116 (4)

Phil sighed and grabbed another menu. He had looked through them twice already, but he was in no mood to hear Bob flirting with the front desk girl again. He especially wasn’t in the mood to hear Bob refer to himself as “Eli” on more than one occasion. He took a menu from a place called the Millstone. He flipped open the menu and looked again. He looked over the menu and lingered on the breakfast items. His mind started drifting to omelets, waffles and pancakes. He thought about the early days with Michelle, and how he’d make pancakes every morning after she had spent the night. At least, that’s how he had done it in the early days. Pancakes and eggs gave way to cereal and toast, then orange juice and pop tarts, then coffee, and eventually he didn’t do anything special. He wanted so bad to do it again, to never stop making breakfast. He knew deep down that not making breakfast wasn’t the reason she left, but it would have been something, anything to try differently. He started going over everything in his head that he’d have done differently, when suddenly his world shifted focus back to the present. His hands were empty, and Bob was standing by him. His sunglasses were balanced on his nose, and he was looking at the menu with one hand. In the other hand, he had a Super 8 business card with a number scrawled in pen on the back. “Looks good, and it’s close. Let’s go.” Bob tossed the menu back into the wooden magazine/menu rack on the wall and swung open the door. He pushed his sunglasses up and looked at Phil. “Are ya comin’ or what.”

“Right behind you.”

***

Julio Perez rubbed his eyes and looked across the desk at officer Bucholz. “Do you need something to drink Mr. Perez?”

“No thanks. I’ve had enough coffee today. I just need some sleep eventually.”

“It has been a long day Mr. Perez, but we should hear something from the Minnesota Highway Patrol soon.”

“Do you ever get the feeling something more is going on?”

“Mr. Perez?”

“Please, call me Julio. I’ve heard Mr. Perez more today than I have in the past year.”

“Okay…Julio. What do you mean by something more?”

“This explosion, the boxcars, the officer who was shot, the government agents in your captain’s office. I heard one of your officers looking up something called the N.G.A. on a search engine…did I forget anything?”

“I…I can’t comment…officially. But, yeah, I think that’s most of it, or most of what I know about.”

Bucholz’s mind drifted for a moment, and he jumped slightly when his phone rang. “No more coffee for you either” Julio remarked.

“Bucholz.” Julio watched as Bucholz started scribbling on a notepad. “Uh-huh. Yep. No. Yes. Thanks for the tip, and give Mr. Simon our thanks for his quick action. Okay. Thank you.” Bucholz hung up the phone and started typing with one hand, as he sipped coffee with the other. He noticed Julio staring, and put down the coffee. “They found an old ATM receipt. Once I put in this number, we should know who was in the car.”

“I think we already know who, don’t we?” Julio slouched in his chair, in a vain attempt to get some sleep.