She gave him another grateful smile, then went behind the counter.

“It’s me. I’m jumpy, I guess. I have to go to the hospital.”

“Why is he lying?”

“Why do you think? He’s scared they’ll come back.”

“They’ve been here before?”

She turned off the deep fryers and put lids on metal condiment containers, speaking as she worked. Wilson sounded like a New Yorker, but her accent was softer, maybe because she was a woman.

“They live here, we live here, so we have to think about these things. People like that, they always come back.”

“If you think they’ll come back, you should tell the police. Hydeck knows what she’s doing.”

She cocked her head.

“I thought you were the police.”

“No.”

“You look like a policeman. Kinda.”

“Just passing by.”

She smiled again, then offered her hand across the counter.

“Dru Rayne. You can call me Dru.”

“Joe Pike.”

“Then that was extra nice, what you did, helping like that, Mr. Pike. Thank you.”

They shook, then Dru Rayne turned back to her work, speaking over her shoulder.

“Now, I don’t want to be rude or anything, but I have to get this place locked up so I can get to the hospital.”

Pike nodded, thinking there was no reason he shouldn’t leave, but he didn’t. He clocked her hand. No wedding ring.

“Would you like me to take you?”

“That’s all right, no. But thank you for offering.”

Pike tried to think of something else to say.

“Talk to the police.”

“We’ll be fine. You don’t know my uncle. He probably called them names.”

She flashed a warm smile, but Pike knew she wasn’t going to tell the police any more than her uncle.

She stacked the metal containers, then carried the stack into the back room. When she disappeared, Pike wrote his name and cell number on an order pad he found by the cash register. He wrote his personal cell number, not the business number he gave the police.

“I’m leaving my number. You need me, call.”

She was still in the back.

“Okay. Thanks again.”

Pike returned to his Jeep, but did not leave the scene. He found the service alley that ran behind Wilson’s sandwich shop, and waited at the far end. A few minutes later, Dru Rayne came out, locked the door, and hurried to a silver Tercel. It was an older model with paint scraped from the rear bumper, and it needed a wash. Pike thought she looked worried.

He sat in the Jeep for a while, then got out and walked the length of the block, first in the alley, then on the sidewalk. He took in the people on the sidewalks and in the stores, and the rooflines of the surrounding buildings. He studied the people behind the wheels of the passing cars, thinking about what she had said: They always come back.