“That would be the one with Coburn shooting the rider instead of the horse.”
“Uh-huh.”
“He does go back to that one a lot.”
Lewis came forward from the back of the shop. His black hair was long, greasy, and tangled, and his thick glasses had surgical tape holding one stem to the frame. Yellow perspiration marks stained the armpits of his white shirt.
“Lewis, meet my friend, Sue Tracy.”
“My pleasure,” said Lewis. Tracy and Lewis shook hands.
“I’m gonna punch out for the day, Lewis. That okay by you?”
Lewis blinked hard behind the lenses of his glasses. “Fine.”
Quinn gathered his things, marking the Leonard paperback off in the store’s inventory notebook before he came around the counter.
“This Johnny Winter?” said Tracy.
“How’d you know that?”
“Older brothers. I had one played this till the grooves wore out on the vinyl.”
“That’s Rick Derringer on second lead right here.”
“Who?”
“You’re too young.”
They left the shop and walked up Bonifant.
“Lewis gonna be all right back there, all by himself?” said Tracy.
“He’s the best employee Syreeta’s got. A little lonely, though. Any suggestions?”
Tracy laced her fingers through Quinn’s. “I’m spoken for.”
“Maybe your partner, then.”
“He’s not Karen’s type.”
“What type is that?”
“The type who runs a comb through his hair every so often. The type who showers.”
“Picky,” said Quinn.
They stopped at his car, parked in the bank lot.
“Sweet,” said Tracy. Quinn had recently waxed the body, scrubbed the Cragar mags with Wheel-Brite and wet-blacked the rubber. The Chevelle’s clean lines gleamed in the sun.
“You like, huh?”
Tracy nodded. “You got the Flowmasters on there, huh?”
“I bought it like that off the lot.”
“What’s under the hood, a three ninety-six?”
“Now you’re making me nervous.”
“My older brothers.”
“C’mon, get in.”
She got into the passenger side. Quinn saw her admiring the shifter, a four-speed Hurst.
“You want to drive?”
“Could I?”
“I knew there was something else I liked about you. Aside from you being a natural blonde, I mean.”
“What can I say? I like fast cars.”
“Bad-ass,” said Quinn.
Tracy drove down into Rock Creek Park. They parked near a bridle trail on the west side of the creek and took the path up a rise and all the way to the old mill. On the walk back they sat on some boulders in the middle of the creek. Quinn took his shirt off, and Tracy removed her socks and shoes. She let her feet dangle in the cool water. They talked about their pasts and kissed in the sun.
Late in the afternoon they went back to Quinn’s apartment and made love. They showered and re-dressed and had dinner at Vicino’s, a small Italian restaurant Quinn liked up on Sligo Avenue. Quinn had the calimari over linguini, and Tracy had the seafood platter, and they washed it down with a carafe of the house red. They stopped for another bottle of red on the way back to Quinn’s place and drank it while listening to music and making out on his couch. They fucked like teenagers in his room, and afterward they lay in bed, Tracy smoking and talking, Quinn listening with a natural smile on his face.
The day had been a good one. The kids had won their game, and in his mind Quinn could still see the look of pride on their faces as they had run off the field. Then Sue Tracy had surprised him and stopped by the shop.
