Growing up, she'd always known Gospel was a little odd, but after that night, she was convinced it was more than odd. She now knew that she was living in an alternate dimension, one that looked fairly normal on the surface but was freaky as hell underneath. Four nights ago, she'd glimpsed the craziness that hid behind normal faces, and it was scary. The only person who hadn't acted like a nut had been Rob Sutter. He'd looked more angry than insane.

"Why don't you go out, Katie?"

She rolled her head to the left and looked at her grandfather. "Are you trying to get rid of me?"

"Yes. You're wearing me out." He turned his attention back to his television program. "I love you, Katie, but I need a break from you."

She sat up. She was in Gospel to give him a hand in the store and to help him over his grief. She needed a break from him, too, but she wasn't so rude as to tell him. Obviously, he didn't suffer under the same restraint.

"Go have a green beer somewhere."

She didn't want to drink in a bar alone. There was something a little sad about it, and besides, it hadn't worked out for her the last time. She'd drunk too much and was still paying the price.

"Play a little pool and meet young people your own age."

Pool. She could play pool. That wasn't sad and pathetic, and if she didn't drink too much, she wouldn't do anything stupid. "Which bars have tables?" she asked.

"The Buckhorn has a few in the back. I don't believe Rocky's Bar has any, but the Hitching Post might still have a couple." While Kate tried to recall which was closest to her grandfather's house, he added, "Of course you should probably stay out of the Hitching Post on account of the restrooms are a little rough."

Kate looked down at her sweats and Tasmanian Devil slippers. "Isn't the Buckhorn a little rough?" she asked. She'd driven by the bar several times and thought it looked about a hundred years old. Not falling down, just very rustic.

"Not this time of year. It only tends to get rough when flatlanders come up for the summer."

"Why don't we go play some pool together? I'll bet some of your friends are there."

He shook his head. "I don't want to go anywhere." Before she could argue, he added, "I'll call Jerome and see if he wants to come over for a beer."

She stood. If her grandfather had a friend over, he wouldn't need her company. "Okay. Maybe I will go play some pool," she said as she moved into her bedroom. She changed into her strapless bra, then pulled on a black-and-white-striped boatneck sweater and a pair of jeans. She shoved her feet into her black boots and shot perfume on the insides of her wrists. After she brushed her teeth, she combed her hair until it fell in a smooth, blunt line across the middle of her shoulder blades. She didn't waste a lot of effort on makeup, just a little mascara and soft pink lip gloss. Then she grabbed her coat and her small black Dooney & Bourke backpack and headed out.

"I doubt I'll be late," she told her grandfather as he walked with her past the kitchen table set with Tom Jones place mats.

"You look lovely." Stanley helped her with her coat. "If you drink too much, promise to give me a call."

"Thanks. I will," she said, but she didn't have any intention of drinking much at all. She fished her keys out of her backpack and reached for the door.

"And Kate."

She looked up into her grandfather's eyes. "What?"

"Don't beat all the boys at pool." He laughed, but Kate wasn't sure he was joking.

The outside of the Buckhorn Bar looked like a lot of the businesses in Gospel, made of split logs, with a green tin roof. But unlike the other establishments, there were no striped awnings or planters to soften the rough appearance. No wooden Indian or gold leaf lettering on the blacked-out windows. The door handle was made from a horn, and a big neon sign with an elk on it hung over the worn porch. Cement patched the holes in the old logs, but slices of dim light and the whine of steel guitar slipped through a few cracks and into the darkness outside.

Walking into the Buckhorn was like walking into a hundred other small-town cowboy bars. It was a second home to the regulars, and anyone new was eyed with suspicion.

The owner of the bar, Burley Morton, weighed in at about three hundred pounds and stood just over six-feet-five. He kept a Louisville Slugger and a sawed-off shotgun behind the long bar. He hadn't used the Slugger since '85, when a flatlander had attempted to rob him of a case of Coors Lite and a pack of beer nuts. He hadn't had trouble of that nature in years, but he kept both items handy just in case. Occasionally, one of the locals got riled up and developed beer muscles, but it was nothing he couldn't handle with a call to the sheriff's office or his own two fists.

The door to the Buckhorn closed behind Kate, and she was reminded of a lot of the older hotels and casinos in Vegas. The bar smelled of alcohol and old cigarette smoke that had seeped into the wood like varnish. The owner's attempt to cover it up with cherry deodorizer didn't help.

On the jukebox, Kenny Chesney sang about a big star while a few couples danced in the center of the large room. Kate wasn't a huge fan of country music, but Kenny was a big improvement over Tom. Green shamrock garlands decorated the long bar and several of the red booths. A bulletin board filled with multicolored flyers was nailed to the wall to Kate's right.

Kate hung her backpack over her shoulder and moved toward the bar. She wove through a few tables and found a stool near the neon Coor's light.

"What can I get ya?" the owner of the Buckhorn asked around the cigar stuck in one corner of his mouth.

"Do you have a winter wheat?"

Burley's thick black brows pulled together, and he looked at her as if she'd ordered a Shirley Temple with extra cherries.

"I'll have a Bud Lite," she amended.

"Good choice," he said, and a thin plume of smoke followed him as he moved away to the beer spigots.

"Aren't you Stanley's granddaughter?"

She turned her gaze to the man on the stool next to her and instantly recognized Hayden Dean, the inspiration for the Mangy Rat poem.

"Yes. How are you, Mr. Dean?"

"Good." He reached for his beer, and his shoulder brushed Kate's. She wasn't so sure it was an accident.

Burley returned and set two glasses of green beer in front of her. "Two-fifty."

"I only ordered one," she said as the song on the juke changed and Clint Black poured from the speakers.

He took the cigar out of his mouth and pointed to a sign behind him. "Wednesday night is twofer night."

Wow, twofer night. Kate hadn't enjoyed twofer night since college. These days, pounding beer didn't hold the appeal it had in her early twenties, when she'd been a champion keg stander and beer bonger.

"I haven't been in here before," she said to Hayden as she dug into her Dooney bag and handed Burley a five. She glanced over her left shoulder toward the back of the bar. Through an opening she could see billiard lights hanging over two pool tables.

She raised a beer to her lips and felt something brush her thigh.

"I love the redheads," Hay den said.

She looked down at his hand on her leg, then back up into his heavily lined face. It figured that the only man to pay attention to her in a year was a creepy old guy with beer breath and a reputation for low standards. "Take your hand off my thigh, Mr. Dean."

He smiled, and she noticed that some of his back molars were missing. "You've got fire. I like that in a woman."

Kate rolled her eyes. She'd kept up with self-defense classes since she'd first received her PI license, and if she wanted, she could remove Hayden's hand and pin his thumb to his wrist all in one motion. But she didn't want to hurt Mr. Dean. It might make things difficult the next time he came into the M &S for a free cup of coffee. She stood and placed the strap of her backpack on her shoulder. Even though she really didn't want two green beers, she grabbed them off the bar and headed toward the back. As she carefully wove her way through the locals, she sipped out of each glass to keep them from spilling.

In the cramped back room, four players occupied the two tables while several spectators drank beer and loitered under the big No Spitting, No Fighting, No Betting sign.

Within the dusky shadows of the room, Rob Sutter pushed away from the wall and moved to lean over one of the tables. "Three in the side pocket," he said over the crack of pool balls from the other table and the sound of George Jones crooning from the juke in the next room.

Kate stood in the doorway and watched him line up the shot. The light hanging directly over the table shone down on his left hand and the silver ring on his middle finger. Blue flannel was rolled up his long arms, exposing the tail of his snake tattoo, and he wore a navy blue ball cap with a fly hook and the words "Bite me" embroidered on it. He slid the stick between his thumb and first finger and shot. What he lacked in finesse, he made up for in pure muscle. The cue ball hit the solid red ball so hard that it jumped before shooting across the table and falling into the pocket. His gaze followed the ball to the edge of the table, paused for several heartbeats, then continued up the buttons of Kate's coat, passed her chin and mouth to her eyes. Within the shadow of his hat, his gaze met hers, and he simply stared. Then a slight frown pulled at the corners of his mouth. Kate didn't know if he was irritated to see her or bothered because he'd hit the cue so hard that he'd lost control of it. Probably both.

He stood in one smooth motion, and a shadow from the brim of his cap slid to the end of his nose, leaving only his lips, mustache, and soul patch exposed to the dim light of the room. He wore a white T-shirt beneath the unbuttoned blue flannel shirt. The tails hung loose about the hips and the button fly of his Levi's.