“Stop whining then.” His house was large and well kept. The grass was cut and the garden was tidy. “Let’s try the back first.” We walked along the side of the house. The backyard was just as neat, with large bushes and trees lining the boundary, like a giant, natural barbed-wire fence. This was his way of keeping his life private without it being suspicious. The guy was a creep, but an intelligent one.
“This is eerie. Too normal,” Henry whispered. It was. Without knowing Colin, you would think a family lived here. He had made it too normal. So why had no one else ever realized? “There. Look!” He pointed to the kitchen window; above it was a smaller rectangle window—which was open.
“You’re smaller than me,” I said and grinned, nodding to the window.
He sighed. “Bloody knew you were going to say that.”
“Shouldn’t have wasted that gym membership. Go on, I’ll help you up.” He placed his hands on the glass and one foot in my hands. I gritted my teeth as he pushed up. Henry was skinny so I thought he would be quite light. I was wrong. “Christ. How much do you weigh?”
He ignored my question and shoved the window fully open. “Push me up,” he said. The muscles in my arms flexed and strained as I shoved Henry’s foot into the air. He gripped the window frame and shuffled through the tight gap. I couldn’t help grinning as he hung upside down on the other side of the window. He fell onto the floor with a thud.
“All right?”
“Yeah, was only a hard tile floor,” he replied sarcastically, rubbing his elbow where it had smacked the ground. He smiled and turned the key in the back door. “Very helpful, Colin.” I pushed the door open and walked inside. The kitchen was immaculately tidy, nothing sat on the countertops. It looked like a show home. “Where first?”
“You take down here and I’ll go upstairs,” I said and headed out of the room. “Check everything, okay?”
“Got it.”
I took the stairs two at a time, desperately eager for answers. I pushed the first door open and stepped inside the room. The smell of lemon washed over me. It smelled worse than a hospital and started giving me a headache almost immediately.
The bathroom gleamed. I could practically see my own face in the sink. He certainly didn’t live like a single man. I don’t think I’ve ever picked up a bottle of bleach. Two bottles of hand sanitizer sat at the side of the sink. Germ freak. I stepped back out and closed the door. The smell was too overpowering; it burned my nose. How the hell could he live in it all the time?
I opened the door to the next room and heard Henry rummaging through cupboards. Was he searching for Summer or robbing him? “Henry,” I called.
“Yeah?”
“If you move anything, make sure it goes back in exactly the same place. He’ll know.”
“Right,” he replied. “Will do.”
I walked into the overly tidy room and my eyes widened. The room was painted in a peach color. It was just as clean but very old-fashioned. The bedding had a disgusting floral pattern with matching bedside lamps. Whose room was this? Definitely not his. This was a female’s room, and an old one. Did he really live with someone? His mum or gran? I froze. Shit, was someone in the house? Surely we would have heard them already if there were. I didn’t want to tell Henry in case he freaked. We couldn’t turn back now.
I was about to leave when something on the chest of drawers caught my eye. A line of white, wooden picture frames covered the surface. I took a step closer and my stomach turned. They were all pictures of Colin and a woman that looked like him—his mum? Kissing! The final picture was one of them kissing. What the fuck?
I turned around and left the room, swallowing my discomfort. If he did that with his mum, what was he doing to Summer?
“Have you found anything?” I called. I couldn’t have cared less if anyone else was in the house; I needed to find Summer right now.
“Not yet,” Henry replied. He sounded as frustrated as I was.
I ripped another door open and continued searching the house. I was in a rush, desperate to get her out of here. What if she’s not here? No, she is. She has to be.
Every room was immaculate and empty. In the final room, there was nothing but a wall of built-in mahogany wardrobes. I gulped. My heart raced as I eyed them, imagining all kinds of fucked-up shit behind the doors. Stepping forward, I held my breath and reached out to open the doors.
Women’s clothes? Why would he have a full wardrobe of women’s clothes? The first wardrobe was filled with dresses and cardigans. They were too modern to be his mum’s, going by her old-fashioned room. Nothing looked like anything Summer would wear. She was a jeans and T-shirt girl and rarely wore dresses or skirts. Why did he have these? A thought flew through my mind. What if he wore them? It seemed unlikely, but still possible.