Horace was a slim guy with bad breath and a thick gold chain around his wrist. He had a diamond ring on his pinky and a gaudy Rolex on his other wrist, and I thought maybe him and the mayor went shopping together.

“Oh, right! Saw the billboard. It was great. I thought you were hocking used cars at first but was more impressed it was an election.”

He grinned and then lost the grin as he realized I was insulting him.

“So you’re the hotshot we’ve been hearing so much about, huh? Well,” he said, smile returning, “I’m not sure how the mayor feels about a pinch hitter coming in from the outside on the biggest case this town has ever had. I’ll tell ya what, though, this case has been mishandled from the beginning. It was a mistake to put a woman in the county attorney position, and the handling of this case shows it. If you’ll excuse me.”

He hobbled away, but not before checking out Gates’s backside as he went around her.

“That guy has douchebag dripping off him like he took a douchebag shower,” I said.

She chuckled and wrapped her arm through the crook of my elbow. “Come on. I have a few more people for you to insult.”

First I met the county recorder, a cute little old man who combed his hair to one side to cover a massive bald spot that had clearly been sprayed with some type of black paint. Two Utah state representatives were there: one looked like he was twelve years old and the other like he was a hundred. He began telling me what it was like to live through the civil rights movement, which “started all the problems this country now has.” At that point I basically zoned out, and by the end of the night I couldn’t really remember who I had spoken with.

The mayor was there, saw me, and flipped me off.

We climbed back into Gates’s truck when it was time to leave and sat there a bit. She turned on some music, a country station, and then said, “Sorry. You’ve probably outgrown this, too.”

“It’s fine. Reminds me of the drive to Florida. I turned on some Merle Haggard, rolled down all the windows, and just let the wind whip my face.”

“Must’ve been scary going somewhere you didn’t know anybody, with no idea how to make money.”

“Oh, it was terrifying. But I knew I had to get out. I had to go as far away from Adam as I could. After my mother died, our relationship got worse and worse, and I was just counting down the days.”

She thought for a second. “So you didn’t miss us at all?”

I looked over to her and she was looking at me. Perfect in every way.

“I missed some more than others.”

My cell phone buzzed.