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“The way Josh talked about his parents and losing them. How much he missed them and how his life fell apart.” Meredith stopped to take a deep breath. “I can’t really explain it except to say, he makes you want to be with him. He’s beenthrough awful things and was really empathetic. He’s also really attentive and listens. Even in the beginning, when it was just sex, he didn’t forget things that were important to me.”
“But he did forget he had a fiancée.” Fidelity mattered to Elisa and it made her antsy when it didn’t matter to other people. They could do whatever they wanted in their relationships but she had a line that couldn’t be crossed.
“Even when he talked about Abby... it’s just . . . ” Meredith sighed. “He would say he made a mistake and jumped too fast. He’d been lonely. Missed being in a relationship. Talked about his wife’s awful accident.”
“Which wife?”
Meredith stopped shifting her weight around. “What?”
So, he hid Lauren from Meredith, too. Seemed he spent a lifetime forgetting Lauren, which made Elisa ache for justice for Lauren, too. “Nothing. Go ahead.”
“You’re married so you might not understand this, but it’s rough out there. Dating is just... awful. You see this guy who has his life together and loves his brother and you. He talks about his nephew and doing things together. It’s refreshing. It’s easy to be drawn to that.”
“He used my son as a dating tool?”Of course he did. The asshole.
“The point is we had something, or I thought we did.” Meredith rubbed her forehead, her expression looking just as pained as it had when she’d started this story. “Then Abby left. He had all these excuses and said that’s the type of person she was, which made sense at first...”
“But then?”
“He immediately stopped talking about her. It was like he was . . .” Meredith shrugged. “I don’t know the right word. Relieved she was gone?”
The words sat there, confirming every doubt and fear that had been percolating inside Elisa since Abby disappeared.
“I thought we’d be together then, but he said it would look suspect. People would think he did something to Abby if they knew he was cheating on her.”
Elisa had the exact thought as Meredith said it. “Uh, yeah.”
Buzz, the tabby cat, wound its way around Elisa’s feet. It meowed and rubbed and generally begged for attention. Not the usual cat behavior for Buzz but Elisa ignored it.
“We were still together then he started canceling dates. I followed him and saw the new woman. It was obvious he was dating—”
“Rachel?” Elisa moved her legs apart so it was easier for Buzz to walk in between them.
“Yes. The relationship came out of nowhere and he was showing her off to you guys. Acting like moving on and dating someone new wasn’t a big deal, despite what he’d told me. I confronted him and he denied it at first, but he stopped calling. Stopped... wanting anything from me.” The anger rose in Meredith’s voice the longer she talked about the new relationship.
“You’ve been following him.”
“I didn’t know what went wrong.” Meredith stopped to take a deep breath. “I admit, at first I was going to tell everyone about us. Ruin him by getting the police’s attention. I didn’t care, but then I started to think about Abby and hisbehavior. I became convinced something terrible happened to her and worried he’d somehow blame me.”
Elisa couldn’t process thehowbehind that last part right now. Letting thoughts about Abby into her head would derail her, and she needed to be on her game until she ushered Meredith out of the house. “Why stalk me? Why lie about everything to Harris?”
“Josh can’t stand to disappoint Harris.”
Buzz’s meowing grew louder at Elisa’s feet. “I’m aware.”
“He will lie and twist things, lash out and—” Meredith came to an abrupt stop then started again. “I was following the two of you, you and your husband, to try to figure out what you knew about Abby and the new girlfriend. When Josh found out about our run-in at the school, he was livid. I’d never seen him like that. He said awful things. So personal and untrue. He told me to fix the mess and act as if you’d made it all up.”
Elisa gave up and picked up the cat. She didn’t break eye contact with Meredith but rubbed her hand over Buzz to make sure he wasn’t injured. “Why?”
Meredith stared at the cat for a few seconds before answering. “He said he needed to discredit you. He thinks you’re looking into Abby’s disappearance. He’s convinced you’ll mess up his life and get the police looking closer at him. If you start talking, he wants to be able to tell people you need help.”
That fit with every one of Elisa’s theories about Josh’s recent behavior. “Why are you really here today?”
“I kept thinking about your husband and what I said in the parking lot. Your expression . . .” Meredith’s own starkexpression mirrored the roughness of her voice. “Well, I couldn’t do it. Not for Josh. He doesn’t deserve that kind of help from me.”
“Okay.” Elisa didn’t believe Meredith had a burst of conscience, but fine.
Meredith’s information was shocking but not surprising. Horrible but not hard to imagine. Every word she said about Josh made sense. He’d morphed from surviving a tragedy to using the telling of it to lure women. So many smart women got sucked in, wanted to save him. And he destroyed them.
