Cal’s expression was skeptical in the reflection of the flashlight. “So where’s the car now?”
“Pirate towed it over to my parents’ place.” He wanted to let Cal know about his plan to help his dad, but the other man interrupted.
“If you just came for the car, why are you creeping around the house with a flashlight?”
Sam hesitated. After Pirate’s reaction, Sam felt foolish describing it to Cal. “When we were taking the car, I saw something in the window, and I wanted to make sure no one’s in the house. Can you help me get inside so we can check it out before Erielle gets home?”
“What exactly did you see?”
“I thought I saw a light in there. Moving.”
“You sure it wasn’t just a reflection of your light?” Cal nodded toward the heavy-duty flashlight in his hand.
Sam considered. While it probably wasn’t the flashlight, could it have been the headlights? No, it had moved, or else he wouldn’t have seen it.
“Can you just help me check out the house and make sure no one’s inside?”
Cal rolled his head on his neck, like a teenager asked to clean his room. “I’ve already been through it inch by inch. This house is enormous.”
“All the better reason for two of us to check it out. Look, do you want to be responsible for a woman alone coming home from work and facing someone in her house?”
Cal grunted, then mounted the front steps. With a tool slipped between the door and frame, he popped the lock in seconds.
“I’ll go. You stay out here. I’d hate to shoot you on accident.”
“Come on, man. You take the bottom floor, I’ll take the second floor, we both do the attic.” They should probably start there, since that’s where he saw the light, but whoever it had been would have to come downstairs anyway, right?
Cal sighed and motioned for Sam to precede him into the house.
The hairs on the back of Sam’s neck stood up as he entered the dark house. “Lights on or lights off?”
“I’m not walking around this house in the dark,” Cal said, and flicked the switch beside the door, illuminating the foyer and stairs. “You got the second floor?”
Sam nodded and started for the stairs.
The lights cut out.
“What the hell?” He pivoted to see Cal still by the light switch, grinning, Then he turned them back on. Sam muttered a curse loud enough for Cal to hear, then continued up the stairs.
Four bedrooms. Not too much to see, some furniture, not many places to hide. He checked the back two, then the front bedroom Erielle had claimed. He flicked on the light, wondering why she’d chosen this one. Being here without her felt weird, looking at the rumbled bed—well air-mattress covered with one of her grandmother’s quilts—the folding wooden TV tray beside it, with her charging cord and laptop, a box of tissues and a tube of Chapstick.
Her suitcase was sitting on a dresser, open, still unpacked. He wondered why. And next to the dresser, a rolling canvas hamper with clothes draped over it.
No place to hide in here, either. But lots of questions brought to mind.
“Anything?” Cal asked from the doorway, making Sam jump a foot.
“Nothing.”
“You ready to go up to the attic?”
He was not. Something buzzed under his skin, something he couldn’t define, but they mounted the steps, Cal in front.
A bookcase blocked the doorway to the attic.
“This wasn’t here the last time I was here,” Cal muttered.
“She put it there to block the attic.”
