Pure Heat by M. L. Buchman Page A

the bar. Thankfully, the pretty center of the tourist part of town was only about four by six blocks and the Doghouse Inn had a good sign.
    As he’d been circling, he’d also spotted Carly’s battered, dark blue Jeep. Gravel littered the paved street on either side of the front seats where she’d obviously cleared out the floor. It was nose-in parking and no one on her driver side.
    Excellent!
    He pulled in so tight she’d either have to climb through his car or her own. He hesitated for a moment, then checked that the street was dry. It was. So if she did climb through his car, at least the boot prints wouldn’t be muddy. The joke was worth the risk of dusty prints across his black leather.
    Steve surveyed the crowd from the bar’s door. He was glad to see that the name of the Doghouse was ironic. As a matter of fact, this was exactly the sort of place he liked, even if he was in the proverbial doghouse himself.
    Rather than being low, dark, and smelling vaguely of wet fur, it had a warm and cozy feel. Soft lighting revealed a long wooden bar that ran down one side of the room, ending in a small, open kitchen. The bar sported a collection of stools and spaces to stand. It was a bar you could walk up to and lean on while ordering a beer without having to shove and reach between a pair of hipsters with their carefully torn T-shirts, designer beer, and just-released-generation smartphones.
    Wooden tables were scattered about, just a little too closely. The kind of spacing that might be tougher on a waitress but made it easy for a conversation to start at one table and flow to the next. Friendly.
    The wall art was doghouses. Hundreds, maybe thousands of pictures and drawings. Some black-and-white newsprint, some drawn right on the dark wood, and a ton of photos.
    The place had clearly been around long enough that visitors had sent back pictures. And they’d been doing it for a while. The wall was covered with photos and posters of all shapes and sizes. They were layered and overlapping in many places. There were regular doghouses, some with the mutt, some without. Bright pink princess ones, dark and brooding ones for your friendly neighborhood mastiff, a massive Bavarian one of dark woodwork over white sporting a little gray schnauzer napping across the threshold.
    The grand centerpiece was a large painting, right on the dark wooden wall, of Snoopy in full World War I flying ace gear. He leaned forward in attack mode, hands fisted around an imaginary wheel, the wind in his scarf, and a line of bullet holes down the side of his doghouse, courtesy of his archrival, the Red Baron. The painting dominated the room.
    Steve could spend hours just looking at all the pictures that literally went from floor to ceiling and covered posts and doors, but he got less than ten seconds. Chutes waved him over to the crowded bar.
    â€œWhat’s your poison, Merks?”
    â€œGuinness.”
    â€œTraitor.”
    Steve looked down the long row of taps and didn’t recognize any of them.
    â€œNorthwest microbrews are all you get at the Doghouse. Now get with the program.” Chutes cuffed him on the shoulder with a bonhomie that had gone out of style while Chutes was probably still in diapers.
    â€œOkay, how about a stout?”
    Chutes turned to the bartender, a cute redhead in her early twenties. “Need a stout here, Amy. Give him a pint of the Walking Man. You’ll like this.” Chutes’s last comment sounded more like an order than a prediction.
    Steve shrugged and dug into the plate of nachos sitting on the bar. Order was big enough to gag a horse, maybe even a firefighter. Big portions. Meant he’d definitely be trying a burger tonight. He bet they’d never even heard of a wimpy quarter-pound patty here.
    â€œSo, Chutes, what the hell is your real name?”
    Chutes laughed and dug out some beans and guacamole with his chip. “Damned if I remember. Ham, Carly’s