Epilogue

November was a month of changes.

Jack stopped being Zahra’s lawyer the moment they stepped out of the cottage on Jupiter Island. He’d represented worse human

beings in his career, but Jack drew the line at defending anyone who lied to him. Even without his help, Zahra avoided the

more serious criminal charge of child abduction. As in most cases of “parental kidnapping” in Florida, Zahra faced a single

charge of interference with a custody order, a third-degree felony. A federal immigration judge rendered all of it moot: Zahra

was deported and sent back to Iran before the arraignment. Jack shuddered to think what life was waiting for her there.

Farid and Yasmin found a happier ending. Farid could have taken the easy road. He could have continued to insist on the legitimacy

of the custody order of the Iranian family court—the order that the US State Department had certified as “authentic,” that

his lawyer had presented to a family court judge in Miami, and that the judge had enforced. He could have relied on that order

to claim full custody of Yasmin, packed their suitcases, and taken her anywhere. Instead, Farid hired a new lawyer and initiated

supplemental proceedings before the same judge in Miami family court. Dr. Vestry, the child psychiatrist Jack had hired, was

a key witness at the hearing. She cleared Farid’s name and reputation, testifying that in her expert opinion Yasmin’s drawings

were the product of Zahra’s coaching—parental alienation syndrome—and that Farid presented no danger, much less grave danger,

to his daughter.

Jack checked in with Farid’s lawyer after the hearing, and she made it possible for Jack to say a proper goodbye to Yasmin. He drove to the airport and met Farid and his daughter at the international terminal two hours before their flight to Heathrow. Their bags were checked, and Jack had a few minutes with them before they joined the long, snaking line through security.

“How long are you planning to stay in London?” Jack asked Farid.

“Forever, I hope,” said Farid.

A horn beeped, and an electric vehicle loaded with elderly passengers zipped past them. Yasmin held on to her father even

more tightly.

“Did your British citizenship come through?”

“My immigration lawyer says it looks good,” said Farid. “In the meantime, we can stay under the Entrepreneur visa.”

Jack got down on a knee to bring himself eye-to-eye with Yasmin. “I brought you a present from Righley,” he said.

“Righley’s nice,” she said in a little voice.

“Do you want to see it?”

Yasmin nodded. Jack opened his backpack and pulled out a stuffed bear.

“His name is Paddington,” said Jack.

Yasmin extended her arms. Jack handed over the bear, and she squeezed it so hard that Paddington’s signature red rain hat

popped off. It reminded him of Righley’s reaction, two years earlier, when he’d returned from London with the same gift.

“Thank you,” said Yasmin.

Farid checked the departures board. “We have to be going.”

Jack rose and wished him luck. Farid took Yasmin by the hand, and they started away.

“Farid,” Jack said, stopping them.

Farid turned and looked.

“I’m glad you’re honoring Ava’s wish,” he said.

Jack didn’t have to explain. Farid knew he meant Ava’s wish that Yasmin be raised in a free country. He simply nodded, and

the new family—Farid, Yasmin, and Paddington Bear—entered the security line.

It was early evening by the time Jack escaped the traffic and left the airport. Andie had asked him to meet her for happy

hour at one of their favorite neighborhood bars, and he drove straight there.

Fox’s was a relic of old My-amma, cozy and unpretentious, everything modern Miami was not. Its heyday had been in the 1970s, which was obvious from the most popular items on the bar-food menu: spinach dip, French onion soup, and fried mozzarella sticks. There were no windows, no skylights, no flat-screen TVs, and definitely no shot girls with recently enhanced breasts. Fox’s had been at the same location since the 1940s, and after a short hiatus to remove decades of grime, a new owner reopened the bar exactly as it always had been, right down to the brown wood-textured wall panels, which had a certain nostalgic charm but also reminded Jack of a refurbished basement somewhere in New Jersey. Above all, Fox’s was dark. So dark that you could barely see the people at the other end of the long bar. Even in darkness, Jack would have sworn that the woman with the blond bob, alone in the back booth, was trying to catch his eye.

He looked away, and the bartender came over.

“What’ya drinking?”

This was not the place to order a skinny margarita. “How about an old-fashioned,” said Jack.

“You got it.”

Jack checked the time on his cell phone. At that very moment, Farid and Yasmin were somewhere in the air, which made Jack

smile to himself. In another two days Nouri Asmoun’s parents and sister would be flying in the opposite direction. Their emigration

from Iran was the final piece of a larger US-Iran negotiation that had already resulted in the release of five Americans from

Evin Prison in Tehran. The names of four hostages were made public, and their reunion with overjoyed family members at JFK

Airport was headline news. The fifth chose to remain anonymous. Jack was one of the few to know that it was CIA agent Brian

Guthrie.

“Here you go,” the bartender said as he set up the drink. “Compliments of that gorgeous blonde over there in the booth.”

Oh, boy , thought Jack, and as he glanced in her direction, he saw that she was already coming through the darkness and headed his way.

Only when she passed the neon beer sign, three stools away from him, did the realization kick in.

“Come here often?” asked Andie as she climbed onto the stool beside him.

“You cut your hair?”

“It’s a wig. It’s a different color, too, in case you didn’t notice.”

“Uh, yeah , I noticed. What’s this about?”

Andie set her drink on the bar top and swiveled her seat to face Jack more directly.

“I’m going away for a little while.”

It took Jack a moment to get a word out. “What?”

She seemed to appreciate the expression on his face. “Sorry, that didn’t come out right. I’m going undercover for a while.”

“Ohhh,” Jack said with relief. “So, this will be your new look?”

“Exactly.”

“Wait. I thought that was the whole point behind your promotion to the international corruption squad—so that you could stop

doing undercover work?”

“It was. But that was when I thought there was a possibility of becoming a single mother.”

She took Jack’s hand, and he smiled. Things had come a long way since their first marriage counseling session, but this was

the first major life decision to confirm the mend.

Andie shed the serious moment and was suddenly playful. “Maybe I’ll lose the wig and make this permanent. Take the plunge.

Cut and color.”

“Whoa,” said Jack. “I love your hair.”

“I could be like Catherine Barkley in A Farewell to Arms . She told Frederic that she would cut her hair short so that he could fall in love with her all over again.”

A Farewell to Arms was the one old movie they completely agreed on: the 1932 version with Gary Cooper and Helen Hayes was better than the 1957

release, but neither was remotely true to Hemingway.

“Doesn’t Catherine die in that movie?” asked Jack.

“Yes, but only once. It’s the cowards who die a thousand deaths.”

“Sounds like Hemingway.”

“It’s actually Julius Caesar, as written by Shakespeare, as interpreted by Hemingway. But that’s not the point.”

“What is the point?”

She tossed her hair awkwardly, a bit too much neck torque given the loss of length. “The sex was great,” she said.

Jack smiled receptively. “Point taken.”