The closest to him was the no-name electronics store. As Gurney approached it, he saw two hand-printed signs in the glass door: “Refurbed Tablet Computers from $199” and “Will Return 2PM.” Gurney glanced at his watch. It was 2:09. He tried the door. It was locked. He was starting toward River Kings, with the added goal of buying a Coke and a couple of slices, when a pristine yellow Corvette pulled up to the curb. The couple who emerged from it were less pristine. The man was in his late forties, thickly built, with more hair on his arms than on his head. The woman was a bit younger, with spiky blue and blond hair, a broad Slavic face, and huge breasts straining against the buttons of a half-open pink sweater. As she struggled revealingly out of the low-slung seat, the man went to the electronics store door, unlocked it, and looked back at Gurney. “You want something?” The guttural, heavily accented question was as much a challenge as an invitation.

“Yes. But it’s kind of complicated.”

The man shrugged and gestured to the woman, who’d finally freed herself from the grip of the car. “Talk to Sophia. Got something I need to do.” He went inside, leaving the door open behind him.

Sophia walked past Gurney into the store. “Always got something needs to do.” The voice was as Slavic as the cheekbones. “What I can be helping you?”

“How long have you had this store?”

“Long? He had it years, years, years. What you want?”

“You have security cameras?”

“Secure?”

“Cameras that photograph people in the store, on the street, coming in, leaving, maybe shoplifting.”

“Shoplifting?”

“Stealing from you.”

“Me?”

“Stealing from the store.”

“From the store. Yes. Fucking bastards try to steal the store.”

“So you have video cameras watching?”

“Video. Yes.”

“Were you here nine months ago when the famous Carl Spalter shooting happened?”

“Sure. Famous. Right here. Fucking bastard wife upstairs shoot him over there.” Sophia gestured broadly in the direction of Willow Rest. “Mother’s funeral. Own mother. You think of that?” She shook her head as if to say that a bad deed done at a mother’s funeral should earn the doer double the pain in hell.

“How long do you keep the security tapes or digital files?”

“Long?”

“How much time? For how many weeks or months? Do you retain any of what’s recorded, or is it all periodically erased?”

“Usually erase. Not fucking bastard wife.”

“You have copies of your security videos from the day Spalter was shot?”

“Cop took all, nothing left. Lot of money could have been. Big fucking bastard cop.”

“A cop took your security videos?”

“Sure.”