One Foot in the Grave (Carly Moore #3) - Denise Grover Swank Page 0,115
you again, did he?”
“No,” I said, walking around the sofa and sitting on the end next to him. “Nothing like that. I took the afternoon off to look into Heather’s murder.”
He glanced up at Marco, who still stood by the door. “You here as a deputy sheriff or Carly’s friend?”
“Carly’s friend, sir,” he said respectfully.
Hank motioned him over. “Then come sit down. No need for you to guard the door.”
Marco cracked a grin as he moved around the sofa to sit next to me.
“I take it you have questions,” Hank said, clicking off the TV.
“Yeah.”
He held his hands wide. “Ask away. I’ll tell you what I can.”
“When you were running your drug kingdom,” I said, “you said you limited it to pot and pills. I remember you saying you didn’t have the stomach to cook meth and that oxy was too hard to get. But surely people wanted those things.”
He made a face. “True, but they had to leave the area to get it. I didn’t tolerate anyone sellin’ that nonsense while I was in charge.”
“What about roofies?” Marco asked. “Or ecstasy?”
Hank’s eyes narrowed.
“I don’t give a shit about what you did in the past, Hank,” Marco said. “There’s plenty of bad shit floatin’ around now to keep us busy.”
Hank didn’t look entirely convinced.
“Did the people buying drugs ever come straight to you?” I asked.
“No. Wouldn’t bring the business into my home, and they had no reason to come to my place of business. There were too many other men around for anyone to get through.”
Did Hank used to have bodyguards? Or maybe they were just his workers who acted tough. Either way, I had to wonder where they were now. Working for Bingham?
“So if someone was lookin’ for something specific, would they go to their dealer and ask?” I said.
“This might go a little faster if you just spit out what you’re tryin’ to ask,” Hank said gruffly.
The man I knew was all bark and no bite when it came to me, although I’d seen him shoot a man dead while protecting me, so I knew he was capable of violence.
“The Drummonds paid Heather five thousand dollars to leave, but she was cooking up a plan to stay. A witness claims to have overheard her talking on the phone, telling the other person she needed drugs to put someone in a compromising position without them waking up.”
“And you think she called me?” he asked, his brow raised.
“Maybe. Or made the request of someone who could ask you. Do you remember anyone making any unusual requests around the time Heather left?”
“That question presumes I knew Heather, let alone gave a shit about her leavin’ town. So the short answer is I have no idea what kind of requests were made back then. I didn’t usually handle the little things. I was the big picture guy.”
“Did you sell roofies, Hank?” I asked quietly.
He turned to me, his expression blank. “I sold a wide variety of pills, but I never sold anything that could be used to take someone’s control from them.”
I nodded in relief.
“If someone wanted something like that around here back then,” I said, “where would they go?”
“I’m fairly certain Bingham was sellin’ the things I wouldn’t. I know he sells them now.”
Further proof that Bingham was slime, but it also confirmed that I did need to talk to him again.
“Who was she hopin’ to incapacitate?” he asked.
“We’re not sure,” I said. “Maybe Bart.”
He released a short laugh. “If she’d come to me with that purpose in mind, I would have tracked the drugs down myself. Bingham had a horse in the race if she asked him. He very much wanted to eliminate Drummond. Still does.”
Crap. That put Bingham back on the suspect list, but if he wasn’t responsible, we still needed to figure out where Heather’s car had gone.
“If someone was wanting to dump a car,” I said, “what would be the best place to do it?”
“You can’t be serious,” he scoffed.
“Other than Bingham’s chop shop.”
He slowly shook his head. “Not many places. You’d want a deep lake or mine shaft, but you’re not going to find either of those around here. You’d have to head up into Kentucky.”
I cast a glance over my shoulder to Marco.
“You’re gonna go talk to Bingham, ain’t ya?” Hank asked. When I didn’t respond, he said, “He ain’t gonna like you askin’ questions that insinuate he’s a murderer.”