She swore. What a mouth she had, but everything sounded better when spoken in a husky undertone. “Come on. I’m only taking you as far as Lake Charles, and if you spill a drop of anything on Myrna’s upholstery, I’ll kill you with my bare hands.”

“Myrna?”

The woman shot him a look that said it wasn’t the time to talk about the name of her car. By the time she got the keys in the ignition, he’d settled into the passenger seat. She handled the big car with careless expertise, backing out in a spit of gravel.

Just in time, too.

The bar door flew open, and six men poured out. One chucked a beer bottle at them, and it smashed against the fender. To his amusement, the hellcat spat another curse and reversed hard into the lot, like she’d happily run all the rednecks down. They apparently thought so, too, because they scattered, fell on their asses. She shifted gears and then stuck her hand out the window, flashing the finger as they fish-tailed out onto Rural Route 9.

“Myrna Loy,” she said, as if they’d never been interrupted. “I’m nuts about her.”

It took him a minute to place the name, and then connect it to her car. He tended to connect the dots, not make tangential leaps; logic, not Rorschach blots.

“You like her movies then?” This wasn’t going at all as he’d planned. She still hadn’t even answered his original question. He prided himself on being adaptable, however; it made him the best at what he did. So he’d circle back to it soon enough.

Before answering, she adjusted the radio and tuned it to KBON, filling the car with zydeco music and rushing wind. “Love them. Have you ever seen The Thin Man?”

“I’m afraid not. Good?”

Her smile flashed, a dimple in her right cheek. “Fantastic. She and William Powell were the couple back then—so suave and charming. When I was a kid, I wanted to be Nora Charles.”