Chapter 30: What She Asked For

Nina's POV

The state's attorney had a small office with a bad radiator and a framed photograph of her dog.

She sat behind a metal desk with Dylan's file open in front of her.

Dylan sat across from her beside his lawyer, with his healed hands flat on his knees.

I sat at the end, next to Sam, with the one page I'd written.

"Ms. Doyle," she said. "You asked to go last."

"I did."

"Mr. Mercer's lawyer is offering a plea to reckless conduct and endangerment," she said.

"If the victim agrees, I recommend two years probation. If she asks for the cell, I'll ask for the cell."

Dylan's lawyer touched his sleeve.

Dylan did not look at him.

He looked at me.

I unfolded the page.

I had rewritten it eleven times in the last week, and in the end it had come out short.

"I don't want him in a cell," I said.

"I thought about it for a long time. I don't want to be the one who decides how long he suffers. That's his habit, not mine."

Dylan's mouth moved.

"I want three things," I said.

"He pays for the fire-safety unit out of his own money, every building, and he never touches its budget again."

"He does fifteen hundred hours of service at a fire station, doing whatever they tell him."

"And he never asks me, in any room, to forgive him."

The state's attorney wrote it down.

"Mr. Mercer?"

"Yes," Dylan said. "All of it."

"You understand fifteen hundred hours is a year of weekends."

"I understand."

"You'll be mopping floors."

"I hope so."

She looked at him for a long moment.

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