Blindsighted (Grant County #1) - Karin Slaughter Page 0,52
Sibyl was sighted again. To this day, Lena thought this trick was what made her a good detective. She paid attention to detail. She listened to her gut instinct. Right now, her gut was telling her any more time focusing on Gordon was wasted.
“Hey there,” Hank said, taking a Coke out of the refrigerator. He held up a bottle for Lena, but she shook her head.
Lena asked, “Where did those come from?”
“I went to the store,” he said. “How’d it go today?”
Lena didn’t answer his question. “Why did you go to the store?”
“You didn’t have anything to eat,” he said. “I’m surprised you haven’t wasted away.”
“I don’t need you to go to the store for me,” Lena countered. “When are you going back to Reece?”
He seemed pained by her question. “In a couple of days, I guess. I can stay with Nan if you don’t want me here.”
“You can stay here.”
“It’s no trouble, Lee. She’s already offered her sofa.”
“You don’t need to stay with her,” Lena snapped. “Okay? Just drop it. If it’s only a few days, that’s fine.”
“I could stay in a hotel.”
“Hank,” Lena said, aware her voice was louder than it needed to be. “Just drop it, okay? I’ve had a really hard day.”
Hank fiddled with his bottle of Coke. “Wanna talk about it?”
Lena bit back the “Not with you” that was on the tip of her tongue. “No,” she said.
He took a swig of Coke, staring somewhere over her shoulder.
“There are no leads,” Lena said. “Other than the list.” Hank look puzzled, and she explained, “We’ve got this list of everybody who moved to Grant in the last six years who’s a sexual predator.”
“They keep a list of that?”
“Thank God they do,” Lena said, heading off any civil liberties arguments he wanted to start. As an ex-addict, Hank tended to side with personal privacy over common sense. Lena was in no mood for a discussion about how ex-cons had paid their dues.
“So,” Hank said, “you’ve got this list?”
“We’ve all got lists,” Lena clarified. “We’re knocking on doors, trying to see if anybody matches up.”
“To?”
She stared at him, trying to decide whether or not to go on. “Someone with a violent sexual assault in their background. Someone who’s white, between the ages of twenty-eight and thirty-five. Someone who thinks of himself as a religious person. Someone who might have seen Sibyl around. Whoever attacked her knew her routines, so this person had to be someone who knew her by sight or in passing.”
“That sounds like a pretty narrow margin.”
“There are nearly a hundred people on the list.”
He gave a low whistle. “In Grant?” He shook his head side to side, not quite buying this.
“That’s just the last six years, Hank. I guess if we go through these without finding anyone, we’ll go back even further. Maybe ten or fifteen years.”
Hank pushed his hair back off his forehead, giving Lena a good look at his forearms. She pointed to his bare arms. “I want you to keep your coat on tonight.”
Hank looked down at the old track marks. “If you want me to, okay.”
“Cops will be there. Friends of mine. People I work with. They see those tracks and they’re gonna know.”
He looked down at his arms. “I don’t think you’d have to be a cop to know what these are.”
“Don’t embarrass me, Hank. It’s bad enough I had to tell my boss you’re a junkie.”
“I’m sorry about that.”
“Yeah, well,” Lena said, not knowing what else to offer. She was tempted to look him over, to pick at him until he exploded and she got a good fight out of him.
Instead, she turned in her chair, looking away from him. “I’m not in the mood for a heart-to-heart.”
“Well, I’m sorry to hear that,” Hank said, but he did not get up. “We need to talk about what to do with your sister’s ashes.”
Lena held her hand up to stop him. “I can’t do that right now.”
“I’ve been talking to Nan—”
She interrupted him. “I don’t care what Nan has to say about this.”
“She was her lover, Lee. They had a life together.”
“So did we,” Lena snapped. “She was my sister, Hank. For God’s sake, I’m not going to let Nan Thomas have her.”
“Nan seems like a real nice person.”
“I’m sure she is.”
Hank fiddled with the bottle. “We can’t leave her out of this just because you’re uncomfortable with it, Lee.” He paused, then, “They were in love with each other. I don’t know why you have a problem accepting that.”