The Lucky One(18)

The structure of the marines was based on threes. Three men to a fire team, three fire teams to a squad, three squads to a platoon. He served three tours in Iraq. Checking his watch, he noted that he’d been in Hampton for three hours, and straight ahead, right where they should have been, were three evergreen trees clustered together.

Thibault walked back to the highway, knowing he was closer to finding her. He wasn’t there yet, but he soon would be.

She’d been here. He knew that now.

What he needed now was a name. On his walk across the country, he’d had a lot of time to think, and he’d decided there were three ways to go about it. First, he could try to find a local veterans association and ask if any locals had served in Iraq. That might lead him to someone who might recognize her. Second, he could go to the local high school and see if it had copies of yearbooks from ten to fifteen years ago. He could look through the photographs one by one. Or third, he could show the photograph and ask around.

All had their drawbacks, none were guaranteed. As for the veterans association, he hadn’t found one listed in the phone book. Strike one. Because it was still summer vacation, he doubted if the high school would be open; even if it was, it might be difficult to gain access to the library’s yearbooks. Strike two—for now, anyway. Which meant that his best bet was to ask around and see if anyone recognized her.

Who to ask, though?

He knew from the almanac that nine thousand people lived in Hampton, North Carolina. Another thirteen thousand people lived in Hampton County. Way too many. The most efficient strategy was to limit his search to the likeliest pool of candidates. Again, he started with what he knew.

She appeared to be in her early twenties when the photograph had been taken, which meant she was in her late twenties now. Possibly early thirties. She was obviously attractive. Further, in a town this size, assuming an equal distribution among age brackets, that meant there were roughly 2,750 kids from newborns up to ten years of age, 2,750 from eleven to twenty, and 5,500 people in their twenties and thirties, her age bracket. Roughly. Of those, he assumed half were males and half were females. Females would tend to be more suspicious about his intentions, especially if they actually knew her. He was a stranger. Strangers were dangerous. He doubted they would reveal much.

Men might, depending on how he framed the question. In his experience, nearly all males noticed attractive females in their age bracket, especially if they were single men. How many men in her current age group were single? He guessed about thirty percent. Might be right, might be wrong, but he’d go with it. Say 900 or so. Of those, he figured eighty percent had been living here back then. Just a guess, but Hampton struck him as a town that people were more likely to emigrate from, as opposed to immigrate to. That brought the number down to 720. He could further cut that in half if he concentrated on single men aged twenty-five to thirty-five, instead of twenty to forty. That brought it down to 360. He figured a good chunk of those men either knew her or knew of her five years ago. Maybe they’d gone to high school with her or maybe not—he knew there was one in town—but they would know her if she was single. Of course, it was possible she wasn’t single—women in small southern towns probably married young, after all—but he would work with this set of assumptions first. The words on the back of the photograph—“Keep Safe! E”—didn’t strike him as romantic enough to have been given to a boyfriend or fiancé. No “Love you,” no “I’ll miss you.” Just an initial. A friend.

Down from 22,000 to 360 in less than ten minutes. Not bad. And definitely good enough to get started. Assuming, of course, she lived here when the photograph had been taken. Assuming she hadn’t been visiting.

He knew it was another big assumption. But he had to start someplace, and he knew she’d been here once. He would learn the truth one way or the other and move on from there.

Where did single men hang out? Single men who could be drawn into conversation? I met her a couple of years ago and she told me to call her if I got back into town, but I lost her name and number. . . .

Bars. Pool halls.

In a town this size, he doubted whether there were more than three or four places where locals hung out. Bars and pool halls had the advantage of alcohol, and it was Saturday night. They’d be filled. He figured he’d have his answer, one way or the other, within the next twelve hours.

He glanced at Zeus. “Seems like you’re going to be on your own tonight. I could bring you, but I’d have to leave you outside and I don’t know how long I’ll be.”

Zeus continued walking, his head down, tongue out. Tired and hot. Zeus didn’t care.

“I’ll put the air conditioner on, okay?”





5

Clayton

It was nine o’clock on Saturday night, and he was stuck at home babysitting. Great. Just great.

How else could a day like today end, though? First, one of the girls almost catches him taking pictures, then the department’s camera gets stolen, and then Logan Thigh-bolt flattens his tires. Worse, he’d had to explain both the loss of the camera and the tires to his dad, Mr. County Sheriff. Predictably, his dad was spitting mad and somehow didn’t buy the story he’d concocted. Instead he just kept peppering him with questions. By the end, Clayton had wanted to pop the old man. Dad might be a bigwig to a lot of the folks around here, but the man had no business talking to him like he was an idiot. But Clayton had kept to his story—he’d thought he’d seen someone, gone to investigate, and somehow run over a couple of nails. And the camera? Don’t ask him. He had no idea if it had even been in the cruiser in the first place. Not great, he knew, but good enough.