Hard Cash Valley by Brian Panowich

Author:Brian Panowich
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

* * *

Dane continued to chew on a pinstriped straw from a Waffle House to-go cup of sweet tea when Roselita answered her phone. He looked out the window at the blur of pine trees and pretended not to be interested. Roselita kept the conversation brief, using one-word answers until she ended the call and tossed the phone into the console. Dane looked over and waited to hear if the call was relevant to the case. Dane hoped it wasn’t, but the conversation had turned Roselita’s tan skin pale, so he knew it was.

“What’s the word, partner?”

“I’m not your partner.”

“Okay, whatever. Are you going to tell me what that was about?”

Roselita drove another quarter mile before she answered.

“They found Blackwell’s dealer.”

“Dealer?” The term didn’t register at first.

“The dealer,” Roselita repeated. “Arnold Blackwell’s partner. He was a midlevel pot dealer named Bobby Turo. C’mon, Dane, he’s the guy you told us to find. Well, they found him.” She sounded almost defensive before adding, “I should’ve been the one to find him instead of being out here with you.”

“Why? That’s great. Did they get anything out of him? Did they find anything that might lead us to William? Wait, you said he was a midlevel pot dealer?”

“Right. He’s dead—along with seven other people, including a woman.”

“What?”

“Those bastards who did Arnold got to them first—killed everyone in the room including a young woman named Bernadette Sellers. The house?” Agent Velasquez wiped at her face with the back of her hand. “Less than ten miles from Arnold’s rattrap apartment. We were right there.”

“Well, shit.” Dane rubbed at his knee. “Hold on, Rose. We got our people there as fast as we could. It isn’t our fault.”

“No, it’s not our fault. It’s my fault. You gave me the lead. I should’ve acted on it right then, instead of—” Roselita pounded her fist against the steering wheel. “Goddamnit.”

“Take it easy. It’s not your fault. How do they even know if the two scenes are related?”

“They’re related. August was right, but I didn’t want to listen. Geoff said the house was attacked by the same two bastards that killed Blackwell.”

“Geoff?”

“Yeah, Geoff—Dahmer. Remember? My partner.”

“He’s the one who tracked her down?”

“Yeah.”

“Did he go alone?”

Roselita didn’t care for Dane’s tone. “I’m sure he didn’t. That’s not the way we do things, Kirby, but I should’ve been there instead of here. I could’ve—”

“You couldn’t have done anything.” Dane checked his own phone for any missed messages from August. There was nothing. “What else did he say?”

“Only that it had to be related.”

“How does he know that?”

“The woman,” he said. “She fought back. She killed one of them.”

“And what makes Dahmer so sure it’s one of the same assholes who killed Blackwell?”

Roselita reached over and popped the glove box. She pulled out an ancient-looking soft pack of Marlboro Ultra Lights with a BIC lighter tucked into the outside cellophane. Dane hadn’t seen Roselita smoke before, and by the way she threw a fit half an hour back about Dane tossing his

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