“Look at this.” She opened the backpack wide. “A .357 if I’m not mistaken.” With a gloved hand she held up the shiny chrome revolver. “It’s old and beat-up. It resembles the police special my dad used to carry.” She squinted, trying to read the serial number. “It looks like he tried to destroy the serial number, but I’m sure it still works. I’m surprised he left the weapon behind.”

Harp got up and stepped closer to Tess, peering at the gun. “Your dad is a cop?” she asked.

“He was. He was killed in the line of duty a long time ago. Back in the day, revolvers like this were standard issue.”

Briefly, Tess caught a strange expression crossing the woman’s face, but her attention was diverted to Steve.

“Dead guy had a .45 but never got off a shot,” Steve said. “As for the other guy, we recovered 9mm shell casings in the yard, so he had other weapons. And I don’t think he expected to be chased away from here by two armed women. Anything else?”

“Some clothing.” She held it up. “This has to belong to Ice. From what I saw of the dead guy, this would never fit him. There’s a lot of cash—” she held up a wad of hundred-dollar bills—“some hair dye and what looks like makeup . . .” She frowned. “And what I bet is a burner phone.”

“Hopefully we have all his makeup and he won’t be able to change his appearance too drastically. I’ll see that all of this gets sent to the lab.” He had evidence bags with him and packaged up the fake court order and the contents of the backpack.

Harp left the room, heading down the hall in the direction of the restroom.

Tess stood and stretched, the long day getting to her. “Thanks, Steve, I appreciate all your help.” He’d smoothed everything over with Sheriff Belcher, and Tess was grateful. In a small town it was important to nurture and maintain good relationships.

“Just glad everyone here is okay.” He looked down the hallway in the direction Harp had gone.

“Missing something?” Tess asked.

“Remind Livie for me about the formal interview and the fingerprinting. I’m heading out. I’ll get all this evidence sent to the lab. If we can make a connection, put this Ice character on the work crew, you have copies of all the driver’s licenses and IDs, correct?”

Livie. Briefly Tess wondered if Steve seemed a little too interested in Livie. Did it matter? Other than the fact that she was quite a bit older than him, Tess didn’t think so.

“I do. I have a file on my car computer. I’ll send it to you.”

“Thank you.”