Juggling hot coffee and a crutch was a recipe for first-degree burns, but that didn't keep Jack from insisting he could manage. That crutch, though, meant I could move a lot faster, and I sprinted for the counter, leaving him muttering behind me.
So we sat, drank coffee, watched out the window, and talked. Or I talked, about my plans for a meadow picnic area. Intentionally boring conversation. Had anyone been inclined to eavesdrop, he would have given up after about ten seconds... or fallen asleep. Jack seemed interested enough, asking questions and making comments. He always seemed interested in my plans for the lodge. Maybe because he knew it was one topic, other than guns, that I could blather endlessly about.
After an hour, Fenniger left... to relocate to a restaurant farther down, presumably for dinner. We took his place in Tim Hortons and dined on sandwiches.
As dusk fell, the girl and baby left their apartment. I gathered our trash, preparing to follow. But the restaurant door stayed closed. Had Fenniger been caught unawares on a bathroom break? Or with the bill unpaid? Or had he slipped out the back?
We were about to leave when Fenniger finally emerged. The girl was a block ahead, but he didn't hurry to catch up, instead fussing with his wallet under the shadow of the storefront overhang. Two minutes passed. Then he crossed the street, and disappeared into her building.
"Recon work," I said.
Jack nodded.
"Should we...?"
Another nod. I wiped our crumbs from the table, then followed him.
I hoped Fenniger was breaking into the girl's apartment. Instant interrogation room. An occupied building in early evening wasn't ideal, but we could make it work.
Unfortunately, Fenniger chose to get his information from a more direct source. As we waited in the foyer, out of sight, we heard him stop a boy who sounded about twelve, naive enough to answer a stranger, old enough to answer intelligently.
Fenniger put on a good show. He was looking for his niece, whom he hadn't seen in a few years. She was a teenager, dark hair, baby... Oh, right. Tina in 2B. Tina? No, his niece's name was Katrina. But he'd heard friends called her Trina. Or maybe that was Tina...
Using leading questions under the guise of making sure his Katrina was this Tina, Fenniger fished for the details he wanted, soon learning that Tina didn't have a boyfriend, rarely had friends over, and was never visited by anyone over twenty. The boy said she kept to herself, and he didn't know her well, but if Fenniger was her uncle, maybe he could help her out, because she seemed really nice, and he'd heard she was behind on the rent. Another marginalized teenage mother, estranged from her family. Perfect pickings.
Fenniger ended with a few general questions about Tina's appearance, and finally admitted that, no, this definitely wasn't his niece. Too bad.
Mission accomplished, he left... and returned to Tim Hortons. Before Jack and I could decide on another place to hole up, Fenniger emerged, large coffee in hand, supporting my theory of addictive properties.
He headed back toward the community center. Jack went for the car as I followed on foot. At the center, Fenniger got into his car and pulled away. We fell in behind.
"A junkyard?" I said, squinting into the darkness at the jagged metal mountains crossing the landscape.
"Auto wreckers"
"Whatever. The point is - "
" - why's he stopping? No fucking idea. Maybe his carburetor broke. Needs a replacement."
I couldn't tell whether he was joking. I never could.
I peered out at a half dozen heaps of parts on a lot blank
eted with rusting corpses. The whole place might be seven acres. Around the front, at the end of the rutted dirt laneway, we'd spotted a tiny building, probably an office, much too small for a house. The only lights came from it, a pair of security floods attached to the roofline.
Whatever the reason, I could only pray that Fenniger got out of that car and walked into that vacant lot, with the nearest neighbors a half kilometer away...
A flare of light as Fenniger opened his door. For a second, he stood illuminated in the glow. Then he eased it shut, trying to be quiet, the click still loud enough to carry through our closed windows. A moment of darkness. Then a second ball of light, smaller, as he flipped on a flashlight and headed for the fence.
I smiled. "Talk about a lucky break."
"Not luck. Wait long enough? Chance will come. Just gotta be patient."
"Evelyn's right. You are an optimist."
He met my grin with a level look. There was no rebuke in it, but no smile, either.
I rubbed my hands over my face, pushing back the lick of giddy excitement. "Okay, I'm fine."