I just opened the door for you.”

“Look, Brent, I don’t mean to go all fatherly on you or anything, but can I offer you some advice before I leave?”

“Sure, Pops.”

“I’m serious. This is important. You’ve got to learn something from all of this.”

“I have,” Brent said. “If you think you might have to cut off someone’s finger, don’t eat a breakfast burrito in the morning.”

“As useful as that may be, I hope you learned something from my mistakes. I hope you realize that it doesn’t have to be that way for you. Don’t ever become the kind of asshole I was.”

“C’mon, Jeremiah,” he started.

“I mean it. All of that stuff you said when we were arguing. That’s all true. I know that. And somewhere, you do, too. Or else you wouldn’t have been able to come up with it so quickly. You’re not that good of an actor, pal.” Jeremiah took a breath. “If you ever start to doubt yourself, promise me you’ll take a good hard look at your life and turn it around before it’s too late. You get to decide who you are and who you’re going to be. Don’t let anyone else decide for you.”