Page 35 of Your Every Wish

“This is crazy, absolutely insane,” I say. “We can go to jail for this.”

“We can’t if no one finds out, so keep your voice down.” Kennedy shines her phone’s flashlight as Liam tries to hoist me over Willy’s padlocked garden gate to the backyard.

“Are you sure you left the French doors unlocked?”

“Yes. As long as no one came after us and locked them, we should be fine.”

“Shit, someone’s coming. Go, Emma. Kennedy, shut off the light,” Liam whispers.

I can’t believe he volunteered to come with us.

As soon as I’m on the other side of the stucco wall, I duck down, my heart racing.

“Where are you guys?”

Silence.

“Liam? Kennedy?” I call from the shrub I’m hiding behind.

It’s dark and I can’t see a damn thing. I’m sincerely starting to wish that we never embarked on this moronic mission—Kennedy’s idea, not mine.

It’s cold, though less so here in La Jolla than Ghost, but still chilly enough that I have goose bumps up and down my arms. And something smells like dog shit.

“You guys?”

More silence.

Then finally Liam says, “Okay, he’s gone. It was some guy walking his boxer. Are you okay back there?”

“Yes, but I can’t see.”

“Here, use my phone.” Kennedy drops it over the gate, and I catch it before it hits the ground. I left mine in Liam’s van.

I use the light to find my way and nearly trip over Willy’s garbage cans.

A motion light goes on and I suddenly feel exposed.

I hold my breath, waiting for an alarm to go off, wondering whether I should run for cover or get to the French doors.

Then it occurs to me that there are probably security cameras everywhere, if not installed by Willy, then put up by the feds.

How did we not plan for this inevitability?

What am I talking about? We didn’t plan at all.

When Mr. Townsend said the U.S. Justice Department had denied our request for a second visit, Kennedy announced that we would simply break in.

That’s when I marched over to Liam’s trailer and told him everything (it’s not like I could tell Dex).

The thirty thousand dollars Kennedy’s mom stole from Brock Sterling (I probably shouldn’t have implicated Madge, but I just couldn’t stand the idea of Liam thinking badly of Kennedy).

I told him about Misty and the golf bag and the money and the house in La Jolla. And how Kennedy wanted to break in.

I guess I just needed a reality check and, while a little mysterious about what he does for a living, Liam seems so centered, so mature.

I fully expected him to say breaking and entering was a terrible idea—uh, because it is.

But oddly enough, he wholeheartedly embraced the idea and even offered to drive.

I get the sense he may be bored out of his mind living in a senior citizen trailer park in the middle of the country.

So, here we are, doomed.

I wait a few breathless moments and . . . nothing. The motion light flicks off, leaving me once again shrouded in darkness. And thank God, no alarm sirens, just the sound of something lapping against the pool. The wind probably. Or a branch from an overgrown tree.

I gingerly make my way to the patio off the primary bedroom using the light from Kennedy’s phone. The wind picks up and something scrapes against the window, making me jump.

I’m halfway there when the phone rings. Shit. Madge’s name flashes on the display and I quickly slide the phone off. Of all the inopportune times to call. WTF?

How did I ever let myself get roped into this? This place is a lot spookier in the dark.

When I finally reach the French doors, I breathe a sigh of relief. But it’s short lived when I jiggle the doorknob and it doesn’t give. Goddamn you, Kennedy.

Try again, Emma .

With a shaking hand I try the other knob and voilà, the door squeaks open. I push it the rest of the way and step inside. Again, I wait, pulse pumping, for an alarm to go off. Instead, I’m greeted with silence. Odd. Who in this day and age doesn’t have a security system?

I start to flick on a light and think better of it.

No need to alert the neighbors that someone is here.

Illegally. The house seems bigger than it did before, and it takes me an eternity to get to the front door.

Of course, it doesn’t help that I have to feel my way using the walls and Kennedy’s lame-ass light to find it.

I’m about to crack it open when the crook in me (I am my father’s daughter) says to look for one of those alarm doohickeys on the door. Unless it’s microscopic, I don’t see one. Yet, I suck in my breath as I inch it open.

“What took you so long?” Kennedy comes in and Liam trails in behind her.

“I was worried about alarms . . . and cameras.”

“Liam disarmed them all.”

“What? Where? Are you two nuts? How do you even know how to do that?” Whatever he did will probably trip something and alert the police that we’re here. I expect that within minutes we’ll be handcuffed and taken away in patrol cars.

“Easy peasy,” Liam says.

Who is this man and how is it that he knows how to disable alarm systems?

“Should we split up? Each take a section of the house?” Kennedy suggests.

“Sounds good. But let’s hurry.”

“What exactly are we looking for?” Liam wants to know.

Kennedy looks at me warily. Even in the short time we’ve been acquainted, I know exactly what she’s thinking: Can we trust him?

I give her an imperceptible nod. What is he going to do, grab the money, run to his van, and head for the border?

If there is any money, which I highly doubt.

This is mainly an exercise in humoring Kennedy.

But my gut tells me Liam is honorable. Trustworthy.

“A golf bag,” she says, and I know her gut is telling her the same thing.

“I can tell you right now it’s not in any of the closets.

We searched those high and low. Why don’t I take the garage, laundry room, and kitchen; Emma, you take the office and primary bedroom; and Liam the two guest bedrooms.”

I lead Liam down the hallway and point out his rooms, while I go in the direction of the office.

It doesn’t appear that anything has been touched since the last time we were here.

And frankly, unless there’s a trapdoor or a secret room somewhere, this seems futile.

We’ve already picked this place clean as a chicken bone.

I start with the wet-bar cabinets, which seem too small for a golf bag but maybe they’re making them smaller these days.

Other than Dex’s, I’m not all that familiar with golf bags, golf, or any of its other accoutrements.

I check the bookcases on the chance that there’s one of those Murphy doors, like the ones in the movies that lead to a back room where they used to hide the booze during Prohibition or a trendy cigar lounge.

No such luck. I search the floors for a loose board or a hidden cellar door, though I think this house is built on a slab.

Most of the desk drawers have already been pulled apart and the small closet is empty except for a few boxes of printer paper and other assorted office supplies, most of them tossed to the floor.

I scan the ceiling for a hatch or access panel to an attic.

I have no idea whether this house has one but given the vaulted ceilings in the common space, it seems unlikely.

Nothing here, so I move on to the primary and search for any hidden spaces I can find. There aren’t any, as I suspected all along. Five hundred and fifty miles for nothing.

At least the drive was nice and the company good.

Liam regaled us with stories of the residents at Cedar Pines.

It turns out Trapper Bing is a retired ornithologist who used to work at the Honolulu Zoo.

It explains his obsession with birds. And Rondi is a linguist who speaks seventeen languages.

Liam says there’s a guy on the other side of the park who speaks twenty-two.

Everyone thinks Azriel Sabag, a quiet man who lives in trailer 47 with his dog, Benji, is former Mossad.

No one, however, has been able to substantiate it.

Zola Abdi, one of the canasta ladies, has her own African-print clothing line.

And the guy who lives in the trailer next to Liam’s (for the life of me I can’t remember his name) is Guy Fieri’s first cousin once removed.

Liam finds me crawling through the back of Willy’s closet. “You find anything?”

I bolt upright and hit my head on one of the clothing rods. “Shit.”

“Did I scare you? Sorry.”

“It’s just so dark in here. I haven’t found a thing. You?”

“Nothing. Just a mess left by the federal agents who searched the place. Any chance they seized the bag when they searched?”

“It’s not on the inventory list they provided to our lawyer. Believe you me, Kennedy and I combed through every inch of that list. Computers, files, phones, and bank records were the bulk of it.”

“Hey!” Kennedy rushes in. Her face is flushed with excitement. “I may have found something. Come quick.”

We follow her down the hallway, through the laundry room into the garage, where she goes straight to the west-facing wall.

“There’s something here.” She pounds her fist against the drywall. “Feel it? There’s something hard back there. And who drywalls their garage anyway?”

“A lot of people. It’s often required by code for fire resistance,” Liam says and knocks on the wall. “Yeah, you may be right.” He darts a look around the garage. “No tools.”

“Willy doesn’t strike me as a tool guy. Let me check the kitchen for something sharp we can use.” Kennedy takes off and returns a short time later with a butcher knife and a pair of poultry shears. Apparently, we’re going to spatchcock the wall. “Will this work?”

“Yep, but it’s going to leave a mess. The authorities will know someone was here. Worse, they’re going to think that whoever it was knew that Willy was hiding things and knew exactly where to find them.”