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“Are you okay?” He didn’t deserve the question, but I didn’t want to witness another parent die. An image of my mother as she was shot invaded my brain. The pain was acute and fierce.
“You’re like her.” The statement was low. He looked surprised he’d spoken it aloud.
“That’s the nicest thing you’ve said to me in thirty years.”
The beeping slowed again to a steady pace. I sank in a nearby chair, drained from the constant state of turmoil. I couldn’t live like this. I needed peace. I needed Pepper.
“What do you remember about that day?”
Thank goodness I hadn’t touched that coffee. It would’ve soured in my stomach.
I slid down in the chair. “Everything.”
“Except who murdered her.” There was frustration and relief in his voice.
“Why did you give up on finding out who did it?” This was the most persistent person I knew. I’d never understood why he’d let it go. Why the case was still unsolved.
“I didn’t.”
I straightened and leaned forward. “You know who did it?”
A few days ago, I would’ve thought it was possible he had killed her the way bodies were piling up. Now, I had no clue. Had he gotten vigilante justice? If he had, we’d just found something we could agree on.
“Nothing changes. She’s still . . .”
I waited. I knew the end of that sentence. What was odd was he couldn’t finish it.
“Gone.”
He closed his eyes. For a minute, I thought he was back out. “Don’t try to remember who murdered her, son.”
“I thought that was what you wanted?” He’d been so angry when I couldn’t. The details of the face were so fuzzy. It was as if I couldn’t focus on them, and I’d been trying all my life.
“Come back to the company. I’ll overlook your disobedience.”
I white-knuckled the arm rests. He always cut off a conversation he didn’t like with an insult.
“I’m not a child.”
“And I won’t let you suffer the same fate as she did.”
He had no control over that unless he’d pulled the trigger himself.
“It makes no difference to me, but if you love that girl as you say you do, you will get away from her as far and as fast as you can. I assure you, living without her, knowing she’s still breathing, is a far better fate than the alternative.”
I stood again. “Are you threatening her again?”
He was out of control. Near death in a hospital bed, he was still dictating our lives like he was God. He did not sound like a man who had just been unconscious for three days after a heart attack. His words still contained such venom.
“I’m telling you how to protect her.” Bullshit. He didn’t care about Pepper. Why did he want me away from her? Why her?
My brain worked overtime. All the pieces of a puzzle I couldn’t make fit scrambled in my head. I’d seen and talked to Pepper periodically over the past few days. She’d been supportive of my choice to stay at the hospital, easily setting aside her own feelings about my father.
How had he known I wouldn’t leave his side?
I pulled out my phone and dialed Pepper’s number. All the worst-case scenarios blared louder with every unanswered ring.
“What did you do?” I asked as the call went to voicemail.
