Page 143 of Nash Falls

“So what can I do about that?” asked Nash. “I can’t necessarily stop it.”

“No, but you canpreparefor it, choose how you want to handle it, react to it.”

“How?” asked Nash curiously.

“Your daddy was held as a POW by the North Vietnamese for two months. Did you know that?”

Nash shook his head in surprise. “No, I didn’t. He never said.”

“Yeah, well, Ty don’t like to talk ’bout shit where he thinks he failed. But he didn’t fail. It was just bad timin’. Anyway, after he escaped he told me how he’d hung in there when they was torturin’ him.”

“How?”

“When we was growin’ up in Mississippi, your daddy found this big, old horse roamin’ his parents’ farm. Nobody knew where that damn critter come from. Now your daddy, he was maybe fifteen, he took ownership of that horse, feedin’ it and groomin’ it and fixin’ up an old shack on the back of his parents’ property like a stable. He would ride that thing bareback for miles and miles. Or sometimes I’d see ’em walkin’ together ’cross the fields. Your daddy seemed to be talkin’ to that creature and it seemed to be talkin’ back. I was with your daddy pretty much every day back then. And so was that there horse. He named him Sunshine, ’cause your daddy say whenever he was with that horse the sun was shinin’ on him no matter if it was rainin’ or thunderin’ or whatnot. So when your daddy was a POW and they were doin’ shit to him, he told me he’d close his eyes and make his mind believe he was ridin’ Sunshine ’cross those fields back in Mississippi. And no matter what them muthers did to him, he didn’t break, didn’t even really notice. ’Cause he was with Sunshine. He told me that. And then he got loose, killed all his guards, and hightailed it back to our side.”

“What happened to Sunshine?” asked Nash.

Shock shook his head sadly. “Your daddy joined the Army and I went off to college. When we both come back on leave his momma told him Sunshine got out and was hit by a truck. Had to shoot thething, put it out of its misery. Your big, strong daddy cried for a week. Nobody’s fault, just happened. Hell, I think Sunshine was out lookin’ for your daddy. I tell you this, Walter, so you can findyourSunshine, ’cause maybe you gonna need it one day.”

Nash thanked him, then did the last thing he needed to do before leaving. He got some soap and water and massaged his finger, lubricating it thoroughly. And then, with Shock’s help, he tugged and pulled until he got it free.

Then Nash handed his wedding band to Shock.

“It’ll be here waitin’ for you, Walter.”

As Nash had started to leave, Shock said, “One last thing.”

Nash turned back. “Yeah?”

“I’m proud of you, Walter Nash. No lie. Truth,bro.”

And now Isaiah York’s large eyes held a cluster of tears.

Nash had set up an auto pay for the credit and debit cards coming out of a new account he had established under the name Dillon Hope and in which he had deposited the FBI funds. He had no expenses other than food and gas and wherever he would be staying. The physical address attached to the account was a rental owned by a shell company that was connected to one of Shock’s friends.

Shock had also provided him a flash drive with intel on Steers. Some of it he already knew, but parts of it were new to Nash. When he’d asked Shock how he had come by it, Shock told him, “You don’t want to know, but I had to call in every marker I had. Victoria Steers is a damn enigma, but maybe a little bit less so after you read that.”

Byron Jackson had driven him to a town near the state line.

And now Walter Nash was on his own.

CHAPTER

69

THE FOLLOWING MORNING, NASH, DRESSEDin jeans, a white sweatshirt that pulled tight against his hardened physique, secondhand work boots, and a ball cap with the American flag on it, drove down the highway in a Ford F150 pickup truck he had purchased in the town where Jackson had dropped him. He was currently headed to his old hometown, and the butterflies in his stomach were nearly incapacitating. But when he thought about the images from Maggie’s funeral service, the butterflies vanished, replaced by something difficult to precisely describe, but that did not lessen the hold it had over Nash’s emotions. It was not about simply justice, but maybe something approaching righteousness, augmented by an overwhelming desire for revenge.

He arrived back in town that evening and rented a room at a motel not that far from his old childhood home. The old Walter Nash would never have chosen to stay in such a place, where there were racks of hard-ridden motorcycles and old cars and trucks, and pot-smoking folks in ripped folding chairs sitting outside, and women wandering around who looked like they would show you a good time in return for some drugs, booze, and/or a meal.

It also demonstrated how much he had changed that the woman managing the place looked him up and down and said, “We don’t want no trouble, mister, and you got that look about you.”

“No trouble,” Nash said back.

“You got weapons?”

He just stared at her.

“Well, you just keep them out of sight. I run a nice, clean place, okay?”