I arched both brows at her as I grabbed the nearest coffee pot and ran water into it at the bar sink. “I thought you wanted to be involved.”
“I also want to sleep,” she snapped. “Why am I here?”
“Because I need all hands on deck, and I couldn’t leave you alone.”
“In my home? Where I live? Alone?” she demanded.
“Extraordinary circumstances,” I mumbled as I poured the pot of water into the reservoir on the coffee pot.
“That’s for decaf.” Davey grabbed the orange-rimmed pitcher from me and exchanged it for the regular one. “Move out of the way.”
As she took over, I lifted the bar flap, and—
“Charley,” Davey called, and I turned back to see her staring at a conspicuous gap on the top shelf. “We’re missing a bottle of Johnny Walker. Gold Label.”
“It’s not missing,” I said with a glance into the dining area, where Tucker, Vance, Austin, and Bishop were gathered around a table in the center of the space—the only one that didn’t still have chairs stacked on top of it. “I applied it to Bishop’s tab.”
Davey shrugged. “If nothing else, the man’s good for business.”
On my way into the dining room, I shrugged the nylon pack from my right shoulder and pulled apart the drawstrings. “For those who haven’t heard, it turns out that Silas Morelock had a son named Denny. Not sure what his surname is yet, but I’ve found a picture of the two of them together.”
I pulled the photo from my pack and slammed it down on the table. “Anyone recognize that boy?”
As the coffee pot hissed and dripped from behind the bar, all four men leaned in to look at the old picture.
“I mean, he looks really young there, but isn’t that your fry cook?” Bishop asked.
“Technically, he’s a short order cook. But yes,” I said. “That’s Billy.”
“Wait,what?” Davey’s steps tripped rapidly toward us. She shoved her way into the huddle, where she snatched the picture and held it up to the light. “Billy Bullen? Billy the Kid? No way. How can you be sure?” She squinted at the faded photo. “Areyou sure?”
Heads all around us nodded. Our eyes were sharper than hers.
“Good god,” Tucker swore. “How can Eamonpossiblyjustify this?”
“Eamon?” Davey turned on me. “You spoke to Eamon? Do you tell menothinganymore?”
It took all of my self-discipline not to glance at Bishop.
“Who’s Eamon?” Bishop plucked the photo from my sister’s hand before she could accidentally wad it up.
“The previous Marshal,” I said, just as Davey blurted, “Charley’s ex.”
“Okay, that sounds like a story I would definitely like to hear.” Bishop’s focus lingered on me just alittletoo long. “But what does this Eamon have to do with Billy?”
“He’s the reason Billy works here.” Davey took the picture back from him and stared at it as she spoke. “We knew Eamon and Billy before Charley was infected. Before this was a shifter bar. Eamon was a regular back when our parents ran the place, and he talked them—or Charley, I guess—into hiring Billy. But…” She turned back to me. “Billy’s just a kid. That’s why theycallhim Billy thekid.”
“Wait, so Eamon knew?” Vance demanded as the coffee machine sputtered with the last drops of the pot. “All this time? He knew who Billy was, and he got you tohirehim?”
“Billy wasn’t the son of a serial killer back then,” Davey said as she headed back behind the bar and began setting out mugs, sugar, and creamer. “He couldn’t have been. Eamon got him hired before Silas kidnapped Charley. Before there were any ‘sins of the father’ to hide from us.” She folded a bar rag and set the coffee pot on it. “I’m not serving you assholes at four in the morning, so come help yourselves. But don’t set the pot directly on the bar; it’ll scorch the wood.”
“Thanks.” Vance was the first to cross the dining room and fill a mug. “So, we’re supposed to believe it’s just coincidence that Billy was working here when his dad kidnapped you from the parking lot?” he said as he handed me the mug he’d filled, then poured another for himself.
Austin scowled. “You know my feelings on coincidence in a murder investigation. Those two things are almost certainly related.” He filled a mug for himself, then he dumped a good quarter of the sugar canister into it. “Either Silas found you through Billy, or Billy helped him kidnap you.” He shrugged, the mug halfway to his mouth. “Or Billy hit you over the head himself.”
“No. No way,” Davey insisted as she pulled a six-pound bag of dry roasted peanuts from beneath the bar.
I shrugged. “All we know for sure is that Billy isn’t the one who infected me.” If he had been, they all would have known that with their first whiff of me, post-infection.
