“What the hell, Campbell? I told you the old injury had healed to the point I could barely tell where it was, let alone what caused it. Oh, and if you could get your other girlfriend the hell out of my hair, I’d be grateful.”

“My other—”

“The scribbler. She’s been on me about this PM the whole goddamn week. She annoys me even more than you do and that’s saying something.” Brillo hung up.

Liam let the phone drop into its cradle and picked his jaw up off the floor. He looked down at the square.

Couldn’t get around without a cane.

But Blue Jay Jefferson had been with him that night.

As if Liam’s thought had conjured him out of the ether, the door to his office opened and Blue Jay Jefferson thumped in with his walker. He didn’t look happy. He was carrying Hilary Houten’s cane and he dropped it on Liam’s desk. It knocked the phone out of its cradle and then the entire phone crashed to the floor.

Over his shoulder Ms. Petroff said, “I’m sorry, sir, I tried to stop him.”

“It’s all right, Ms. Petroff. As you were.”

She disappeared without closing the door.

Liam picked up the phone and set it back on the desk. There was a chip out of the handset but there was still a dial tone. He put it back in its cradle and looked up. “You have something you want to tell me, Mr. Jefferson?”

“I didn’t know about the kids,” Jefferson said, and sat down.

“Hil came back across the Bay with me after the Chamber do,” Jefferson said. His face was set, his mouth a straight line.

“That afternoon Garvey Halloran came over on his Bayliner. He’s a volunteer for the fire department, and he was there when you pulled that skeleton out of the cave.” Some emotion must have crossed Liam’s face because Jefferson snorted. “Garvey went to school with my kids. They’re all living Outside now so Garvey checks in on me. Since he’s a first responder, I get all the news first and firsthand. Ain’t no secrets in a small town.”

There were no secrets in Alaska period, Liam thought. “Mr. Jefferson—”

“It’s Tom,” Jefferson said. “That Blue Jay crap got hung on me by the newspapers, and it sure as hell ain’t Mr. Jefferson. Let me finish, Sergeant, and then I’ll answer any questions you got.” Jefferson thought about the ramifications of that all-encompassing statement for a moment and added, “Mostly.”

“All right.”

“So, Garvey told us about finding the skeleton.” Jeff shook his head and sighed. “I never see a man go so white. I don’t think Garvey noticed. Leastways he didn’t say anything. After Garvey left I tackled Hil about it. He wouldn’t say nothing at first. For days he was practically mute. I don’t think he was sleeping, like at all. Then last night I poured myself my usual sun over the yardarm tot and Hil asked me to pour him one, too.” Jefferson fixed Liam with a piercing yellow eye, his resemblance to a bald eagle even more pronounced. “Understand, Sergeant, I’ve known Hil for forty years and I never see him take a drink. He never said why, he just never did. I always figured him for an alkie, or maybe just a teetotaler.” He shrugged. “Didn’t matter to me. But last night he asks for a drink. So I pour him one and we sit down in front of the fireplace to plan out how to fix the world like we always do. He takes a gulp and his hand is shaking like a seven-point-four and he coughs and chokes and wheezes, and then by god, he takes another.