He grinned and gave her knee an affectionate squeeze. Being called a smartass meant she wasn’t holding any grudges from their argument that morning. Either him telling her what to do wasn’t that bad of an infraction or she was used to much worse shit from her turd of an ex-husband. As long as it meant she wasn’t harboring a grudge against him, he was happy.
“Living the dream, baby,” he said. “Let’s go find ourselves a missing Larry.”
They got out of the Jeep. Burt trotted along behind them, pausing to lift his leg on a fire hydrant. Three concrete steps led to Larry’s front door.
“This place looks like where divorced men go to learn to fend for themselves,” Riley noted as she pulled on the latex gloves he handed her. She’d changed out of summer civilian consultant casual into what Nick liked to think of as hot girl casual. Cute cut-offs, sandals, and a blue tank with a scoop neck that showed just enough cleavage to catch his eye every time he looked at her. She’d pulled her hair back from her face in a cute ponytail after complaining about humidity helmet. Why women ever thought big hair was a bad thing, he’d never understand.
He raised his fist and knocked.
“Wouldn’t it be weird if he answered the door?” she mused, looking around at the other identical empty stoops and boring tan front doors.
Burt nosed his way between them and cocked his head.
Nick tried the doorbell next, and when no one answered, he produced the key Shelley had given him. “Let’s hope he’s not in the middle of an orgy,” he said, opening the door. “After you.”
“After that image?” Riley shook her head.
He stepped inside over a small pile of mail located directly under the mail slot in the door.
Sparsely furnished was being kind. There was a sagging couch on one off-white wall. It faced a new TV with about two dozen cords running to and from it. The coffee table looked like a trash day sidewalk find. It had two gaming controllers on it and a wallet.
“Mr. Rupley? Are you home?” he called. “Larry?”
Burt echoed with a questioning bark and went snuffling into the kitchen. There was no response.
“Feels empty,” Riley said.
“Let’s start digging.”
Burt pawed at the carpet in the dining area.
“Not literally, buddy,” Nick warned him. The dog looked embarrassed.
“So what exactly are we looking for?” Riley asked, sounding eager as she opened the coat closet. “Is there a PI checklist for tossing a stranger’s place?”
“We’re looking for a couple of things. Clues as to how Rupley lives, how he spends his time, and who he’s spending it with. Then we’re looking for anything out of the ordinary. What prescriptions is he on? Does he have a pot or a porn stash? What’s he hiding, and how good is he at hiding it?”
She nodded thoughtfully.
Speaking of hiding things. “Can I borrow your phone to take pictures?” he asked. “I left mine in the Jeep.”
“Sure.” She handed it over and opened the coat closet to peer inside. Nick kept his attention on her as he deftly changed a few settings before opening the camera. He wasn’t going to feel guilty about it. Not when he was doing it for her own good, he decided.
Nefarious overprotective boyfriend task complete, he flipped the wallet open and found Larry’s driver’s license, a few credit cards, $42 in cash, and a grocery store club card. No condoms. No slivers of paper with mysterious phone numbers or addresses. He pulled everything out and took a picture of the contents lined up on the coffee table.
There was no art, no framed photos, no plants in the living space. Dirty socks and two pairs of khakis were balled up in a pile next to the front door. Larry Rupley appeared to be a door pants dropper just like Nick’s uncle Ricardo. Unlike Uncle Rico, Larry didn’t have an Aunt Fotoula picking up his laundry.
The combined kitchen and dining space was too small for any real function other than warming up frozen burritos for one. The appliances were “apartment-sized” and over a decade old. There was a small folding table with a padded top in the middle of the room. There were no chairs, but it held a small mound of unopened packages and envelopes. Larry was apparently the kind of guy who was used to his wife keeping up with the house and the mail.
Nick riffled through the mail, finding mostly junk and Amazon packages.
It looked as though Larry took his meals either on the couch or standing up in the kitchen.
Beyond the table was a sliding glass door that opened out onto a deck so small it could only house a grill. And not a big manly grill but one of the portable charcoal kinds. Off the deck was what Nick guessed was considered a back “yard.” It was fenced in for privacy, but given the fact that it was eight feet by eight feet, it felt more like an outdoor prison cell.
Larry had done nothing with his eight feet of backyard.
“Anything interesting?” he asked Riley when he came back in. She’d been combing through the kitchen trash.
