Chapter 8 - THE PRICE OF THE TRUTH
Daniel pleaded guilty to racketeering-related offenses, illegal contracting practices and financial crimes.
He was not charged with murder.
There was no evidence he had personally ordered one.
That didn't make him innocent.
Daniel never claimed it did.
His cooperation dismantled much of Vincent's organization and helped prosecutors rescue victims connected to the trafficking network.
The judge considered that.
So did the victims who submitted statements.
Daniel received a prison sentence.
Thirty months.
The newspapers called it the fall of a king.
I hated that headline.
Not because it was unfair.
Because it still made crime sound glamorous.
There was nothing glamorous about visiting Daniel behind glass.
Nothing glamorous about seeing Ethan searched before entering.
Nothing glamorous about Daniel telling me:
“You don't have to wait.”
“I know.”
“Maya.”
“I said I know.”
“You're going back to school.”
“Yes.”
“You should live.”
“I intend to.”
“With me?”
I looked at him.
“Maybe.”
That hurt him.
Good.
It was honest.
“I don't know who you'll be when you come out.”
“Neither do I.”
“Figure it out.”
He nodded.
“I will.”
I returned to MIT.
At twenty-seven.
Surrounded by students younger than me.
I felt ancient for approximately a week.
Then engineering took over.
Equations didn't care how old I was.
Circuits didn't ask why I'd left.
My professors didn't treat survival as failure.
I completed my bachelor's degree.
Then entered a master's program focused on resilient energy-control systems.
The hundred million remained mostly untouched.
I used part of it to pay taxes, clear debts, fund Ethan's education and create a scholarship in my mother's name for students forced to interrupt school to care for family members.
Daniel wrote me letters.
Not love letters.
Mostly.
He wrote about books.
Responsibility.
Therapy.
The men he'd once hurt through decisions made from offices where he never saw the consequences.
I wrote back.
Sometimes.
I did not make rehabilitation easy for him by pretending the past had disappeared.
Two years later, I visited shortly before his release.
Daniel looked different.
Lean.
Quieter.
“What are you afraid of?” I asked.
He smiled.
“Job interviews.”
I laughed.
“Seriously.”
“That was serious.”
Then he said:
“Becoming powerful again and forgetting what power did to me.”
That answer told me more than a declaration of love could have.
“What about you?”
“Failing.”
“You fixed a machine my entire engineering division couldn't.”
“That's one machine.”
He smiled.
“Then fail at something.”
I frowned.
“What?”
“Build something difficult enough that you might fail.”
That irritated me.
May you like
Which usually meant he was right.
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