Chapter 4: The Slow Payer

Spencer had taken me at my word.

His closet was half empty, and his razor was gone from the bathroom shelf.

The house was ours in the sense that my name was on the lease, and I stood in the front hall with the registry papers in my hand.

Dina arrived twenty minutes later with flattened boxes under one arm.

"I called in for both of us," she said. "I told them you were having an emergency and I was your emergency contact. Then I took the van."

"There is no van."

"There's the clinic van. I'm returning it tomorrow, it's fine."

She kicked the door shut behind her and looked around.

"Okay. Where do we start? I vote we start with his stuff on the lawn."

"He took what he wanted."

"Then I vote we start with everything he left."

We worked in the living room first, because that was where he had left his tablet.

It sat on the arm of the sofa, charging.

I would not have touched it a day ago.

A message lit the screen while Dina was taping a box.

It was from a contact saved only as L.

Can't believe the dinner is Friday! Also, did your roommate ever pay her share of the rent? You shouldn't have to carry her forever.

Dina stopped taping.

"Willa."

"I see it."

I picked up the tablet.

It had no passcode, because Spencer had never believed anyone would look.

Below Lydia's message was his answer, sent that morning.

She's a slow payer, but she's harmless. Don't worry about it, babe. I'll handle her.

I read it twice.

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