"Your lawyer's going to be mad," he said.
"Yes."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry." She did not look up. "I sat in the back seat once and didn't say anything. I was thirteen. I've been not saying anything for almost forty years." She put the title back in its sleeve and the sleeve in the safe and shut the door and spun the dial. "Go home, Mr. Cole. Your son's waiting."
He bought a twelve-piece and red beans and biscuits at the Popeyes on Tanyard Road, and drove the rest of the way home at exactly the speed limit, with his signal on for every turn, and pulled into the driveway on Tanyard behind his own truck. Mrs. Toliver had left for the day. The porch light was on. Through the front window he could see Quincy at the kitchen table, still at the laptop, his headset on.
Alton took the front passenger seat out in the driveway, under the porch light, pulling the quick-release pins the way he'd been shown, and set the seat on the grass. Then he went in and stood in the kitchen door with the Popeyes bag.
"You're late," Quincy said.
"Come outside."
"Why?"
"Just come outside."