Wish You Were Gone(10)

And maybe he could have still been that person who adored her—who lived every moment of every day for her. Maybe if she’d done something differently or spoken up more often or taken a stand. Or maybe if she’d left him. Taken the kids and moved in with her mom and actually served up a consequence. Maybe he would have hit that mythic rock bottom addicts were always going on about. Maybe something would have changed. Maybe James—her James—would have come back to her. If only she had ever lived for him the way he had once lived for her.

Maybe this was all her fault.

Emma was back in the kitchen now, unable to recall making the decision to move. She shook herself, trying to regain some sort of consciousness. Her eyes were dry from staring. There was a layer of film on the kitchen counters, and crumbs everywhere. There were dishes in the sink and most likely mold was spawning on casseroles in the fridge. On her phone were dozens of messages from Zoe. She had to call the girl back. And she had to call Gray and Lizzie and the contractor for the cottage. When had they said they’d walk the house and make plans? They’d picked a date, but she couldn’t even remember.

She had also missed a couple of photo shoots Lizzie had set up for the two of them—Lizzie occasionally hired Emma to shoot before-and-after pictorials of her bigger decorating projects—but she couldn’t deal with that right now. And she knew that Lizzie, God bless her, wouldn’t want her to, but still it niggled at her. Things undone always niggled at her.

The doorbell rang. The sound reverberated through the house and startled Emma so badly, she nearly hit the deck. Part of her wanted to crouch down into a corner and wait out whoever it was. She couldn’t deal with more well-meaning friends right now.

“Mrs. Walsh?”

It was the raspy voice of Nick Baer, their landscaper. Emma looked at the calendar again. No. Not Friday. Monday. This wasn’t his day to be here. Yet she could hear the industrial lawn mowers growling, the weed-whackers whacking. She went to the door.

Nick tugged off his well-worn and sweat-stained baseball cap. He already had large pit stains on his T-shirt and his graying hair was plastered to his forehead. His blue eyes were kind and sorrowful, the creases around them deepening at the sight of her.

“Hello, Mrs. Walsh,” he said formally. “I’m… I’m so sorry about Mr. Walsh. I don’t even know what to say.”

“Thank you,” Emma replied. There was a long and awkward pause. “Did you need something? It’s not your normal day, right?”

She felt uncertain about pretty much everything at that moment.

“No, it’s not at that. I came on Friday, but your mother came out and asked us to go… She didn’t tell you?”

Emma shook her head.

“She said you were sleeping and she didn’t want the noise to wake you,” he told her. “I would’ve let it go till next Friday, but you got so many leaves and I didn’t want to let ’em sit on the grass for too long, so I figured we’d come do a quick cleanup today and then get back to our regular schedule.”

“Oh. Okay. That’s great. Thanks for doing that.”

She started to close the door.

“Oh! Mrs. Walsh?”

“Yes?”

“Here. We found this in the bushes by the driveway. That’s why I rang the bell.”

He thrust his fist forward. Hanging from it was a necktie. A light blue necktie with little red dots. One of James’s favorites.

Emma was numb as she took the slippery fabric from his dirt-streaked hand.

“Not sure what it was doing there, but I figured—”

“Which driveway?” she asked, her voice high and reedy and not like her own at all.

“The one…” He gestured in the direction of the garage, too uncomfortable to finish the sentence.

“Okay, thanks,” she said, and closed the door.

She clutched at the tie, her fingers suddenly sweaty. It didn’t make any sense. Why would one of James’s ties be in the bushes? How long had it been there? It couldn’t have been long, or the landscapers would have found it before now. They came every Friday morning like clockwork. They’d come that Friday morning. They would have been here at 10 a.m. when James was probably downing his second espresso at his desk on Madison Avenue. His last second espresso at his desk on Madison Avenue, as it turned out. Emma took a few steps into the foyer and leaned against the wall, feeling weak. Was this the tie James had been wearing the night he’d died?

The cops had told Emma that James had most likely made it to the top of the driveway, then passed out, his foot falling on the gas. The car had then accelerated down their steep driveway, caught some air on the lip between the garage and the drive, and crashed into the back wall.

But if that theory were true, then how the hell had his tie gotten into the bushes? Had he gotten out of the car and pulled it off? He often loosened his tie or removed it when he felt agitated or was in the midst of an argument. Had someone been with him? Had he actually gotten out of the car, taken off his tie, tossed it into the bushes, then gotten back in the car and passed out? It didn’t make any sense.

She tried to remember what he had been wearing when they’d found him, but couldn’t seem to recall a single detail other than the red polo horse and player embroidered into his blue sock. He always wore a tie to work. Every single day. But she hadn’t seen him that morning. Had pointedly ignored him like she always did on the morning after a big fight. She had no clue what he’d left the house in.