She Discovered Too Late novel · Chapter 19 of 24

Chapter 19: The Room Above the Laundromat

The apartment on the east side was a single room above a laundromat.

It had a mattress on the floor, a hot plate and a window that looked at a bus shelter.

The lease Miriam had paid for was in Colby's name, and the key was on a plain ring.

I had lived in a room like it, in a different city, for most of a year.

I followed him up the stairs and watched him put the duffel on the mattress.

He stood in the middle of the floor with his coat still on.

"Great," he said to the empty room. "Great."

The dryers started below, and the whole floor began to hum.

For three days he did not leave.

He ate crackers and counted his pills into the plastic organizer, Monday through Sunday.

He did not miss a single one, and I had to give him that.

On the fourth day he put on the good sweater and took the bus to a plant on the edge of town.

It made brake parts. A sign on the fence said it was hiring for the night line.

I stood beside him at the gate while the guard phoned the office.

"Name?" the guard asked.

"Colby Ellingham."

The guard looked up.

"Like the company," he said.

"A different branch," Colby said, and smiled.

The guard did not smile back.

He held up his phone, where a news page showed a photograph of the Ellingham Holdings lobby.

Under it was the headline about the board, and a line about private investigators.

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