My Wife Is Missing(38)

“I told you it was a bad idea for her to take that trip,” Lucinda said to Harvey. If she’d shared her concern with her daughter, it had never made it back to Michael.

Harvey barked, “What the hell did you do to her?” Michael recoiled at his accusatory tone. “It’s something, I know it, because it’s not like Natalie to behave this way.”

“It’s not me. I think her sleep troubles were more severe than I realized.”

Michael offered up his defense like a reflex, omitting much of the truth with an ease that unsettled him. “Nat’s become paranoid over the last couple months. It can happen in extreme cases of insomnia like hers. Lack of sleep is known to induce hallucinations, too. Honestly, it can mimic severe mental illness. I think she has some of that going on, maybe quite a lot. I think she was afraid, but for no good reason.”

“Afraid of what?” asked Harvey, who seemed to grow in stature before Michael’s eyes. He stood straighter, became broader in the shoulders and back, inflating himself as if that would somehow protect his missing daughter.

“Of me,” said Michael gloomily. “I think Natalie has become afraid of me.”

“You?” said Lucinda, who was shaking now.

With his admission, Michael suddenly deflated. He felt vulnerable opening up and owning that he might be part of the reason for Natalie’s disappearance. His in-laws noticed this shift in his body language. They finally invited him into the home to take seats in the living room. The home was nicely furnished, but far from cozy. The couch on which Michael sat had all the softness of a plank of wood. Decorating the room were plenty of framed pictures of Natalie, their one and only child, as well as photos of the grandchildren. On occasion, Michael would comment to Natalie that his face didn’t grace any of these photos.

“You’re not blood,” Natalie would say in a teasing way, whenever Michael mentioned this observation. Family was everything to Natalie’s parents, and as far as they were concerned Michael had one job: take care of their precious daughter and grandchildren. And he’d failed them all, profoundly. Normally, Lucinda would brew some tea, or Harvey would offer up a beer. Not today.

“Honestly, I’m not sure what Natalie is afraid of specifically,” said Michael. “She could have invented any number of stories about me.”

“Why leave from New York? Why not come to us?” Lucinda asked.

Naturally, that’s how any parent would think, but especially a mother.

“I can’t say what’s going through Nat’s head,” Michael offered. “I think she figured Amtrak would make it harder for me to find her. She’s not in any car we can track or trace. It must have seemed like a good way to just disappear.”

“I can’t believe what I’m hearing,” Lucinda said, whose color had yet to return.

A familiar little voice sounded in Michael’s ears. The devil was back on his shoulder, doing that whisper thing he did so well.

You really got game, you know that, Mike? said the devil. It’s not about the affair, and you know it. You can’t admit to anything, can you? You can’t admit even to yourself what you’ve done. You know damn well why Natalie ran. Tell them, Mike. Get it off your chest. Unload. It’ll make you feel so much better.

Michael shook his head like a boxer after a knockdown, and the devil’s voice went away. If his in-laws noticed his momentary distress, they kept it to themselves.

“What now?” Harvey asked.

“She took five hundred from the file safe, half of what we kept in there so the missing money wouldn’t be easily noticed, and then she made several withdrawals from our checking account, hundred here, a hundred there, over the course of several weeks. The money won’t last her forever. Eventually, she’ll have to use a credit card, and then we should be able to locate her that way. If she bought a ticket on Amtrak, we’ll get the destination soon enough.”

Harvey didn’t look impressed. “We’ve got to call the police,” he demanded. “Michael, why aren’t the police out looking for them?”

His anger was rising. Michael explained again how legally it’s not an Amber Alert situation and it was unclear if any laws had been broken.

“It isn’t considered abduction if Natalie and I share equal parenting rights.”

Harvey was on his feet, inflating himself once more.

“I don’t care what the law says,” he growled in a low voice. “I have contacts at the damn FBI. I’ll get them on the job.” He glared at Michael as if to say, Because you failed.

“That’s great, Harvey,” Michael said. “The more help, the better. I’m going to put the word out on social media. See if we can get a post to go viral.”

Lucinda took this as her cue to assist.

“I have pictures,” she said, a hitch in her voice. “I’ll get them off my phone. And I’ll help you write the post.”

Lucinda went to the kitchen, muttering to herself, wringing her hands nervously as she left the room. Michael heard her open and close the oven door. She had to take out the lemon tart. He knew that signature dessert by smell alone. She returned to the living room moments later carrying her phone on a tray that also held a pot of tea, three small saucers, and cups. To his surprise, Lucinda, even under duress, couldn’t help but do as she’d always done—serve the tea and baked goods.