Page 123 of Nash Falls

“Okay, but will I ever get a chance to spend it?”

“That is somewhat up to you and somewhat up to me.”

“Great. And what about Maggie Nash? Is she alive?”

The line went dead and so did all his hope that Maggie might still be among the living. Rhett had very little of his humanity left. But what had happened to the young woman had hit him hard in the part he had retained.

His other phone buzzed and he looked at the caller ID.Just what I need.

“Hey, Mindy. What’s up with the world’s newest billionairess?”

“Can we meet? Like now?”

“No we can’t. I’ll pencil you in for a month from now.”

“A month! You can’t do it earlier?” she asked.

“I already left town and I’m not coming back early. I needed some R and R. I’m lying on a beach right now sucking down a margarita. Where do you want to meet? Your place?”

“No, your place. Okay, a month from this Sunday. At seven?”

“I’ll even order dinner and open a nice bottle.”

“See you then.”

He clicked off, dumped his phone on the couch, and looked out the window of his fourteen-million-dollar bachelor pad.

I have everything in the world to make me happy. And yet I’m the unhappiest man in the world, except maybe for Walter Nash. And I know it’s only gonna get worse from here on. Unless I figure out a way to make it better. And maybe I can. I’m not stupid, like Dad told everyone I was. So now’s my chance to prove it.

CHAPTER

59

NASH LAY ON HIS BUNK. Every molecule in his body was in pain. And he had never felt such exhaustion. And in three hours’ time it would all start again. He wasn’t even sure how long he’d been doing this. Isolated like this, he’d lost all track of time. Every day was the same.

Work out until he felt like he’d died, with perfect nutritional meals interspersed. Cram and practice sessions on all subjects necessary to observe and assess foes, and how to find people, hide from people, kill people. He’d learned how to make improvised explosive devices from fairly ordinary items and set them off in the inner courtyard of the training facility. He had gotten so good at hitting the black tape X’s with knife strikes that Shock had allowed him a beer one night as a reward.

The first time he’d gotten into the boxing ring with Shock for close-quarter-combat training he had been a little cocky because of Shock’s age and bulk. That feeling had disappeared the first time Shock had knocked him out of the ring. And the second and third times had done nothing except reinforce the reality that a very large, but still nearly eighty-year-old man had kicked his ass with ease.

He rubbed his arm where one of Shock’s massive hands had clocked him with a classic blocking maneuver. The bruise there was so purple and large it was like an eggplant had sprouted on Nash’s limb. Next, Shock had swept Nash’s leg out from under him, dumping him right on his ass. Then the big man had knelt down and in a real fight would have killed Nash with an elbow strike to his throat, crushing his windpipe.

Shock had told him, “We don’t have time for me to train you up as a black belt in any particular martial arts, Walter, but what I can do is teach you key moves in each that are fairly straightforward. You learn to do those in your sleep, you can beat pretty much anybody out there.”

Nash subsequently practiced kicks, blocks, arm strikes, and attacking nerve pressure points until he could barely lift his limbs or bend his fingers. It was not all physical, Shock had said. “Ninety-nine percent of the folks are oblivious to what’s going on around them. Got their eyes stuck on their stupid phones. The one percent that have situational awareness could rob, rape, or kill any of them. The one-tenth of one percent of those folks could rob, rape, or kill the other ninety-nine and nine-tenths.”

He had taught Nash in detail how to look for tendencies of his opponents and then use those against them.

“Some folks are dominant leg or arm strike happy. That gives you an openin’. Others like distance between them and whoever they’re goin’ up against. With a weapon in hand, that can be an advantage. The close-in dudes who like to control your hands? They often forget about the legs.”

One day Shock had led him over to a swimming pool that was situated in its own room. The space reeked of chlorine.

“Can you swim?” he’d asked Nash.

“Not all that well, no.”

Shock had pushed him in and Nash had gone under, fully clothed as he was, with weights on his ankles, because he’d been running on the treadmill.

He struggled to the surface, spitting out water. “Are you trying to kill me!” he shouted.