Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #3: Books 9-12 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [reading in the dark TXT] 📗

He shook his head again. “I don’t know. Maybe I’ve seen her, but if I have I don’t recall. A lot of people come through my bar, they would have to be either regular or very remarkable. One thing I can tell you is they were not regulars here.”

I nodded. “How about Pam? You know Pam? She’s pretty but she’s not Latina.” I smiled and he looked a little uncomfortable. “She lives in the neighborhood.”

He flapped his fingers at his hair. “Blonde, mid twenties, blue eyes?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, I know Pam…” His face changed and he frowned. “Wait a minute, let me see that first one again. Pam used to come in here sometimes with a cute friend…” Dehan swiped the screen and handed him back the phone. He looked at it, frowning. “Yeah, maybe, could be. Pam had a friend, used to visit her sometimes and they’d come in here for a drink. That could be her. Nice kid, bright. They both were. But that is going back a bit.”

Dehan said, “Last time she was here was two years ago.”

“Seriously?” He made a face. “I guess that’s about right, yeah. The other girl, I don’t know.”

I rubbed my chin. I needed a shave and suddenly wanted to be home with this case behind me. I sighed. “OK, this is a long shot, Ted, but I need you to try and remember. Third week of May, two years ago, Pam and Rosario…”

“Rosario! That was her name!” He leaned back, smiling, and slapped his forehead. “Rosario!”

I paused, then went on, “Yeah, Rosario. They came in here mid week. They’d have been sitting, having a drink, and some guy started trying to hit on Rosario. Ring any bells?”

He frowned. He looked unhappy. “I run a nice establishment. People come in here, they feel safe. This is a nice, safe neighborhood. OK, we have the PJs down the road, but it’s like a different world.” He shook his head. “A woman, or a young lady, wants to come in here alone, read a book or shoot the breeze, nobody is going to give her trouble here. Anyone tries that, they get kicked out on their ass. Excuse my language.” This last was directed at Dehan.

“Don’t worry. I hear worse at the station house. So maybe it wasn’t a problem? Maybe he was just talking to them? Perhaps Rosario was open to it…?”

He spread his hands and shook his head. “I’m open every day. That’s seven hundred and thirty nights since what you’re asking me to remember. That scenario must have happened seven hundred times in those two years.”

I sighed. “Sure. OK, how about a guy who frequented your bar at that time. He would have been here most nights, maybe had a habit of talking to young women, particularly Hispanic girls, who were either alone or at least not with a man.”

He started chewing his lip and raised a hand like he was telling me to wait and be quiet. He stared over at the bar, but not seeing it, trying to see or hear something in his memory. “There was a guy,” he said. “What the hell was his name. Casual…”

Dehan frowned. “You mean he was a casual kind of guy?”

He shook his head, almost impatient. “No, no. He worked here, like Pete.” He gestured at the Australian bartender. “Casual labor, he was from Arizona or New Mexico, or maybe it was southern California. Hell, I can’t remember. But he was always talking to the girls. He especially liked the Puerto Rican girls and the Mexicans and the Cubanas. We used to make fun of him, but he didn’t like that.”

She pulled out her pad and pen. “What was his name?”

“Damned if I can remember! Just give me a minute. It’ll come to me. If it don’t, I got to have it written down somewhere.” He frowned suddenly. “But he was a nice kid. He was never offensive to nobody. He never upset the clients or he would have been out before he could say Viva Mexico!!” He glanced at Dehan. “No offense.”

She raised an eyebrow and made a face of confusion. “None taken, Ted. We are going to need his name, and any contact details you have for him.”

“Also,” I added, “the days he worked.”

“Oh, I can tell you that. He worked Monday through Friday. I remember that because, though he was a nice kid, we wasn’t what you might call energetic. He just about got by on Friday, but Saturday and Sunday are busy days for us, and he just couldn’t keep up. So I used to give him Monday through Friday.”

Dehan glanced at me and I nodded. “OK, we are going to need his name and details. Can you get them for us now?”

He looked from me to Dehan and then back again as realization dawned. “Are those girls OK? I’m pretty sure I saw Pam only recently.”

I drew breath to answer, but instead I said, “How about Angela?”

“Angela?”

“About the same time. Again, pretty, well educated, used to wear a very beautiful cross around her neck…”

He went pale. “You’re talking about the Angel.”

I nodded.

He pointed at Dehan’s phone. “They were killed?”

“We don’t know.”

He looked a little sick. “I never thought… Nobody ever asked me. It never crossed my mind. You think Jimmy…” His face cleared. “That was his name! Jimmy! Give me a second and I’ll tell you… Fillmore. Jimmy Fillmore.” He stopped dead, confused by his own verbiage. “You think Jimmy could have done that?”

I shook my head. “We don’t know.”

“If he did, he was picking up the girls here…”

“We don’t know, Ted.”

“So the Angel, Angela, she would have been in here.”

“It’s possible. Can you give us whatever information you have on him?”

He was quiet for a long