“I said I didn’t know.”
“Okay.”
“They were very polite. The lead guy, the one who did all the talking, he had this pale skin and whispery voice. Gave me the chills. His fingernails were too long. I don’t like that on a man. He said that Maura wasn’t in trouble. He said that if she just came forward now it would all be okay. He was very persistent.”
“But you didn’t know.”
“Right.”
“So then what?”
“So then . . .” I see her eyes fill with tears. She reaches her hand up and puts it on her own throat. “I don’t even know how to tell this part.”
I reach out now and put my hand on hers. “It’s okay.”
Something has changed in the room. You can feel it like an electric surge.
“What happened next, Mrs. Wells?”
“What happened next . . .” She stops, shrugs. “It’s a week later.”
I pause. Then I say, “I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I. Next thing I remember I hear pounding on my back door. I open my eyes, and I’m in my own bed. I peek through the shade to see who was there.”
She looks at me.
“It was you, Nap.”
I remember this, of course. I remember going to their house and pounding on that back door, searching for Maura, who had not contacted me since my brother’s death other than to say that the news about my brother was too awful, that she was going away.
That we were over.
“I didn’t answer the door,” she says.
“I know.”
“I’m sorry about that.”
I wave it off. “You said something about it being a week later.”
“That’s just it. See, I thought it was the next morning, but a full week had passed. I didn’t know what to do. I tried to re-create what had happened. The most likely thing was that I drank myself into an extended blackout, right? I figured the pale man with the whispery voice thanked me for my time, told me to get in touch if I heard from Maura, and left me. Then I got in my car and went on a bender.” She tilted her head. “Doesn’t that sound like the most likely explanation, Nap?”
The room feels ten degrees cooler.
“But I don’t think that’s what happened.”
“What do you think happened?” I ask.
“I think the pale man with the whispery voice did something to me.”
I can hear my breathing like seashells pressed against my ears. “Like what?”
“I think they took me someplace and asked me about Maura again. I had these memories when I first woke up. Bad memories. But they disappeared, like after a dream. You ever have that? You wake up and you remember the nightmare and you think you’ll never forget it and then the images just slip away?”
I hear myself say, “Yes.”
“That’s what it was like. I know it was bad. Like the worst dream possible. I reach out and try to remember, but it’s like grabbing smoke.”
I nod more just to have something to do, some way to handle the blows. “So what did you do?”
“I just . . .” Lynn Wells shrugs. “I went to work at Kohl’s. I thought I’d get in huge trouble for missing shifts, but they said I called in sick.”
“And you don’t remember doing that.”
“No. The same thing when I went to Bennigan’s. They said I called in sick too.”
I lean back now, try to take it in.
“I . . . I got paranoid too. I kept thinking I was being followed. I would see a man reading a newspaper and I’d be sure he was watching me. You started coming around the house too, Nap. I remember snapping at you to go away, but I couldn’t keep that up. I knew I had to do something until Maura told me what was going on. So I did what she said. I told you that lie about her transferring schools. I contacted Westbridge High too. I told them we were moving and would let them know where to forward Maura’s records. The school didn’t really ask too many questions. I think a lot of your classmates were devastated and taking time off.”
Lynn Wells puts her hand to her throat again. “I need some water.”
I get up and circle behind the desk. Ellie keeps a small fridge under the windowsill. I wonder why Mrs. Wells came to me via Ellie, but there are more pressing matters. I open the fridge, see the anally laid-out water bottles, and grab one for her.
“Thank you,” she says.
She twists open the top and takes a deep pull like, well, an alcoholic. “You quit drinking,” I say.
“You’re always an alcoholic,” she says. “But, yes, it’s been thirteen years since my last drink.”
I nod my approval, not that she needs it.
“I owe Bernadette for that. She’s my rock. Just when I was at my lowest, I found her. We got legally married two years ago.”
I don’t know what to say to that—I want to get back on topic—so I just say, “Okay.” Then I add, “When did you next hear from Maura?”
She takes another swig and twists the top back on the bottle.
“Days passed. Then weeks. I jumped every time the phone rang. I thought about telling someone, but who? Maura had said not to go to the police, and after what I experienced with that pale guy, well, like I said, if you aren’t sure about Road A or B, just stay where you are. But I was scared. I had terrible dreams. I could hear that whispery voice asking me over and over about where Maura was. I didn’t know what to do. The whole town was grieving over your brother and Diana. Diana’s father, the police chief, he came by one day. He wanted to know about Maura too.”
“What did you tell him?”
“The same thing I told everyone else. Maura was freaked out by what happened. I said she was staying with my cousin in Milwaukee for a while and then transferring schools.”
“Was there a cousin in Milwaukee?”
She nods. “He said he would cover for me.”
“So when did you hear from Maura again?”
She stares at the water bottle, one hand on the white top, the other cupping the bottom. “Three months later.”
I stand there, trying not to look stunned. “So for three months . . . ?”
“I had no idea where she was. I had no contact. Nothing.”
I don’t know what to say. My phone vibrates again.
“I worried a million times over. Maura was a smart girl, resourceful, but you know what I figured?”
I shake my head.
“I figured she was dead. I figured the pale man with the whispery voice found her and killed her. I was trying to stay calm, but really, what could I do? If I went to the police, what would I say? Who would believe me about that missing week or any of it, really? Whoever those guys were, they either killed her—or if I made too much noise, I was going to help them kill her. Do you see my choices? Going to the police wasn’t going to help her. Maura either was making it on her own or . . .”
“Or she was dead,” I say.
Lynn Wells nods.
“So where did you finally see her?”
“At a Starbucks in Ramsey. I went to the bathroom in the back and suddenly she came in behind me.”
“Wait, she didn’t call you first?”
“No.”
“She just showed up?”
“Yes.”
I try to comprehend this.
“So what happened?”
“She said she was in danger, but that she’d be okay.”
“What else?”
“Nothing.”
“That was all she said?”
“Yes.”
“And you didn’t ask—?”
“Of course I asked.” For the first time, Lynn Wells has raised her voice. “I grabbed her arm and desperately hung on. I begged her to tell me more. I apologized for everything I did wrong. She hugged me, and then she pushed me away. She got out the door and headed out the back. I followed her, but . . . you don’t get it.”
“So explain it to me.”
“When I came out of the bathroom . . . there were men there again.”
I give it a second to make sure I’m hearing right. “The same men?”
“Not literally the same, but . . . one headed out the back door too. I got to my car and then . . .”
“Then what?”
When Lynn Wells looks up—when I see the tears come to her eyes and her hand go to her throat again—I feel my heart plummet down a mine shaft. “Some might say that the pressure of seeing my daughter again sent me on another bender.”
I reach out again and take her hand. “How many days this time?”
“Three. But you see it now, don’t you?”
I nod. “Maura knew.”