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First Published:
Apr 2003, 352 pages
Paperback:
May 2004, 448 pages
Mired in a deepening quicksand of deception and deadly secrets Marc clings to one unwavering vow - to bring home his six-month-old kidnapped daughter, at any cost.
Harlan Coben "serves up everything you could ask for in a can't-put-it-down book...rocket-fast pace with solid emotional underpinning" (San Francisco Chronicle). Now, he returns with an explosive novel about the love of a father, in a story where nothing is what it seems-and where hope and fear collide in the most surprising ways.
When the first bullet hit my chest, I thought of my daughter…
Marc Seidman awakens to find himself in an ICU, hooked up to an IV, his head swathed in bandages. Twelve days earlier, he had an enviable life as a successful surgeon, living in a peaceful suburban neighborhood with his beautiful wife and a baby he adored. Now he lies in a hospital bed, shot by an unseen assailant. His wife has been killed, and his six-month-old daughter, Tara, has vanished. But just when his world seems forever shattered, something arrives to give Marc new hope: a ransom note.
We are watching. If you contact the authorities, you will never see your daughter again. There will be no second chance.
The note is chilling, but Marc sees only one thing—he has the chance to save his daughter. He can’t talk to the police or the FBI. He doesn’t know who he can trust. And now the authorities are closing in on a new suspect: Marc himself. Mired in a deepening quicksand of deception and deadly secrets-about his wife, about an old love he’s never forgotten, and about his own past—he clings to one, unwavering vow…to bring home Tara, at any cost.
Both a white-knuckle thriller and an emotionally powerful tale about the loyalty of old friends and the bond between parent and child, No Second Chance is another masterpiece from an author who writes “suspense at its finest” (Jeffrey Deaver).
Chapter I
When the first bullet hit my chest, I thought of my daughter. At least, that is what I want to believe. I lost consciousness pretty fast. And, if you want to get technical about it, I don't even remember being shot. I know that I lost a lot of blood. I know that a second bullet skimmed the top of my head, though I was probably already out by then. I know that my heart stopped. But I still like to think that as I lay dying, I thought of Tara.
FYI: I saw no bright light or tunnel. Or if I did, I don't remember that either.
Tara, my daughter, is only six months old. She was lying in her crib. I wonder if the gunfire frightened her. It must have. She probably began to cry. I wonder if the familiar albeit grating sound of her cries somehow sliced through my haze, if on some level I actually heard her. But again I have no memory of it.
What I do remember, however, was the moment Tara was born. I remember Monica - that's Tara's mother - bearing down...
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