"Almost certainly."
She narrowed her eyes.
"You don't sound discouraged."
Cole looked back at the building.
"Or it could be a good start."
Nadia didn't answer.
But she stayed sitting beside him until the streetlights came on.
Six months later, Ruby Whitaker was in eighth grade in Columbus.
The custody arrangement had changed.
Not overnight.
Cole didn't demand it.
Sandra didn't surrender anything easily.
There were conversations.
Mediation.
Schedules.
Questions about school.
Travel.
Stability.
And one conversation between Cole and Sandra that should have happened years earlier.
They sat in a coffee shop near Ruby's school.
Sandra stirred a cup she wasn't drinking.
"I believed the company."
Cole looked at her.
"I know."
"Part of me wanted to believe them."
That hurt more.
Sandra continued.
"Because if they were right, then leaving you felt simpler."
Cole looked out the window.
"Was I that bad?"
"You weren't a bad man."
"That's not what I asked."
Sandra sighed.
"You were never home."
"I was working."
"You were always working."
"For us."
"No, Cole."
She shook her head.
"That's what you told yourself."
He didn't answer.
"Sometimes you worked because work was the place where every problem had a drawing, a load calculation or a deadline."
Cole looked at her.
"Marriage didn't."
"No."
"Neither did being a father."
"No."
He absorbed it.
For seven years, Cole had organized the past around a single injustice.
Harland & Voss did this.
And they had.
But they hadn't caused every fracture.
Some existed before the collapse.
Sandra looked at him.
"You deserved what happened at work?"
"No."
"You deserved losing Ruby?"
"No."
"Neither do I."
Cole nodded.
That was the closest they came to an apology.
It was enough to begin from.
Ruby asked to spend more time in Columbus.
Then asked to transfer schools.
Cole found a house twenty minutes from campus.
Not enormous.
Not a billionaire's monument.
Ruby chose the room facing the backyard.
On the first night, she stood in the doorway with two boxes still unopened.
"So this is mine?"
"Yes."
"Like actually mine?"
"As long as you want it."
She looked around.
"You aren't turning it into an office if I'm gone for two weeks?"
"No."
"Gym?"
"No."
"Storage?"
"Ruby."
"I'm checking."
Cole smiled.
"It's your room."
She nodded.
Then closed the door.
A few minutes later, it opened again.
"Dad?"
"Yeah?"