The Good Daughter (The Good Daughter #1) - Karin Slaughter Page 0,146

you owe him something?”

“Men in that position often feel they are owed something.”

“Please don’t tell me there is value in forgiving him.”

“There is value in forgetting him,” Rusty clarified. “I have forgotten him so that I can move on with my life. My mind has rendered his existence immaterial; however, I will never forgive him for taking away my soulmate.”

Sam was tempted to roll her eyes.

“I loved your mother more than anything else on this earth. Every day with her was the best day of my life, even if we were screaming at each other at the top of our lungs.”

Sam remembered the screaming if not the adulation. “I’ve never understood what she saw in you.”

“A man who did not want to wear her underwear.”

Sam laughed, then felt bad for laughing.

“Lenny introduced us. Did you know that?” Rusty did not wait for a response. “He dragged me up north to meet this gal he was kind of dating, and the minute I saw her, I thought a God damn boulder had fallen out of the sky and conked me on the head. I simply could not take my eyes off of her. She was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Legs that went on for miles. Lovely curve of her hip.” He grinned at Sam. “And of course, lest you think your daddy was a total poonhound, there was the enigma of her mind. My Lord, she knew things. Just blew me away with the breadth and depth of her knowledge. I had never in my life met a woman like that. She was like a cat.” He pointed his finger at Sam. “Anyone ever say that about you?”

“I can’t say that they have.”

“Dogs are stupid,” Rusty said. “This is a known fact. But a cat—you have to earn a cat’s respect every single day of your life. You lose it and—” He snapped his fingers. “That’s what your mama was to me. She was my cat. She kept my compass pointing true north.”

“Your metaphors are mixing.”

“Cats sailed with the Vikings.”

“To kill rats. Not to navigate the ship,” Sam said. “Mama hated what you did.”

“She hated the inherent risks in what I did. She hated the hours, without a doubt. But she understood that I needed to do it, and she always respected people who made themselves useful.”

Sam heard Gamma’s own voice in his words.

Rusty said, “City of Portland v. Henry Alameda.”

Sam felt a jolt of shock.

Her first case.

Rusty said, “I sat in the back with my teeth shining so bright I could’ve shown a cat how to sail a ship away from the rocky shore.”

“But, Dad—”

“You were a natural, my girl. Just a damn fine prosecutor. Totally in charge of the courtroom. Never been more proud.”

“Why didn’t you—”

“I just wanted to check on you, see if you’d found your place.” Rusty shook another cigarette out of his pack. “Clinton Cable Corp. v. Stanley Mercantile Limited.” He winked at her, as if it was nothing to recite the first patent complaint she had argued completely on her own. “That’s your place, Samantha. You have found your way to be useful in this world, and you are undoubtedly the best in the game.” He tossed the cigarette into his mouth. “I cannot say that I would’ve chosen that particular direction to point your remarkable brain, but you are truly in your element when you are discussing the tensile strength of a reinforced cable.” He leaned over. He pointed his finger at her chest. “Gamma would have been proud.”

Sam felt unwelcome tears in her eyes. She tried to conjure the image of the courtroom, to make herself turn around, to see her father sitting in the back row, but the memory would not come. “I never knew you were there.”

“No, you did not. I wanted to see you. You didn’t want to see me.” He held up his hand to spare her the trouble of making an excuse. “It is a father’s job to love his daughter in the way that she needs to be loved.”

Instead of joking this time, Sam wiped away tears.

He said, “There’s a picture of Gamma in my office that I want you to have.”

Sam was surprised. Rusty had no way of knowing that she had spent part of her day thinking about the photo.

He said, “The picture is one you haven’t seen before. I’m sorry about that. I always thought I would show it to you girls eventually.”

“Charlie hasn’t seen it?”

Rusty shook his head. “She