A swift search revealed that the apartment was indeed empty. “He’s not here,” Cade began, walking back into the open living and dining area. He frowned when he saw Jack standing at the small dining room table. “What’s that?”

Jack rapped a knuckle on the table. “I think it’s the long story.”

Cade moved closer, recognizing what had been Olivia’s everyday collar lying on top of a thick stack of papers. He skimmed the top page, his mouth twisting in a grimace. “Yeah, that’s it.”

“Quite a statement.” Jack lifted up one end of the broken necklace. “Olivia doesn’t strike me as the type to make this type of gesture lightly.”

Cade met his friend’s steady gaze. “She was a tad upset.”

“I’ll bet.” Jack straightened. “So, what are we packing?”

Cade dug into his pocket for the lists Olivia had made. “She wrote it out by room. Kitchen, living, bedroom. Where do you want to start?”

Jack’s mouth quirked under his beard. “I do love an organized woman. I’ll take the kitchen.”

Cade handed over the list. “There are only a couple of things in the bedroom, so I’ll do the living room first.”

Thanks to Olivia’s detailed directions, it took them less than an hour to get everything packed up, and even with the larger pieces of furniture—the ‘reading chair’ was a six-foot tufted velvet chaise—they got everything into the two pickups with room to spare.

When they got back to Cade’s, they moved the boxes in first. “Just stack them in the dining room,” Cade told Jack. “She can decide later where she wants them.”

Jack set down the box he was holding with a grunt. “Where is she?”

Cade frowned. “I don’t know.” He glanced around the kitchen, then spotted the note propped up against the coffeemaker. “Errands, apparently.”

Jack followed him back outside. “Where are we putting the furniture?”

Cade hauled another box out of the truck as he considered. The logical place was the basement—it was out of the way, and they’d only need to get it down one set of stairs. But the basement wasn’t finished, and if the plan he was formulating worked out, she’d have more access to her things if they were in the third-floor bonus space.

“Third floor,” he said, and handed Jack the box.

Jack held his gaze for a long moment, then shrugged and turned for the house. “Your call.”

Grateful for the lack of questions, Cade grabbed the next box and followed him in. “You want a cold drink?”

“Let’s get everything in first. Then I want whatever you have that’s cold enough to have ice crystals.”

“You got it.”

When the boxes were all stacked along the dining room wall, they started on the furniture. The console table was the lightest and easiest to move, so they did that first.