I could be lying in a pool of my own blood right now.
And I have to move fast, because the clock is ticking.
I leave without another word.
When I return an hour later, her house is in total shambles, and she’s gone.
38
Nat
The instant the door closes behind Kage, I bolt into my bedroom, run into the closet, and rip my engagement album off the top shelf.
When I open the leather cover, David’s letter flutters out and lands at my feet. I stashed it here that day I left the bank.
Throwing the album aside, I snatch up the letter and quickly scan it. My hands shake so hard, the paper trembles.
It finally makes sense, this strange safety deposit box letter.
There’s a clue inside.
I missed it before because I didn’t have the right frame of reference. I wasn’t looking at it with the same eyes. But now that I know what I know, the logic is perfect.
David didn’t tell me about the safety deposit box because it was a secret. A secret meant just for me. His way of telling me it was something special was to mail me the key.
If it hadn’t gotten stuck in his decrepit outgoing mailbox, I would have received that key a few days after he disappeared. Maybe even on the same day we were supposed to be getting married. And if I had received it then, I would’ve shown it to the police. Without question. They would’ve tracked down the safety deposit box and had the bank open it.
And just like when I opened it, there would’ve been only a love letter inside.
Not cash. Not unmarked bearer bonds. Nothing suspicious, just a letter.
The police would’ve thought it was a dead end. But I might’ve known better.
Because of that one line that I’m so desperate to reread now, that I think will tell me everything.
Nat,
I love you. First and always, remember that. You’re the only thing that has ever made my life worth living, and I thank God every day for you and your precious smile.
I mutter, “Lying shithead men.” I skip ahead to the next section.
You once told me you always find yourself in art. You said that whenever you get lost, you find yourself in your paintings.
My beautiful Natalie, I hope you’ll find me there, too.
“Find me in your paintings,” I say slowly.
A chill falls over my skin. I raise my head and look around the bedroom at all the art hanging on the walls.
I look at all my paintings hanging on the walls.
And I remember the movie David and I watched the week before we were supposed to get married as we were sitting up in bed.
It was a crime drama called Traffic. There were several different interconnected stories, all of them set around the illegal drug trade. A judge has a crack-addicted daughter. Two DEA agents protect an informant.
A drug king’s wife carries on the business when he’s sent to jail.
Catherine Zeta-Jones played the part of the drug king’s wife. She looked amazing, of course. But there was one scene where she visits her husband in jail, complaining that she and her kids have no money because the government has seized all their bank accounts.
Her husband, staying very cool, knowing the guards are watching and every word they’re saying is being recorded, says something casual along the lines of “Maybe sell a few things. We have a lot of expensive stuff.” Significant pause. “Look into the paintings.”
Then he gives her this look.
She, being a drug king’s wife, knows what the look means.
And it doesn’t mean sell the fucking paintings.
So she goes around investigating all the artwork in the house and finds microfilm hidden in the frames that detailed dozens of secret offshore bank accounts where her husband parked most of their illegal cash.
At that point in the movie, David turned to me and said, “Smart idea. Don’t you think?”
I have no recollection of my response, but I do remember he was giving me the same look the drug king gave his wife.
I whisper, “Jesus, David. That was a stretch.”
Then I go from room to room, ripping down paintings from the walls.
I examine the frames, front and back. I examine the canvases, front and back. I examine the mattings, the mount boards, the backing boards. In a frenzy, I tear apart dozens upon dozens of pieces of artwork.
I find jack shit.
Forty-five minutes later, I’m desperate.
Kage will be back any second, and I’ll have to explain what I’m doing. So I go around kicking over chairs and smashing lamps until it looks like I was having a good old-fashioned breakdown instead of searching for hidden treasure.
When I’m at my wits’ end, I stand in the middle of the living room, looking around at the wreckage, wondering what I’ve missed.
Then my gaze falls on the picture above the fireplace.
I should have started there first.
The painting is one I made as a gift for David’s birthday one year. He loved this particular spot in an alpine meadow overlooking Lake Tahoe called Chickadee Ridge. In the winter and spring, you can go there with a handful of birdseed, and the little birdies will fly right over and perch on your outstretched hand to feed. It’s a beautiful, magical place, and the painting reflects its quiet majesty.
Of all the landscapes I ever painted when we were together, this one was David’s favorite.
I say to the painting, “You scheming piece of shit.”
A wife. And kids.
And I almost married him.
How I wish now that he would’ve fallen off the side of the mountain like I thought he did and smashed his lying head in.
I know that sometime soon, I’ll need intensive therapy to unravel this. Probably lots of it. Probably for the rest of my life. But right now, I’m in a weird kind of Neverland. The “real” world doesn’t exist.
Finding David—Damon—has become my only reality.
I take the painting from the wall and lay it facedown on the floor. I remove the wooden backing board, exposing the frame and the back of the canvas…
And the single word scrawled in David’s handwriting on the bottom edge.
Panama.
He didn’t have to write more. He knew I’d know where to go with only that.
I pack a bag, call my parents, and convince them to stay with a friend until they hear back from me, and drop Mojo off at Sloane’s.
When she asks me where I’m going, I tell her the truth: on my honeymoon.
Then I take a cab to the airport and buy a ticket, first class.
That trust account Kage set up for me is going to come in mighty handy.
39
Nat
The Villa Camilla Hotel in Panama is nestled between a silver-strand beach and a tropical forest on the Azuero Peninsula on the Pacific Coast. With only seven rooms, it’s a small but fabulously beautiful hotel.
When I arrive, it’s early afternoon, ninety degrees, and oppressively humid. I’m wilting in boots, a turtleneck sweater, and my heavy winter coat.
The attractive concierge greets me with a friendly smile. “Welcome to Villa Camilla, se?orita. Are you checking in?”
Sweating, exhausted from twelve hours of flying with a connection through LAX, I drop my overnight bag to the red Spanish tiles and lean on the edge of the carved mahogany counter that separates us. “I’m not sure yet.”
“Would you like a tour of the property or one of the rooms? We do have two lovely suites available, both with ocean views.”