Page 90 of Stormy Ride

Nobouncers came running towards Harlan to check his ID, so I pushed forward past Shorty in the bar—Krystal’s watchdog—and as we passed center stage, Harlan paused for a few seconds to watch the gyrating routines of an almost naked dancer.

Halfway up the pole, she hung upside down showing the men in the front row all of her good stuff.

“How does she get her leg up that high?” asked Harlan.

“She must work out,” I said, then laughed and so did Billy.

Moving forward down the red-carpeted hallway, dim lighting showed the way past small cubicles designed for private lap dances.

At the end of the lap dance walk was Krystal’s office.

A knock on her door and she hollered for us to come in. “Oh, Sheriff, it’s you. I thought it was Shorty.”

“Nope, just me, Krystal. Can I ask you a couple of questions about Louise Carrigan?”

“Go ahead. What do you want to know?” Krystal winked at Harlan. “Hey, cutie. You here for your first lap dance?”

“No, he isn’t.” I answered for Harlan, and he grinned. “Anything you can tell me about Louise’s relationship with Evan Bronowski.”

“Evan is a regular and I think Candy Ann has been seeing him.”

“I have reason to believe that Evan killed his wife, Krystal, and I want to know if it’s because of his relationship with Louise.”

“I don’t know that, Sheriff, but I don’t think what’s going on with him and Candy is anything serious. A lot of the regulars have favorite dancers, and they take them home for the weekend, or on a trip. I think it was something like that. Not a serious thing to kill his wife over. Louise has never let herself get too involved with a customer before.”

“Just to let you know, if Louise is on your schedule, I have her locked up in my jail.”

“Oh, no,” said Krystal.

“When I arrested Bronowski earlier for killing his wife, Louise was in his house.”

Krystal flipped through papers on her desk. “Does that mean she’s not going to show up all weekend?”

“She won’t be arraigned until Monday morning at the earliest.”

“Thanks for the heads up, Sheriff. I was expecting her to show up for work in an hour.”

As we piled into the truck, Billy wanted to know if Harlan had ever been to a strip club before.

“Only at the carnival where they had the strippers in a tent. You had to be over eighteen, but me and a couple of guys went in anyway. Don’t remember where it was.”

“You’ve lived a lot of different places?” asked Billy.

“Yep. A few. Never lived this far north in butt-crack territory.”

Dry Run Roadhouse. Coyote Creek.

On the way back to the ranch from the strip club, Billy wanted to stop at the roadhouse for a pitcher of beer. He was suffering from cabin fever and didn’t want to go home.

Loud and crowded, there wasn’t an empty table or booth in the whole place. The only available seats were at the bar.

“You’ve got a sell-out tonight here, Jack,” said Billy to his cousin.

“Spring fever has hit Montana, and the bears are coming out of hibernation,” said Jack with a chuckle. “Good for business.” He plunked a Coke down in front of Harlan and a pitcher of Miller between me and Billy.

I filled my first glass and chugged it down.

“What’s new in the world of crime prevention?” asked Jack. “Bring me up to date.”

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