French felt that one in his chest. “You knew I’d call it in.”

“I believed you when you told me that Gibby was young and needed protection. I don’t take it personally.”

“What if you’d gotten him killed?”

“What if you had?” That bought a moment between them. Father. Son. Nothing quiet between them. “Like I said, I don’t want to talk about it. He’s alive. You’re here.”

“Just like that?”

“Pretty much.”

“Do you really hate me so much?”

“Hate?” Jason looked his way for the first time. “Dad, I’ll never hate you.”

“But the rest of it?”

He meant family, the future. Jason raised his shoulders, and let them settle. “Too much water, I guess. Besides, it looks like I’m rocking this outlaw thing now. And, well…” He made a motion with his hand, like he was shaving down a piece of wood. “The open road is calling.”

French wanted to say something to get his son back, to make up for the mistakes he’d made. “Would an apology help?”

“Not now, no.” Jason’s head moved. “In time, maybe.”

French lifted his eyes to the cliff’s edge. They were so small, the boys. “I know what you did at Bến Hải. How you saved that village. And I know what General Laughtner did to you, afterward, the way he tried to cover it up, the drugs and the dishonorable discharge. I wish I’d known sooner. I wish I could go back.”

Jason raised an eyebrow, but showed no emotion at all.

French took that one in the chest, too. “Will you say goodbye to your mother?”

“She doesn’t want to see me. You know that.”

“Where will you go?”

“Are you asking as an officer of the law or as my father?”

“Enough, Jason. Please. As your father. Always, your father.”

Jason took a deep breath, as if to fill himself up, then stooped for a rock, and skimmed it. “You feel like a walk?”

The trail was a quarter mile long, but felt longer. French still had things to say; and still had no idea how to say them. Each step was a moment lost, a steady dwindle. As they neared the top, Jason broke the silence. “He was only trying to help me, you know. Whatever he did to make you angry or make Mom worry … He’s a good kid, and a lot like Robert.”

French shook his head. “Once upon a time, maybe. The older he gets, the more I see of you.”

Jason stopped for a moment. Birds were calling. Light slanted through the trees. “Do you really believe that?”

“Like you could be twins.”

“Is that right?”

There was a note of surprise in Jason’s voice. A smile came, too, and the sight of it broke French in half.