Page 52 of The Summer Guests

“Not now.” She kept her gaze on Farley. “So for the record, you’re telling me you don’t care if your dog gets shot?”

“I don’t care.”

“Excuse me,” Lloyd repeated.

She turned. “What?”

“I have half a pastrami sandwich. When I heard the barking, I thought it might come in useful, so I got it from the car.” He handed her the sandwich, wrapped in plastic.

“You just happen to have a sandwich around?”

“I always pack an emergency sandwich, in case I get stranded someplace without food.” Which, judging by the man’s girth, did not happen very often.

She looked at Mike, who still had his weapon out, and then at the sandwich. God, she hoped this worked. She did not want a dead dog on her conscience.

She peeled off the plastic wrap, releasing the aroma of pastrami and mustard, and her stomach gave a loud rumble. She’d missed dinner, and all she’d eaten this evening were those few delicious tidbits from the Martini Club’s antipasti tray. This sandwich was just what she craved, and now she had to feed it to the dog. Cautiously, she pushed the trailer door open an inch. The dog lunged toward her, growling, teeth bared. She could feel Mike move in close behind her, knew his finger was already on the trigger. She waved him back.

“Hey,” Jo said to the dog. “Hey, sweetie. Are you hungry? Look what I have for you.” She tore off a corner of the sandwich and pushed it through the crack in the door. In an instant the dog snatched it up, and she heard the noisy chomp of jaws devouring the morsel. “Want more?” She pushed the door open a little wider. This time the dog didn’t lunge but simply peered out, a line of drool hanging from his tongue. She held out another scrap of sandwich. He devoured it andstared at her, whining for more. A black Labrador. Huge, yes, but not aggressive, just hungry, poor thing. She wondered how long it had been since Farley had last fed him. Cautiously, she reached in and gave him a pat on the head.

He licked her hand. Okay, then.

She fed him the rest of the sandwich, then turned to Mike. “I think it’s safe to let him out.”

She opened the door, and the dog came trotting out of the trailer, tail wagging. Jo was the one who’d fed him, petted him, but to her annoyance, he headed straight toward the glowering Ben Diamond, of all people.

To her surprise, Ben immediately dropped to his knees and wrapped his burly arms around the dog. “Oh, you are a good boy, aren’t you? Who’s a good boy?” he gushed, and was rewarded with a slobbery lick on the face.

So much for Ben’s gangster act. All it took was a dog to unmask him.

She pushed the trailer door wide open and glanced at Mike, and they both pulled on latex gloves. Hoping there weren’t other dogs inside to deal with, she stepped into the double-wide and confronted the stench of a filthy trailer. She flipped on the lights.

“Jesus” was all Mike could say.

Along with inheriting his grandmother’s double-wide, it appeared Farley had also inherited her nicotine stains and her rubbish. The walls and ceiling were tinged a sickly yellow, and the odor from decades of cigarette smoke had permeated the plaid sofa and the worn green carpet. The trash can overflowed with empty tin cans and beer bottles, and in the sink were plates crusted with the remains of Farley’s last meal. It appeared that no one had vacuumed or dusted in months, maybe years, and black dog hair was everywhere. If Zoe Conover had been in this trailer, the forensic traces of her would certainly still be here.

As Mike headed toward the bedroom, Jo ducked into the bathroom. There she scanned the floor and sink, looking for any evidence of a female presence. She saw plenty of short brown hair strands—eitherFarley was prematurely losing his hair, or he’d never bothered to sweep the room—but nothing that would match Zoe’s long brown hair. She opened the medicine cabinet and saw shelves filled with prescription pill bottles, not his, most of them long expired. Grandma had been a pill popper.

Mike came out of the bedroom. “The girl’s not here. But I found this,” he said, holding up an iPhone in a neon-pink case. “And come look at what else I found.”

She followed him into the bedroom, where he pointed to the closet, its door hanging open. Stacked inside were a dozen plastic bins. Mike lifted off one of the lids to show her the contents.

“Voilà!” he said.

She stared at the jumble of jewelry, purses, and watches. “Holy cow.”

Mike nodded. “Someone’s been a busy boy.”

Chapter 25

“Come on, Farley,” said Jo, pointing to the iPhone on the dining table. “Tell us how you got this.”

She and Mike had brought Farley inside the double-wide, where there was enough light to properly question him, and where they could escape the inevitable swarm of biting insects that materialized every nightfall in the summer. Maggie and her friends had wormed their way into the trailer as well, but they’d retreated into the corners of the room, wisely staying silent. After they’d so helpfully delivered Farley into her custody, Jo could hardly kick them out, especially since Ben Diamond was the only person who seemed capable of keeping the dog from howling.

Jo leaned across the table, trying to get Farley to look at her, but his gaze ping-ponged everywhere else. “The phone, Farley,” she said.

“How do you know it’s not mine?”

“With a pink case? I didn’t think that was your color.”

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