There was a downtown strip with a paved road, no traffic lights, only a three-way stop. The police station was sandwiched between a gun store and a clinic. Store owners sat on crates outside their businesses. Some waved at Luke and Kitty as they drove through.

“How do you think this place survives?” Kitty asked.

“They probably pick up some Dead Mountains tourism,” Luke said. “And there are a couple of casinos just across the state line.”

A ranch marked the edge of town, advertising horseback adventures and guided tours into the mountains. Several dusty animals—dogs and cows, mainly—dozed in the shade of a sprawling mesquite. It neighbored a trading post with a huge plastic eagle on the roof and a sign that read snake farm inside $3.

“I don’t see this bar or club, whatever it is,” Kitty said. “You think we drove past it?”

“No,” Luke said. He checked his phone. “Google Maps says it’s two and a half miles northwest of here. Looks like we’re going deeper into the wilderness.”

“Jesus, could we get any deeper?”

They arrived five minutes later, with the Caliber wearing a thick coat of desert grit and a tumbleweed caught beneath one of the rear wheel arches. Luke pulled into an empty parking lot, shut off the engine, and sat looking at the building for a moment. Xander had said it was a refurbished saloon, but Luke thought this particular drinking establishment had been built long after Billy the Kid was shooting ’em dead. It was all too straight, too perfect. Its authenticity was further derailed by a neon sign above the door—cold and dark now—and a stuffed grizzly on the veranda wearing a stray bullets tee. More signage in the windows announced free wi-fi and live music every nite.

“Looks super-closed,” Kitty noted.

“It super-does,” Luke agreed. He got out of the car, stepped onto the neatly laid porch boards, and tried the door. Locked tight. He peered through one of the windows. They were heavily tinted, but he could just make out a light shining toward the back. Otherwise, no sign of life.

“Opens at three,” Kitty said, stepping up beside him and pointing at a small sign beside the door. “I’m surprised it gets busy enough to open at all.”

“It’s got that roadhouse vibe,” Luke said. “Gets pretty rowdy, judging from its PictoShark account. A real diamond in the rough.”

They returned to the car, their heads low, both feeling the gravity of their different and complicated emotions. Luke got behind the wheel. He looked up at Stray Bullets as he did so, half expecting to see the bat-faced man in one of the upstairs windows.

“We’ll come back later,” he said as Kitty got in beside him. “Are you hungry?”

“Not at all. But somewhere with ice-cold drinks and air-conditioning would be nice.”