She brought him up to date; he hadn’t heard about Reba’s death—or about Carly, never mind the situation regarding the girl’s unknown father and the three contenders for that position.

“Shit, I feel bad about Reba. And it’s gotta be hard on the kid.”

“It’s very hard.”

“Hey, maybe I should take bets around town. Who’s this girl’s dad? Personally, I’m betting on… Eli.”

“None of our business,” she said sharply.

At last, she broached the subject of Christine Fletcher, and he told her what he could recollect, but there was nothing she didn’t already know, most of it from her childhood—except for the Chicago phone call, which she’d heard about in their previous conversation.

Shallie asked if he thought Christine had come from Chicago, based on that call.

“Never heard,” he replied. “But I guess it makes sense. I never actually found out anything about her from Norm and Della.” It wasn’t a surprise that he didn’t refer to them as Mom and Dad. “And nothing about her husband,” he added. “Or partner as they now seem to say. Who knows if they were even married?”

“You mean…my father?”

“Well, yeah.” He raised the bourbon bottle, but she shook her head.

“He certainly didn’t try to get in touch with me,” she told him.

“My guess,” Russ said slowly, “is that he’s dead. I wonder if we can find out.”

“I’m not sure why I never tried. Well…we don’t even know his name. And, for me, it’s always been about Christine.”

“You’ve got this detective working for you now. Eddie, right? Bet he could find out in about five seconds.”

“We’ll know soon enough. I hope.”

“Guess we will. This guy’s going to come up with all the pieces and then put them together.” An obvious comment, perhaps, but a fitting one. Christine was a puzzle.

“Now, what are your plans for the rest of the day?” she asked, almost sure she already knew the answer.

As expected, he said, “Not much.” Taking a noisy gulp of his cheap bourbon, he said he watched a variety of shows on Netflix, one of his indulgences. He also got books from the small local library, mostly digital.

“Oh, yes, that’s run by Susan, isn’t it? Susan Robbins. What kind of books do you like?”

“Susan makes some recommendations. I mostly read suspense. Authors like Elmore Leonard, Lee Child, John Grisham, Linwood Barclay.”

She told him she liked suspense, too, and listed a few of her own favorites.

“I also like nonfiction, adventure books,” he said.

Adventure? The farthest possible thing from his own life. Of course, that was one of the needs books filled, wasn’t it? Showing you a completely different reality…