Maria cocks her head to the side. “Are you sure? I don’t want to trouble you.”
“It’s no problem!”
“But—”
“Let April do it,” Julie interrupts her. “This is her thing. She loves to be helpful.”
Well, that’s true. I do enjoy helping other people. But does she have to say it like it’s an insult?
Maria’s shoulders relax. “Thank you so much, April. You’re a lifesaver.”
I’m happy to do it. After all, what are neighbors for?
Chapter 6
The key to Maria’s house is exactly where she said it would be: under the potted plant next to the front door. It’s a horrible place to hide a key. If I were a burglar, that’s the first place I would look.
I step into her tiny living room, which has been tidied up since I was here yesterday. Her television is smaller than ours and she doesn’t have any sort of stereo system set up. I wonder how much money Sean Cooper makes as a contractor.
Now that Maria isn’t around, I open up her refrigerator to get a better look. I shouldn’t snoop, but it’s just her refrigerator, for God’s sake. Anyway, there’s nothing very surprising here. She only has supermarket brand food items. I notice she has quite a lot of raw meat—far more than anything else. A pack of two pounds of ground beef. Steaks one inch thick, dripping with blood.
Then I look in the pantry. The supplies in there are embarrassingly scarce. She doesn’t even have flour! Who doesn’t have flour in their pantry? There’s white sugar, but no brown sugar. No vanilla extract either. How does she bake anything without having vanilla?
Vanilla is just about my favorite ingredient. The smell of vanilla is known to directly impact the brain and induce a feeling of calmness. Maybe that’s why I feel so calm when I’m baking.
All right, better go upstairs.
Our stairs are carpeted, but these aren’t. Every step creaks under the weight of my flats. I reach the top of the steps and immediately see a room with a twin bed and colorful bedspread. Owen’s room. The place where I’ll find Raffey on his bed.
But my eyes are drawn to the room next to it. The master bedroom.
Yes, I’m curious. Is that so terrible? Elliot hates my curiosity. Why do you always have to know everything, April? But it’s not like I’m going to take anything. I just want to see what her bedroom looks like. I’d like to see what sort of bedspread and sheets they have. Maybe take a peek in the closet. Nobody will even know. No harm done.
Like everything else in the house, the door to the bedroom creaks loudly as I open it up. The bedroom is decorated as simply as the rest of the house. A queen-sized bed in the center, a dresser on the side, a night table with a photo of Sean, Maria, and Owen together at Disneyland. A happy family.
The covers are not made up on the bed. Apparently, Maria doesn’t require all the beds to be made before she leaves the house. That is an absolute rule at the Masterson house. I try to get Bobby to do his, but ninety percent of the time, I end up doing it. I look down at the covers, itching to make the bed for her. I mean, how could she just leave it like this? It’s like leaving the house without buttoning your shirt.
Before I can give the matter any other thought, a noise makes me nearly jump out of my skin. It’s coming from outside the bedroom. It sounds like footsteps.
Oh no, there’s somebody else in the house.
I’ve got to get out of here.
My heart is slamming in my chest as I make a run for the door to the bedroom. As it swings open, I nearly run straight into Sean. Who looks absolutely stunned to see me.
Also, he’s wearing nothing but a towel.
His mouth is hanging open and he’s gripping the towel with his right hand. “You… What are you…？”
“I’m April,” I say quickly. “We met yesterday. I was here with my son Bobby.”
He just shakes his head. His hair is damp, and I have to say, I underestimated him yesterday when he was wearing a T-shirt. Oh my God, this guy has a nice chest. So many muscles. It must be from all the manual labor. Or sports. Either way, it’s making me a little weak in the knees. “But what are you doing here?”
“Maria sent me.” I swallow so hard, I’m sure he must hear it. “Owen forgot Raffey, so she sent me to get it for him.” When his expression is still blank, I add, “You know, his toy giraffe.”
Sean looks at the door to the master bedroom, then back at me. “That’s our bedroom though.”
“Right. I was confused.”
I watch Sean’s face, hoping he’ll buy it. Although mostly, I’m hoping he manages to hang onto that towel.
“I’ll just grab the toy and go.” I bat my eyes innocently. “Is that Owen’s room over there then? I wasn’t sure.”
I should have been an actress. Really.
Sean looks me up and down. “Don’t worry about it. I’m heading out now anyway, so I’ll bring Raffey to Owen.”
“Are you sure? I don’t mind.”
“Yeah. I’ll take care of it.”
Sean doesn’t seem that thrilled with me. I guess I can’t blame him, since he caught me snooping in his bedroom. Still, I’m determined to make nice. Elliot always says that I have a desperate need for everybody to like me, and I can’t say he’s entirely wrong.
“Well, his school is only a couple of minutes away,” I say. “It’s the Hopkins school. On River Street.”
He looks at me like I have two heads. “Yes, I know where my son goes to school.”
“Oh.”
Well, it’s not completely crazy that he wouldn’t know. I’m not entirely sure Elliot knows where Bobby goes to school. We were going to see Bobby in a play at the end of last year, and Elliot started driving us in the entirely wrong direction until I corrected him.
“By the way,” Sean says, “where did you get the key?”
“Key?”
He raises his eyebrows. “The key. To the house. Where did you get it?”
“Maria left it under the potted plant by the door.”
He swears under his breath. “I told her not to leave it there. Any burglar could find it in two minutes.”
“It’s a safe neighborhood.”
“Still.”
Sean holds out his hand to me, and for a moment, I stare at it, confused at what he wants me to do. Then I realize. He wants his key back.
I fish around in my pocket until I come up with it. I place it down in his calloused palm, and he closes his fingers around it.
“Thanks, April,” he says.
It takes me another second to realize that what he’s really saying is, Get the hell out of my house, April. So I get the hell out of there.
Chapter 7
Text messages between April and Elliot Masterson:
April: Would you like me to pack a picnic basket for us or do you want to go out to lunch?
April: Actually, I think I’d rather go out.
April: What do you think about going to that new French place?
April: I keep passing it and it looks so good.
April: OK, on my way out the door!
April: See you soon!
Elliot: OK
It’s a twenty-minute drive from our house to Elliot’s office in his Tesla, but when I take my SUV, it’s closer to half an hour. I don’t speed. Ever.