The Boy from the Woods(51)
Dash finished up a phone call and moved next to his wife. There was an ease between Dash and Delia, always, a flow, and while Gavin had had plenty of great relationships in his life, he envied these two. People can fool you—they fool you every day—but Gavin had been hanging around the Maynards long enough to recognize that Dash and Delia were the real deal, the kind of love that makes yours, no matter how good, seem somewhat inadequate. It wasn’t just what they said. It wasn’t just how they looked at each other or casually touched. There was an intangible here, that mix of great friendship and physical attraction, and maybe that was something Gavin was projecting on them, but when they talk about a soulmate, one person in this world that is perfect for you and almost impossible to find, Dash and Delia seemed to have done just that.
“What do the protestors want?” Delia asked.
“You can hear them,” Gavin said. “They want the tapes.”
“There are no tapes,” Delia replied.
“They don’t believe that.”
“Do you, Gavin?” she asked.
“Doesn’t matter.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I’ll protect you either way.”
Dash finally spoke. “That’s not what she asked.”
Gavin looked at Dash, then back at Delia. “Of course there are tapes,” Gavin said. “Are they as damaging to Rusty as our hemp-adorned friends below would like to believe? Not for me to say.”
Dash moved back toward his office desk. “You understand the situation then.”
Gavin didn’t bother with a response.
“We aren’t safe,” Delia said, moving with her husband. “If Crash could be approached like that in his very school—”
“That won’t happen again.”
Dash put his arm around his wife’s shoulder. Again Gavin couldn’t help but notice the ease, the naturalness, the tenderness, in this everyday move. “Not good enough.”
“Who was that man?” Delia asked.
“Crash didn’t tell you?”
Delia shook her head. “He said he kept asking about Naomi Pine.”
“They call him Wilde.”
“Wait, he’s that weird mountain guy they found in the woods?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t get it. What does he have to do with Naomi Pine?”
“He is something of a surrogate parent for Matthew Crimstein. For some reason, Matthew and his family are interested in Naomi’s whereabouts.”
“Crimstein,” Dash repeated. “As in Hester?”
“Yes.”
No one liked that.
“Crash swears he doesn’t know anything about Naomi,” Delia said. When Gavin didn’t respond, she asked, “Do you think he does?”
“Crash has been in touch with her. Naomi Pine, I mean. As you probably know, she disappeared a week or so ago playing a game called Challenge.”
“Some of the mothers were talking about that.”
“Crash…encouraged her to do it.”
“Are you saying he forced her?”
“No, but peer pressure was a major factor.”
“You don’t think Crash did something bad to this girl, do you?”
“Very doubtful,” Gavin said. “He’s too monitored.”
They both were visibly relieved.
“But that doesn’t mean he knows nothing about it.”
“So what do we do? I don’t like this.” Delia looked down at the courtyard again. Saul Strauss was staring straight up, almost as though he could see them through the one-way windows. “I don’t like any of this.”
“I would suggest the family take a bit of a break from this town. Maybe travel overseas.”
“Why?”
“People perceive Rusty Eggers as an existential threat.”
Gavin Chambers waited for one of them to argue this point. Neither did.
Delia said, “Gavin?”
“Yes.”
“We are safe, right? You won’t let anything happen to our son.”
“You’re safe,” Gavin said. “He’s safe.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE
Matthew made himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, sat alone at the kitchen table, ate it, still felt hungry, made a second, and was eating when there was a knock on his back door.
He looked out the window and was surprised—closer to shocked—to see Crash Maynard. Prepared for anything, Matthew carefully opened the door halfway.
“Hey,” Crash said.
“Hey.”
“Can I come in a second?”
Matthew didn’t move or open the door any wider. “What’s up?”
“I just…” Crash used his sleeve to wipe his eyes. He looked out at the yard. “Remember when we used to play kickball out here?”
“In fifth grade.”
“We sat next to each other in Mr. Richardson’s class,” Crash said. “He was out there, wasn’t he?”
“Yeah.”
“But he was also kinda awesome.”
“He was,” Matthew agreed.