Page 47 of Break for Me

“It’s where the signal died. I’m sure she’s not in there now. But it’s only been a few hours. Someone in that building at least saw her,” Memphis said. It was funny now that I was seeing where the signal died. Even technology abandoned all hope here. There were far more people inside than I would’ve guessed based on the parking lot. I tried to imagine why Trista would’ve come in here. What did she need? And who did she think she could get it from? Narrowing it down to who might’ve seen or interacted with her wouldn’t be easy when it came to the other patrons, but bartenders paid attention to everything and there were only two in here. I went to the empty barstool across from the grumpiest looking asshole I’d ever seen. I got a good look at a nasty scar through his eyebrow and across his forehead while he looked me up and down. I wondered what passed for manners in Kentucky while he stood like a fucking statue rather than asking if I wanted anything to drink.

“You a cop?” Eyebrow Scar asked, leaning back against the shelves behind him to fold his arms over his chest.

Really? Those were the first words out of his mouth to a customer? The fuck was this place?

“Do I look like a cop?” I asked glancing down the front of my suit.

“You look like an asshole.”

“I’m in love with him,” Memphis said in my ear.

I chuckled while I rolled my neck from side to side.

“You own this place?” I asked.

“Sounds like a question a cop would ask.”

“Play nice, Jersey,” Memphis chimed in immediately.

“Is this your regular crowd for a weeknight?” I asked. “Does it ever actually get busy around here? I thought drinking was all you folks did down here. I would’ve thought every bar in the state would be filled with people.”

“I know everybody in here, minus one,” Eyebrow Scar said.

“Don’t get too many out-of-towners, huh?” I asked.

“I’m not interested in helping you find anyone.”

“Why would you think I’m looking for someone?”

He stepped up to the bar again to lean across it a little.

“We don’t get out-of-towners in here,” he said. “And you’re an out-of-towner.”

I laughed. “Listen, my name —.”

“I really don’t care, man,” he interrupted.

I was going to have to coverup a hillbilly murder tonight. I forced more air into my lungs and pulled out my phone to open a picture of Trista. I sat it on the bar in between us.

“Was she here?” I asked, turning the phone so it faced him.

This son of a bitch never took his eyes from mine, never so much as glanced at that photo.

“No,” he said before I’d even turned the phone all the way in his direction. I had no doubt that she was here and I had no doubt that she’d talked to this very asshole, but he wasn’t going to tell me anything at all about his interaction with her. I’d never be able to get him alone right now to make him talk, and I was only a few hours behind her so I just didn’t have the time to fucking wait for this bar to close.

“You know, seems pretty clear to me that if a woman is willing to run to the hollers of Kentucky for some alone time, maybe she doesn’t want to be found at all,” Eyebrow Scar said. “The high class crowd on the East coast didn’t teach you how men are supposed to treat women while they were teaching you that stupid fucking accent?”

I couldn’t even hear Memphis when she started chattering in my ear while I stood from the barstool. I could feel that this man was probably a dangerous one. I’d always been decent at reading people. This redneck probably wasn’t a skilled killer; probably not trained in it the way that I had been, but everything about this man tickled my danger senses. It wouldn’t serve me well to go picking a fight with some hillbilly right now just for the fuck of it, but I was becoming more impatient by the second. About the time that I was ready to open my mouth again, a flash of bright red hair caught my attention behind Eyebrow Scar.

“We won’t have any customers left around here if you scare everybody away, Sunshine,” she said and touched his shoulders while she continued to walk by him. His whole body went rigid, but something came to life in his eyes that hadn’t been there a second before.

“That’s ten, love,” he said watching her walk away. She froze right where she was for a moment, before she turned around to look at him. Her cheeks were the same color as her hair by the time she’d smiled. Redheads had never been my thing but Jesus, I would’ve made an exception for this one. Until my eyes managed to get away from her face and land on a very round bump that had to have been its third trimester by that point.

“I was at four this morning,” she said to Eyebrow Scar.

“Pulling that shit in front of someone else gets you to ten real quick,” he said.

What the fuck?

---