Lockdown

Forty

Ty and Lock slid into a booth. Opposite them, Tiffany stirred a hole in the bottom of her coffee cup with a spoon.

Ty slid a picture of Cody Parker across the table. Tiffany glanced at it for less than a New York second and shook her head.

Lock leaned across the table towards her. ‘But that’s him, that’s Cody Parker.’

‘He didn’t look nothing like that.’

Lock used his hand to crop the top of Cody’s head, reasoning that for all he knew Cody’s long flowing locks could have been a disguise, grown at a later date. ‘Look again.’

She kept stirring her coffee. Lock reached across and plucked the spoon from her hand. She went to snatch it back but he held it out of reach.

‘I said, look again.’

‘I don’t have to. That looks nothing like him.’

Lock handed her back the spoon and she resumed her stirring.

‘OK, so what did the Cody Parker that Natalya was seeing look like, then? And if you say “not like the picture” I’ll take that spoon from you and wedge it up your ass.’

Tiffany glanced at Ty. ‘Your buddy’s really intense.’

‘I know,’ said Ty, ‘and that’s one of his better qualities.’

‘Let’s start with height,’ said Lock.

‘Like his height,’ she said, indicating a squat Hispanic busboy who was clearing the detritus from a nearby table.

‘Around five eight?’

‘If that’s what that guy is, then yes.’

‘White? Black? Hispanic?’

‘White, but his skin was all messed up. Like he’d had really bad acne when he was younger.’

‘What kind of hair?’

‘Brown with some white. Cut short.’

‘Like mine?’

She put the spoon down on the table, a tiny slick of coffee clinging to its bowl. She looked up at Lock like she’d only just noticed him. ‘Yeah. Kind of.’

‘How old?’

‘Forties. Maybe fifty.’

‘But he said his name was Cody?’

She regarded Lock like a particularly impatient teacher might look at a defiantly obtuse pupil. ‘Yeah.’

‘You stay with her for five minutes,’ Lock said to Ty. ‘Make sure she doesn’t go anywhere.’

‘Why? Where are you going?’

‘To get some more pictures.’