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“I owe him,” Myron said.
“Like you owe him a favor?”
“Worse,” Myron said. “I wronged him.”
“How?”
“Long story and one I can’t tell you. I just did him wrong.”
“And you’re trying to make amends?”
“This won’t make amends. But maybe something is better than nothing.”
Chaz didn’t say anything for a few beats. Then: “I know you, Myron. You don’t ‘wrong’ people without a reason.”
“There was a reason. But it’s not a reflection on Spark. He’s an innocent.”
“Fair enough,” Chaz said. “His résumé looks pretty solid anyway. I’ll interview him.”
“Thank you.”
“And I’ll announce it publicly. Even if he doesn’t get the job, that should get him some cred.”
Myron told Chaz he appreciated it. They hung up. He sat back.
The plane began its descent. Myron looked out the window. Montana. A whole lot of beautiful nothingness. That wasn’t a judgment. When you live on the East Coast, it’s just different. Montana is twenty times bigger than Myron’s home state of New Jersey. Twenty times bigger. Montana has about a million people while New Jersey has over nine million. Not to be all mathy, but that means that New Jersey has 1,260 people per square mile. Montana? About 7.5 people per square mile.
Different.
Myron checked the app. The phone he was tracking—he was still assuming it belonged to Spark’s brother Bo/Brian—was still at the Budget Inn. A rental car waited for Myron at the airport. He put the Budget Inn into Google Maps. The app told him it would be a nine-minute ride.
You don’t expect a lot from a place called the Budget Inn, and you don’t get a lot either. The two-level motel didn’t have the word “FLEABAG” spray-painted on the side of it, but maybe it should have. Myron parked and headed toward a sign saying MOTEL OFFICE. One thing struck Myron as odd right away. There were probably twenty vehicles in the lot, but he counted only eight rooms: four on top, four on the bottom. No lights on in any of them. Not one. The motel office was locked. A handwritten sign on the cracked glass door read: “PERMANENTLY CLOSED.”
Myron checked his phone. As with most tracking apps, the location was approximate. Now as he looked at it again, the dot seemed to be somewhere in the corner of the parking lot. As Myron headed back toward the front, he spotted a red shack with a yellow sign aptly reading: THE SHANTY LOUNGE.
In another era, the Shanty had probably been the Budget Inn’s watering hole, but whereas the lodging had ceased to exist, the lounge was still hopping. Two men stumbled out the front door, both clearly intoxicated. One jumped into a monster SUV, vroomed the engine, and took off over the curb. The other guy vomited on a Ford Taurus before walking it off. Myron checked the location app again. The answer was obvious now.
Whoever Spark had called was currently inside the Shanty Lounge.
Myron headed to the saloon door. He wasn’t sure how to play it or what he expected to find here. Could Spark have called Greg Downing? Could Greg be in this bar? And then what? If it was Bo and not Greg, what was Myron’s play here? Question him? Watch him and follow him back to wherever he lived?
He reached the door. The bar sounded happening from the outside. The old yacht-rock classic “Sailing” by Christopher Cross was playing, maybe on a jukebox, maybe karaoke. Several patrons were singing that sailing took them away to where they always heard it could be. Okay. Myron hesitated. If Greg was inside, suppose he recognized Myron. Would Greg—what?—run? Still none of it made any sense. Let’s say Greg was here. Let’s say Greg and his lover Bo had run away from Joey the Toe and decided to hide in Montana.
Why travel to New York and kill a former model he had barely known?
It made no sense.
Myron was missing something. That wasn’t uncommon. Situations like this were always about missing stuff. His normal way was to keep shaking the box and hope more pieces fell out. But something here, something about the pieces he had already, made him feel as though he was shaking the wrong box.
So Myron just pushed open the door and entered. Spark had called someone. Maybe Greg, maybe Bo. Whoever—they might be on the lookout. Maybe Spark had warned them that people were looking for them. Maybe they were prepared.
Best to be on guard.
When Myron entered, he half expected the whole bar to go silent and turn toward him, like you used to see in old Westerns. Nothing like that happened. The aptly named Shanty was a classic small-town watering hole. That was a compliment. Oodles of neon beer signs shined bright against dark wood paneling. Coors Light dominated, but Budweiser had a pretty good showing too. There were deer antlers on the walls and a long mirror behind the bar. The specials were written on a whiteboard. The Shanty was small but happening. Four dudes with cowboy hats played darts. Two guys with trucker hats scrutinized a pile of giant Jenga blocks. A tall woman leaned on the corner jukebox and sang that fantasy, it gets the best of her, and three guys backed up when she noted that she felt this way when sailing. Shanty Lounge and the Pips. There might be a variety of tops—tees, flannels, polos—but everyone wore blue jeans. Myron counted three dogs—two golden retrievers lying on the floor like throw rugs, and a third dog, a French bulldog, slouching on a stool at the bar.
The corner jukebox transitioned from Christopher Cross to an old Doobie Brothers ditty. Soon Michael McDonald and the tall woman were urging the bar patrons to take it to the streets. No one in here seemed in the mood to take it anywhere. The clientele all seemed pretty content inside with their drinks and darts and billiards.
Myron took in the crowd. No Greg. No Bo/Brian.
