Witness

“This can’t be right,” I breathed in spite of myself, in spite of the fact that Arthur Trask was standing just feet from me. “There is no way that this is right.”

They had said my father was waiting for me inside, that it was imperative that we met. But never in a million years could I have ever guessed that he would be the man before me.

“I’m so sorry,” he sighed awkwardly, his arms dangling loosely at his sides; he didn’t quite know what to do with himself. “I… I didn’t know.”

I was entirely desensitized. I couldn’t even hear for the buzzing in my ears, the impossibility of it all sending me into a head spin. Arthur Trask, billionaire father of Damien Trask, the man who was trying to kill me, was my father too. The one I never knew.

Making Damien Trask my brother. It was too much.

So much, in fact, that all I could do was laugh.

I laughed so hard my sides split; I backed against the door and slid down to the floor, my laughter gripping me, not allowing me to breathe. Arthur stood watching me, confused yet knowing, unable to take a step forward for the lack of intimacy between us. He couldn’t help me even though his blood rushed through my veins. He wouldn’t know how.

It was all just so improbable, and the improbability made it hilarious. What were the chances that my father was still alive and around, much less that I had glanced at him across crowded hotel lobbies and ballrooms, his face plastered all over Page Six and elsewhere? What were the chances that he would come back to me in this time, the time of tumult, hands at his sides and a red pocket square in his breast, hoping that – what? What were the chances that the father of Damien Trask, the man who had me on the run for the last six months, would turn out to be my father, too?

Lil-ee-ah.

“I’m sorry,” I gasped between bursts of laughter. “I’m really sorry. This is so – inappropriate.”

Arthur stared at me with a stunned gaze, then proceeded to take a step forward before stopping once more. “Mara…” he began, his voice trailing off undecidedly. “I’m the one who should be apologizing. And I should never stop. I wish I ever could have known.”

I glanced up at him defiantly, my laughter finally subsiding. His proximity scared me. Because aside from the features that I possessed, everything else was an aged version of Damien. The sharp eyes. The thin lipped presence. The towering, slight build. The older version of the man who haunted me everywhere I went.

I just couldn’t escape him, could I?

“What cruel, alternate universe did I just end up in?” I murmured to myself, forgetting for a moment that Arthur was even there. It couldn’t be real. It just couldn’t.

“God, Mara, I’m so sorry,” he replied again, as if that could ever make it better.

There was no repairing this one, unfortunately.

“I can’t believe that after all these years, they found you,” I murmured again, not knowing what else to say. “That after finally giving up that you would ever come for me, that you’re here. And that you’re you.”

“When they contacted me, I didn’t quite believe it either,” he replied, finally taking a solace in the fact that I was no longer laughing like a maniac and taking a seat on the bed again. “I had no idea there was another party involved, other than the billboard incident.”

The billboard incident?

I stared at him blankly, a numb fury at his ignorance burning in my chest. To Arthur Trask, the threat of death must have been so removed. To Arthur Trask, what happened with the billboard must have felt so far away.

“I thought he was dead too, you know,” he continued. “Until that Amelia girl turned up dead instead. You’re not the only one whose life has been endangered.”

I seethed. Did he think I didn’t know that? Did he think I didn’t carry the weight of the deaths and pain I caused on my shoulders every day?

“After today, they’re moving me to a safe location,” he explained softly. “Some place where my life can’t be threatened anymore. I refused for so long, stayed to run my company. Stock has fallen considerably since this mess.”

I was silent. Did he expect me to feel sorry for him?

“They tried to explain me all of this before I came to meet you,” he detailed to me, looking rather like a boy. “How you met him in the alley, how he threatened your life, how it all came to be. They thought that maybe if we talked, we would be able to figure it out. That somehow, through all this, we could find some way that he was weak – the reason that he’s latched onto you so deeply.”

It seemed clear to me. Arthur was my father, Damien my brother. I was the sister born out of adultery, the bastard child of his father who never quite paid attention to his son. I was an easy target of his anger, and that almost made it all worse.

“Your son is a monster,” I breathed, not knowing quite what else to say.

Arthur glanced at me pointedly. “This monster is not the son I knew.”

We were quiet for a while, alternating stares at each other and at the floor. What could I tell that man across from me? He had left me to fend for myself when I could have had everything. He had lost a beloved son to insanity. And now he was losing his empire, everything he’d ever worked for, to a string of scandalous mistakes. I was simply the end of a very long chain of disasters.

I didn’t know whether to be furious or confused.

“I’d like to think, that perhaps under different circumstances, this would be a happy reunion.”

I looked at him, stunned at his words.

“How could it be?” I demanded angrily. “When I’ve lived my whole life alone, without a family, without anyone to lay claim to me? I grew up in Alphabet City, Arthur, while you kept your neat little family on Park Avenue and let your mistress die. Let my mother die!”

“Mara, you think that of my character? You must know me better than that,” he demanded back, his expression taking an offended turn.

“I don’t know anything about you! So yeah, I do!” I exclaimed, amazed that such an amazingly smart, rich man could be so dense. “What kind of man leaves his daughter to the dogs like that? What kind of man can’t be brave enough to face his mistakes?”

I was a mistake; that I knew now.

“A man who is not me!” he roared in response. “I didn’t know your mother was pregnant! I didn’t know anything! One day she was in my life, the next she disappeared! And with her gone, I could finally see clearly again – I had a family to take care of, a son to father, a house to head. I heard she was dead months later, from childbirth. I never could have guessed it was mine, it had been so long. I never thought for a minute.”

This caught me by surprise. Arthur didn’t know about me? He wasn’t even aware of my mother’s pregnancy? It entirely dispelled any thought I had of why Damien wanted my blood so badly.

“You were thick, then,” I stated flatly instead, to masque my surprise, “to think that. Or did you think so lowly of my mother to make her out to be a common whore?”

I didn’t know why I was defending her. I knew absolutely nothing about her. For all I knew, she was a common whore; a special one Arthur had kept on a shelf for himself.

Arthur shook his head sadly. “I could never think such a thing of Lea,” he murmured, like he was somewhere else. “She was a lovely woman.”

“Lovely enough to cheat on you wife with her,” I spat. “But not lovely enough to leave and choose her instead?”

He stared at me, a distinct sadness in his gaze. “I left her shortly after Lea’s death,” he replied. “Surely you know of my string of failed relationships. It all started with Lea.”

Lea Hitchcock. The mysterious woman who gave me life just before she left it. The woman I apparently looked so much like but would never get a chance to lay eyes on. It was a point of weakness in my strong front against Arthur, bending and breaking my dam.

“What was she like?” I demanded of him, more accusatory than anything else.

A sad smile came over Arthur’s face, a bit of stray light pouring through the window to illuminate his expression. “She was just that,” he replied softly, abstractedly. “Lovely. She was so lovely.”

I was greedy then. “I need more than that, Arthur.”

His expression turned surprised, then, shocked at my bluntness. And then he let out a bit of sardonic laughter.

“She was just like you,” he continued, locking his gaze on mine. “From what I can tell so far, and from what the gentlemen outside told me before. Quick, incredibly smart, funny. Dedicated to what was important to her. Never took no for an answer. Uncommonly kind.”

My heart swelled so largely it ached. She had existed, she had walked this Earth. Someone had known her, someone who could tell me more about her.

“She had gorgeous, long hair,” he described wistfully, now looking more through me than at me. “And she sometimes wore it in this braid that trailed down the side of her neck.”

A smile returned to his lips. “She made amazing chicken cacciatore. And she read a lot of Steinbeck. Her writing was phenomenal, she had a real talent” – at that my heart swelled further – “and she liked to keep her spaces immaculate. She loved children. She would have loved you.”

We exchanged a sad glance for a moment, and at that both our eyes began to well with tears. For Lea Hitchcock, his forbidden love. For Lea Hitchcock, my lost mother. I couldn’t contain the distinct combination of longing, sadness, and happiness all at once. It was all too much for me. I never thought it was possible to be so happy and so sad at the same time.

Arthur let out a chuckle. “She could make you the exact ice cream sundae you were in the mood for without you even having to tell her.”

I smiled softly at that one, imagining a displaced version of myself standing at the refrigerator, picking out the proper fixing for exactly what Arthur wanted. I had never once felt so close to her.

“It’s funny,” he susurrated, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket and thumbing through the folds, “the last time I was in England, I was with her. Here, I brought a picture. The original went missing, but I had a copy on my computer. Look.”

I took the glossy photo from his hands, turning it around straight so I could examine it. Sure enough, a woman who looked rather like me stood next to a young Arthur, their arms wrapped around each other’s waists. The breath caught in my lungs upon catching her gaze. The first time I’d ever seen my mother, with her long brown hair in a braid, a laughing smile perched on her lips, legs in a pair of lace tights.

“We’re at Blenheim Palace in Woodstock,” he explained, pointing to the large estate behind them in the photo. “Winston Churchill’s family home. This trip was one of the last times I ever saw her. I figure she must have been with child by then.”

I was quiet for a moment, examining the photo. Looking at them both together, side by side, it was clear how I was their child. Somehow, I was a perfect blend of the both of them. A perfect blend of two people I never knew.

“I’m afraid there’s nothing for us to figure out then,” I murmured. “If you didn’t know I existed, then how could Damien? And how could he have known it was me when he tried to kill me that night?”

Arthur sighed. “I wish I had the answers Mara. I really do.”

We sat in silence again for a while, this time my hostile mood all but vanished. It wasn’t Arthur’s fault that I’d been alone for so long. And it remained to be seen if he had anything to do with Damien’s behavior. For then, we were simply two people, not quite father and daughter and not quite strangers, sitting in a room together. Two moons in orbit of a greater cause.

“I hope someday, when this is all over, that we can try again,” he spoke out into the silence, his tired gaze meeting mine.

I gave him a weak smile. “I don’t know, Arthur. After all this time, I’ve learned to be alone. It may be too late for me to have a father.”

His expression turned sad for a moment before he nodded curtly. “Well, perhaps someday, you’ll change your mind. Until then.”

And with that he rose, smiled absently at me, and left the room. Leaving me to sob with all that I had so suddenly lost and found weighing on my shoulders.