"Can you come to the house?" he asked, a trace of urgency in his voice that had me sitting up straighter.
"Yes, of course. Is everything okay? Is your wife okay?"
"Stable and no change. The nurse told me if I didn't go home, shower and change, she would forcibly evict me and not let me return until I did. I got home at midnight and started looking for a bag to take back to the hospital with some of Sophie's things for when she wakes up and I found something."
"Oh?"
"It's... Lexi, I don't know what to make of it. Could you come by and take a look?"
Chapter Twelve
Austen and I stared down at the open backpack in the middle of the otherwise empty room. The windows were closed and the air very still. Imprints of furnishings marred the worn carpet and the seventies' style closet doors had no handles. A faint scent of mint hung in the air; the source of which was Austen, whose recently shampooed hair was still damp. When he answered the door a few minutes before, I noticed his shirt buttons were all one off and the tail of his shirt was hanging at an angle, like he got dressed carelessly, and his thoughts were elsewhere.
"So?" prompted Austen.
"I'm still thinking," I said.
"There is a reasonable explanation, right?"
I made a non-committal noise while a dozen possibilities ran through my head. Austen was right; there could be a simple reason why a backpack stuffed with cash lay at our feet. A backpack, Austen told me, he found buried deep inside a closet that he and Sophie never used.
"There's no way you could have put it in there and forgotten about it?" I asked. Austen turned his head and raised his eyebrows. "Forget I asked," I added. "What about the previous owners?"
"Sophie and I walked through every room as soon as we got the keys. We checked every closet. Sophie said it was like going on a treasure hunt. The house hadn't been touched in a couple of decades. I think she hoped to find something exciting hidden somewhere in the house."
I raised my eyebrows. "You have now."
"Except I think my wife put it there. There must be fifty thousand dollars in the bag!"
"Does she have a problem with banks? Like, did she have a grandparent who got ripped off by one and always encouraged the family to keep the money under the mattress?"
"I don't think so. We share a joint account. She has a credit card. She's not a crazy spender, but she uses them whenever she likes."
"For cash?"
"Not thousands and thousands of dollars worth."
"A lot of people come in and out of the house during the renovation," I pointed out. "Someone else could have hidden the bag here, especially knowing it's a room that neither of you use."
"Wouldn't that be risky? Knowing we might happen to take a look around?"
I had to agree with Austen. My guesses were weak but they were the only explanations I could come up with that didn't include Sophie being up to something nefarious. I couldn't think of a single person with that much cash stashed in their home. Not even Solomon, although I once found some weapons concealed behind a false wall, which was quite the eye opener. Strangely, that put me in a good position to empathize with Austen. It wasn't pleasant to discover something like that about the person you loved, especially when it lacked a helpful explanation.
"Did she ever mention winning a large amount? Or possibly finding it?"
"Have you ever heard of anyone leaving a backpack of cash for someone else to find, and not reporting it?"
"Nope."
"Me neither. And no, she never mentioned winning anything. She doesn't even play the lottery or the scratch-offs."
I thought again. "Perhaps she inherited it? Or could she have recently closed an old savings account and didn't get around to putting the cash into the new bank?"
"Then why hide it in a closet?"
"Okay, it is a little suspicious."
"Can you find out where it came from?"
I knelt down and pulled out one of the bundles. It was wrapped in a plain, unmarked band but all the serial numbers appeared to be random. The cash was real. "I'll try but it won't be easy," I said. "Do you mind if I empty the bag?"
"Go ahead."
I upended the bag, shaking it until I was sure the last bundle tumbled onto the carpet. Ignoring the pile of cash, I rummaged through the