Doyle turned into the Dunes Motel at a quarter past ten in the morning and parked by the front office and went in.

The woman at the desk wore her white hair in stiff curls held in place with a yellow scarf. She was smoking a cigarette and reading a Harlequin romance. When he tipped his Stetson, she glanced up with no great interest in what she saw and then returned to Cowboy Commando. He dinged the bell. She blew a whiff of smoke at him. “Hello, honey,” she said. “You want a night? Or the hour rate?”

“I’m looking for some boys.”

She squinted at him. “We’re a moral establishment here.”

Doyle stared at her. He looked around the squalid office. “Have a couple of boys checked in? One maybe seventeen. The other younger.”

“Honey, I’m not at liberty to give out information about guests.”

He put his badge on the counter. “How about now?”

She closed the Harlequin. She seemed unruffled. “Well, sir, I apologize.”

“Has anyone checked in over the last forty-eight hours?”

She lifted the cigarette to her lips, inhaled. Blew a small ring of smoke. “A girl. Pretty one. Young.”

“Was she with anyone?”

“I don’t keep track.”

“Maybe you can think about it right now and remember.”

The clerk stood there, a pillar of menace in a scarf.

“These kids are in trouble,” Doyle said. “They need help.”

“I might’ve seen her with a little boy.”

His phone rang. He silenced it. Looked at the screen.

Midge.

He pressed the answer button and listened. “Whose house?”

On the road, a fire truck rushed by, siren wailing. He swore softly. “Okay. Don’t do anything. I’m on my way.”

Jack cracked the blinds and peeked through, the hammer in one hand. Blood pounded in his ears. Endless snow. The sheriff’s truck sat parked in front of the office. He watched the doors. Trying to think. The hammer clenched in his fist.

Can you do it?

If he comes here?

You lift and strike down. Do it quick and hard.

Hard.

He waited, trying to draw in air. Thirty seconds. A minute.

Lights flared in the distance and then on the road, a fire truck rushed past. The sheriff came out of the front office and got in his truck. He didn’t look toward Jack’s room. The motor went on. Then the lights. Jack watched it all without blinking.

The sheriff headed onto the road, following the fire truck. Jack waited. When it was out of sight, he let go of the blinds.

Utter quiet.

He went to the bed and dropped down to look underneath it. Matty lay on his stomach beneath the dusty wooden bed slats, his pale face in shadows. His chin on the carpet.

“Is he gone?”

“Yeah.”