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"That's the kind of reality my mom likes—scripted, entertaining, and mostly mindlessly happy."
"Which do you prefer—books or TV?"
"Books. I love suspense novels. Now, I feel like I'm living in one. I just hope that good will triumph over evil as it does in fiction."
"I'm going to work hard to make that happen."
"I know. But this trip is a bit of a letdown. There's nothing here, Flynn. No trace of Arthur bringing his secret lover here. No stolen paintings. No phones or computers."
Her disappointment matched his own. They went back downstairs, and Callie wandered onto the patio. The pool was covered, as were the deck chairs and barbecue. But the grounds were beautifully landscaped with desert-friendly plants and shrubs. A water feature was dry, but apparently cascaded into the pool on warmer days. The back of the house was almost up against a rocky hillside, giving it a very private feel.
Callie lifted her face to the sun. "It feels good out here, cold but nice. Arthur loved the desert air. He said there was something magical about it. The weekend I was here, we spent all our time on this patio, swimming in the pool, barbecuing every meal, and having a lot of drinks. Of course, it was much warmer in September."
"Was anyone else here but you and your mother?"
"No; it was just the three of us." She glanced at him. "What do we do now? Head back to LA? Fly to Maui and check that place out?"
He smiled. "I probably need to stick closer to the crime scene."
"But the paintings could be in Hawaii."
"I'll get someone on Maui to check that out for me." He looked at his watch. "It's four now. We might as well go home."
"I suppose, but if we want to make this trip worth something, we could make a stop before we leave and get one of those gigantic ice cream cones—you know, those big waffle cones that hold like three scoops. There's a place nearby I went to with my mom." She gave him a hopeful look. "It's really good."
He smiled at the sparkle in her eyes. "You're an ice cream girl."
"Guilty. Nothing better than ice cream, even on a cold day in January. It solves so many problems."
"We can stop on the way out. I could eat some ice cream." As his gaze moved around the backyard once more, he couldn't shake the feeling that he was missing something that was right in front of him.
"What's wrong?" Callie asked, giving him a thoughtful look.
"I don't know. My gut says there's something here, but I don't know what it is or where it might be." He paused, thinking about what Callie had said earlier. "You told me that Arthur bought the house six months ago, but that your mother didn't really like coming down here."
"No, she wasn't a fan of the desert. She thought it was boring, but Arthur insisted this would be a great getaway place for them."
"How often would you say they came down?"
"Together? Maybe three times. However, Arthur came down a lot on his own. My mother often ran events at the museum on weekends, so she wasn't as free as he was to make the trip." She gave him a disgruntled look. "This must be his love nest."
"It's a long way to come for an affair when there are plenty of hotels in LA or the surrounding suburbs."
"He's well known in Los Angeles. Maybe he wanted to get farther away."
"Maybe," he muttered. "How did he find this place? Did the idea just come out of the blue? Does he have friends who vacation down here?"
"He brought my mother to a big tennis tournament here last March. Arthur loved tennis."
"I remember. He was a very competitive player; he hated to lose."
"It was after that tournament that he started talking about getting a place down here. He kept saying how the dry air was good for him. He felt like he could breathe better. He must have said that a dozen times, and I couldn't figure out why he needed to be in dry air. It's not like he had a lot of allergies or anything. It's also not like Pacific Palisades is extremely humid, although they are close to the ocean. I guess that might make the air wetter."
His mind began to spin with her words.
Why had Arthur been so consumed with the air quality? And why did all that sound familiar?
His dad had always worried about humidity, too. He was always trying to lower the humidity level in his gallery to protect the art. "You know what else does well in areas with low humidity?" he muttered. "Paintings, especially oil paintings."