Twice Dead - Catherine Coulter [85]
“He managed to escape me. I decided that I would have to kill him to protect you. When I tried, I found out that he’d simply disappeared. There was no trace of him. The KGB helped him, obviously, and he stayed buried until very recently, when I was told he was killed in an auto accident in Crete. You know the rest.”
“You left us to protect us?”
“Yes. Your mother and I discussed it. Matlock is a common name. She took you and moved to New York. I saw her four, maybe five times a year. We were always very, very careful. We couldn’t tell you. We couldn’t put you in danger. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life, Becca. Believe me.”
All of a sudden she had a father. She stared at his face, seeing herself in him, seeing also a stranger. It was too much. She heard him say something, heard Adam arguing with someone inside the door, sharp and loud, then she didn’t hear anything at all. That was a good thing, she thought as she slipped away, back where there were no dreams, only seamless darkness, without him, no worries or voices to tear her apart. Her father was dead, dead since she was very young. It was impossible that he was here, there was no way. Maybe she was dead, too, and had seen what she wanted to see. Dead. It wasn’t bad, truly it wasn’t. She heard a sound, like a wounded animal. It had come from her, she realized, but then there was nothing at all.
When she awoke, it was dark in her room except for a small bedside lamp that was turned to its lowest setting. The small hospital room was filled with shadows and quiet voices. There were needles in both of her arms connected to bags of liquid beside both sides of her bed. There were two men sitting in chairs next to the window, in low conversation. One was Adam. The other was her father—oh yes, she believed him now, perhaps even understood a bit—and he’d called her his darling girl. She blinked several times. He didn’t fade back into her mind. He remained exactly where he was. She saw him very clearly now, and she could do nothing but stare, breathe him in, settle his face, his features, his expressions, into her mind. He used his hands while he spoke to Adam, just like she did when she was trying to make a point, to convince someone to come around to her way of thinking. He was her father.
She cleared her throat and said, “I know I’m not dead because I would kill for some water. And I don’t believe that if someone is dead, she’s particularly thirsty. May I please have some water?”
Adam was on his feet in an instant. When he bent the straw into her mouth, she closed her eyes in bliss. She drank nearly the entire glass. She was panting when she finished. “Oh goodness, that was delicious.”
He didn’t straighten, placed one large hand on either side of her face on that hard hospital pillow. He studied her face, her eyes. “You okay?”
“Yes. I realize I’m not dead, so you must be real. I remember you told me that he threw me out of the car. Is there anything bad wrong with me?”
“No, nothing bad. When he shoved you out of the car yesterday right there at Police Plaza, you were still wearing your nightgown. You got a lot of scrapes, a bruised elbow, but that’s it. Now it’s just a matter of getting the drug out of your system. They pumped your stomach. Nobody seems to know what the drug was, but it was potent. You should be about clear of it now.” He had to close his eyes a moment. He’d never been so afraid in his life, never. But she would live. She would be fine. He said, “Do the scrapes hurt? Would you like a couple of aspirin?”
“No, I’m all right.” She licked her lips, looked over into the shadows, clutched his hand, and whispered, “Adam, he really is my father, isn’t he?