“That would really, really piss me off,” I said.
“Me too,” Sky said. “I’m sure that’s why she sent Dylan those texts.”
“Are you sure she stopped with texts?”
“What are you saying?”
I just looked at her.
Sky shook her head vigorously, like a kid who’s just beentold that Santa Claus isn’t real. “Rhonda isn’t a violent person,” she said. “She’s hurting, but she would never physically harm anyone.”
“I understand what you’re saying,” I said. And I did. But like I mentioned earlier, we humans are complicated creatures. And even if we weren’t, this woman had plenty of uncomplicated reasons to break her peaceable streak with Dylan Welch. “I think I’ll talk to Rhonda all the same.”
Ten
The only contact information Sky had for Rhonda Lewis was her lawyer’s phone number. She called him. Surprising no one, he wasn’t willing to offer up his client to aid in our search for the missing CEO of the company she was suing for the second time. “I’m not sure why I even tried that,” Sky said after ending the call.
“You want to find your friend,” I said. “You’re willing to try anything.”
Sky nodded. She shut her eyes for a moment, too choked up to speak. Could Dylan be that awful if he inspired such heartfelt emotion from an obviously intelligent woman? Well…yes, he could. It happened all the time, and with men even worse than him.
“I believe Rhonda sent Dylan those texts,” Sky said. “I thinkthey probably scared him. But I know that she didn’t have anything to do with his going missing.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“This is going to sound weird.”
“Try me.”
“During litigation, I saw Rhonda in a resting state,” Sky said. “She wasn’t raging. She wasn’t screaming, so I was able to reallyseeher. I was able to look into her eyes. I can read people, Sunny. And after being that close to her, I know that Rhonda Lewis isn’t capable of that type of violence.”
“You’re right,” I said. “That did sound weird.”
“Okay, fine. But from a practical standpoint, she’s suing us. Again. Why would she want to jeopardize that by…by doing something to Dylan?”
“That actually makes some sense.”
“I just want to find my friend,” she said. “And I don’t want to waste time by focusing on the wrong person.”
“How about this?” I said. “I’m going toconsiderRhonda Lewis—meaning I am going to pursue the idea that she might possibly know where Dylan is and what happened to him. But I will continue to follow any leads I come across. And I will keep you and Lydia informed of everything.”
Sky sighed. “Fair enough.”
“Good.”
The one thing that Rhonda’s lawyer did mention during the call was that she was on leave from her job. And when I asked Sky where Rhonda had worked, she told me she’d been a nurse practitioner at an urgent care in Watertown. I looked up theaddress on my phone. It was just five minutes away from my shrink’s office in Cambridge.
“I still think you’re wasting your time,” Sky told me as we said goodbye. “She’s a nurse, Sunny. Anurse.” Sky Farley, who had clearly never watched a true crime documentary in her life.
I stopped by security again on my way out and asked Maurice if there was anything else he wanted to tell me, now that the COO wasn’t around. “Anything at all,” I said, “that might help my investigation.”
He told me the same thing that Elspeth had. “Sky likes everybody.”
“Meaning…”
“Meaning, she sees the best in people all the fuckin’ time, and while it’s admirable, it’s also annoying as shit,” he said. “Oops. Pardon my French.”
I had to laugh at that.
