Kane sets his mug down on the bar cart. He doesn't smile or apologize for the interruption. He looks at me, the question still unanswered, and what he gives me isn't the answer I asked for.
"You're not driving back Saturday."
My plan was three days, no more. He just changed it.
"What... How long should I stay?"
"I don't know yet."
"That's not an answer. A week? A month?"
"At least a week. Maybe longer. I'll know more in the next few days."
"Kane, you called me because of Danny. You used his name. That doesn't entitle you to a blank check on my life. You have to tell me what's going on."
He holds my eyes for a long moment.
"This is about how your brother died. The version you were told isn't the whole story. I've spent years building toward the point where I could act on it. You being here is part of that. That's what I can tell you tonight. The rest I'll tell you when I can. For now I'm asking you to stay. And to trust me."
He seems unused to asking. When in doubt, I'm going to say yes.
"Okay," I tell him.
He nods once. "Then we should eat."
I nod. I haven't eaten since the airport. The letter in my bag has waited eight years. It can wait one more hour.
***
We head down the stairs. Jaxson is still bent over the open hood, the welder at his rig. Kane nods to them as we pass and walks me out the side door. He doesn't ask if I want him to drive, just opens the passenger side of a black pickup parked behind the building and waits for me to get in. The truck is older than I expected, the seats worn into a shape that fits him, with a folding knife in the cup holder. He pulls out onto the road and drives the half mile back into town.
"You eat anything since Bozeman?" he asks.
"Coffee."
He nods. "There's a diner on Main if you want quieter. But Mama Lou's is more family. Anyone in town first meets her before me. She'll want to look at you."
"Mama Lou's, then," I tell him, because I'll take family over quiet today.
The Rusty Anchor is on Main Street, a low wood building with painted anchors on the windows. Kane parks across the street, gets out, comes around and opens my door before I have my hand on the handle. None of that fits any version of him my brother had written down.
"Thank you," I tell him.
He doesn't answer, but the corner of his mouth lifts. He waits while I step down.
Inside, the bar is half full of working men eating with their elbows on the tables and a hockey game playing low over the bar. Behind the counter is a woman with a steel-gray braid down her back and a faded anchor tattoo on her left forearm. She looks up when we walk in. Her eyes go from Kane to me and back to him, and whatever happens behind them I would pay money to read.
"Kane."
"Lou."
"Two for the back booth?"
"Yes."
That's the entire negotiation. She comes around the counter, walks us to a corner booth, hands us two menus that look older than I am, and stops at the table with her hands on her hips.
She smiles at me. "You must be Callie. I've been waiting for you to come through that door."
