Page 3 of Bad to the Bone
“That’s a Harley Fat Boy S. Top of the line, and tricked out the way it is, you’re looking at twenty to twenty-five thousand, easy.”
“Maybe a bike, even a top-of-the-line model, is easier for him to afford than a car.”
“Maybe, though he’s licensed for both.” Sam added some creamer to her coffee and stirred thoughtfully. “Richard Lee Jennings, Portland, Oregon. Greg ran the license when he stopped him, of course.”
“What did he stop him for anyway?” Alex asked. “Was Ricky Lee speeding?”
“No—just big, loud, and from out of state. That’s all Hankins needs to pull someone over. His record came up clean, so he just got off with a warning about noise restrictions.”
“Freeland has noise restrictions?”
“Not really, but ‘I pulled you over because I don’t like your looks’ is hard to defend, even in Freeland.”
“Well, it’s good to know his record is clean. At least maybe now Chief Cowart will see that Ricky Lee wasn’t the incorrigible delinquent he always thought he was.”
Sam’s grimace made Alex set down his coffee cup and lean forward. “What? He can’t still think that, does he?”
Sam shook her head. “I don’t know what goes through that man’s mind, but he wants me to dig a little bit deeper. He doesn’t want ‘bad influences’ running loose in town.”
“We don’t even know why Ricky Lee is back, let alone whether he plans to stay or not.” Alex refused to examine why the thought made his already uneasy stomach twist all the more.
“He’s checked into the new suite hotel that just opened, so it looks like he might be planning to stick around for a while. Two rooms—connecting.” Sam grinned. “You know how fast gossip spreads in this town.”
“Who’s his… companion?” Alex asked. It was an innocent question, right? At least Sam seemed to accept it as simple curiosity.
“Hankins had no reason to check the passenger’s license when he pulled them over, but the second room is registered to a Crae Adams. I’ll see if I can find out more when I do the background checks Cowart wants.”
As much as he wanted to know how Ricky Lee had spent the intervening years since leaving Freeland, the idea made him uncomfortable. “Isn’t that an invasion of privacy?”
“I’m not going to steal his identity to empty his bank account or open a credit card in his name,” Sam said, smiling. “I’ll just be sure there isn’t anything disturbing in his past so I can get Chief Cowart to cut him some slack.”
Alex supposed he’d have to be content with that.
“And I promise to tell you if I uncover any interesting dirt.” Sam’s smile turned into a grin.
“You do that.” Alex drained his cup and reached for his wallet. “My turn today. I guess I will take the cinnamon roll with me—Alanna may want it.”
Brigit was at the table almost before he finished, making him wonder how much of the rest of their conversation she’d overheard. Nothing that wasn’t already fairly common knowledge, Alex thought. He took the bagged pastry from her and dropped a few bills on the tabletop to cover their meal.
“We’re doing the final setup for the reunion tonight, so I guess I’ll see you there tomorrow night,” he told Sam. “Will you at least have a chance to go home and change once you get off duty?”
“Put on my designer frock and curl my hair and do my makeup?” Sam shook her head. “I’ll leave that to Stephanie and Ashley and the rest of the cheerleading squad. Just save me a dance when I finally get there, okay?”
Alex thought Sam, with her blonde hair pulled back into a regulation ponytail and her trim form beneath the blue and tan police uniform, was more appealing than Stephanie on her best day. “I’ll pencil it on my dance card. You be careful out there, okay?”
She dropped a kiss on his cheek. “Always am, Alex. You too.”
