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“But would you—”
“No.”
“For the sake of your ass—”
He didn’t even get to finish that one because, it turned out, you could apparently give someone a vicious wedgie even if they were wearing nothing but a leisure suit, and the squeaking noise he made didn’t qualify as words.
By the time Shaw had recovered, they were in the GTO, the engine purring as North eased them out of the motor court’s parking lot.
“Adam Ezell?” Shaw asked as he soothed his ravaged nethers. “That’s who they had to be talking about, right? What Welch was saying about looking for something in his house.”
North grunted.
“You realize this is polyester, right? You realize it’s like rug burn, and you effectively ravaged my—”
“Say ‘nethers,’ Shaw. Say it and see what happens.”
There was a certain dignity, Shaw decided, in silence.
When they drove past the dead-end street on the north side of town, Adam Ezell’s house looked dark. North found a spot on the next block and parked. Then he took out his phone.
“Who are you texting?” Shaw asked.
North displayed the message he’d sent to Jem and Tean.Are you watching Ezell’s house?
Tean answered:No.
Then a second message came through immediately.Jem says to wait for us. We’re on our way.
“Jesus Christ,” North said and threw his head back. It bounced off the seat. “Why don’t they bring Evie too? Why don’t they bring the whole daycare?”
“Well, it’s almost nine o’clock at night, so the daycare is probably closed.” That had seemed like a trenchant observation, but something about the way North looked at Shaw made him ask, “What?”
North got out of the car, muttering to himself as he stalked down the block.
They cut through backyards to approach Ezell’s house from the rear. It didn’t look much better from this side—the board-and-batten siding with its dingy paint, the weeds growing in the lava-rock beds, the blinds that hung closed in every window. The lawn was at least a week past needing mowing, and what might, years ago, have been a raised garden bed was now a crumbling spill of earth and wood.
“Well, that’s fucking inconsiderate,” North said, crouching to examine the back door. “What kind of fuckery is this?”
“It’s a lock,” Shaw said.
“I know it’s a lock. I’m trying to decide how I want to open it.” He was quiet for a moment and added, “My fucking luck. Last night, every fucking Sally for a hundred miles was walking through this door, and now it’s locked.”
Shaw considered the lock. It did look different from some of the other locks he’d seen. “Usually you do it—wait, we’ve talked about this. You do it the same way you do sex. You stick it in and wiggle it around.”
“One fucking time,” North muttered. “I make one mistake, and there goes the rest of my fucking life. I could probably kick it in—”
Before he could finish, the deadbolt slid back. North scrambled upright, putting distance between himself and the door as it swung open.
“Pay up,” Jem said from where he leaned against the doorjamb.
“That’s not really fair,” Tean said from deeper inside the house. “Mostly because I never agreed to the bet.”
“It took less than five minutes for North to want to kick something with those huge-ass boots. That means you owe me twenty bucks.”
“Also, on a related note, you already have all my money.”
“We watched one race,” Jem told North and Shaw. “I cleaned him out. You’d think a veterinarian would be able to pick the ponies.”
