“In the second, the minute the story breaks that you were a terrorist mastermind, the press finds a way to worm its way into your mother’s assisted-living facility in Nashville and get the first garbled, incoherent statement they can out of her, which they will then edit into the sound bite they want for the story they’ve already written. And your other son, well, he’ll probably have to move his family out of Minneapolis, because it’s a big city and the exposure will be too much. He’ll also have to leave the insurance firm where he works. Maybe go into a business where he doesn’t constantly come into contact with people who recognize his last name. He’ll tell his wife that they’re just pulling the kids out of school for a little while. But a while will probably turn into a few months, then a year. Then homeschooling, if his wife can manage the stress of it. If she can manage the stress of being married to him at all after a year. Maybe less. This is all provided, of course, that no other members of your family were part of your insane plot. But don’t worry. I’ll find out for sure.”

“Who are you?” Donald whispers.

“You really should have asked that question before.”

“Before what?”

“Before you brought this shit to my doorstep.”

“Yeah, I can see that now.”

“Your son and his friends did terrible things to people who are incredibly valuable to me.”

“Who? Lacey? What are you, her billionaire faggot brother?”

“You’ll never know, Donald.”

The man’s sneer fades.

“You want more names, is that it?” he asks.

Cole nods.

“They only made contact with four men. Their goal was twelve. But they had sit-downs with four. They met ’em through chat rooms. But they didn’t even have their targets yet. They were just testing them to see if they could be trusted. It was early. All of it, it was real early. So I don’t have their damn names because they never gave ’em to me. You can torture me all night long, I still won’t have ’em. As for all the guys you mentioned, sounds like you got the lot. Milo brought some of them to the table, Jordy brought the others. All the names you just said, I recognized.”

For a while, Donald stares at the table.

Cole glances at Scott to see if he believes the man’s statement; Scott’s curt nod says he does.

“Well, Donald, it goes without saying that if that turns out not to be the case, no matter how things end tonight, the scenario I laid out for you a moment ago can still come to pass.”

“If it goes without saying, then don’t fucking say it.”

“A story, then.”

“A story?”

“Yes, it might answer the question you just asked me.”

“Which one?”

“The one about who I am.”

Despite his furrowed brow and wild eyes, there’s no real strength to Donald’s glare. It’s a mask worn by a man who’s collapsing on the inside. His lower lip’s even started to tremble a little.

“When I was thirteen, my father sent me to this wilderness camp in Colorado. He was trying to toughen me up. Make me less of a spoiled brat, I guess. Anyway, on the last day this counselor and I got in a fight. The details are not important. The point is, he was sick of my mouth, and I was sick of being made to do stuff that scared the shit out of me. So I took off running and believe it or not, nobody caught up with me. My plan was to walk back to the nearest town, call my dad, and get him to come take me home.

“Then this beat-up old pickup truck came down the road next to me, and I think I stared a little too long at the boy in the passenger seat. He was real pretty, you see. So they pulled over suddenly, got out, and asked me if I needed help, and when I said no, they all came at me at once. The next thing I knew, they’d tied me up and thrown me in their truck. They took me to this shed in the middle of nowhere, and they raped me one after the other. Real rape, not movie rape. Not desire boiling over and not being able to hear the word no. The kind of rape where someone uses sex to inflict as much pain and humiliation as they can. I’d stared too long at that boy as they drove by, you see. That was my mistake. When they were done with me, they let me go. That was theirs.

“I guess in their little world, they thought the shame of it would keep me silent. But when I finally got back to town I found a phone and I called my father and told him everything that happened. He got there as fast as he could. He even brought a doctor with him so I wouldn’t have to go to the hospital. They treated me in a hotel, took my blood so they could test for everything. And then, about the third day, I realized there’d been no police. I mean, I was being taken excellent care of. My father was there. Doctors were there. And I was fine to travel. We could leave, but we weren’t leaving, and yet no one had called the police.”

Cole reaches out and takes another sip from the beer bottle sitting between him and Donald.

“That afternoon, my dad knocked on my door. He asked me to get dressed. He told me we were going somewhere. We got in a car with some guys just like the fine gentlemen who came here with me tonight. And he gave me this little pill and told me to swallow it. I didn’t think twice about it. He was handing out pills all the time. That was his business.

“And then I realized we were driving to the shack where those boys took me. He told me to be calm and that everything would be all right and that he was there for me no matter what happened. And there they were, all three of them. Inside. They’d brought in a little round table and they were all sitting at it, scared out of their minds. But my dad, he just acted like we were there to talk things through. He actually asked them to explain themselves. To explain why they’d raped me, but he asked like he was asking them to explain why they stole five dollars. It was so insane.