Chapter 79
CHAPTER
EVERYTHING GOOD WITH MS. RYDER?” Nash asked as he and Rhett headed out in Rhett’s Porsche.
“Look, she’s part of what I talked about before. Where you can’t really be.”
“You’re the boss. So, where are we headed now?”
“A friend’s place. I haven’t seen her in a while and I want to check on her.”
A bit later Nash tensed as they turned down the road to his old neighborhood. He then noticed that Rhett had a security strip on his windshield that allowed him to get through the gate without the guard having to let him in.
Things definitely have changed in that regard.
The closer they drew to his old home, the more nervous Nash became.
He knew that he looked nothing like his old self.
He had obviously fooled Rhett, and Rosie Parker, and Elaine Fixx, Ellen Douglas the receptionist, and Detective Ramos, who, in varying degrees of familiarity, knew the old Nash.
But none of them were Judith. And Nash was suddenly afraid that despite everything he had done to make Walter Nash disappear from the face of the earth, it might all be blown up in a couple of minutes.
Would Judith be able to see beneath the tats and muscles and broken nose?
The anticipatory dread was eating away his gut lining.
They pulled into the front of Nash’s old home and he had to disguise his surprise. The dead grass was nearly calf high and there were more weeds in the flower beds than plants.
“Who lives here?” he asked.
“My friend Judith. She’s Walter Nash’s wife.”
“Okay.”
Rhett had a key and used it to unlock the front door.
Another change, thought Nash, willing himself to remain calm.
“Judith!” Rhett called out as they went inside. He turned to Nash. “I tried phoning and texting, but she usually doesn’t answer.”
Nash was busy glancing around, and while not exactly surprised by what he was seeing given the abysmal state of the landscaping, he was still taken aback.
Kept immaculate by his wife when they had all lived here, the place looked like several people were squatting in his former home.
There were overflowing plastic bags of trash everywhere, along with piled-up and pizza boxes.
Plates of dried food were stacked on the dining room table.
More trash bags were piled up in the hall.
Clothing and shoes were strewn about. The smells all around them had a fuggy, unsettling odor.
“Is she… okay?” Nash asked.
A worried-looking Rhett said, “Not really. Give me a sec.”
He jogged up the steps to the second floor while Nash went into the kitchen and found it just as foul as the rest of the rooms he’d seen.
Judith clearly had fired the cleaning service they’d used.
When he looked out the rear window he saw that the pool, which should have been closed by now for the season, was full of debris and the water dark.
He opened the door to the garage and spied Judith’s Mercedes. His heart fell when he looked at Maggie’s BMW.
“Hey, Dillon!”
Nash took the steps two at a time and arrived in the master bedroom following Rhett’s cries.
“Yes, sir?”
He found Rhett in the sitting room, where he was kneeling next to Judith, who was sprawled on the couch, half-clothed. Her hair was unkempt, and Nash saw that his once fitness-obsessed wife looked bloated, her skin pasty and blotched.
“Is she all right?” he asked, trying to keep his voice level and calm.
“She’s breathing okay but her pulse seems weak. And I can’t get her to wake up.”
Nash looked around and saw the bottle of prescription pills. He picked it up.
“Ativan,” he said as Rhett looked up at him. “She might have taken too many.” He knelt down and helped Rhett to lift Judith to her feet.
“Let’s walk her around some to see if she’ll rouse,” Nash suggested.
They did so, taking turns calling out her name. After five minutes of this, Judith finally stirred. She looked first at Rhett and then at Nash, who would not meet her eye.
This was the ultimate test, he knew. If anyone could see past his transformation, it would be Judith. But then again, she seemed so out of it that any sort of recognition on her part would probably be impossible.
“I’ll go down and make some coffee,” said Rhett. “You stay with her and try and keep her awake.”
He left. Nash put his arm around Judith’s waist and used his strength to hold her up, which was easy despite the weight she had put on. He was amazed at how fleshy she had become, and he wondered if it was simply bad food and no exercise, or whether something else was going on.
Was she retaining fluids? Did she have a kidney issue?
He spied the empty wine and liquor bottles that were piled in one corner of the room and thought that too much alcohol was a big part of the problem his wife was facing.
“Ju— Mrs. Nash? Stay with me. Stay awake, okay? Let’s go. You can do this.” He was modulating his voice dramatically to keep it as far away from his actual tone as possible.
When she seemed to be slipping back into a deep sleep, he picked her up in his arms and shook her. This caused Judith to rally, and she clutched tightly to his shoulders.
“Who the hell are you?”
He glanced down to see that she was staring up at him.
“I… I work for Rhett Temple. He’s downstairs making some coffee. I think you took too many pills, ma’am.”
“There’s no such thing as too many pills. There’s only too few pills, that’s a thing.” She belched heavily and pushed against him. “Put me down. I feel sick.”
He did so but when she started to heave, he snatched her up and carried her to the bathroom. He supported her over the toilet as she threw up twice. He figured that might be a good thing, to get some of the medication out of her system.
When she was done he grabbed a washcloth and wet it. He ran it over her forehead and face, and across the back of her neck.
“Are you feeling better now?” he asked.
She nodded and, with his help, slowly stood.
He led her back into the sitting room, where he helped her down onto the couch. She leaned back, and tucked her bare feet beneath her.
“Who are you again?”
“He works for me, Judith,” said Rhett as he came in with a large mug of steaming coffee. “Here, drink this, you’ll feel better. And here are some peanut butter crackers.”
“I threw up, Rhett.”
“I’m sure. Here, drink it and eat some crackers.”
She took several sips and managed to eat two of the crackers.
Rhett and Nash stood back and watched her as she ran a hand through her dirty hair and then looked up at them guiltily. “I didn’t have a very good day, Rhett,” she said in an almost schoolgirl voice that made the hair on Nash’s arms tingle.
Rhett sat down next to her and gripped her hand. “Yeah, I can see that.” He snagged the bottle of pills. “I’m taking these with me, Judith. This is the second time. You can’t keep doing this. Something bad will happen, honey.”
“Something bad has happened!” she exclaimed. “Maggie is dead!”
“I know, I know,” he said soothingly. “And I’m so sorry. So very sorry for it all.”
Judith set her cup down, leaned over, and put her face in her hands. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take, Rhett, I really don’t.”
“I offered to get you help a dozen times. I know people, good people, who deal with this sort of thing all the time. They can help you, Judith.”
“I don’t want any help. I don’t deserve any help.”
“None of this is your fault. It’s his fault, your husband’s. This whole fucking nightmare is down to Walter, not you.”
Nash glanced out the window and in his mind’s eye he conjured the painting of the girl and the dog. But Nash wasn’t sure how much more of this he could take.
“I’ve been thinking about that.”
Nash shot her a look because her voice had suddenly become more like the old Judith—focused and firm.
She took several more sips of coffee, ate another cracker, and composed herself.
“You’ve been thinking about what?” asked Rhett, with an edge to his voice that Nash did not care for at all.
“The night Maggie disappeared, we had an argument.”
Rhett looked up at Nash and said, “Dillon, go wait outside.”
Nash glanced at Judith and then nodded and walked out. But he didn’t go far and he left the door open, so he could still hear their conversation.
“An argument? About what?” asked Rhett.
“She knew I’d been with another man. She didn’t know it was you, but she knew that I’d had sex. And do you know what she told me?”
“What?”
“That I didn’t deserve Walter. That he doted on me, loved me with all his heart. That he was too good for me.”
“I’m not following—”
“Why would she have said those things if he was going into her bedroom and doing all those awful things to her? Why would she have gone online and said he was abusing her just a few days later? Why didn’t she tell me that the night of our argument?
She could have opened up, told me the truth. But she didn’t. Why!”
Rhett said nervously, “I don’t know, Judith. These things are complicated. She could have been in shock. She could have been confused. Sexual abuse by a parent can do funny things to you, or so I’ve been told.”
Judith shook her head before looking directly at him. “Do you know what I think?”
“What?” said Rhett with a tightness to his voice.
“I think Walter was telling me the truth when he denied abusing her.”
“Then why did he run?”
“Because I called the police.”
“Are you saying your own daughter was lying about all of it? Is that what you’re saying!”
She let out a sob and dipped her head. “I don’t know. I just don’t know. I can’t figure out that part, why she would, why Maggie would…”
Rhett said gently, “Look, you just need to get some rest. And no more pills.”
She shot him a pleading look. “Do you… do you have the other stuff?”
“You can’t combine it with Ativan, Judith. It could really screw you up.”
“But you will get me some more?”
“Yes, yes I will.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
Outside in the hall, Nash, who had heard most of this, felt his hands turn to fists.
Do not kill him. Do not. Not yet.