Even though we worked in the same department, I didn’t often see him, since Cody usually worked night shifts. Affinity for the nocturnal and all. It was the first time since grade school that we’d be spending any length of time together. I wondered how long it took his stubble to grow, and whether men of the howl-at-the-moon persuasion had to shave more often than most people.

Or whether, indeed, most bothered. The older members of the Fairfax clan did keep to themselves, but I seemed to remember a couple of them being sort of hairy—not in a Joaquin Phoenix–losing-his-marbles-and-growing-a-long-scraggly-beard way, but more in a sexy Hugh Jackman–as-Wolverine-unexpectedly-rocking-the-muttonchops way.

“Daisy Jo?” Cody waved a file folder at me. “Ready?”

“Huh?”

He thrust the folder into my hands. “Let’s canvass.”

We hit the town on foot. Downtown Pemkowet is small enough that it’s easier to walk than drive. Unfortunately, we struck out left and right. None of the bartenders on duty this early in the day had been working last night. Whether out of genuine disinterest or an instinctive desire to protect their own, everyone we spoke to claimed not to know who had been working.

I staged a detour at the Fabulous Casimir’s retail nemesis, Baubles & Beads, where I bought a long strand of freshwater pearls. Mission pearl, check. The salesclerk eyed Cody and me with mild curiosity as I looped them around my neck. I guess women didn’t usually shop for cheap pearls with uniformed cops in tow.

“I can get reimbursed for this, right?” I asked him.

“Hell if I know,” Cody admitted. “Keep your receipts.”

“I will.”

His stomach rumbled, and he grimaced. “Daise? We’re not getting anywhere at this hour. What do you say we get a bite to eat?”

I smiled. “I say yes.”

Every town has its local cop shop, and Pemkowet was no exception. Callahan’s Café was only a block and a half away from the station. It was one of those places that for inexplicable reasons, or maybe proximity to the police station, proved tourist-averse and attracted a local clientele instead. Their coffee sucked, but they offered a bottomless cup of it in the age of Starbucks, and they did good things with red meat. Plus, I had a soft spot in my heart for the place. My mom waitressed there for years, and I have fond memories of spending long hours sitting quietly at a corner table with a coloring book. That was when the chief first took a semipaternal interest in me.

I ordered the meat loaf special, because who doesn’t love meat loaf? Cody got ribs. And yes, I enjoyed watching him gnaw on them with his strong, white teeth. Most people leave shreds of meat clinging to the bone. Not Officer Down-low.

It gave me a shivery feeling deep in my belly, and made my tail twitch. Those teeth . . . gah!

Focus, Daisy.