Page 84 of Nash Falls

“No one steady.”

“You’ve checked with her friends?”

“Yes, no one has seen her since earlier yesterday.”

“Young people do run away, all the time.”

“Look, Officer, I know you don’t know Maggie, but this is not like her. She would not have just vanished without a word. She’s never given us trouble.”

The cop looked around. “Most runaways have different economic situations than this one, but rich kids run away, too.”

“Not Maggie. And her car is still in the garage. And leaving home without money and credit cards and ID?”

“Okay, any signs of forced entry into your home?”

Nash had not thought of that and said so.

The cop said, “Let me look around, sir.”

He walked off and Nash immediately went to his bedroom to check on Judith. He was stunned to find her lying nearly naked on the bed with a wet compress over her eyes, her clothes strewn across the floor.

Nash was about to rouse her when she let out a soft snore. He looked at the bottle of Ambien on the nightstand and a half-empty bottle of water, covered her with a sheet, and quietly retreated.

He was sitting on the stairs when the cop came back into the foyer.

“Come with me, sir.”

He led Nash to a room where there was a large washer and dryer, and pullout bins for laundry. An ironing board was housed behind a panel on the wall, and an iron sat on a shelf next to it. There was also a long counter for folding clothes and a mud sink. On the shelves were bottles of detergent and bleach.

The cop pointed at the lock and doorjamb on the rear door here. “Forced.”

The blood drained from Nash’s face. “Oh my God.”

“You didn’t notice this?”

“No, I always come in through the garage. This is obviously the laundry room.”

“Do you have an alarm system?”

“Yes, but I’m not sure if my wife turned it on last night.”

“Cameras?”

“Just on the front door.”

“Can you see if your wife had the alarm on last night?”

“She… took a sleeping aid.”

“She took a sleeping aid?” said the cop incredulously.

Nash said, “I’ll ask her as soon as she’s.… No, wait, I can check the alarm record. I have it on my phone app.”

He checked. “The alarm was not turned on last night.”

“Okay. With this development I’m going to have a forensics team out along with the detectives. And we’re putting an alert out on her.”

“You… you think she’s been kidnapped?”