Rink seesawed his head. “Well enough to nod in passing. I knew him more by reputation than from sharing a beer, if that’s what you mean.”

“What did he specialize in?”

Rink was a PI and so was Harvey, but even they had different slants on what that entailed. There were different niches in the market that PI outfits concentrated on. “Far as I know, he was happy with low-end cases. You’ve seen Cheaters on TV, right? That’s Chisholm’s usual type of gig.”

“So it’d be a big step up for him to go to something like this?”

“Yup.”

“You think he was after this guy ’cause he was playing away from home?” Harvey laughed under his breath at the irony of it.

“Maybe that’s all they thought Rickard was up to.” I’d already learned the killer’s name. And that of his wife. “I don’t think that Alisha knew what he was involved in. Maybe she didn’t trust him, thought he was up to no good, put two and two together and got five. She called in Chisholm to put some meat on her suspicions.”

“Makes sense,” Rink said. “But that doesn’t explain why Chisholm takes two heavies along and breaks into the apartment.”

It didn’t.

“Sounds like an extraction,” Harvey said.

We nodded along with him.

“Alisha wanted out and asked Chisholm to help. They thought that by waving a gun under his nose, maybe intimidating him by way of the two heavies, Rickard would be a good little boy and back down.”

“Big mistake,” I said.

“The worst kind,” Rink added.

I looked again at the couple by the door. The woman got up and walked in our direction, heading for the restrooms on our left. She was a fine-looking woman. She was wearing a wedding band, and I looked away. Her man had stood up and turned our way too. He started forward, digging in a pocket. Then he diverted to the cashier’s desk and paid their bill. He rested an elbow on the counter and talked with the young female cashier. From where I sat, he was flirting with the girl. A job in the making for the likes of Del Chisholm, I thought. The woman came back out of the restroom and joined the man. They shared a joke with the girl at the till, then the woman gave the man a playful thump on the shoulder and they walked out of the diner together.

As they went out the door, someone caught my eye on the pavement outside. We were expecting Walter and Bryce, but it wasn’t either of them. It was the bloody reporter who’d been watching us outside Rickard’s apartment building.

“Trouble, guys.”

The exit door had swung shut, but now it was opening again.

“Move.”