And then, from the front end of the trailer, the ringing of a cell phone. Inside the trailer. Terrific. Now he knew where to look, but couldn’t do a damn thing about it.
He had to hide.
Where did you hide in a mobile home? It wasn’t like there was a basement to scurry down into. No attic to crawl up into.
He figured he could squeeze himself under the bed. He’d cleared the space out only hours earlier. He flattened himself on the floor and edged his way under.
But not before taking the Ruger out of his pocket and gripping it firmly in his right hand.
Twenty-Four
Springfield, MA
Chloe, standing outside the trailer, phone in hand, said, “That dumbass. No wonder I can’t reach him. Left without taking his phone with him.”
“You said it never leaves his hand.”
She shrugged. “I haven’t known him that long. Maybe sometimes he has something else in his hand. You’d know a little something about that, wouldn’t you, Mr. Sperm Donor?”
Miles gave her a disappointed look. “Is that any way to talk to your dad?”
She took a step toward the trailer. “If he’s left it unlocked, we can wait inside.”
“We can’t just walk in.”
Chloe waved him off. “He’s family.”
She mounted the cinder block steps and tried the door. “Here we go,” she said, pulling the door open. She stepped inside. Miles followed her.
Once inside, Chloe screwed up her face. “Jesus, what’s that smell?”
“Some kind of cleaner?” Miles said. “Maybe bleach? Call his phone again and I’ll try to track it down.”
Chloe dug out her cell one more time and a moment later they could hear a ring near the front end of the trailer. Miles walked over to a couch, looked down, and saw the edge of the phone tucked down in between two cushions.
“Must’ve slipped out of his pocket,” Miles said, picking up the phone and displaying it. “Maybe he tried to find it, but had somewhere to go and had to give up looking. There’s some texts here, and not just from you. There’s a Madeline?”
“His mom.”
“Can’t access them. Know his password?”
“No.”
Chloe had stepped into the kitchen area. “What the...” She took her phone, still in hand, tapped the camera app, and set it to video. “I’m getting a record of this shit. This is crazy. I mean, look at the place.”
“What? The place looks fine.”
“That’s the point. The place is fucking spotless.”
“So Todd’s a neat freak.”
“No, he isn’t.”
She walked slowly over to the sink, looked down. “I can see my reflection.”
Miles bent over, putting his nose to a countertop. “I can smell the bleach here. Maybe Todd hired the world’s best cleaning lady.”
“It’s more than that,” she said, nodding toward the kitchen table. “Where’s his laptop? Where’s his stuff? I’m telling you, the guy’s like totally messy. And the thing is, I don’t think he even knows he’s messy. It’d never occur to him that he needed to spruce the place up or bring in a cleaning lady or anything.” She pondered a moment. “Maybe his mom did it? She was here the other day, would have seen how messy it was. Except she was limping. Can’t see her doing all this hobbling around on one foot.”
She struck off down the hallway, raising the phone to record her journey. As she headed toward the back of the trailer, Miles held back, in the kitchen, standing at the hallway’s end. He felt like more of a stranger here than Chloe did — an interloper — and that he didn’t have the right to start nosing around. But when she reached the end of the hall, she looked back at him and waved at him to join her.
She was starting into the bathroom when he came up alongside her.
“Whoa,” she said, stepping in for a closer inspection.
“What?”
“You could eat off this toilet,” she said. “Not that I plan to.”
Miles followed her into the bathroom. Not large, but large enough for the toilet, small built-in cabinets with drawers and a sink, and a bathtub that doubled as a shower. Chloe, with her free hand, opened the cupboard doors, then each of the drawers, all of which were completely empty and scrubbed clean.
“Do you believe this?” she asked.
“Did Todd rent this trailer?” Miles asked.
“What? Why?”
“If he decided to leave, to move on, his landlord could have had this place cleaned.”
Chloe shook her head. “He told me he owned the trailer, had it brought in here, but he paid some guy to rent the land it’s sittin’ on. But the trailer, it’s his.”
“Maybe he was going to sell it. To whoever owns the property.”
Chloe edged around him and went into the bedroom at the back of the trailer, continuing to film. Again, Miles followed. Chloe opened a set of folding doors that revealed a wide closet. Except for a few wire hangers, it was empty.
“This is like, nuts,” she said.
A built-in set of drawers that spanned the rear wall was her next target. She wanted both hands to open them more quickly, so she stopped recording and put her phone back into her pocket. Every drawer was empty.
“No way,” she said.
Miles, feeling weary, plopped down on the bare mattress.
“Nothing?” he said.
“Not so much as a sock with a hole in it.” Chloe sat down on the bed beside him, ran her hand across the surface of the mattress. “There’s not even any sheets here. What do you make of that?”
“Looks like he’s cleared out.”
Chloe glared at him. “You think?” She slowly shook her head. “So, okay, let’s say you’re right, and he decides to take off. What’s with how clean the place is? Why would he leave without telling me? None of this makes any sense.” Then she looked at him, sharply. “Unless...”
“Unless what?”
She hesitated, as though weighing how much to tell Miles. “I think Todd’s into something he shouldn’t be.”
“Like what?”
“Conning old people,” she said. “I tried to ask him about it, but he just clammed up. Like, some kind of phone scam, where you call people in retirement homes and try to trick them into buying something or giving you their money. Something like that.”
“The computer virus scam.”
“The what?”
“Just one of many. You call someone up, say that you’re from Microsoft or Apple and say you’ve detected a virus on their computer but you can send a fix. All they have to do is provide a credit card number or send some money to Western Union.”
“I can’t believe people do that. Take advantage of oldsters. I’m gonna kick Todd’s ass if I find out he’s really pulling that kind of shit.”
“If you can find him.”
“Yeah, if I... did you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“Shush,” she said, putting her index finger to her lips. “I thought I heard something. Like, in the wall or the floor.”
“I didn’t hear any—”
“Just shut up for a second.”
Miles shut up. For several seconds, neither of them breathed. Finally, Chloe exhaled.
“Maybe it was a mouse or something,” she said.
“Can I talk now?”
“Sure.”
“You mentioned Todd’s mom?”
“Yeah.”
“You got a way to get in touch with her?”
“Right there,” she said, pointing to the cell in Miles’s hand.
“Told you. It’s password or thumbprint protected.”
“You’re the tech guy. Can’t you get into it?”