Page 94 of More Than Nothing
“Fuckin’ cops.”
“Yeah, fucking cops.” She shifted her feet and headed for the door. This wasn’t a conversation she wanted to extend. “They still holding him?” Frank grunted, answering without words, and kicked some old overalls underneath the workbench. “Right, well, I need to go and—” Elenie jerked a thumb toward the house. The metallic clangs and dull thuds of Frank’s “tidying” continued behind her.
Music pumped from Dean’s room; the living room lights were off. Elenie wandered through to the kitchen to grab a drink. Reaching for a glass, her hand froze halfway to one of the cabinets on the wall. On the countertop, next to the stove, Frank’s cell phone was plugged into a socket and charging.
Her stomach bottomed out.
Oh, crap.
Dare she? What if—
Elenie forced herself to move. This was the only chance she’d had so far; it was too good to miss.
She took the stairs in twos, bolting for her room. Dean’s door was shut; her mother’s was open but there was no sign of Athena. With shaking fingers, she wrenched open her closet, upended the box of tampons she’d tucked right at the back of the shelf, and grabbed the tiny plug-in recovery device—black and innocuous-looking—from Dorsey’s “CI toolkit.” Dragging underwear and socks forward to cover everything else, Elenie shoved the doors closed and hurtled back down the stairs.
From the kitchen window, she could still see the garage light and Frank’s outline passing back and forth across the half-open door.
Three to five minutes. That’s all she needed.
Elenie lifted Frank’s cell, pulled the charger out and replaced it with the remote forensic device which would copy and extract his data. His lock screen lit up; the time display read 16:19.
Palms damp, underarms sticky, Elenie swept her hair out of her face with shaky fingers, eyes darting back to the window, back to Frank’s shadow. “Stay there. Please, please, stay there.” The words were a prayer on her tongue.
She drummed her fingers on the countertop, staring at the phone. Dean’s music droned on upstairs, vibrating through the floorboards. She wanted a drink but couldn’t swallow, wanted to go to the bathroom but couldn’t risk it. The kitchen smelled ofburnt pasta. In the sink, a pan held a dirty inch of dishwater and macaroni soup. It almost made her gag.
Elenie jabbed at the button on the side of Frank’s phone to light the screen again. 16:21. Never had time crawled as slowly. Her diaphragm cramped. There was a pain stabbing through her chest. Maybe she was having a heart attack. Maybe the stress would kill her before Frank could.
She forced herself to think of Millie Westlake and her family. All the lives Frank had smeared with his filthy fingers, careless of the mess he left behind. All the reasons the Daxes had been shunned so thoroughly in Pine Springs. So many she’d lost count. She could do this.
16:22.
Should she unplug the device or leave it for the full five minutes? Elenie shot another agonized look out of the window. Frank was still there. Still busy. She’d give it one more minute—
“I’ll have a coffee if you’re making one.”
Elenie whirled around, gaping at her mother in the doorway. The blood drained from her face; her stomach plunged like the downward swoop of a rollercoaster. She tried to force her mouth to form actual words but her lips refused to move.
Athena yawned and stretched, planting herself in front of the small mirror on the wall to wipe at the smudges of makeup in the corners of her eyes. Bare, pale feet on the vinyl floor accounted for her silent appearance.
“Where were you?” Elenie’s voice was hoarse. She heard the quaver and hoped her mother didn’t.
“Fell asleep on the couch.”
Elenie’s eyes darted to Frank’s cell. She didn’t dare move toward it. Couldn’t unplug the device.
Fuck.
“When did you get in?” Athena asked.
“Just now. I’ve only been home five minutes or so.” Elenie stepped closer to the counter, blocking Frank’s phone from view.
Athena wandered over to the back door and peered through the glass. “Better make that three coffees.”
“Three?”
“Frank’s on his way in.”
Elenie’s throat closed. She dragged at the neck of her polo shirt. “He’ll be pissed if Dean doesn’t turn down his music,” she croaked.
