Page 56 of The Body in the Backyard

“You assumed wrong. I regret every second I spend with you, and if you don’t cough up the cash?—”

“We’ll get you an invoice and an itemized receipt,” Mrs. Penny interrupted, hefting herself out of the kitchen chair with an audible fart.

“I’ll be back tomorrow for the money,” Nick said.

“We might be busy tomorrow with national news interviews about our harrowing experience,” Bella warned.

“Let’s go. I need some prime rib,” Mrs. Penny announced.

They headed for the front door. In the study, the uniformed officer was interviewing Griffin’s assistant. “Okay, Staff, what’s your full name? Stafford? Staffington?”

The nervous assistant looked like he was about to puke again. “I can’t take it anymore. I confess.”

Riley, Nick, and Mrs. Penny stopped in their tracks.

“My name isn’t Staff. It’s Henry. Henry Wu. Does that count as an alias? Am I in trouble?”

Riley rolled her eyes. Nick snorted.

“Last time you’ll ever have to see the inside of this house,” Nick said.

“Let’s go celebrate being twenty Gs richer,” Mrs. Penny suggested.

As Riley followed them out, something tickled at the back of her subconscious, and once again, she saw a fuzzy vision of Griffin’s bare legs.

Mrs. Penny tripped over one of the porch urns. The urn toppled off the porch, shattering on a landscaping boulder below. Nick caught Mrs. Penny by the elastic waistband and pulled her back from the edge.

“That thing came out of nowhere,” she barked, stomping over the carnage on the steps.

Riley gripped her purple-haired roommate’s arm and brushed away the tickle in her head. Nick was right. Griffin was no longer her problem. She had a life of her own now. With a TV to hang and an old lady to feed.

15

4:19 p.m. Friday, November 1

Nick helped extricate Mrs. Penny from the back seat of the Jeep. Her cane smacked him smartly in the jaw as she landed on the garage floor with a burp.

“Ow,” he said dryly, wondering if he was destined to forever regret making the elderly woman his business partner.

“It looks like Fred got to work on his to-do list,” Riley observed as they exited the garage and headed for the house. The mudroom window had been boarded up with plywood and spray-painted with a rudimentary drawing of a window lest they forget what had been there before.

“Let’s hope Lily started dialing contractors today. The sooner we can get rid of the geriatric circus, the better,” Nick said, admiring the way Riley’s jeans accentuated her ass as they traipsed across the leaf-strewn driveway toward the house.

Maybe he’d have enough cash left over after paying bills and buying Riley that engagement ring to hire a lawn service.

Mrs. Penny snorted. “It’s no picnic for us either. I’m sharing a room with Lily, who talks in her sleep about all the erotic dreams she’s having.”

“I didn’t need to know that,” Nick said.

“Hmm. It’s eerily quiet,” Riley noted. “And it doesn’t smell like anything is burning.”

“Everyone is out on surveillance today. I called it off after my prime rib snack,” Mrs. Penny said. “The mean one said she and her nerdy hubby would round everyone up.”

As if on cue, Brian’s van made the turn into the driveway and pulled up to the front of the house. The side door slid open, and senior citizens in a variety of disguises clambered out. Mr. Willicott was dressed like what Nick could only assume was a 1920s paperboy with a newsboy cap and tweed shorts that came to his knees. He had a huge film camera hanging from his neck. The muscular Fred had donned his “sporty” toupee and was wearing embarrassingly short shorts and running shoes. Lily had clearly misunderstood the assignment and emerged in a lumpy taffeta bridesmaid’s dress.

They were all eating candy bars.

Gabe and Burt bounded down the van’s ramp. Gabe wore a T-shirt with handwritten letters that spelled outDog Walker. He was munching on hummus and pretzel chips.