They paused in the open doorway and looked back at her. Wally whispered something about ghosts, which prompted a short-lived punching match. Then he asked, “What does your purse look like?”

“Bone leather with burgundy alligator accents.”

“Huh?”

“White and reddish brown.”

She folded her arms and watched the boys-guns raised-slowly move into the house. Lifting a hand, she once again shaded her eyes from the piercing sun and saw them move first to the left and then cross the hall into the living room. They were gone maybe half a minute before they ran back out, Hope’s purse in Adam’s free hand.

“Where was it?” she asked.

“In the big room with the antlers.” He handed her the bag and she reached inside for her sunglasses. She slipped them on, then slid two five-dollar bills from her wallet.

“Thank you very much.” In Hope’s line of work, she’d slipped money to doormen, doctors, and dwarfs. But this was a first. She’d never paid little kids for a favor. “You are the bravest guys I know,” she said as she handed them the money. Their eyes lit up and their smiles turned mercenary.

“If you need us to do anything else, we will,” Wally assured her as he stuck his pistol into the waistband of his shorts.

The dinner rush had hardly slowed by the time Sheriff Dylan Taber entered the Cozy Corner Cafe. The tint on the windows let a person see out, but from the street, they looked like silver foil wrap. If the sun hit them just right, they could burn a hole through your corneas.

On the jukebox next to the front door, Loretta Lynn sang about her Kentucky roots while Jerome Fernwood called out a pickup order from behind the grill.

The smell of fried chicken gravy and coffee assaulted Dylan’s senses and made his stomach growl. He tried to keep fast-food nights at his house to a minimum, but tonight he was tired and covered with dust and the last thing he wanted was to cook dinner. Not even hot dogs and macaroni and cheese, Adam’s favorite.