“Here. Maybe you can teach her some stranger danger,” Cindy said, handing Maxine over to him and leading the way into the house.
Arms full of kid, Nick glanced at Riley and saw her nose twitch. “You okay?” he asked. “You picking up on something about Larry?”
Riley turned bright red and shook her head. “Nope. Nothing about Larry.”
“Sure you’re all right?” he pressed as the little girl squished his cheeks between her hands. He made a fish face, and she let out a belly laugh.
“I’m fine. Totally fine. Nothing is wrong,” Riley insisted before tripping over a tricycle in the hallway.
“Yeah, you look fine,” he observed. She looked like she was about to faint.
“Oh, bite me,” she grumbled under her breath.
“Bite me, asshole,” Maxine chirped.
“Way to go, Thorn.”
“Come on back to the kitchen,” Cindy said. “There’s coffee and cookies there.”
“Coooookie, asshole!” the little girl said with a giggle when they stepped into a sunny kitchen that looked like a dirty dish bomb had gone off.
“That’s my husband, Jim,” Cindy said, pointing at the huge man hand-washing baby bottles and wearing an actual baby. “Excuse the mess. Our dishwasher broke three days ago.”
They made the introductions and sat down at the round oak table in the kitchen.
“We have a few questions about your coworker Larry,” Nick said, getting down to business.
Cindy shook her head. “That guy. You know he just stopped showing up for work right in the middle of a big project? I had to work late every day last week, and I went into the office for four hours yesterday.”
Maxine didn’t like being left out of the conversation. She stood up in his lap, grabbed his face, and yelled, “Hi!”
“Hi.”
“Babe, can you grab Maxine before she devours the PI’s face?” Cindy asked.
“On it,” Jim said, juggling both baby and toddler and disappearing into the family room.
“How long did you work with Larry?” Nick asked.
“Couple of weeks. I was on the hiring committee, and we were desperate. I didn’t like how spotty his resume was or what some of his former supervisors had to say about him. But like I said, we were desperate, and he was the only candidate the temp agency sent us. I wasn’t exactly surprised when he flaked on us.”
“When did you see him last?”
“Friday a week ago.”
“Did he call off on Monday?” Nick asked.
“Nope. He was a no-show. Didn’t answer his phone or his emails. Hasn’t even logged in to the network to submit his time card.”
“Any idea where he’d go?”
“Me?” Cindy gestured around the kitchen with its sink full of breakfast dishes and the crowded calendar on the refrigerator. “I don’t have the time to keep tabs on a guy I didn’t want to hire in the first place.”
“Did anyone else have any issues with him?” Nick asked.
Maxine charged into the room, dragging a stuffed pink octopus behind her. She launched herself at Riley, who—in Nick’s estimation—handled her like an expert.
“You look familiar,” Cindy said to Riley.
