Denny Lowe wouldn’t get it up for Amy Harris.

Unless while he was doing it, he was doing something else that would get him off.

Fucking hell.

Poor Amy.

“You would,” Julie said, taking Colt from his thoughts, “you know, think about the kid you gave up. It’s natural.”

“She tell you about the kid’s Dad?”

“Yeah,” Julie was now a font of information, “she knew him but she never told him about the kid. I wasn’t around but she told me she took a sabbatical from work so no one would see her showin’ and came back after it was all done.”

“Why didn’t she tell the Dad? Weren’t they together?”

“Nope, she said it was a one night stand, if you can believe that of Amy, which I couldn’t at first. Thought she was jerking me around when she told me, tryin’ to seem more interesting. But you could tell it was genuine. Said she didn’t want him to know or anyone to know it was him. She was protectin’ him from something, I reckoned. Thought maybe he was married but didn’t ask. She wasn’t big on talkin’ about it and didn’t for years. Most of the girls, though, know now, even though none of us were around when Amy started here and it all went down.” This was, Colt knew because Julie McCall had told them, the bitch. Colt focused as Julie continued. “Only some of the bank officers were around back then but only because, between most of ‘em, they own the bank,” she finished.

Colt leaned forward in order to pull out his wallet, which took him closer to her. Instead of leaning back as anyone would, she leaned forward too and he just caught another lip curl.

He sat back, flipped out his wallet and gave her a card.

“You hear from Amy, you can tell her I want to talk to her, see she’s all right. Or you could just call me.”

She’d call him, she heard from Amy or, he reckoned, even if she didn’t.

She took the card and smiled, back to suggestive. “Sure, Lieutenant Colton.”

He stood, pushing his wallet in his back pocket and grabbing his coffee. “Thank you, Ms. McCall.”

He didn’t offer his hand, he should have but he had what he wanted from her and he doubted there was any more to be had. Now she needed to know the limits to his friendliness.

She didn’t take the hint. “Call me Julie.”

He wasn’t going to have the opportunity to call her anything and he found this a relief.

He just smiled and threw his arm toward the door, inviting her to precede him. Interview over.

She walked in front of him deliberately slow, drawing out her time with him and likely away from her job. She moved and he knew she wanted him to watch her ass while she was doing it. He did and almost laughed. He’d been watching Feb’s ass move around her bar for the last two years and Julie McCall? No f**king comparison.

At the top of the stairs he thanked her again, turned and gave Dave a nod. Dave was in his office with customers he was now ignoring as his eyes were glued to Colt. Before he could give his customers excuses and hightail it to Colt, Colt gave him a wave and took off.

He walked to Amy’s and thought about her pregnant, having a baby and giving it up for adoption. He had no idea when this happened but he’d find out. She was working at the bank so it was after high school maybe while Denny Lowe was in Northwestern or even later, when Denny married Marie. Like most kids whose parents didn’t leave town, Colt remembered Denny came back during summer breaks and for visits before he moved home with Marie. It could have happened anytime.

There were lots of reasons women gave up kids but Amy didn’t seem the type, not if she’d be crying about it years later. She was shy but she was sweet, responsible, close to her kin, she’d likely make a good Mom. Something made her give up her kid and Colt worried it was something not good for Amy.

If it was because of what he worried it was, Denny had raped her or courted her and then forced rough, weird sex on her, then what this had to do with Feb and Feb’s reaction to Colt being around Amy, Colt had no f**king clue. Except if Denny called Amy February and demanded she call him Alec in return. He could see how that’d freak Amy enough to stay quiet a long while. Enough to take some time to get the courage to come forward, head to the bar, get ready to share then lose your courage when the time was right and get the f**k out of Dodge.

Still, none of this explained Feb’s extreme response to seeing Amy with Colt.

He made it to Amy’s to see her car still in her drive. He knocked then waited then knocked again. And repeat. Nothing and no movement at her draperies this time. He stood around long enough, checking the quiet neighborhood and letting the quiet neighborhood have the opportunity to see him again at her front door. He scanned the windows of the houses he could see, looking to see if some nose was watching just so he’d have another lead, he’d take anything. He stood around long enough for someone to come out, go to their car or come to him and ask him if he needed something.

Nothing.

So he went hunting, knocked on a few doors, both sides of her house and across the street.

No one home.

He gave up and as he walked back to the Station, his cell rang. He yanked it out of his pocket and the display said “February calling.”

When Morrie gave him her number and he’d programmed it into his phone several days ago, he’d been uncertain how he felt about doing it. There was no uncertainty about how he felt about it being there now.

He flipped it open and put it to his ear. “Feb.”

“List is ready. Mom’s bringing it down to the Station once we get into the bar.”

She hated doing it he could hear it in her voice.

That’s why he made his voice soft when he replied, “Okay, honey.”

“You call Costa’s?”

He could see she was rabid for Costa’s but then again Feb liked to eat, always did. He’d noted in the last two years she still did the amount of times he saw her, Morrie, Ruthie or Darryl take off with orders and they got Reggie’s or take out from Frank’s or a delivery came from Shanghai Salon. You didn’t get the kind of curves she had, curves he’d now seen na**d and touched with his hands, from eating salads. The vision of her sliding off his bed to stand na**d at its side this morning was pleasantly seared to the backs of his eyeballs and he hoped to God that burn never healed.

“Not yet.”

“They get busy on a Tuesday.”

They were busy every day.

“Baby, I’ll call.”