"You don't let that office turn you into a stranger," she had told him at the front door.
"Yes, ma'am."
"And don't you forget to call me."
"Yes, ma'am."
"And remember your daddy."
Malcolm had looked at the small framed photograph beside the door: Nathan in his Sunday jacket, one hand on each son's shoulder. "Every day," he said.
An unusual security arrangement had complicated their attempt at an ordinary morning. During Malcolm's previous work on a high-profile public corruption case, investigators had documented threats from people connected to a defendant. A protective assessment remained active while he changed offices, and the United States Marshals Service had arranged a sizable detail for several scheduled movements, including the trip into Richmond.
Supervisory Deputy U.S. Marshal Dana Sutton was coordinating the protection. She had a clipped, patient voice, a gift for detecting the flaw in every casual plan, and a habit of saying no before anyone else finished describing what they wanted. She had not liked the idea of Malcolm driving ahead without officers beside him, and she had liked it less when he explained that he wanted breakfast with his brother.
"Sir, a protective detail isn't decoration," she had told him outside Carolyn's house.
"I know."
"And your first day isn't a good day to make exceptions."
"It's also the last morning my brother and I are going to have to ourselves for a while. Give us some distance, Dana. Fifteen minutes. You have the route, the vehicle, and both our numbers."
Sutton had studied him for several seconds. Then she agreed to a staggered departure, with the protective vehicles following on the agreed route and checkpoints communicated by phone. She repeated the check-in instructions twice and told Malcolm that if she called, she expected an answer. He promised he would keep his phone within reach.
In hindsight, Malcolm would wish he had accepted her first recommendation. But regret would not change the deputy's decisions, and he would come to understand that accepting responsibility for his own imperfect safety choice was not the same as accepting blame for an unlawful detention. Those two facts belonged in different places, and he would refuse to let anyone mix them together.
Elijah began searching his phone for food as they passed a field of sunflowers bowed toward the road. Their mother's biscuits had been excellent, but Elijah declared that a man facing his first day as a federal prosecutor deserved a second breakfast. He found a diner named Loretta's Griddle, fifteen minutes off Route 58, with a four-star rating and photographs of pancakes piled high enough to look like birthday cakes.
"This," he announced, turning the screen toward Malcolm, "is what democracy looks like."
"That looks like a medical emergency covered in maple syrup."
"Live a little, Mr. Attorney."
Malcolm took the exit. The road narrowed, passed a church with a peeling white steeple, and entered the town of Barlow, a place of fewer than five thousand people inside a county whose roads covered more acreage than its businesses ever could. A hardware store stood opposite the bank, and an empty storefront still carried the faded outline of a sign from a pharmacy that had closed years ago.