The Women on Retford Drive, page 20
part #1 of Dancing Hills Series
“Oh,” I say, recoiling when his funk infiltrates my nose.
“Nice to see you again,” Julia says, pulling me toward the coffee shop.
“Can I wash your windows?”
“No thank you,” she says, almost running.
I pick up my pace, and we enter the coffee shop that’s teeming with customers. She looks around, and a bespectacled man with a large afro in the rear waves at us. Wearing a colorful dashiki and faded jeans, he looks like a throwback from the sixties.
“Who’s Dirty Harry?” I ask.
“I’ll tell you later,” she says, motioning for me to follow her.
“Julia?”
“Are you Anozie?”
“I am. I thought we agreed you would come alone.”
“This is my daughter.”
“You look like sisters. You’re both beautiful. Have a seat. I won’t bite.” He motions for us to sit in the booth across from him, and we do so, giving him guarded looks. Anozie squints, and then a knowing grin flashes across his face. “Wait a minute. I know you two. You’re that Pritchard guy’s wife and daughter. I saw that news conference. Holy moly, it’s you.”
“You’re right,” Julia says, sweat spilling down her forehead. I hand her a napkin out of the holder. She dabs at her face. Before she can respond, a waitress comes to our table.
“Can I get you ladies anything?”
“Ice water for me,” Julia says.
“Nothing for me,” I say, still full of pancakes.
“Where are you from?” Julia asks.
“London by way of Nigeria,” he says, laughing. “Tell me why you really want to meet with Mary?”
“Anozie, I can’t say too much. I need you to arrange a meeting. And if things go as I hope, there’s a good chance you’ll be the recipient of a hundred-thousand-dollar reward.”
“That sounds good, but I’m sure there will be a lot of red tape, and I can’t wait for that. You’ll have to give me something now.”
“I thought as much,” she says, reaching into her purse. She shows him a hundred-dollar bill, and I notice a glint in his eye. “Is that enough for you to reach out to her?” Before he can respond, the waitress arrives with Julia’s ice water. “Thank you.” The waitress leaves as Julia rubs the cold glass on the side of her face, then takes a gulp.
“I’ll see if I can reach her.” He holds up his phone and swipes his thick finger across the screen. After a couple of seconds, we hear ringing.
Julia reaches for my hand underneath the table while we wait for the phone to be answered.
Chapter 25
Julia
Blythe squeezes my clammy hand while I listen to Mary’s phone ringing. I touch my torso with my free hand, trying to calm my tumultuous stomach. The ringing stops, and a woman with a faint German accent says, You’ve reached Mary Weber. I’m not able to answer your call at this time. Please leave a message. Anozie disconnects the call, and his dark, clean-shaven face lights up with a smile. My gaze locks on his two gold front teeth. I wonder if they’re real.
“As you can see, she’s not available right now.” He thrusts his phone into his pocket.
I rock in my seat, unsure what to do or say next. Blythe rescues me. “Why don’t you send her a text message? Maybe she’s in a meeting or something, and she can’t answer the phone.”
“She wouldn’t be in a meeting on a Saturday,” he says. “Look, I did my part. You pay me the money now.” He extends his hand, wiggling his thick fingers.
“Don’t give him anything, Julia,” Blythe says, riled.
“Lady, it’s not my fault she didn’t answer. You caused me a lot of problems with my supervisor. You had me drive all the way out here. You owe me.”
“She doesn’t—”
“It’s okay, Blythe,” I say, handing Anozie the hundred dollars. “He did return my call.”
“Thank you,” he says. “I will reach out to her again later this evening. Perhaps we can arrange something for another day.”
“Why don’t you give her Mary’s number?” Blythe asks.
“That won’t be possible.” He gets up from the booth. “You ladies have a nice day. And I hope you find your husband—alive,” he says, leaving.
I rest my head in my hands, feeling like I should give up. Blythe’s right—I should let the detectives do their job and stop playing cop.
Blythe rubs my back. “He didn’t deserve anything, and I’m sorry it turned out this way. I have to go—my phone’s been vibrating. Martha’s calling nonstop.”
“I forgot to show him the photo.” I take it out of my purse. “That woman he called probably isn’t even your mother.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m going to take off. You probably should too.”
“Thanks for coming. I want to do nothing for a minute. I’ll touch base with you later. Richard and the team are going to be landing soon. I need to let him know our availability for tomorrow.”
“Anytime is good for me.”
She kisses my cheek and leaves. I sit there feeling like a dolt. I look over my shoulder at her, then resume sitting on the pity pot. After about five minutes, I sense someone hovering behind me. I pray it’s not Dirty Harry. There’s no body odor, so it’s probably not him.
“Ma’am, can I get you anything else?”
“No thank you,” I say to the waitress. I get up, head to the exit, and nearly collide head-on with another customer. I brush past the tall, dark-haired woman, and she calls out to me.
“Julia?”
“Do I know you?”
“No, we’ve never met.”
How does she know my name, and what does she want? She probably recognizes me from the news. She’s either a reporter or someone out to capitalize on the case somehow. “I’m not interested.” I walk away.
“Julia, I’m Mary Weber.”
I turn, and as my gaze meets her green eyes, I think that she looks nothing like Mary. “Ma’am, I’m sorry I had Anozie call you. You’re not the Mary Weber I was looking for.”
“Who’s Anozie?” she asks, shrugging.
“He’s the Flash Ryde driver. I paid him a hundred dollars to contact you. Anyway, you’re not the Mary Weber I was looking for.”
“No one contacted me.”
“He called you. I was there. I heard your outgoing message and your name.”
“Julia, I’m probably not the only Mary Weber in Dancing Hills. It wasn’t me.”
“Then who are you?” I ask, becoming annoyed.
“I’m Mary Weber, Keith Pritchard’s ex-wife, Blythe’s mother. I’ve been trying to catch up with you ever since I heard about Keith going missing.” Her words finally sink in. “I followed you here today. I didn’t want Blythe to see me. Can we talk?” She motions toward the coffee shop.
Stunned, I nod and follow her to a booth. “You don’t look anything like Mary. You have a slight accent, but …”
She must sense my concern because she reaches into her purse and pulls out her driver’s license. “This is an old license, Julia. It’s me.” She thrusts it into my hand.
I study it like my life depends on it. The woman in the photo has chestnut eyes, red hair, and freckles. My stomach flips when my gaze shifts to her address—3981 Retford Drive, Dancing Hills, California, 91721. EXP. 07/03/2003. “My god, you’re Mary. But your hair, your face.”
“Julia, I dyed my hair, I’m wearing contacts, and I had laser surgery to remove my freckles.”
I remove the photo Blythe printed for me. The woman in the license is the woman in the photo. And looking closer, I now see that the woman in front of me is also the woman in the photo, just older. “It’s you. Wow, Blythe was here. You just missed her.”
“I saw her while I was in the parking lot. It took everything in me not to run to her and squeeze her to death. I haven’t seen my baby girl in sixteen years. The last time I saw her she was no taller than this table, with pigtails. She has grown into a beautiful woman, and I know I have you to thank for that.”
Tingling all over, I have a million questions to ask. “What happened to you? Keith told me you had been abducted.”
“Yes, I heard about that. I ran from him. He wasn’t the man I thought he was. And no, I didn’t want to leave Blythe behind, but he didn’t give me a choice. He said he would kill us both if I tried to take her.”
I give her a curious look.
“What’s wrong?” she asks.
“Why didn’t you reach out to Blythe before now? If I’d been banished from seeing my daughter for sixteen years, and I saw her in a parking lot, there’s no way I wouldn’t have approached her. Something isn’t adding up,” I shake my head.
“Julia, Keith put the fear of god in me. He tried to kill me. It took me forever to get over him, to get past the fear. I believed him when he told me he would kill my daughter if I ever tried to see her. His words have haunted me for sixteen years, and they still do today. The only reason I’m here is because he’s missing and most likely dead, and even now I’m trying to keep a low profile. I love my daughter. I loved her enough to let her go. But once I heard Keith was out of the picture, I took the first flight I could. I arrived Friday morning, and I saw the press conference on TV. I’m staying with friends. They told me about what happened to Keith, and then I saw it on TV back home in Germany.”
“I understand.” I flash back to Keith trying to choke the life out of me. My heart thumps so loudly, I’m sure she can hear it. “You left when she was six.”
“That’s when he tried to kill me.”
“Jesus.”
“It was horrific. He tried to drown me and not just in water.”
Gasping, I grip the table edge, visualizing the horror she must have endured.
“The day it happened started out lovely. It was his mother’s birthday, and we were all having lunch at the country club. I always had the same thing when we went, but on this particular day he wanted to order for me. I didn’t want what he ordered for me, and he blew it out of proportion. Dolores didn’t help matters either.”
“I completely understand.” Her every word rivets me.
“Anyway, I told him to stop acting like a brat. Why did I say that? His face turned beet red, and veins protruded from his forehead. He didn’t say another word the entire day. To say I was concerned would be an understatement. We went home in silence.
“After I put Blythe to bed, he seemed to have calmed down. In fact, he was sweet. He told me he had made me a bubble bath and that he wanted to give me a massage. I was relieved that we had gotten past the country club incident. I undressed and I entered the master bathroom. Red rose petals and candles were everywhere. It was a beautiful scene, but I noticed a funny scent. He told me it was a new air freshener. I got into the tub, and the smell was even stronger—putrid. Then I realized I was smelling piss. He had urinated in the water, Julia.”
“Wow.”
“I started to stand, and he knocked me down. He put his hands on my head and pushed me under. I was swallowing the pissed-laced water, choking, blacking out. I kicked and fought him, and we both froze when we heard Blythe’s little voice: ‘Daddy, can I play with you and mommy in the water?’ Before that she had never seen him try to hurt me. Well, there was one time a few weeks before the drowning incident that we had a fight. There was a lot of screaming, and he pushed me. He was a little tipsy, and I forgave him. I didn’t think much of it. But him trying to kill me was all I needed to know that it was time to go. He ran to Blythe, and I jumped out of the tub and locked myself in the red room. Does he still have the different color rooms?”
“Yes.” Tears fill my eyes.
“He banged and screamed until he wore himself out. When I realized he was finally asleep, I got Blythe, packed a few of her things, and headed out. He caught me before I could escape. He told me he would kill us both if I even thought about taking her. And he told me to get out. I gladly did, thinking there would be some way I could get Blythe. I had signed a prenup, so I wasn’t expecting anything. But I did want my child. I went back to Germany. And I heard from friends that he’d told everyone I had been kidnapped. I couldn’t believe he had the police looking for me. It was insane.”
I feel her pain, and I hold her hand. It seems as if we’re kindred spirits, and if I found out she’d killed Keith, I’m not sure I’d be able to turn her in. But if it would prevent Blythe and me from becoming suspects, I wouldn’t have a choice. “How long did you stay in Germany?”
“For sixteen years. Like I said, I just returned Friday. And if you’re wondering, yes, Keith divorced me. I found out he had a couple of years after I left. It was a simple process because he was able to say he didn’t know where I was. By then things had calmed down, so the filing stayed under the radar.”
“You just got back Friday?”
“Yes.”
Is she lying? Maybe she got here earlier than Friday. Maybe she’s been here all along. I wring my hands, trying to figure out a way to broach the subject I really want to talk about. I don’t want to scare her away. I reach into my purse for my phone. “Excuse me—I need to check this text message.” While doing so, I put my phone on record. I need to get something on tape as a backup, in case Blythe and I are ever charged.
“Do you need to take a call?” she asks.
“No, just checking my messages.” I set my phone on the table. “So what did you think when you heard Keith was missing?” I study her reaction.
“I thought my prayers had finally been answered.”
“What about when you found out his car had been abandoned and that his blood was in the car?”
She pauses. “What are you after, Julia?”
“I’m after the truth. Look, I wasn’t as smart as you were. I should have gotten out when Keith slapped me in the face with a remote. But I didn’t, because by then I was stuck. I was in love. I grew up with an abusive father, and I saw my mother stay, so I guess part of me felt that’s what I was supposed to do. It was stupid. Keith hurt me a lot, and I fantasized about killing him,” I whisper. “I dreamed about it. But I know this much: if he had prevented me from seeing Blythe for sixteen years, I would have found a way to murder his rotten ass.”
“Do you think I killed him?”
“If you did, I wouldn’t be mad at you. Between me, you, and Blythe, you would have done us a favor.”
I pray for a confession. I pray for her to tell me she lied about arriving here Friday and that she never left the U.S., that she’d been waiting for an opportunity to kill Keith.
She looks around and over her shoulder and says, “Yes, I killed him.”
I press on my quavering leg, and my eyes dip to my phone. “How?”
“I killed him over and over again in my dreams, in my fantasies. I hacked him, I burned him, I boiled him, I drowned him. And each time, I got the thrill of a lifetime.”
My face drops, and I purse my lips. “What?”
“Do you need me to say it closer to your phone, so you can get a good recording?”
My face flushes with embarrassment, and I grab my cell and thrust it into my purse. “I’m sorry, Mary … but … the man who owns the convenience store in this strip mall said he saw a woman looking at Keith’s license plate the night his car was abandoned and that she was German with red—”
“Exactly,” she cuts me off. “I don’t have red hair, at least not anymore, and I was in Germany Tuesday.”
And that could be a wig you’re wearing. You admitted you’re wearing contacts, and you can cover freckles with foundation. You could have changed your look for this meeting. And who knows where you were Tuesday?
“It wasn’t me. This is my first time at this strip mall, and I only know about it because I followed you and Blythe here.”
“Then who was the woman at the strip mall?”
“She was probably a woman who just happened to have had red hair and who just happened to have been able to speak a little German. You remind me of myself when I escaped from Keith. I was so paranoid, I thought every man with dark hair and greens eyes was Keith coming to do me in. Sometimes we read more into things than we should. But there is one good thing that has resulted from your overactive imagination—at least I hope it’s good.”
“What’s that?”
“Me. You found me, and I’m hoping that when all this over with, I’ll be able to see my daughter again. I don’t want to get in the middle of all of this. As far as everyone’s concerned, I’m abducted or dead. And I’d like to keep it that way, until the police find out who killed Keith and or close the case unsolved. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in jail for something I didn’t do.”
“Neither do I.”
“What are you going to do now? Are you going to tell Blythe you met me?”
“It would be too much right now. Mary, I agree with you. Let’s let the police do their job, and when everything settles down, we can have a reunion. Why don’t we exchange numbers?”
“Sure,” she says.
We do so, and then we stand and engage in an awkward embrace.
“You’re pretty, Julia. That’s one thing I can say about Keith: he has good taste in women.”
“Yes, he does.”
I leave Mary and head to my car, rethinking what I said. I have to tell Blythe I met her mother. I can’t keep this from her. Her mother’s like a stranger to her. I think she’ll be able to handle whatever happens, and I’ll be there for her.
I crane my neck as I get closer to where I parked, but I don’t see my car. Was it towed? I reach into my pocket for my key, but it’s not there.
Chapter 26
Detective Brian Johnson
Driving on the freeway, I wonder why the highway patrol seems to be dragging their feet in removing the stalled car causing the gridlock.
“This is ridiculous,” Rhonda says.
“The melee is on the other side of the freeway.” I point to uniformed officers surrounding a Mercedes. “It’s the looky-loos on our side of the freeway slowing us down.” I pick up speed, glad to be able to drive faster than zero miles an hour.
“Turn up the air-conditioning. I’m having a private summer.”
