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NancyAnne gave a bitter laugh. “Go right ahead and break into his apartment. I don’t care. Now that I know he’s gone, I’m going to get out of this hellhole and go back where I belong.”
A little part of me bristled at the “hellhole” comment, but I didn’t bother to try defending my adopted home state to the woman. She’d just suffered an awful shock, not because she still had feelings for Jeffrey…or at least, I didn’t think she did…but because he’d promised her money and she now had zero chance of collecting any of it.
If she ever had. For all I knew, he’d had some trick up his sleeve to make it look as though he was paying her off, but instead was doing exactly the opposite, like giving her a fake cashier’s check or something.
“I’m sorry,” I said again. Empty words, but I knew I needed to respond somehow.
I got up from my chair, my purse draped over one arm. NancyAnne didn’t move.
“I guess you can see yourself out,” she told me.
I nodded, then hurried away from her, back out into the corridor, and hurried toward the elevators.
That hadn’t gone as planned, not at all. But at least I’d gotten one vital piece of information.
Now I knew where Jeffrey Sellers had been living at the time he’d died, and maybe — just maybe — if I were really lucky, I’d find something useful there.
Fingers crossed.
11
Inside Job
I was all too aware of how time was passing, and how I really should be getting back to Globe so I wouldn’t leave Melanie alone at the store for too long. But there was no way I’d go home without stopping at Jeffrey’s apartment in Mesa first.
After all, it was right on my route home.
Well, mostly. It turned out the apartment complex where he’d been living was a good ten minutes off the highway, not exactly optimal. But it wouldn’t have made any sense to go back to Globe and then turn around and come here after my workday at Once in a Blue Moon was over with.
The complex reminded me a lot of the strip mall where Jeffrey Sellers’ office had been located, in that it was probably decades old and in desperate need of updating. I still hadn’t formulated any clear plan about getting inside, although I’d concocted a half-baked story about going out with him on a date and leaving my phone inside his place. The chances of getting a sympathetic building manager to let me in were probably zero, but I had to start somewhere.
However, after I located his apartment — situated on the ground floor, to my relief — I noticed something very odd when I put my hand on the doorknob.
It wasn’t locked.
I blinked and looked around. No one seemed to be out and about, which made sense in the middle of a workday. It was almost noon, telling me people possibly could have started to come home for lunch, but right now, the complex seemed pretty much deserted.
Well, fortune favored the bold.
I went into the apartment, then immediately closed the door behind me. As my eyes adjusted to the dimness within — a huge contrast to the almost painfully bright blue day just on the other side of the door — one thought went through my mind.
What a dump.
The furniture all looked as though it had come from garage sales or maybe Facebook freebie swap groups, and none of it matched. Also, the air had a faintly sour, stale smell, as if something inside the refrigerator or the pantry had gone bad during Jeffrey’s absence. And unfortunately, he was never coming back to clean it up.
My stomach turned over, and I told myself I needed to get it together, that I was well past the morning sickness that had given me some grief during the third month of my pregnancy. True, just because I’d had a relatively trouble-free past couple of weeks, it didn’t mean the nausea might not decide to return.
Especially when I was being assailed by some pretty severe stank.
I breathed in through my mouth and reminded myself that the faster I looked around the apartment, the quicker I could be out of there and on my way.
Luckily, the place wasn’t very big, just a small living room with a dinky dining area next to the equally postage-stamp-size kitchen. I figured I’d leave that for last, and headed over to a short hallway that opened on a bathroom on one side and a bedroom on the other. The bathroom didn’t look as if it had been cleaned since Jeffrey Sellers moved in, and sported a nice collection of bristles on the cultured-marble countertop. A quick look in the tiny vanity told me there wasn’t anything under there except a half-used pack of generic toilet paper and a shaving kit.
Likewise, the bedroom didn’t seem to contain anything of note — the bed was rumpled, with the comforter pulled up toward the wall behind the pillows in a half-hearted attempt to make it look as if it had been made, the bedside table didn’t have any drawers for me to even peek into, and a quick look inside the highboy dresser told me there wasn’t anything interesting there beyond socks and underwear and a few spare pairs of jeans and messily folded T-shirts.
And although I was holding out high hopes for the closet, there was nothing to find in there, either, just a couple of pairs of khakis and one slightly wrinkled plaid jacket.
Well, damn it.
