Now that the violence had passed and the room was quiet again, she could not stop wondering whether he had been in pain during the episode or whether he had simply been overwhelmed by whatever had taken hold of him.
Yet beneath those questions, she could feel something else that was becoming impossible to ignore. The bond between mother and son had been faint when she first touched him, almost as though it had been buried beneath years of separation, but now it felt stronger.
It was no longer merely a distant pull she could barely recognize; it was as though another heartbeat had settled beneath her ribs, beating in rhythm with his.
"I will find whoever did this to you," Dakota whispered, her voice lowering as her fingers moved gently through his hair. "And I will make sure they pay for it. I will kill them all."
She rose from the bedside and walked into the bathroom, where she took a face towel and soaked it in warm water before returning to Cooper.
