“But you have been,” Adam said assuredly. He tossed his hands in the air as if he’d tossed away any debate about his father’s dedication. “You saved my life. Narcan? Remember?”
“Yeah, I did, and I’m so damn grateful, I can’t tell you. But I’ve been angry, too. I thought this disease … that it’s your fault … that you did this to yourself and you could have stopped it. Or I’d ask myself, why’d you do it to me, to your mom? And I held on to those thoughts and that anger, and I let it eat me up inside, and then I’d feel guilty and hate myself for not giving you what you need, what you deserved, which was my support and love. I know you’re sick, same as Penny—” Mitch hadn’t meant to bring up her name, but she’d been so embedded in his consciousness it came out almost like a reflex.
“So what are you saying, Dad? That I’ve got multiple personalities?” Adam sounded amused.
“No … I’m not … well—” Mitch paused as a thought came to him. “Actually, yes, I’m saying that, but in a different way. There’s the You Adam and there’s the Drug Adam, and they are—in certain respects—one personality fractured into two, battling within the same self. But just like with Penny, that split is not your fault.” Mitch paused to collect his thoughts. Eventually, the words came to him, and he hoped they were the right ones.
“I get that people think addiction is a choice, not a disease. But I know better. My depression isn’t a choice. You said it, Adam—the way the drugs make you feel, all those heightened senses, the beautiful emotion that flooded you … there’s a chemical reason why the drugs connected with you the way they did … a lack of dopamine receptors in your brain, I suspect, so you were always predestined in some way, shape, or form, to seek out pleasure in other, less natural ways.
“And the more you used drugs, the more your brain chemistry changed—your prefrontal cortex shrank, and it affected your decision-making drastically. But the good news is that recovery is a choice, same as loving you unconditionally is one, as well. I won’t abandon you, son, not now, not ever … so when you get out there—” Mitch pointed a finger to the dining hall window, just like he’d done so many times at Edgewater to indicate the vast, unknowable world beyond its secure walls—“know that you’ll never, ever walk alone. I haven’t done my best by you, but I’ll be there every time to lift you up if you fall down, and that’s my promise. It’s the best I can do.”
Adam sat with it a moment, then rose quickly and came toward Mitch with such purposeful steps that he worried he’d angered his son. To his great relief, Adam bent over and wrapped his father in a tight embrace as thick tears came streaming down his face. When they broke apart, Mitch saw it in Adam’s eyes, on his beautiful, battle-weary face—those were the exact words his boy needed to hear.
Those were perhaps the truest words Mitch had ever spoken, for they came straight from the heart.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This is always one of my favorite bits of writing to do, and it comes at the end of the line, after the book has been edited, copyedited, and reviewed with a fine-tooth comb. Here, I get to say thanks.
These books are a team effort, and many people lent their time and expertise to help me get the details right. If there are any failings here—oversights, misrepresentation of facts or procedures—the error is mine and mine alone. To that end, I want to extend my deepest thanks to Attorney William J. Bladd, for his advice on all legal matters. Dr. Joel Solomon, my first cousin （do you see a theme here?）， provided me with a good primer on dissociative identity disorder and helped me immensely with Mitch’s character and the work he does. Dr. Ethan Prince, yet another highly accomplished cousin, was similarly helpful with my medical-themed questions.
As always, I need to thank my mother, Judy Palmer, for her many reads, suggestions, thoughtful edits, and encouragement along the way. Thanks to Sue Miller, for her proofreading skills, Danielle Girard, a bestselling thriller writer and fellow client of my literary agency, for her thoughtful and insightful feedback, and Zoe Quinton for the same. And special thanks to Barbara Wright and Donna Prince, my eagle-eyed readers who helped catch the errors I missed. Early drafts often look quite different from the final version, and in the case of The Perfect Daughter, that difference was especially pronounced. To that end, my appreciation goes to my agent, Meg Ruley, and Rebecca Scherer, who helped me to see areas for improvement. But nobody made more contributions to this novel than my brilliant editor, Jennifer Enderlin, who has a remarkable gift for seeing what might bog down the story and suspense. Fixing it is my job.