It is simply the refusal to lie to yourself about the people you love, combined with the courage to do right by the truth once you have faced it.

He faced it.

And a grandmother and a little boy in Detroit will be warm and safe for the rest of their lives because he did.

Chapter 20 — Loyalty Cannot Be Bought

The great front door closed behind Justin at last, late that afternoon, with the same heavy, final sound it had made three days earlier when it closed behind me — only this time, it was closing behind him, and I was the one on the inside.

When he was gone, and the house was quiet, I walked through the wide, sunlit hallways, alone, in no hurry at all.