Chapter 23: The Check

I chose the coffee shop on Alder Street, where Derrick and I had met every Sunday for two years.

It had big front windows and a long communal table, and on the day before the sentencing it was full.

Mrs. Brackett arrived early.

She wore a gray suit and pearls and sat with her handbag in her lap.

She had aged ten years in two months.

At the next table sat three women from the Foundation board.

They had come for the scones, and they saw her, and their talk stopped.

I took the chair across from her.

Through the window, Nolan sat in his car across the street with the engine off.

I set my phone face up on the table, with the red recording dot showing.

"I'm recording this," I said.

Mrs. Brackett glanced at it.

"I expected nothing less."

"You asked to speak with me."

"I did." She folded her hands. "I'm not here to apologize."

"Then why?"

"To settle things like adults."

She drew an envelope from her handbag and laid it on the table between us.

"Open it," she said.

I did.

It was a cashier's check made out in my name.

I read the number, and I read it again.

"Two million dollars," Mrs. Brackett said calmly. "Through the Foundation."

She tapped the envelope.

"You sign a statement saying you won't oppose a lenient sentence, and that the recording at the dinner was edited."

"It wasn't edited."

"A statement doesn't have to be true. It has to be signed."

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