Chapter Ninety-Two

D ULCE AND WILLEM found an empty apartment where Robert should have been. She didn't ask Willem to break in, but he didn't bother asking if he should. It wasn't a particularly nice apartment. It depressed Dulce, actually. Robert lived in a studio with only four pieces of furniture in the whole place. There was a bed, unmade, with satin sheets that didn't appear to have been washed in some time. The mattress was on the floor. Next to it was a small dining table with two chairs. A laptop sat open in the middle of the table. Smelly takeout containers languished in the sink. Everything about the place pointed to no one actually living there.

Willem wrinkled his nose as he went into the bathroom.

Dulce headed to the only place she thought she might find something. The computer. She ran her finger across the trackpad and the screen sprung to life, opening up on a word document.

She scanned it, and the thing read a bit like a memoir. Or a journal. Somewhere in between the two. Robert was recording his life in D.C. Not focusing on the BEA so much as being a bear in D.C.

"I think he's got a lover or two we can check out," Willem called out from the bathroom.

"I was just going to say the same thing," Dulce replied. "He's got a journal of sorts. What did you—"

Willem came out of the bathroom holding a trashcan.

"I don't want to know what you found," Dulce said.

"Okay, just, you know, evidence of a few, uh, friends."

"Gross."

"I think I'll just put this back," Willem said.

Dulce didn't respond — she was busy reading. Or more accurately, she was busy not believing what she was reading. Robert wasn't pulling any punches in his memoir; he was naming names and dropping details. And some of the details were beyond risqué.

"I think I know where we can go," Dulce said. "Provided we can find out where the good Senator from Alabama is currently residing."