"Captain Whitfield," he said. "I'm sorry. I'll go. I just — I wanted to say something, and I didn't want to do it in there, in front of everybody, where it'd look like I was saying it for the Board."
Mr. Tolliver looked at him, and then at Naomi, and then he touched the brim of his hat. "I'll be in the stairwell," he said. "Getting my breath. Take your time."
When he had gone, Naomi said, "Go ahead, Officer."
"I'm sorry," Kyle Brandt said. "For grabbing you. For putting you on the ground. For the cuffs. For being glad. I don't know if that means anything coming from me. I know it doesn't fix anything." He took a breath. "And there's something else. You probably already know. The name on that old report."
"I know."
"You didn't put it in the complaint."
"No."
He nodded slowly, as though she had confirmed something he had been afraid of. "My father wants to meet you," he said. "He's eighty-one. He's got something that belongs to you, and something else I think you should have, and he says it's not his to keep and it's not mine to bring. He says he has to hand it over himself. You don't have to. You can say no and I'll tell him, and that'll be the end of it. I want you to know that."
Naomi looked at the young man in front of her, at his visible hands and his tired face and the way he was standing, braced, as though for a blow he had decided he deserved. She thought about the five whys. She thought about her father's index card.
"Mr. Tolliver comes with me," she said. "If he wants to."
* * *
He wanted to.