He was smart, really smart, got good grades but it was more. He was what my Dad would call sharp. He was a quick thinker, good with words, thought things through three times as fast as anyone else which made him an excellent flirt.
He had great handwriting and signed his name cool and weird. Creative. Taking his time, even at the top of tests, putting these rock ‘n’ roll flourishes on it that I always thought were super hip even though he always made me feel a bit funny.
“Loren Smithfield,” I repeated to Colt.
“Feb, Lore doesn’t fit the profile.”
No, it was more that Colt didn’t want him to. Lore was a drinking buddy of Colt and Morrie’s. He didn’t come in regular, say, every night, but he was in J&J’s often enough, a few times a month and when he was he was sitting beside Colt at the end of the bar, Morrie in front of them, all of them engaged in man conversation, some nods, some knowing grins, sometimes low, rough laughter.
“He sat beside me in Geometry class. He flirted with me all through school. He nailed everything that moved.”
There was a hesitation then Colt said, “Lore’s been married three times, three kids, two with the first wife, one with the last. He works for his Dad’s construction firm and he drives a Ford F160.”
“So?”
“February, this guy we’re after, he’s got a desk job. Lore works with his hands. And this guy probably can’t get it up, not unless he’s doin’ somethin’ sick. Lore made those kids the old fashioned way, not through a test tube. And you think Lore would be as successful as he is if he’s into sick shit?”
I knew what Colt was saying. Lore had three wives because Lore had not changed. He still nailed everything that moved. He didn’t search for his pieces out of town but did his thing right under everyone’s noses. His wives, eventually getting sick of it, kicked his ass out.
I’d been around, I knew there were folks out there who liked their kink and sometimes that kink could get dirty and even creepy. But I didn’t figure in this ‘burg, which happened to be placed smack in the middle of the Bible Belt, that there would be that much choice of women who’d put up with dirty, creepy kink.
“And the witnesses saw a silver sedan exiting the alley, not a Ford F160,” Colt continued.
“Loren isn’t stupid, Colt. If he drove a woman into an alley in the morning hours in order to kill her, he wouldn’t use his own truck. He’d rent a car.”
“There somethin’ I don’t know about you and Lore?”
Colt’s voice had turned funny – harder, abrasive, he was pissed about more than me pointing the finger at his buddy Lore.
But I had other things to worry about.
I couldn’t say I liked Lore, I couldn’t say I disliked him. He was a good guy mostly, funny, interesting. Still, I avoided him, for different reasons than I avoided Colt. Loren was persistent and I didn’t want to give him the inkling he had a way in because if he had it, he’d never let it go.
This wasn’t easy for me, pointing a finger at someone, even a jerk which Loren definitely was. But we were talking murder.
“No, there’s nothin’ you don’t know.”
“Don’t keep shit from me, Feb, not with this.” His voice was still pissed, actually now it was more pissed.
“You think this is easy for me? Lore’s got kids. Jessie slept with him in high school. Turns out it’s him, Jessie’d be creeped out for years. Those kids –”
Colt interrupted me. “That all you got?”
I pulled my hair away from my face, holding at the back and stayed quiet.
Then I let my hair go and repeated softly, “This isn’t easy for me, Colt. It’s not only not easy, I don’t like it,” I paused and swallowed before I finished, “not at all.”
We were both quiet then.
Colt broke the silence and he didn’t sound pissed anymore. “Go back over the list, Feb. There are three men on that list still in town or close to town who fit the profile. And they have silver cars.”
I was a little surprised he knew that much and was that thorough. He knew what he was asking me to do that morning, he knew exactly.
“Who are they?” I asked.
“Not sayin’, just look at the list.”
“I thought you weren’t working this case?”
“Not officially but that doesn’t mean I’m gonna sit on my fuckin’ hands when you’re findin’ dead bodies, cryin’ in my arms and my dog’s dead.”
That made me go quiet again.
Colt wasn’t quiet. “Feb, go back to the list.”
“All right.”
He didn’t say anything for awhile and for some reason I didn’t let him go just stood in his kitchen with him on the other end of my phone.
He again broke the silence by saying, “I’ll talk to Sully. Someone’ll look into Lore.”
That didn’t make me feel better at all but I was glad he trusted me on it.
“Okay,” I agreed.
“Later.”
“Later.”
I flipped my phone shut and went back to the list.
*
She walked into J&J’s when I was behind the bar.
It was late afternoon but it was Saturday and we had a decent crowd, nothing overwhelming but enough to make me think people had not yet cottoned onto the situation, therefore avoiding J&J’s and me like the plague.
I felt my neck get tight when I saw her.
Susie Shepherd.
I’d never liked her because she wasn’t easy to like. Won every competition going, had so many tiaras she could convince herself she was queen of the world (and I suspected she did). She was also head cheerleader since she was a sophomore. It was unheard of for a sophomore to be head cheerleader the top spot always went to a senior. But Susie’s Daddy made it so, meaning Susie had cheated girls out of the top spot for two years running. I was no cheerleader but I thought that was low.