But while the room looked tidy and homey, it was sweltering hot and stank of garbage. The smell made my eyes water. It wasn’t a dead body, I didn’t think. I’d smelled bodies before.
It felt strange to stand in Melly’s empty house, but what the hell. She had walked into mine without knocking.
First, I wandered around the room. I was concerned that the garbage smell would hide the stink of a dead body, but I didn’t find one behind the furniture and there were no blood splashes against the walls. The bedroom was empty—the bed was neatly made, in fact, and the little desk in the corner was tidy.
Then I went into the bathroom. The medicine cabinet was standing open. I pushed it closed, getting a glimpse of the dark circles under my eyes. The shower curtain was drawn, and a couple of the rings had been pulled free. I peeked through the gap into the tub. I couldn’t see anything in the bottom of the tub, not even droplets of water.
I went back to the living room and noticed a mail slot just beside the front door. Below it there was a small wicker basket full of mail. It looked like a couple of days’ worth, but I couldn’t tell exactly. I fanned through it and saw that most of it was addressed to Luther Olive.
There was a list of phone numbers on a notepad by the phone. I picked up the receiver and dialed the one at the top, labeled work. The woman who answered announced that it was a hospice-care facility, but she wouldn’t answer any questions about Caramella and she wouldn’t transfer me to her voice mail. I left my real name and a fake call-back number and hung up.
Finally, I went into the kitchen. There was a pink ceramic bowl full of rotting chicken on the counter, but most of the stink was coming from the open garbage can. I looked around without touching anything, then went back into the living room.
I was alone and it was obvious that I was the first person to stand in this room for a couple of days. I picked up a framed photo on the end table.
It was a picture of two faces close together. One was Melly and she was laughing. She looked older than I remembered, and more beautiful. She had little wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, and seeing her openmouthed smile brought back the memory of her laugh.
The man laughing with her, his cheek pressed against hers, was a black man with a short haircut, a scar below his eye, and a crooked nose. He had a beefy, solid look about him—the kind of muscular guy who would get fat at the first sign of comfort. He also gave the impression of puppy-dog earnestness, as though he was eager to please out of habit. That must have been Luther.
I liked the friendly roughneck look of him, and I was a little jealous, too. Not because I wanted Caramella—we hadn’t had that sort of relationship—but because he had happiness and love and a home. I hoped I would be able to save whatever he and Melly had.
There were other pictures on the mantel, and I studied them one by one. Here were pictures of Melly and her guy with her mom and sister in a lush forest somewhere. Next was an old bridal picture of a black couple, both looking heavenward. Next was a picture of Luther with Ty, Lenard, and Arne. They were all smiling. Most of the rest were Melly and her guy at various events—parties, picnics, carousels. The last showed Melly and Violet laughing while they baked Christmas cookies. I was surprised to see them together. They hadn’t been close when I was around, but apparently things had changed.
Suddenly, I couldn’t stand it anymore. I rushed into the kitchen, dumped the rotting chicken, bowl and all, into the trash can, then carried the garbage out the back door.
There was a plastic bin in the little backyard. I upended the trash can into it, letting a plume of stink blow over me. I tossed the can onto the parched lawn and went inside, leaving the back door open. I went to the bathroom and threw open the window, then opened the bedroom and living room windows. A mild crosscurrent blew across me. It wasn’t enough to clear the stink, but it was better than the stale, oppressive heat.
Then I got to work.
I searched the house from top to bottom, taking special care to put things back where they belonged. I was careful out of respect for Caramella more than a desire to trick her, although if she never found out I’d broken in, I’d be happy.
I was looking for spell books, of course. Barring that, I wanted to find single spells, either instructions for casting them or a spell itself—a sigil drawn, carved, or stitched onto another object. If I couldn’t find that, I hoped to find something to tell me where to look for Caramella next. An open phone book with a secluded Big Bear resort circled in red ink, maybe. I wasn’t that lucky.
I searched every drawer, beneath every cushion, inside the pocket of every jacket and pair of pants. I opened every box and chest, looked inside every lamp, and ran my hand along the underside of every piece of furniture. I even unscrewed the grates over the air vents for their central heating. Nothing.
Caramella had a laptop on a tiny sewing desk in her room, but I hadn’t done more than search around it so far. I didn’t have a computer of my own, and I didn’t know much about them.
I opened it and it came to life. I was surprised that it was sitting there, already turned on. Had Caramella been here recently, using it? She could have come and gone invisibly, of course. In fact, she could have followed me around the house while I searched it.
I felt a surge of anxiety as that thought grew larger in my mind, but I took several deep breaths. No one was there. Not with that garbage smell. No one was there.
Once the computer had fully come to life again, it began to download four days’ worth of emails. It had been sitting there, switched on, for several days, and no one had used it recently.
I read the five dozen new emails as well as a couple of days’ worth of old ones. Most were useless: supposedly funny stories about squabbling married couples, ads for natural Viagra, and attempts to organize a group of friends for a Friday movie date.
Only in the last day’s messages did I notice anything unusual. Her mother had sent a note asking where she was, and telling her to please call. She had similar notes from her supervisor and co-worker, and from Arne.
I tried to find out more, but everything I did on her computer caused something inexplicable to happen, so I closed it.
I went back into the living room and looked at the clock. It had been just over two hours since I’d snuck in, and I had nothing to show for my time. Predators were on the loose, and I had no idea what to do next. Tomorrow at seven-thirty I’d go back to Ralphs and hope to meet Annalise, but until then I had nothing.
But there was nothing left to do here. If I went back to my motel, I could have another shower and sleep—maybe—but I would have run out of options. There was nowhere else for me to go but back to Arne, and I wasn’t ready for that yet. I needed to talk to Caramella first.
So I stood there, my indecision making the choice for me. Finally, I decided I might as well wait. I wanted to talk to her, and I was more likely to find her here than at my motel.
I dug out the remote and turned on the local news, hoping there would be a segment about a mysterious invisible assailant, but I was out of luck there, too. The first segment covered the president’s plan to visit L.A.
Then the newscasters switched to extended reports of a break-in at a movie star’s Beverly Hills home. Her name was Ellen Egan-Jade; she’d been in Minnesota filming her latest romantic thriller, but her live-in housekeeper had been beaten, raped, and left for dead. The only thing the asshole took was her Oscar. The cops didn’t have any leads.