“No. But I swear I’ll tell them if and when it becomes relevant to the investigation.”
“And do you anticipate that moment coming soon?”
I nodded slowly. “If we’re really looking for an unknown accomplice of Silas’s, I think it’s going to come pretty fucking quick.”
As the sun rose, shining through the back door we’d left open to cool off the kitchen, I washed the dishes, and Vance dried. And he didn’t point out even once that we had a commercial dishwasher intended for that very purpose.
“Okay, you guys go get some sleep,” I said as Vance and I returned to the front room, our hands wrinkled from the hot water. I felt calmer from the mindless work. Ready to move forward. “Davey and Mitch—” Our other short order cook. “—will be here in a couple of hours, and we can open the bar on our own. I’m going to give Titus an update, then nap until nine-thirty, myself. I’m hoping Titus will be willing to send us some extra manpower, ASAP, because this is the most populous Pride in the country, which means our suspect list is basically enormous, so…” My voice faded into silence when I realized Tucker, Bishop, and Austin were all staring at me.
“Um, so the thing is that we can narrow that list of suspects down by, well…” Tucker shrugged. “Possibly quite a bit.”
“He’s one of yours,” Bishop blurted, and Austin turned to glare at him.
My pulse stuttered. “What do you mean,mine?”
“All of the shifters who’re related to the potential victims we’ve identified so far,” Tucker said. “They’re not just from the Mississippi Valley Pride. They’re from the northern zone, specifically.Allof them. They’re all men we know, which means they’re probably all men the killer knows. We’re looking for one ofour guys, Charley.”
TEN
“What is with you today?” Davey asked as she shimmied past me behind the bar, carrying two empty beer pitchers. “Your head is not in the game.”
My head was very much in the game. But that game was finding a serial killer, not tending bar.
“I didn’t get much sleep.”
“Also, there are no enforcers here today,” she whispered. “Isn’t that a breach of some kind of protocol?”
“Vance, Tucker, and I were up all night working on Yvette’s case, so I gave them the morning off. They’ll be here in half an hour.” Just in time for the lunch rush.
“Hey,” Billy said as he pushed through the swinging door from the kitchen, his hair secured in its net. “You wanted to see me out here?”
“Yeah. We’re short-handed this morning, and it’s slow, so I thought it’d be a good time to try you out behind the bar.”
His brows rose, excitement shining behind his eyes. “For real?”
“Yeah. You’re old enough.” Since I’d filed the proper application, and he was supervised.
“Hey, can I get a beer?” Doug Myers asked as he slid onto a stool at the other end of the bar, and a tide of guilt flooded me at the thought of what I was not telling him. But until we had proof about how his sister had died, saying something to Doug or any of the others would just be compromising the investigation and creating a panic.
So I kept my mouth shut as I nodded at Billy.
“Sure! What kind?” He grabbed a pint mug and pulled a draft just like I’d shown him on a slow night at least a year before. Then he glanced at me with his brows raised, silently asking how he’d done.
I gave him another nod and a smile. He’d become a great short-order cook, but it was good to know he could be pulled up front when we needed him, and the nearly-dead ten am hour was a perfect testing ground. We only had three customers.
“Good job, Billy the Kid,” Doug said. “Too bad you can’t pull one for yourself, huh?”
“Oh, leave him alone and drink your beer,” I scolded Doug as I wiped down the bar, and he seemed more than eager to oblige.
“When do you turn twenty-one, anyway?” Davey glanced at Billy as she stacked clean glasses beneath the bar.
He made an exasperated sound. “Be a while. Ijustturned twenty.”
“Damn. How old were you when you were infected?”
“Davey!” I snapped. “For some people, that’s personal!” All strays had an infection story. Some, like mine, were traumatic, and asking someone to relive that trauma to satisfy her curiosity just wasn’t fair. “If he wants to share his story, he’ll do it without being prompted.”
Billy tugged the net from his hair and shoved it into his back pocket, relieved of the requirement while he wasn’t preparing food. “I don’t mind.”
