She’s my daughter, Craig said. The word came out slightly too deliberate, the way words do when someone has decided in advance which ones to use. She ran off. She gets scared sometimes. Does things that don’t make sense. He said this last part with a particular kind of patience that was designed to sound like long-suffering love and landed about 6 in short of it.
Sorry to hear that, Pete said. Hope you find her. Craig was already scanning the booths. His eyes moved to the woman in the denim jacket, passed over her, moved to the two men at the bar, passed over them, moved toward the back of the room, and stopped. Duke Callahan had not turned around. >> He sat exactly as he had been sitting for the past 3 minutes, leaned back, arms crossed, facing the door, his expression as readable as concrete.
He had watched Craig Bowman walk in and had spent those seconds making a quiet, complete assessment that reached its conclusion before Craig had taken four steps inside. Craig’s eyes moved to the table to the two glasses on it. One bourbon, one water, both on the surface, nothing underneath visible from where he stood. Who are you? Craig said.
Duke looked at him for a moment before answering. The way a man looks at a math problem he already knows the answer to. Nobody important, Duke said. Something moved in Craig’s expression. Not quite uncertainty, more like the faint recalibration of a man who was used to being the most dangerous thing in the room and had just encountered data that complicated that assumption.
I’m just looking for my kid, Craig said. Juke said. Craig took another step toward the back of the room. Duke’s arm came off the table and rested on his knee, and something about that movement, the absolute unhurried quality of it, the way it changed nothing and yet changed everything, stopped Craig in his tracks.
I’d sit down, Duke said pleasantly. I’m not here for trouble, Craig said. Neither am I, Duke said. Sit down. Beat Harlow had his hand below the counter, and his expression had not changed, and the two men at the bar were now looking very carefully at the television. Craig Bowman stood in the middle of the rusty spoke, and ran the numbers.
He had done this before in his life, the quick, instinctive calculation of a man who had never been truly afraid, but had occasionally had the wisdom to recognize when the math wasn’t in his favor. He looked at Duke, at the patch on the chair behind him, at the stillness of the man, which was not the stillness of someone who had nothing to offer, but the stillness of someone who had already decided what he would do.
He sat down at the nearest table. Under Duke’s table, Lily had not moved, had not made a sound. Her hand was still wrapped around the table leg, and the glass of water sat beside his boot, half empty. Duke picked up his bourbon. “She’s not here,” he said to no one and everyone. “Might want to check the diner two blocks down.
” “Kids like diners,” Craig said nothing. “Cold night to be looking,” Duke added. “Might want to think about what you’re going to say to her when you find her.” He took a sip. Kids remember the words you use when they’re scared. The bar was very quiet. Craig Bowman stood up. After a long moment, he pulled his jacket closed. He looked at Duke one more time, and whatever he saw there was enough to make him turn without another word, and walk back toward the door. He pushed it open.
The cold air came in for a moment. Then the door swung shut. Nobody breathed for three full seconds. Then Pete exhaled through his nose. The two men at the bar turned back to the television. The woman in the denim jacket picked up her phone. Duke looked down. He’s gone,” he said quietly. A pause, then a small voice. “For now.
