The Inn by James Patterson & Candice Fox

Author:James Patterson & Candice Fox [Patterson, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473564619
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2019-08-04T18:30:00+00:00

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

FAT PEOPLE REPULSED Cline. They always had. Unfortunately, he couldn’t look at someone like Sheriff Clayton Spears without imagining the man naked, seeing the alien creases and folds of his figure beneath the tan uniform, the parts of him that excessively sweat or grew hair in unnatural biological reactions to his bulk. He reclined in his wing chair in the third-floor office and eyed the man perched on the settee before him scribbling notes in the stupid little notebook he held with his sausage fingers.

“And could you provide a list of the people who can vouch for your presence and activities at the party?” Clay asked. He sat back, making the settee creak. Cline was thinking how he’d dispose of the piece of furniture after the sheriff was gone. Perhaps he’d burn it. “Was there someone with you for a majority of the event?”

“I didn’t sneak out of my own party, leaving my house and my personal property unguarded in the presence of hundreds of strangers, so I could go and blow holes in the house of a man I barely know, Sheriff.” Cline rolled his eyes. “Everything in this house, everything in this room, is expensive. That lamp at your elbow is Baccarat Eye. It’s worth twelve thousand dollars.”

The sheriff looked at the lamp and seemed startled by its presence. He shifted his bulging body to the edge of the settee, apparently not wanting to make physical contact with anything in the room if he could possibly avoid it. “I can see you’re a man of taste, Mr. Cline,” the sheriff said. “You said you were in the importation business?”

“I did.”

“What do you import?”

“Focus, Sheriff.” Cline leaned his chin on his hand. “You’re not here about me. You’re here about the drive-by and the overdose. Don’t lose track.”

“Mr. Cline, I’ll ask whatever questions I deem necessary for the investigation,” the sheriff said. Cline smiled. He enjoyed a little pushback, flickers of power and protest in the fat man’s eyes, but the sheriff’s tone of voice hadn’t sold what he was saying. He was the mongrel in the room, and Cline was the purebred Doberman.

“What do you make, Sheriff?” Cline asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Your salary. What is it?”

“I make a hundred and eighteen thousand, one hundred and thirty-seven dollars.” Clay straightened on the settee. “That’s the base.”

“And that keeps you comfortable?” Cline let his eyes wander over the creature before him. “I suppose your living costs are meager. Your room at the Inn can’t cost much, and you don’t look like you blow wads of it indulging in the single man’s footloose lifestyle. That watch. Where do you even get a watch like that? Walmart? Dollar General?”

Clay turned the plastic watch on his wrist self-consciously.

“Maybe you lost everything in the divorce.” Cline yawned. Turner was on the phone in the hallway. Cline heard him murmuring, “What do you mean? How badly? A police car?”

“Now I’m the one who feels like we’re getting away from the point of my inquiry here tonight, Mr.

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