‘Oops,’ said Ren. ‘Here you go.’ She turned to leave. ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘let me get this –’ She took the bill from the table.
He shook his head. ‘Mine’s free. I get free breakfasts here.’
‘Oh. I forgot. I’m sorry.’
He nodded.
‘But I doubt I’ll be extended the same privilege,’ said Ren, smiling.
The waiter was on his way over. ‘This is on me.’
Ren looked back and forth between both of them. ‘But –’
‘No,’ he said. ‘If Salem has a date, we’re going to cover her too.’
‘Well, thank you very much,’ said Ren. ‘Are you sure?’
‘You bet.’
‘If I’d known I could bring a date here for free …’ said Salem.
The parking lot of the Brockton Filly was almost deserted. Ren got out of the Jeep, wondering what had happened to all Billy’s customers. The new green neon sign looked too bright and shiny for a dead bar. She pushed in the door. Apart from the hum of the air-conditioning, it was like being back in January. There were a few people dotted around, mainly dirty-looking truckers.
Ren went up to the bar. ‘Hey,’ she said.
Billy’s face was stony. ‘Hi.’
‘What’s up?’ She looked at him and around the bar.
‘Like you don’t know …’
‘Don’t know what?’
‘I was raided last night for serving alcohol to minors.’
‘What?’
‘Do you really not know this?’
‘No, how the hell would I?’
‘Well, you’re working out of the Sheriff’s Office aren’t you?’
‘Um, yeah, but it’s not like my priority is underage drinking right now, I’m not in there drawing up a hit-list of bars.’
He let out a breath. ‘I’m sorry. I’m just pissed off. I’m going to get fined; they rounded up a load of kids and brought them to the Sheriff’s Office, so they’re going to be really bummed about that and tell everyone. I mean, it’s not like it’s going to stay quiet for long. But still …’
‘Oh dear.’
‘I’m sorry. I thought you knew.’
‘Don’t worry about it. I can understand how you might think I know everything …’
He smiled.
The door to the ladies room burst open and Jo da Ho staggered out.
‘Damn you, you son-of-a-bitch,’ she shouted, as she fell briefly on her hands, then pushed her weight back up again. The man ran around her and out through the door of the bar.
Billy ran to her. Ren ran too.
‘Did he hurt you?’ said Billy. ‘I will –’
‘No,’ said Jo. ‘But damn him, he broke my damn necklace in two.’
‘Oh, your pretty necklace,’ said Ren, bending down to pick it off a floor she realized too late was very wet.
‘Exactly,’ said Jo. ‘Thank you.’ She held out her hand.
But Ren didn’t hand it to her. ‘Where did you get this, Jo?’
Jo looked at Ren, then Billy, then down to the necklace.
‘Jo?’ said Ren. ‘This is not a big deal. It’s just out of curiosity.’
‘I found it in the bathroom,’ said Jo. ‘A woman dropped it. She’d been in here before and I knew she’d be back, so I kept it for her. But it was pretty, so I wore it. Otherwise I would have just sold it, wouldn’t I? My plan all along was to give it back to its rightful owner.’
Good point. ‘I know that,’ said Ren. She closed her grip on the necklace and put it into her pocket before Billy or Jo could see what she really had in her hand. She took out a photo of Jean Transom that she kept in her wallet. ‘Is this the lady who lost it?’
‘Exactly,’ said Jo. ‘Exactly.’
Billy and Ren looked at each other.
‘Did you see any pictures of this woman on the news or on the posters around Breckenridge?’ said Ren.
‘I don’t have a television set,’ said Jo. ‘But I did see a picture something like that, now you mention it. But that woman in the pictures was an FBI agent, it said. The woman who dropped the necklace didn’t look like an FBI agent. An FBI agent just wouldn’t come into the Filly. So I thought they kind of looked like each other, but it couldn’t be the same person.’
Maybe if you had read the poster and seen that the last sighting was here …
‘That is true,’ said Billy.
‘Well, Jean was a friend of mine,’ said Ren, ‘so, if you don’t mind, I’m going to hang on to this necklace for her family.’
Jo nodded. ‘OK, sure. You do that. I knew I’d only have it for a little while. And I’m sorry I broke it.’
‘You didn’t break it,’ said Ren.
It was designed to come apart. Otherwise you couldn’t plug it into a USB port.
Ren turned to Billy. ‘I’m just going out to the Jeep for a little while. I’ll be back.’
‘Sure, no problem. Is everything OK?’
‘Absolutely.’ She turned to Jo. ‘Thank you.’
‘A pleasure,’ said Jo, sitting down on her corner stool, looking down at her vast, bare cleavage.
Ren grabbed her laptop from the trunk of the Jeep and sat in the front seat. She turned on the heating in the car. She dropped the bottom half of the damp pendant – the cap of the USB flash drive – into the driver’s door and held the part with the USB drive against the vents.
What files have you saved on to this?
Ren’s fingers started to burn in the hot air. She shook the drive. Please dry. After a little while she checked it. There was no way of telling. She plugged it in and a little white disk icon appeared on her screen. Ren clicked on it. There were
