Spencer’s fingers pounded against the keys of his laptop as he scowled at the screen. I leaned closer to see what had him upset, but the only thing I saw was a list of telephone numbers. The most concerning thing on the page of information was that Cassandra’s brother still had a landline. We had one for the office, but I didn’t even realize people had them in their homes.
When nothing else exciting happened, like his computer blowing up or finding something to make him stand up from his chair with a shout, I ended up settling back into mine and getting comfortable. I’d spent time in the room we dubbed the computer bank frequently, but I never reallyspenttime in there.
It was bland.
Downright boring.
Given enough time, I saw why the bakery girls complained about the space when they visited. The ladies may have had a point. We needed to add something.
“Should we stick a plant in here?” I asked absentmindedly.
He looked up at from his computer screen with a weird expression on his face. “No, Frankie always eats those when she comes to visit. You do not want to see what plant puke resembles when it’s projectile vomited from my dog.”
“Noted.” Every man had their limits in life, and cleaning up dog vomit hit the top of my list. “What do you think Cassandra’s brother is into?”
Spencer shook his head and ran a finger over his eyebrow. He rolled his chair back and crossed his feet at the ankles. “I don’t know. Nothing shouts at me as odd.”
I didn’t want to believe it, but considering I’d spent the last two hours watching Spencer, I’d come to the same conclusion earlier. “His standard background check came out clean.”
“It’s possible it was a random,” Spencer said even though neither he or I believed that.
“Keep looking,” I said, giving him a pat on the back. “I want whatever you can find out.”
I could handle background checks, previous addresses, and even arrest records, but when you wanted the superb stuff, you needed a specialist. Spencer always had a knack for technology, but from his long hours of watching the boring cameras in Pelican Bay, he’d taken it upon himself to learn some serious spy-level shit. Now he’d moved on to teaching Sloan.
Spencer went back to his monitor, but his lips pressed together in a thin line. “I don’t know, Riley. He looks clean. Other than charging a shit ton of liquor to his hotel room during their honeymoon, the man’s pretty boring.”
“What about that landline?” Did anyone else find that highly suspicious?
Spencer tapped his pen on the side of his keyboard a few times. “They disconnected it five years ago. Right around the time he moved into the house. The dude only has one email address, too.”
“Only one? Are you sure?” That was as hard to believe as the landline. “Where does he spend his spam?
“The only spam he’s gotten in the last three months is a reoccurring email from L.L. Bean. The guy has a real obsession with flannel. He’s a Tidy Whitey,” Spencer said, giving his head a shake. It was a nickname the men had for a squeaky-clean individual.
“You’re positive?” It just didn’t fit. Why trash his place if it was a random break-in?
Spencer shrugged. “Either the break-in was random or he’s not the one you need to look at,” he said, giving me an expression I wanted to knock off his face with a fist.
“You’re not implying Cassandra? She hasn’t been in Pelican Bay since high school.” And dollars to donuts, Cassandra’s life was as boring as her brothers.
Katy checked on Mrs. Whiskers while we were in Florida and said she had seen nothing suspicious. I believed her. Mostly because when Katy was around, she counted as the most suspicious person.
“So far, there’s nothing on the guy. I’ll keep looking, but unless her brother is a digital mastermind who rivals Corbin Kensington, the dude is clean.”
I leaned back in my chair and tapped my fingers against the counter, the noise echoing in the empty room. Why would someone be after Cassandra? She hadn’t even been in town a week and nothing about her said she was hiding a deep, dark secret. I prided myself on my excellent judge of character. I had a knack for it.
Except for Katy, but we became friends when we were too young to notice the red flags.
“Someone broke into his house and trashed it.” Even if it was random, which I didn’t believe, how convenient they did it the week her brother was halfway across the country.
Spencer flipped between screens on his computer, seriously typing away and searching another database for something on Cassandra’s brother. Regardless of how strongly Spencer believed the breaking and entering to be a random act of violence, he trusted me and would keep up the search.
I watched him work for another minute, and then a horrible thought hit me like a splash of bitter water. Could it have been their mother or father?
But why?
It was no secret the Cable family didn’t get along, but the more I learned about their tattered relationship from Cassandra, the more I questioned how deep their problems ran. Were things so bad they’d steal from their own son? Sure, they fought often, but I never heard of drugs being a problem. Nor had I seen anything else to point toward money troubles.
