“Good god, what a long day.” Davey turned to lean back against the bar, propping her elbows on the worn-smooth wood. Her laptop stood open behind her, most of the screen taken up by an inventory spreadsheet, which she’d started working on around one a.m., when the crowd started to thin.
Last call was at one-thirty on Friday and Saturday nights, and tonight, that final half-hour of business really seemed to drag on. “You have no idea,” I told her as I started stacking chairs on tables.
“Well, whose fault is that?” She closed her laptop and began wiping down the bar.
“It’s not like I could fill you in with ten sets of shifter ears sitting a few feet away.”
“Well, now we’re alone,” she said as Billy backed through the swinging door from the kitchen, pulling the mop bucket, his hair finally free, now that he was done cooking. I glanced at him pointedly, and Davey rolled her eyes. “Billy doesn’t count. He knows everything that goes on around here.”
Billy didnotknow everything that went on in the Fat Cat. But she had a point; it would be impossible to keep our basement guest a secret from the short order cook.
“Did Nolan Blake kill that guy’s wife?” my sister asked.
“Which guy?” I inverted the last chair onto its table and turned back to the bar.
Davey set her cowboy hat on her laptop and glared dramatically at me. “Whichever guy lost his wife.”
She’d been talking to Vance. Or Tucker. Clearly it was time for another reminder to my enforcers that despite her omnipresence at the bar, my sister wasnotan employee of the northern zone.
“It’s complicated,” I finally said, as Davey began counting down the cash register. “But I don’t think so. Stay out of the basement, though, just in case.”
Her hands stilled, one clutching a stack of twenties. “You’re holding him, even though you think he’s innocent?”
“Technically, he’s a guest of the zone, for his own protection. I took him a mattress topper and a spare set of sheets. My good set.”
“Cell C is practically a spare bedroom, at this point,” Vance added. “Charley took him a fucking plant.”
“It’s plastic,” I clarified, as Davey blinked at me. “And to be clear, I’m pretty conflicted about locking him up. I don’t think Nolan did it, but I can’t prove that, and his statement was less than helpful.” He’d admitted to having met Yvette, but insisted it was total coincidence that he drove by the bank that day. He gave us access to his bank account, where we could see that he’d made no large deposits. But until Tucker had time to dig into his finances, we couldn’t assume that he didn’t have other accounts. Until we searched his place, we couldn’t verify he wasn’t holding onto the cash. And none of that would prove that he didn’t have a partner who’d kept the money.
He seemed to have no motive, but if there was even a possibility I was wrong—that he was a threat to Davey or any other human woman—I had to keep him in a cell until we knew for certain.
“And I can’t swear that if I let him walk out of here, the grieving widower won’t try to rip his head off. Speaking of which…”
“You put them up at Pine Cove?” Davey guessed. She shrugged when I gave her a look. “I heard Tucker on the phone with Stuart.”
“They’re in 2A. Stay away from them.”
“You know I will.”
“I know no such thing.” She only followed around half of the instructions I gave her about running the bar and even less of my life advice.
Davey rolled her eyes. “So then, why don’t you just tell Vance to spy on me?”
I dipped a rag in bleach solution and began wiping down the beer taps.
“Oh my god, you already did!” She turned to glare at Vance, who was cleaning the soda gun holsters. “You’re—?” She shoved him, and he backed away from her, both hands up to protest his innocence.
“Don’t blame him. He’s only following orders.” I exhaled slowly as Vance motioned for Billy to clear out of the front room and give us some privacy. A moment later, the kitchen door swung shut behind them both. That was just for show, though. A courtesy. They’d still be able to hear everything we said.
“Davey, I’m just trying to protect you.”
“I don’t need you to—”
“Yes, you do.”
Davey’s blue-eyed gaze hardened. “I’m a grown woman.”
“You’re a grownhumanwoman with a fraction of the speed, strength, and hearing that the men around you have.”
