“Did you clean out his shop after his death?” Evan asked.
“Nah. I called another computer repair shop, who came in and made an offer on some different parts and whatnot. The rest I paid to have hauled away to the dump. When all was said and done, I pretty much broke even.”
“My father had a laptop that seems to be missing,” Noelle said. “Do you happen to know if the other computer repair shop might have taken it if my father left it at Dow’s shop?”
“There were three or four computers Dow was working on, but they belonged to customers. I contacted those people, and they came and picked them up. They were all spoken for.”
Noelle ran her hands over her thighs, then rested them on her knees. What Louise had offered hadn’t really advanced their case, but she couldn’t think of anything else to ask her. She glanced over at Evan, who was pulling a card out of his wallet, which meant he’d obviously come to the same conclusion. He set the card on her coffee table. “Here’s my number in case you think of anything else.”
“Oh, wait,” Louise said, standing. “I do have a small box of his things in the extra bedroom.” She tapped her fingers on her chin momentarily. “He’d been living with some woman friend on her couch, apparently, after some roommate situation or another went bust. When she heard about Dow, she brought the stuff he’d left at her place to me. It looked like a bunch of junk, but I wasn’t really in a place to go through it at the time either. I only remember it even exists because I saw it when I moved to this apartment nine months ago. Follow me.”
She turned and led them down a short hall to a room on the left, then pushed the door open and stepped inside. It looked like she was using it solely for storage. There was no bed or any other furniture, just piles of boxes, plastic bins, and household odds and ends. Noelle and Evan remained just outside the room, as there was really no space for them to stand inside.
“Do you remember her name?” Evan asked as Louise rummaged through some things. “The woman who dropped off his things?”
She stood straight, squinting for a moment. “No. No memory at all of her name.”
They waited as she went back to moving this and that aside, murmuring to herself and forming a path to the far wall, where she bent, retrieving a cardboard box, the flaps tucked closed, the name Dow scrawled on the side.
Interesting to think that if they moved forward in the investigation, it might be thanks to the contents of several dusty cardboard boxes belonging to her father and his friend.
Louise handed it to Evan. “Thanks,” he said. “We’ll look through it and return it afterward.”
“Don’t bother returning it,” she said. “Just toss whatever isn’t useful. Lord knows I don’t need something else to store.” She sighed. “I suppose it’s just one less thing my daughter will have to get rid of once I’m gone.”
“Oh wow, that’s good,” Noelle said around a mouthful of Thai noodles. They’d stopped on the way to Evan’s house at a restaurant he said was one of his local favorites and gotten dinner to go. Now they were sitting at his dining table, cartons and bags spread out around them as they ate off paper plates. “I feel like I haven’t eaten adult food in far too long.”
Evan wiped his mouth, picking up his beer and taking a sip before setting it down. A smile played around his lips. “Adult food?”
She shrugged. “Well, at least anything that has a spice rating over negative three.”
He laughed. “Callie’s not a fan of spice, huh?”
She smiled. “Not yet. I should probably introduce her to more variety, but there’s a kitchen right on site, and she’s got the cooks wrapped around her finger. They’re more than happy to make all her favorites all the time, notably spaghetti and meatballs. It’s far too convenient to let them take care of dinner many a night.”
He watched her for a minute. “You work hard.”
“I do, but I like my job.”
He nodded but seemed slightly troubled, the way she noticed he did each time she spoke about her job, or her life, or South Carolina. And she knew why. They were going to have to address it sooner or later, especially because she only had a week and a half left in town. They’d uncovered a few unusual things that caused more questions, but so far nothing that indicated they’d break the case wide open. They had beer in hand, so why not now? “About Callie . . . ,” she started.
He stilled slightly, fork halfway to his mouth.
She took a quick swig from her beer bottle, her eyes sweeping his apartment. His place was small and had an open layout, and the only rooms she couldn’t see fully were the bedroom behind a closed door next to the kitchen and the entirety of a powder room to the right of that. It was clean and neat and featured the basics as far as furniture. But he clearly hadn’t done much to decorate or add any form of personal touch. It was the quintessential bachelor pad. “You said you’d like to work out an agreement as far as seeing her. But . . . I imagine when it comes to some cases, you can work from anywhere, right?”
“Some,” he said. “Not all. But I can arrange my own work schedule in advance.”
She nodded, a quick dip of her chin. “We’ll have to tell her first, of course, that you’re her father. I think she’ll take it well. She already likes you, and . . . she longs for male attention.” His eyes shuttered momentarily, and she wondered if he was considering whether there had been other men in her life. She’d dated a few, but no one who’d become serious. But Noelle had mostly been referring to the men who worked at Sweetgrass and had taken her little girl under their wings. She basked in their attention, and it made Noelle feel guilty. She knew very well what it was like to have a male look at you with love. Her own father’s pride in her had meant everything. She’d blossomed under it. She’d felt the terrible loss of it twice, once when he’d been too consumed with the grief over her mother’s death and then again when she’d come home from experiencing horror and he hadn’t been there.
“I’d like to be there when you tell her.”
She thought about that. “Okay. Yes, she’ll have questions. It will be good if you can answer the ones she has for you.” God, her heart was beating fast just verbalizing all this. It made her realize that she’d have to prepare. She’d have to explain things to Callie in a way that she could understand. And they’d have to figure out what to tell her about what they’d experienced together and what to leave out that was far above her maturity level. Which was quite a bit. So, yes, they’d have to coordinate their stories. Her heart rate slowed slightly. He’d be on board with that. He’d be fair and agreeable. She didn’t have to worry that he wouldn’t be.
“Maybe I can accompany you when—”
A knock on the door made him pause, his head turning toward the sound. She looked over her shoulder to where the front door was.
Evan stood, dropped his napkin on the table, walked to the door, and looked through the peephole. She thought he stilled slightly, even though she could only see him from the back. But his pause seemed overly long, like he was trying to figure out whether to open the door or not, before his shoulders dropped and he flipped the lock and pulled the door open. “Aria,” he said.
Oh. A woman. Now she understood his discomfort.
“Hey.” She heard the smile in the woman’s voice. “Sorry I didn’t call, but I think you’ll be happy about why I’m here.”
He stepped back so she could enter. The woman wearing a police uniform stepped inside, her smile faltering as she looked at Noelle sitting at the dining table, a beer in hand. She glanced quickly at Evan and then back to Noelle. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you had company.”
“Aria Dixon, this is Noelle Meyer,” he said.