I picked up the pace. The front door was locked, as I expected, so I rang the bell. It was almost a full minute before I heard shuffling on the other side of the door. I imagined a man standing there, staring at us through the peephole, but the locks remained in place.
I pressed the doorbell again ... and then again.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m getting to you. There’s no reason to get impatient.”
Eliot and I exchanged amused glances, but they disappeared when the door swung open to reveal a grumpy-looking man in a flannel shirt and oversized jogging pants. He leaned forward, a pair of dated glasses perched on the end of his nose. “What do you want?”
As far as greetings go, I’d heard worse. “My name is Avery Shaw. I’m from Macomb County. I work for a newspaper there.”
The man moved to shut the door, but Eliot extended his foot to keep that from happening.
“Let’s not be hasty,” Eliot chastised. “Hear her out.”
“There’s nothing that a newspaper reporter can say to me that I’ll care about,” the man challenged. “We don’t like her type here.”
“And I understand that,” I offered, fighting to keep my voice even. I was already agitated but displaying that wouldn’t get me what I wanted. “We’re not here to give you a hard time. We’re here for information.”
The man was instantly suspicious. “What sort of information?”
“Well, for starters ... what’s your name?” I decided that social niceties would be a necessity if I wanted to drag information out of this curmudgeon.
“John Doe.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Is that hyphenated?”
“Not last time I checked.”
Eliot, perhaps sensing the conversation was going down the toilet, took over. “You’re Cal Shepperly.”
I cast him a sidelong look, impressed. “How do you know that?”
“Yeah, how do you know that?” The man demanded.
“I looked it up this afternoon,” Eliot replied calmly. “You technically work for the state, so that’s public information.”
That was something I knew and yet had forgotten. “Good job.”
He lightly patted my back and continued. “We’re not here to cause trouble for you, Mr. Shepperly. We’re here for information about one of your residents. Once we get that information, we’ll be out of your hair.”
Shepperly didn’t look swayed. “Or I could just close the door in your faces and go back to watching The Masked Singer. There’s a giant swordfish on and I just know he’s going next. I think it’s Screech from Saved by the Bell.”
“We don’t want to keep you from that important spectacle,” Eliot drawled, “but we’re not simply going to leave. We’ll be interrupting your show if you don’t take a few minutes to talk with us.”
I was impressed. Eliot was definitely taking a page out of my book. I wasn’t sure he had it in him.
“We really don’t want to take up much of your time,” I pressed. “We’re here about one of the men who stayed here. Nothing more.”
Shepperly sighed. “What man?”
“Beau Burton.”
Shepperly’s expression shifted. “If he’s done something, that’s not on me. I reported to the state when he didn’t return. He’s not my responsibility.”
“We don’t believe he’s done anything,” I reassured him quickly.
“Oh, right, because you folks seem the type who want to hang out with Beau because he’s such an entertaining guy.”
“It’s more that we believe something has happened to him,” I offered hurriedly. “We think he’s dead.”
“Really?” That stilled Shepperly. “I didn’t hear anything about that. The state is supposed to inform me if one of my guys turns up dead.”
“They might still be working on that,” Eliot said. “The body was discovered yesterday. They might still be working through the chain of communication. We aren’t constrained by rules.”
“Definitely not,” I agreed. “I think rules are stupid.”
Shepperly folded his arms across his chest and regarded me. He seemed much calmer than he had moments before. “Why doesn’t that surprise me? There’s nothing about you that screams ‘rule-follower’ now, is there?”
“Definitely not.” I saw no reason to lie. “We’re looking for information on Beau. What can you tell us about him?”
Shepperly shrugged. “He wasn’t an easy guy to live with. He had a chip on his shoulder. He was angry that he was charged with a crime in the first place because he said he was providing a valuable service.”
“He got off on those charges,” I pointed out. “The prosecutor couldn’t find anyone to testify against him.”
“No, but he was charged with a few piddly crimes, all associated with lying about his financial status,” Shepperly replied. “I can’t remember the list of charges, but they got him six months in jail. He was released for time served when the other cases evaporated.”
I’d forgotten about that. “He was in the county jail a long time,” I mused. “A good six months or so.”
Shepperly bobbed his head. “And that’s the sentence he got. I don’t think it was a coincidence. The folks out in Macomb County wanted him gone. That’s why he was sent here. They said they were afraid someone might try to hurt him if they found out he’d been released into a halfway house in those parts.”
“What sort of resident was he? Did he pull his fair share around the house?”
Shepperly let loose a derisive snort. “Look around. Do you think anybody pulls their fair share here? This place is a halfway house to hell. People who come here have no intention of bettering themselves. I can count on one hand the number who have walked through this door with the intention of getting back to a decent life.”
“How long was Beau supposed to stay here?”
“They gave him two years’ probation.”
“Was he supposed to stay here for those two years?”
“Pretty much.” Shepperly said. “You can petition the court to change your living requirements, but you need a legitimate reason. Most of those reasons fall under parenting duties. Last
