I parked at the curb and stared in disbelief. I supposed it wasn’t such a stretch to imagine not wanting to live in a tight neighborhood like this one when your daughter was a known murderer, but for some reason being unable to just walk up to the door and talk to Peter Fairchild felt like a blow. Or should I say another blow.
I leaned my forehead on the steering wheel and groaned. Option after option after option. Dead end after dead end after dead end. Chris was done helping me search. Shelby was clueless. Even Vee had seemed to give up. Blue had nothing for me. Pear Magic. Angry Elephant. igNight. Blue Yonder. I had literally been everywhere I could possibly think of to find Luna. And she was not in a single one of those places. She was a ghost. A shadow. A memory that nobody wanted to hold on to. Now what?
I turned so my temple was resting on the wheel and opened my eyes.
I could so see why this house wasn’t enough for a person like Luna. It was charming. It was unassuming. Black and white with tidy—if not dreadfully plain—little trees and bushes. The only thing colorful anywhere around it was the For Sale sign.
I sat up.
Of course. The For Sale sign. Caroline Mackey, agent. I got out of the car and took a flyer out of the box attached to the sign. White, white, white, bronze, pink, brown, pink.
Without giving it another thought, I pulled out my phone and dialed.
“Caroline here,” a voice sang into the receiver after the first ring.
“Um, hi. I’m wondering if you can show me a house?” I felt squeaky, so I cleared my throat, tried to make my voice sound deeper, more mature.
“Of course. Which house were you wanting to see?”
“Two-fifty-seven Noble,” I said. I scanned the paper in my hand. “Three bedroom, two bath? Great starter house?”
“Oh, of course! Yes, it is a perfect starter house. And your name is?”
“Carrie,” I blurted. I’d never used my mother’s name before, and the move took me by surprise. I fumbled for a last name, then said the first thing that came to mind. “Carrie Martinez.” Surprise number two. I was full of them today. “We, um, I’m a newlywed, and we’re, um, looking.” I squeezed my eyes tight. I sounded like such a liar, even to myself.
“Wonderful!” she exclaimed. If I sounded like a liar, she was ignoring it. “Can you be at the address in an hour?”
I stuffed the paper back in its box. “Sure.”
I HAD AN hour to convince Chris to join me.
I drove until I found a nearby coffee shop and sat at a table by the window, which overlooked a busy boulevard.
Hey, I texted.
No response. I sipped my coffee while I waited. After several minutes, I texted again.
I don’t suppose you want to pretend to be my husband for an hour?
I knew he was mad at me, but surely that would get him talking. Surely it would at least make him curious. But the minutes ticked by and there was nothing. I tried again.
You can’t stay mad at me forever.
Nothing, nothing, nothing, and then, just when I was about to text again, this:
I’m not mad. I’m busy. You will have to find someone else to play actor with you.
I could feel the bite in his words, even through the phone. He may have been saying he wasn’t mad, but he was 100 percent lying.
Come on. You know you’re my favorite actor.
Nothing. So much nothing I started to actually get irritated. I was out of coffee and out of patience and it was going to be a hell of a lot harder to pretend I had a good reason to be looking at this house if I was alone. I dialed his number and got voice mail.
“Look,” I said, talking through my teeth to keep my voice low. “I know you’re mad, and I’m sorry, okay? I will help you track down Leon or Heriberto or whoever you want, but I need you right now. I’m going to be looking at Peter Fairchild’s house in, like, fifteen minutes. It’s two-fifty-seven Noble. Just meet me there.” I unclenched my teeth, knowing that I sounded angrier than I felt. Magenta tears popped into my eyes and I blinked to keep them inside. “Chris, this is dumb. We’re a team because you basically forced it. I didn’t want to work with you, but you wore me down. I got used to you. Bailing on me now would be . . .” I had to blink again. Damn it. I hated this. I took a deep breath and reclenched my teeth. “It would be a real dick move. I’ll see you there.”
I was halfway out the door when my phone beeped. A text message.
Don’t worry, I’m not forcing you anymore. You’re free.
THE HOUSE WAS empty. Bare walls, bare floors, bare shelves. It had a closed-up feeling, but not like it had been closed up for long. Our footsteps echoed on the hardwood in the living room, on the tile in the kitchen; our voices bounced back at us in every room.
Caroline yammered on what seemed like endlessly about the features of the house, and I had to pretend that I cared, which was immeasurably more difficult after the conversation—or not conversation—between Chris and me. I was a mixture of so many colors—disappointment, shame, anger, despair—it was hard to tell what the resulting shade or texture even was. I could only liken it to something rotting. I started thinking of it as rottenshade. Congratulations, Martinez, you created a new hue.
There was nothing to see here. Not a scrap of paper or a computer screen or even so much as a footprint to help guide me to where Peter—and perhaps Luna—had gone. But I couldn’t just cry defeat. I had come too far. I had to at least try to get information out of good old Caroline.
We had toured the whole house, ending back in the kitchen, where she’d lain her keys, phone, and a stack of flyers for various other houses she was selling just in case this one wasn’t the right fit. I stood awkwardly in the middle of the room while she leaned against the counter.
“So why did the previous owner move out?” I asked, hoping I sounded like the average home buyer. Crossed my arms over my chest. Uncrossed them. Scratched my forearm and crossed again. How did average home buyers hold their arms?
“Major life change,” she said, smiling. Caroline seemed to never stop smiling. Her teeth were glossy and intensely white. “He bought a houseboat. Wanted to live on the water.”
“A houseboat?”
“Well, I went there to go over paperwork. It was more like a yacht, in my opinion. Between you and me, I don’t know where he got all that money. He’s still paying a mortgage on this until it sells. Can’t be free to tie up at Del Rey every day. I think he just likes being able to say he lives in Tahiti.” She winked.
I had an idea where he’d gotten all that money. Luna. She was all that was left of her family. She must have figured out how to get her hands on the Hollis family fortune. Knowing them, they had an illegal stash hidden somewhere, and she knew exactly where it was.
“Just him?” I asked. I bent low to look at the underside of the counter so I would look disinterested in her answer.
“Not sure, actually.” I stood; she was still aiming that dorky smile at me. “So what do you think?”
I sighed, trying to look torn. “I wish my husband could be here. I would feel so much better if we could talk to the owner, you know? Get his take on the pros and cons of this place. I don’t suppose you could hook us up?”
For the first time, her smile fell. She looked floored that I would even ask such thing. Apparently, asking to speak to the owner was not something people usually did. I tried to save it. “You make him sound like such a personable guy. I figured he probably wouldn’t mind.”