Blood Runs Cold (14 page)

The windscreen wipers did little to help the visibility. Ren drove a thin line between patience and urgency. Adrenaline and a can of Red Bull were pumping through her. Main Street was like the ghost town it had never become. The lights twinkled brief joy before the dark roads ahead. She passed a handful of cars on the way to the Filly. She pulled in behind the green, filthy truck she was hoping she would find there. The reverse-Minotaur guy. She glanced in the window and saw a mess of papers, coffee cups, a box of NoDoz, some hair gel. She moved on.

He wasn’t there when she walked in. But he walked out of the men’s room not long after Jo.

‘Another pitcher, please, Billy,’ Jo called out across the bar. ‘Hey,’ she said, waving to Ren. ‘How’ve you been?’

‘Good,’ said Ren. ‘Good. How you doing?’

‘Super.’

Ren went to the bar. Billy was sitting behind it reading a book.

‘Working hard?’ she said, smiling.

He smiled back. He put the book down. ‘I have to be here to take care of the kegs that have just come in. And I have not sat down all evening until about five minutes before you came in.’

‘Oh, OK, then,’ said Ren.

‘I actually love my job,’ said Billy.

‘Do you?’ said Ren.

‘Yes, I do. Do you?’

‘Yes,’ said Ren. ‘I did different things when I was younger that didn’t suit me, but now, I know I’m in the right job.’

‘Yup, because you have no life,’ said Billy.

‘I … do have a life,’ she said. ‘I’m just wondering exactly where it is.’

Billy smiled. ‘I’m sorry. That wasn’t very nice.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘So, what are you reading?’

‘
The Man Who Fell in Love with the Moon
.’

‘That is one of my favorite books.’

He nodded. ‘Me too. It’s just so strange. And so beautifully written.’

‘Show it to me.’

He frowned. ‘OK.’

He walked toward her and lay the book on the bar. Ren leaned in to look at it, but whispered to him: ‘Could you take our friend’s beer bottle, so I can run his prints?’

‘Sure,’ said Billy. ‘Now?’

‘Well not, like, right now, no.’ She smiled. ‘But yes – tonight.’

‘Sure.’

After finishing his beer, the guy finally left. Billy waited a while, then went to his table. He put a napkin around the top of the bottle and took it into the back room behind the bar. He stayed back there a while. Ren started flicking through the book. When she turned around, she realized the bar was empty. She could hear Billy rolling kegs of beer somewhere. She caught a glimpse of him through the doorway. The last confidential informant she’d dealt with had been an ever-moaning man – five-foot nothing and fought the world to gain a few more inches in height.

‘Are you OK out there?’ Billy shouted.

‘Yes. I’m fine.’

‘I’ll be out in a little while,’ he said.

Why am I still here?
‘OK.’

She wandered around the bar, looking at the photos on the wall, the madam’s ‘girls’ dressed up to look older and primmer than they may have been. She started to read the yellowed newspaper cuttings about them being run out of Boston to Denver and finally settling in their famed out-of-town spot by Quandary Peak. Billy came down to join her when he was done.

‘Can I ask you about Mark Allen Wilson – the missing guy?’ said Ren.

Billy frowned. ‘Sure.’

‘What happened the Saturday night between him and Terrence Haggart?’

‘Wilson came in here in the afternoon and started drinking. A couple of hours later, Terrence Haggart came in – he was a regular.’

‘What was he like?’

‘Terrence Haggart thought the world owed him a living. He’d get aggressive with lottery tickets that didn’t have the right numbers printed on them.’

Ren smiled.

‘He was always disagreeing with people about sports or work or women. He would just pick the opposing view of whoever he was talking to. I’d see it played out in front of me every time. I used to hope he’d meet someone who would take him from his bar stool to a booth, so I wouldn’t have to listen to his bullshit. He was ignorant.’

‘Can I guess that you served him hard liquor?’ said Ren.

‘What – as opposed to soda?’

‘No. I just heard he was charming, depending what kind of alcohol was coursing through his veins.’

Billy rolled his eyes. ‘Sure, whatever. I guess in the early stages of an evening, yes. But it was the later stages that left the lasting impression on me. I mean, he had a party guy rep, but he’s not the kind of guy I’d want to party with.’

‘And what was Mark Wilson like?’

‘A heavy drinker, but a harmless one, from what I saw. He’d only been here once or twice before the night he disappeared.’

‘So what happened that night?’

‘I got the impression they knew each other. So it was all friendly until Haggart had one of his lottery-ticket meltdowns. Wilson started laughing at him. Haggart went ballistic and said if Wilson hadn’t owed him so much money, he wouldn’t have been in such a desperate need of a lottery win.’

Ren rolled her eyes. ‘God, alcohol sucks people into the most petty bullshit.’

‘Tell me about it,’ said Billy. ‘Anyway, they start punching the crap out of each other. I try and get between them. I break it up for a little while. Then Wilson starts calling him Terrence Jackpot Haggart. Haggart loses it, pushes him out into the parking lot, kicks the shit out of him and leaves him there. He comes back in for a few drinks. And a couple days later, we hear Wilson’s disappeared.’

‘How come you let Wilson leave alone when he was clearly so drunk, he had been beaten up, and it was a freezing cold night?’ said Ren.

‘Have you ever worked in a bar?’

‘Yes … when I was in college.’

‘Well, was it a nicer bar than this?’

She smiled. ‘It was in a five-star hotel. But … all bars serve alcohol. And last time I checked,
alcohol has a pretty similar effect on people with pockets full of cash and people with pockets full of unobliging lottery tickets.’

Billy smiled. ‘OK. But at least you will acknowledgeit was a bar, not a day-care center.’

‘I will.’

‘And no matter what, the pretty girl serving the drinks on a tray doesn’t have to subdue the drunks,’ said Billy.

‘Ah, but I worked the door,’ said Ren.

‘What?’ said Billy.

She nodded. ‘So maybe you could have done with me that night.’

‘Maybe I could have,’ he said. ‘So, are you working the Wilson case?’

‘No,’ said Ren. ‘I said I’d look into it as a favor. I’m keeping track of my man-hours, so if it goes over a particular number, I will stop.’

‘How many hours?’

‘About one point five.’

He smiled.

‘Five,’ said Ren. ‘So that’s one lunch hour a day, one working week.’

‘I bet you don’t even do lunch.’

‘But I do delusion pretty well.’

She went over to the window. The snow was falling relentlessly.

‘Holy shit,’ she said. ‘How did that happen?’

‘What?’ said Billy.

‘It’s dumped, like, seven inches out there.’

‘Uh-oh,’ said Billy.

‘Shit.’

He came over beside her and looked out. ‘They might have closed McCullough Gulch Road.’

‘What?’ said Ren.

He nodded. ‘There’ve been too many accidents there.’

‘No way.’

He nodded. ‘Let me go call Traffic Watch.’

He came back with bad news. ‘Looks like we might be stuck here.’

‘This is a disaster,’ said Ren. She rubbed an arm across the window and looked out on to a black-and-white night. ‘Screw this.’ She turned around to him. ‘Did you listen to the forecast this morning?’

‘Oh, this is my fault?’ He was smiling. ‘I don’t want to be here either. I want to close up.’

‘You are closed up.’

‘I want to go home to my own bed, instead of …’ He threw a glance back behind the bar.

‘What’s back there?’

‘It’s not five star.’ He looked embarrassed.

‘Do you stay there a lot?’

‘No. Jesus. In the back of a shitty-ass bar like this? In the cold? In the middle of nowhere?’

Ren shrugged. ‘I don’t know what you’re into …’

‘Who’s into that?’

Ren stared back out the window. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.’ She went quiet, staring at a rising storm. ‘What will I do?’

‘Is there someone you can call?’ said Billy. ‘State patrol?’

‘No one’s going to be out in this weather. Anyway, by the time they make it out here, it will be the middle of the night and the storm will probably have passed. I’d rather stay here until four a. m …’ She turned slowly around. ‘I mean, if that’s OK with you …’

‘I’m sure whatever’s OK with you is OK with everyone. All the time.’

Screw you
.

‘I didn’t mean you have to stay up talking to me until four a. m.,’ said Ren. ‘You can go ahead to bed. It’s not like I’m going to rob the place.’

‘I don’t know what you’d be like, let loose in a bar.’

‘You don’t want to know.’

‘That sounds interesting.’

‘No. Take it from me. It’s not.’ She turned back to the window. ‘Some proper insulation here might be good.’ She walked away and took a seat by the fire. ‘It’s at an annoying level,’ she said, pointing to it.

‘Its
only
level,’ said Billy. ‘The boss is tight. The heating’s OK, but he doesn’t want the fire to ever be turned up.’

‘Yeah,’ said Ren, stretching her palms toward it. ‘God forbid the place ends up looking cozy.’

‘Does the princess find anything to her satisfaction?’ said Billy.

Ren ignored him.

‘I’m going to fix myself a drink,’ said Billy. ‘Do you want something?’

‘I’m not really drinking … but, OK. I’ll have a vodka Red Bull.’

‘Are you worried you might fall asleep?’

Ren smiled. ‘Vodka’ll do that to you.’

Billy went behind the bar and poured the drinks.

‘Cheers.’

‘Cheers.’

‘So …’ said Ren.

Billy turned to her, waiting. ‘So …?’ He grabbed the remote control for the television and hit the power button. Nothing happened. He shook out the batteries and tried again. He got up, switched it on and got static. ‘Damn,’ he said. ‘Damn.’

‘Yeah, last thing you want to have to do is talk to me,’ said Ren.

‘It’s not that. It’s just …’

‘I’m kidding,’ said Ren.

‘I don’t know what to say to you.’

‘Same as what you’d say to anyone else …’

‘… who could put me behind bars for life.’

‘Come on. Why would I want to do that?’

‘Ask your Atlanta buddies.’

‘Oh, come on. Would I be sitting here alone with you if I thought you were … you know?’

‘It could be all part of your plan.’

‘I don’t have a plan. I’m just doing my job.’

They sat in silence. ‘So … how did you end up here?’ said Ren.

‘It was a long hard climb up the corporate ladder, but I did it. I made it.’ He hit his glass off hers.

Ren laughed. ‘I don’t know what to say to that.’

‘OK – let me think – how did I make it here? Do you know that song “God Bless the Broken Road”? Well, think of mine as a broken road, but maybe the devil blessed it.’

‘That song’s adorable. Was your road that rough?’

‘Yes.’

End of discussion
. ‘But, like, how was it, growing up?’ said Ren.

‘It was a badly beaten, animal-murdering kind of childhood.’

Ren laughed loud.

‘Seriously, though – did my mom send you?’ said Billy. ‘You’re not really the FBI, right? She just wants to make sure I don’t blame her for anything.’

‘Well, obviously your childhood was just fine.’

‘It was. Crazy, but not bad. I saw some weird shit. But … I’m all right now.’

She smiled.

‘What about you?’ said Billy.

‘Ooh,’ said Ren. ‘This is where I lie and say my father worked in an office and my mother was a housewife. Or I tell the truth. Although, maybe you only deserve the pared-back truth, like you’ve just given me.’

‘What? That was all lies. Go with the lies.’

‘My father worked in an office and my mother was a housewife.’

‘Good for them.’ They clinked glasses again. And with the next drink. And the next one … all the way to the last one.

‘Can I ask?’ said Billy. ‘Is Ren short for something?’

Ren smiled slowly.

‘Ah …’ said Billy, ‘something you don’t want to say.’

Ren smiled big. ‘Yes.’

‘Now I really want to know.’

She paused. ‘OK… Renegade.’

‘What? Are you serious?’

‘No.’

He laughed loud. ‘I thought your parents might have been Hollywood movie stars or something.’

‘No – worse than that on both counts.’

‘Yeah? Go ahead.’

‘Orenda.’

‘Orenda. That’s … terrible.’

‘I know. She’s a sacred power … it’s an Iroquois thing.’

‘I thought there might be something like that in you … you have a very striking face.’

Shit
. ‘Thank you.’ She moved quickly on. ‘The Iroquois believe that if you ignore your dreams, you’re in big trouble because your dreams are connected directly to your soul. But also that when
you dream you can communicate with the sacred power … Orenda.’

Billy paused. ‘Mystical … but the name still sucks.’

Ren laughed. ‘All right, all right …’

‘Does your family still call you that?’

‘Some of them.’

Billy laughed again. ‘Yeah, well, I won’t. No way.’

‘Hey – it’s Agent Bryce to you, anyway.’

‘Is it?’ He made a face.

‘I’m joking, you idiot.’

‘Can FBI agents call people idiots?’

‘We can do whatever we want,’ she said, smiling.

He shook his head.

‘Right,’ said Ren. ‘It is four thirty.’

‘You can’t drive now. Take the prison bunk. And I’ll have the … booth here.’

‘Nah. I’ll … let’s just wait up, eat something, drink coffee, then I’ll go on my way in a couple hours. I couldn’t sleep here … but thanks anyway.’

‘OK,’ said Billy, reaching out his hand, pulling her to her feet.

‘Good grip,’ said Ren.

‘Yeah. Steady hand. For the drive-bys.’

Ren laughed. ‘Stop.’ She held his gaze and saw what could be behind it. He hadn’t let go of her hand. She looked away. She pulled her hand gently
from his and bent down to grab her purse from the floor. ‘Right,’ she said, ‘I’ve got to –’ She stood up.
Do not look at him
. But she did. His eyes. Pale and nervous.
Oh, no. Don’t
. She closed her eyes as Billy leaned down to her. He kissed her so slowly and gently she could barely move; he looked like the kind of guy who would slam you up against a wall. She didn’t mind that he wasn’t that kind of guy.

And she didn’t mind that this could be the biggest mistake she had ever made.