“Do you remember the guy’s name he was meeting with?” I asked.

“He had two names,” she said. “Two first names. But I don’t remember what they were.”

“Was it John?” I asked. “John Adrian?”

“Yeah,” the mom said. “Yeah, that was it.”

And there it was, I thought. Sitting back.

Evidence that the feeling I’d had almost two years ago at the liquor store was justified. Adrian had lied to me.

“And how about where the meeting was?” I asked the mom.

“I think he said it was at his boss’s house,” she said.

“John Adrian’s place?”

“Yeah.”

I thanked the woman and hung up. Sat there, with Purvis asleep against my foot again.

I needed to find out where John Adrian lived two years ago. If the liquor store was hot after the robbery, it would’ve been wise for Adrian to take the meeting with Christian Pelo off-site.

The adrenaline was pumping, and it was one-thirty a.m. And I wasn’t gonna find that info slogging through names like a P.I.

I needed the tools we had at work. I threw on my jacket and grabbed my keys. Headed to the precinct.

41

I pushed open the door to the lobby, and Hope Duffy at the front glanced up from her computer.

Hope had been a hard-ass cop on patrol for nearabout a decade until she went over a wall too hard and screwed up her leg. Since that day, she’s run the intake desk up front, and works late and early shifts.

“If it ain’t the big hero,” she said. Hope used a hand to pull a strand of blond hair behind her ear. “Or is it Loverboy Hero?”

I glanced at her. Hope had earned the right to talk smack from her time in the field. I just didn’t always understand her.

“That woman stopped by again,” she said by way of explanation. “The same gal who asked you out in front of me.”

Meaning Kelly Borland, the teacher.

“When?” I asked.

“Six p.m. maybe,” she said. “She asked about you.”

This was before Kelly had texted me, so I’d already responded. I grunted in acknowledgment.

“What are you doing here?” Hope asked. “I heard what happened in Atlanta.”

“Yeah,” I said. “My sleep schedule’s a mess.”

I eyed Hope’s terminal. I needed to look up John Adrian’s info, but didn’t want to do it with my own log-in.

“I went home and crashed,” I said. “Just got up and realized I needed to finish some paperwork.”

“Well, you’re in the right place for paperwork.”

I plopped into one of the big chairs across from Hope. Our lobby, like the rest of the building, had been remodeled in the last year. The idea was to make it more welcoming for folks walking into a police department for the first time. This included furniture that was actually comfortable, like the chair I was in.

I glanced at the sign about tomorrow’s police fundraiser. An old picture of me was plastered front and center across the foam board.