The party ran later than it should have.

Maya had already passed out upstairs. Most of the others had either left or paired off. I was standing in the kitchen of her parents’ house at 1:40 a.m., drinking water and trying to decide whether to call a rideshare, when the back door opened and her father walked in.

Mr. Harlan Cole.

I had known him for years in the distant way you know a best friend’s dad—polite hellos at holiday dinners, the occasional ride home when Maya and I were still in high school. He was forty-seven now, tall, broad-shouldered, silver starting at the temples. He still wore the same...