Twill leaned closer to Cab. The beer and pot were on his breath. ‘She told me she heard Drew screaming about how he was going to kill Birch Fairmont. This was right before he got shipped off to rehab. Quote unquote, he was going to blow his fucking head off.’

*

Rufus Twill waited until the tall detective disappeared around the front of his house. He stayed in the boat, which bobbed gently in the waves beside the dock. He took off his baseball cap and rubbed his sweaty hands through his hair. When he was sure that he was alone, he popped another beer and dug a phone out of his pocket. He dialed a number with one hand.

‘It’s Rufus,’ he said.

‘You shouldn’t be calling me,’ Ogden Bush replied.

‘Yeah? Well, I thought you’d want to know. Somebody else is poking into the old shit. A detective named Bolton. He says he’s working for Common Way. Just wondering if you’d heard about that.’

There was a long silence from the political operative. ‘Interesting.’

‘So they’re keeping things from you, huh? Sounds like they don’t necessarily trust you over there, Ogden.’

‘Shut up, Rufus.’

‘Hey, I didn’t need to call. I’m doing you a favor.’

‘I know. I appreciate it.’

‘Yeah, well, appreciation don’t come free. I like my new boat, but I was thinking, my truck’s getting kind of old, too. Thought you might be able to do something about that.’

He could almost hear Bush grinding his teeth. ‘I’ll see what I can do. Now what did you tell the detective?’

‘Oh, don’t you worry about that,’ Twill replied. ‘I told him exactly what I told that kid Justin. Guess we’ll see if Bolton winds up dead, too.’

14

‘You okay, hun?’

Peach looked up from her plate of fried shrimp, which she hadn’t touched. She sat at a long table in a corner of the Crab Shack restaurant, next to a lovey-dovey couple feeding each other bites of crab across the table. The Sunday afternoon crowd was noisy, and Peach had a headache.

‘What?’ she said.

‘Just wanted to make sure you’re all right,’ the waitress repeated. ‘You’re not eating.’

Peach nibbled half-heartedly on a French fry. ‘Oh, yeah, thanks. I don’t have much of an appetite. Could you package this to go?’

‘Sure, hun.’ She added: ‘Where’s your friend?’

‘My friend?’

‘You came in here once before with a real nice guy. Had one of those old-fashioned mustaches. You guys looked so cute together.’

Peach tried to muster a smile. ‘He’s busy.’

The waitress put her hand on Peach’s shoulder and gave her a just-us-girls look of sympathy, as if she’d blundered into the middle of a bad break-up. ‘I understand, hun. I’m real sorry.’