The Colonel's Daughter Is Gone novel · Chapter 15 of 24
Chapter 15: Not a Client
"Because I gave him my word," Cedric said.
He still looked at his hands.
"He is the man who made me a partner when no one else would, and he asked me for one thing."
"He asked you to hide my own daughter from me."
"Yes."
"For four months."
"Yes."
I let the stair door swing shut behind me.
"In March you held her drawings in your hands," I said. "You knew she was good enough to win. And you knew she was going home every night to a man who planned to put her in Alaska."
"I didn't know about Alaska."
"You knew she was unhappy. You read her letters to him."
"Some of them."
"I sat at my own table and watched Rodney toast her away, and the whole time you could have picked up a telephone."
He stood up.
"I know."
"Don't say you know."
"I do know." His voice cracked on it. "I asked him three times, and then I stopped asking, and I let you walk in that morning not knowing. That is mine. I won't hide behind him."
"Say you're sorry," I said.
"I'm sorry."
"Say it like you mean it."
"I am so sorry I can hardly stand up," he said. "I've been sorry since the day you came off that plane."
I hit him.
Not with my hand, but with my whole body, both fists flat against his chest, and he took it without moving back.
I did it again.
"I was alone," I said. "You were the one person in that city who could've told me, and you had a nice quiet reason."
"Lydia."
"I hate that you're kind to me."
"I know."
"I hate that it isn't an order."
His hands closed around my wrists.
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