It was drafty inside the Drift and I hugged myself as I looked around for my favorite detective. He sat at the very end of the bar with his hat tipped down low over his face. He had a whiskey on the rocks in one hand and his boot tapped rhythmically with the beat of a song on the jukebox.

“Never too early for a whiskey,” I said to him as I slid onto the seat to his right.

He looked up and I could tell by the glassy look in his eyes and the crooked smile on his face that he wasn’t operating at full capacity. I wondered how long he had been here. “Oh, Kelly Kane, Kelly Kane! The fearless reporter. You’re right! You’re always right. It’s never too early.”

I waved at Rio to bring me whatever Owen was having. She looked me dead in the eyes then turned her back without any sort of sign that she’d actually even seen me. I loved that woman.

“What’re you up to tonight, Owen?” I asked, swiveling in my seat to face him.

He shrugged a little, pressing his lips together and exhaling heavily. “What’s it look like? I’m drinking.”

I realized from the way he spoke that he was already very drunk. “Yeah, I can see that,” I said as Rio placed a glass of amber liquid in front of me. I took a small sip and tried to swallow down the burn in my throat.

Owen grunted something about being happy to see me but not in the condition to be very good company, but I didn't care. I saw an opportunity and I still needed answers.

“Why didn’t you tell me about the evidence linking Senator McClinton to Lake Carmi? The tire tread.” I asked. There was no need for pleasantries between us anymore.

“Ah, goddammit, Kelly. Can’t you just let it be?” Owen grumbled. “Christ, can’t a man just leave his work at work?”

“Owen, c’mon, you’re a detective. Your cases follow you everywhere you go and you know it.” I knew that pressing him too hard might cause him to close down altogether, but I had to try. “C’mon. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because,” he said, as if that settled the matter. “I told you to back off from the beginning, and clearly you ain’t listening.”

“You’re right, I’m not. You listen, I’ve gotten a new... lead, I guess. I don’t know. It’s kind of ridiculous and I really don’t know what to think. Mis–” I stopped myself and took a long sip of whiskey before I kept going. “Someone told me that Cold Hollow has a history with... the occult. Supernatural stuff. Vampires and witches, to be exact.” I paused and tried to read his face, but he just stared ahead as if I weren’t there. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking, so I kept going. “I’m sure you’ve heard of the Hound of Cold Hollow, right? Local legend about the––”

“Yeah, yeah, of course I’ve heard about it. The big ass wolf that likes to scare school kids and bored housewives. Sure, sure.”

I couldn’t tell if he bought into the legend or not. “Well, I just learned there are two schools of thought about werewolves. The French see them as evil monsters, demons basically. But the Irish and some of the Nordic people see them as guardians. They protect humans from…well, from vampires.” I choked a little on my last word realizing how absurd it sounded.

I waited for a response, but Owen said nothing, his face steely.

“See, the werewolves – according to the legends – they protect humans from people doing witchcraft. The witches, however, are working for these things – they’re sort of like gods – but, well, they’re basically vampires and—”

Owen stopped me. “Are you sure you aren’t the one who’s drunk, Kelly Kane?”

“What?” I scoffed, annoyed that he wasn’t taking me seriously. Then again, why should he? I certainly hadn’t given Misty that privilege. “No. No, I’m not drunk, Owen. I’m... I’m freaked the hell out, to be honest. I want to know why Misty Turner is telling me that werewolves are real and that her girlfriend, Sivene Doyle, might be one. Tell me why everyone in Cold Hollow seems to believe this shit,” I hissed.

“I don’t believe that shit,” Owen chuckled. “But I do believe your friends Misty and Sivene might have had something to do with what happened that night at Lake Carmi.”

I was taken aback. Owen suddenly seemed to sober a bit and his tone was very serious. I wondered if he had evidence against either of them or if he was just talking loosely.

“They’re not my friends,” I mumbled, unsure if he somehow knew about my brief romantic fling with Misty. “You have evidence?”

“I’m not at liberty to say,” Owen said. “And you have nothing to do with this case anymore, remember?”

I rolled my eyes at him and looked down into the bottom of my drink. My world had been turned upside down in the last twenty-four hours and I wasn’t sure what to do about it. “Okay, put the case aside for a moment. The whole witchcraft, occult, werewolf thing...It’s irrational to believe in such things because we don’t have evidence of them, right?”

“Sure, I suppose.”

Owen and I were very much alike. We weren’t superstitious and all of this talk of mythical creatures and black magic left us both frustrated. We wanted facts, hard evidence that could help us solve real crimes committed by real people, but there had to be something to the legends – a grain of truth that might point to the real reason why women were disappearing and why Nicole had been drained of her blood and dumped at the lake.

“So why do so many people in Cold Hollow believe in it?” I asked.

“People got boring lives, Kelly. Makes living in the middle of nowhere with nothing a lot more fun if you believe that there just might be something we don’t understand calling the shots,” he said cynically.

Owen sipped at his drink and I noticed his knuckles were a little raw and torn like he had punched something earlier.

“Okay, but it’s irrational. There’s no such thing as werewolves, right? It’s fiction. I mean, people have to recognize that, don’t they?”

“How’s believing in witches and werewolves more irrational than believing in God and angels? Huh?” I was surprised at Owen’s philosophical depth, especially while he was under the influence.

“Well, it’s... it’s different, isn’t it? I mean, there’s...” I trailed away as I realized the flaw in my own argument. There was no tangible evidence of God and, as I thought about it, there are still a lot of people in the world that don’t believe in the God of the Bible. On the other hand, every culture all over the world has some form of witchcraft they believe in, or did at one point in their history. Why should it be any different in Cold Hollow?

“It ain't different,” he said, and punctuated his statement with an air of finality by placing his empty glass down hard on the bar.

I sat back on my barstool to think on what he had said. So, the people of Cold Hollow believed in the Hound and the supernatural entanglements that families like the McClintons were suspected to have. That still didn’t explain what really happened that night at Lake Carmi.

“Hey,” I said, leaning forward and tilting my head so I could get a look at his eyes. “You really think Misty and Sivene are the killers?”

“I said they might be,” he said correcting me.

“Well, I don’t think they are.” I sighed. “I just... there’s something missing, obviously. Something I’m not seeing. Misty and Sivene, sure, they’re unusual and lead lives that are a bit outside the norm, but they’re not murderers. Sivene has some issues she’s working through, but I really don’t think she’s capable of doing something like that, and Misty certainly isn’t.”

Owen grinned. His eyes were glassy and he swayed a little on his seat. “What makes you so certain about them?”

Something told me he knew about me and Misty, but I wasn’t sure and he wasn’t showing all of his cards.

“I’m serious, Owen. It’s not them.” I didn’t want to see Misty and Sivene get drawn into this any further. They seemed like they were going through enough already. I wanted to get Owen to back off of them as suspects if I could. “I’ve got an idea. Call me crazy if you want, but hear me out.” I could see I had Owen’s attention then. “Why don’t we go stake them out, huh? Watch them for a little bit and just see what we see. They say that guilty people under pressure always return to the scene of the crime, right?”

I could see Owen was intrigued by my idea, in spite of the fact that it was totally inappropriate, and probably illegal to take me with him, but he was just drunk enough that I might convince him.

“C’mon,” I said, elbowing his arm lightly. “I’ll drive. All you have to do is sit there and watch.”

I paid for our drinks, despite Owen’s protests, and had to practically drag him to my car. He complained about the trash in the front seat, the trash in the back seat, my music choice, and just about everything about my car. But most of all, he complained about wanting another drink, which reminded me that I had bought a bottle of whiskey for Misty and I to share but the occasion had never arisen to break it out.

“Will you shut up if I give you more whiskey?” I asked him and rummaged in an overnight bag I always kept in my car until I found the bottle and tossed it to Owen.

We drove to Misty’s apartment without speaking much. My cassette tape wailed while Owen tapped his knees and sang off-key to a completely different song that only he was hearing.

“This it?” he said, looking out the window as I slowed the car, shut off the headlights and pulled into the faded brick apartment complex’s parking lot. It was dark. The closest streetlight was halfway down the block and the whole lot bathed in inky black. I pointed to a couple of rectangular windows against the side of the building. The curtains were partially open, just enough to see the yellow light of a lamp beside Misty’s old iron bed.

I squinted and sat forward in the driver’s seat. I saw movement in what must have been the bedroom, but I couldn’t tell if it was Misty or Sivene.

“You don’t happen to have binoculars on you, do you?” I smirked at Owen.

“Nope,” he said, and crossed his arms over his chest to let me know he was already bored.

“That’s what I thought. I’m going to pull up a little closer.” I kept the headlights off and rolled my car slowly into another parking spot along the road with a better view into Misty’s bedroom window. “There,” I said, jabbing Owen with my elbow for the second time that night. “Misty. She’s in the bedroom.”

I don’t know what I was expecting to find. Rationally, I knew that what we were doing was wrong and fruitless, but something told me that I needed to see them together. I don’t know if it was jealousy or the strange fascination I had with Sivene, whom I had never met in person.

I watched for half an hour or so as Misty meandered around the room. She folded some clothes, moved some things off of the bed, and eventually was joined by a redhead who I assumed must have been Sivene.

My heart started to beat faster and harder. I had only heard about her through Misty’s complaints. She was a bit taller than Misty with long red hair that fell down to the middle of her back. Her face, from what little I could see through the window, was angular and cold. For some reason, I found it hard to imagine her smiling.

“There’s Sivene, I think.”

Owen took a swig from the bottle and swallowed loudly as he shifted around in the seat. “Yeah? Looks like they’re getting comfy,” he said.

I watched Sivene slide into the bed as Misty got undressed. Sivene lay stretched out and, wearing nothing but one delightful little thong, and Misty crawled on top. My mouth went a little dry as Misty bent down to kiss her. Misty’s dark hair spilled out over the side of her head and for a few moments, their faces were obscured. I didn’t need to see their faces to know what was happening, though. Their bodies told me all I needed to know.

I cleared my throat, glancing away from the window as Misty tugged at Sivene’s shirt and pulled it over her head. I suddenly felt gross. The stakeout seemed like a terrible idea.

Owen kept his eyes on the window. “Uhhh, Kelly, no offense, but... what exactly are you trying to prove here?”

“I dunno,” I said, dejected. I thought about Misty and I being intimate just a few days prior. “Nothing, I guess. I just don’t think they had anything to do with Nicole’s death and I don’t want them to get in trouble.”

“Yeah, I mean, this is a good show and all, but it doesn’t prove they’re innocent.” He chuckled. “We’d probably better go before somebody spots us.”

“Yeah, okay, I know.” I snapped, but I couldn’t help but to keep watching them. Sivene was sitting up now with Misty sitting between her legs. They were writhing against one another and I could only imagine what their moans sounded like.

Owen sat back in his seat and drummed his fingers on his knee. I think he was trying to be polite and give Misty and Sivene their privacy, despite the fact that we were there to watch them.

“Let’s just... let’s just wait a little longer,” I said. “Misty said that Sivene has a bad habit of leaving when they’re... intimate.”

“Leaving?”

“Yeah, she’s done it to Misty a few times before. They’ll be having sex and then she just stops and leaves. Misty said she did it to her that night out at Lake Carmi. That Sivene just up and ran off somewhere,” I explained. My jealousy raged as I told myself that I would never do something like that to Misty. I felt another wave of depression as I realized that was exactly what I had done to Elle.

“Whatever you say, detective,” Owen muttered. “Let me know if something relevant happens,” he said, then laid his seat back, pulled his hat down over his eyes and looked as if he were planning to go to sleep.

I looked over at him and for a very brief moment considered what it might be like to have sex with him. I hadn’t been with a man since my freshman year, and there were definitely aspects of the experienced I missed. Owen was attractive for a man his age and we had both been drinking. It would be interesting at least, but I looked back toward Misty’s window and the thought of crossing the line with Owen left just as quickly as it came. It was my jealousy speaking and that was all.