I usually try to avoid confrontations like this. They profit no one. But John Portman has a special place in my pantheon of dark spirits, and my guilt for what happened to Lutjens already weighs on me like a heavy stone.

“I go where the cases take me,” I tell him. “And you’d do well to remember what happened the last time you went up against me.”

After years of near omnipotence as a federal judge, a man becomes unused to resistance. FBI directors must enjoy similar insulation from unpleasantness, because Portman’s thin lips narrow to a white line, and his eyes blaze. Before he can threaten me further, I simply walk past him and down the hall. A rush of footsteps comes after me, and a hand jerks me around.

It’s Portman, his face livid. “You fucking dilettante—”

“You’re not a judge anymore, Portman. You’re a civil servant, serving at the pleasure of the President. And presidents are pretty sensitive to negative publicity.”

His grimace morphs into a twisted smile. “You don’t know what power is, Cage. But if you keep pushing, you’re going to find out.”

“All this over a little Mississippi murder,” I murmur. “I push in Natchez, you feel it in Washington. I find that very interesting. I think a lot of people will.”

This time when I walk away, Portman doesn’t follow.

As I descend the staircase and cross the dark pavement outside the death house, I feel my pulse pounding in my temples. There’s nothing quite like threatening the director of the FBI to get the blood circulating. I quicken my steps toward the parking lot, wanting to get out of the prison as swiftly as I can. Life is back at the hotel with Annie and Caitlin, not here at the Walls.

But Portman won’t leave my thoughts. I can’t shake the feeling that he came to Huntsville specifically to see me, and not Arthur Lee Hanratty. He knew he could speak to me here without appearing to have sought me out. His ruthless punishment of Peter Lutjens proves that my interest in the Payton murder has touched a bureaucratic nerve, at the very least. And at worst? I can’t even guess. Anything is possible.

As I near my rental car, a couple of reporters from the witness room start shouting questions at me. Do I really believe the death penalty is a deterrent? Am I absolutely convinced of Hanratty’s guilt? What were John Portman and I talking about? What was the FBI director doing here at all? I climb into the car, resisting the temptation to pour gasoline onto the fire of the Payton case. I need to think. I need to see Annie and Caitlin.