The trip upstate would have been pleasant, if not for Cooper anxiously looking over his shoulders every ten seconds for staties, and the fact that his companion was obviously gowed up, a fact that might be successfully hidden from someone without a working pair of ears or eyes, but probably not a police officer with even a soupçon of experience. Maybe this whole thing had been a bad idea. Cooper sometimes thought that someone somewhere should make a machine that just prints out a card with a good idea written on it every hour on the hour, so everyone could keep one in their house. Then they could just read the cards and follow up on the randomly generated good ideas. That way, there would be no real excuse for doing dumb shit.

Somehow, Cooper doubted the machine would print out a card that would read "Leave town with a drug dealer you don't fully trust and try to solve a mystery."

Lillith gave him a nudge as they walked and pointed out the beat-up old church, telling him that Maria had been part of the congregation there. He hadn't been inside a church since he was a little kid. Did he own a Bible? He couldn't remember. Probably not.

Cooper looked at the time on his cell phone. The party would just be starting. Good. What kind of loser showed up at a party on time? Which meant they had time to poke around. Anything they could learn would be a good bargaining chip in case either got caught. For a man who prided himself on his worldly pragmatism, but still managed to be wrong about most things, this was terribly prescient. "Yeah, let's go have a look, maybe ask a few questions," he said with a nod. Being reasonably certain that he wouldn't burst into flames upon stepping onto consecrated ground, he walked towards the church, reassuring himself that his little pistol was still readily accessible. Pushing open the door, he looked around for an office or a pastor or something that might be useful. "Hello?" he called questioningly.