“Maybe I can find something for Emmaline.” I should get into the habit of always having dog food on hand for her.

She comes toward me at the sound of her name. Emmy and I follow Trey into a vast kitchen that overlooks a sprawling family room. Everything is decorated in light gray and white, with splashes of turquoise. This house is spotless, the floors and counters gleaming, the cushions on the sofas plumped to perfection. A wall of windows overlooks a covered cedar deck and a built-in barbeque with a sink.

“Check this out,” Trey says, peering at the oversized refrigerator. It’s covered with photos, haphazardly tacked on by magnets. He indicates one in the middle, canted at a slight diagonal. The photos feel odd, a splash of disorder in an otherwise pristine showroom. “Doesn’t that look like Tanq?”

He’s pointing to a middle-aged man in a red polo shirt. His arm is wrapped around a woman’s shoulders; she’s red haired and aggressively curvy and seemingly not that much older than me. Standing waist high are three young children, all boys. Everyone smiles at the camera as though their lives depend on it.

I can see why the photo stopped Trey in his tracks. The man in the polo shirt stares at us with Tanq’s wide, anime eyes, and his white, white smile spreads out over Tanq’s delicate elfin chin.

“Whoa,” I say. “Maybe that’s her dad?”

“It would explain why she had the code to get inside.”

“But she said she grew up in Whitehall.”

He opens the fridge, and our noses are walloped by a wave of rot. The entry lock may have had a backup battery, but the rest of the house sure doesn’t. Emmaline thinks the scent is delightful. She wags furiously, thrusting her face into the open fridge.

I turn away from the stench, but Trey bumps my shoulder with something. A glass bottle of Coca-Cola, wrapped in a Christmas sleigh graphic.

“Whoever lived here collected holiday-themed Coke,” he said. “There’s a ton of them in here.”

“Is it still good, do you think?”

“One way to find out.”

Using his giant hands, he pops off two bottle caps. Brown stuff threatens to froth over the sides. He hands one to me, and we clink bottles, grinning at each other.

Feeling brave, I take a long swig. “It . . . tastes like cola. Warm cola.” Emmaline whines, certain my bottle holds a delicious treat.

Trey follows my lead, then wipes his mouth and says, “I’m a little bit scared of whatever they put in this stuff to preserve it for years and y—”

Glass shatters. A girl screams.

Our cola bottles crash into the sink as Trey and I drop them and sprint toward the sound, Emmaline at our heels—through the family room, down a short hallway, past a laundry room, and through a doorway into the six-car garage.