my lunch while I worked, which was definitely against the rules.
“Good afternoon, Carly,” she whispered as I signed in on the log-in sheet at her desk. “I’ve got number two all ready for you.”
“Thanks,” I said with a smile.
“What are you working on today?” she asked eagerly.
“That’s a good question,” I said. “I think I’ve about exhausted my resources.”
For the past six months or so, I’d spent several days a week researching Max’s father, Bart Drummond. The Drummonds had supposedly founded the town two hundred years ago, give or take a few decades, and they’d essentially run it ever since. Even though Bart wasn’t as wealthy as he’d once been, given his lumber business had been closed for years and his moonshine business was less profitable now that it was legal, he still had plenty of power.
For decades, he’d ruled the area with a favor system—people went to him requesting favors, and they would then have to agree to do an unidentified favor for him at a later date in return, no questions asked. Rumor had it that Bart requested a wide variety of favors, from getting weekly deliveries of fresh tomatoes from a person’s garden to murder. Refusing would come with dire consequences.
But that was all I had: rumors. Though there were a lot of them, and I believed in the saying “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”
I was determined to find the burning embers.
Since last December, I’d been researching every seemingly motiveless murder or crime that had been recorded in the area over the past two decades. I had a notebook full of them, and I was the first to admit that most of what I’d found probably amounted to nothing. People did horrible things and often for absolutely no acceptable reason. But a few of the leads I’d found seemed promising. Which was why I’d decided to start asking questions of the people involved. Marco had been worried that Bart would get wind of what I was doing and come after me or the people I cared about.
He’d been right to worry.
The morning of Jerry’s murder, a man had shown up at Marco’s house after he left for work. At the time of his break-in, I was in the shower, and when I smelled smoke and heard a noise in the kitchen, I came running out—only to find a middle-aged man sitting at Marco’s kitchen table, smoking a cigarette. He’d told me to “let this go” or someone I cared about would find themselves in an accident. Like a fool, I’d mouthed off, telling him to inform his boss that I’d do whatever I damn well felt like.
Less than twelve hours later, Jerry had been run off the road.
I still didn’t know who had sent that man to Marco’s place but I felt fairly sure he was wrapped up in Bart and Emily Drummond’s orbit. Because it had become clear to me that Emily knew more than she’d let on. She’d called me Caroline, for one thing, and for another, she’d told me that Todd Bingham had information that could put her husband away.
I didn’t trust Emily much more than I did Bart, but I’d approached Bingham anyway. He’d agreed to meet with me, only I’d bailed on our meeting out of worry that the intruder with the cigarette had done something to Marco. Although I didn’t know it at the time, Marco had been late getting to the tavern because he’d discovered Jerry after the accident.
Bingham had warned me that he wouldn’t talk if I ran out on him, and apparently he’d meant it, because he still refused to respond to my messages. Learning about Jerry hadn’t softened him.
The murder of my friend suggested that I was on the right track with my research, but it also had raised the stakes to the point where I didn’t feel comfortable taking a direct approach and talking to the people in my notebook. I felt like I was at an impasse. Still, Carnita didn’t know any of that. She thought I’d started researching the town out of curiosity.
“I’m not sure what I’m going to research,” I said with a frown. “The internet only goes back so far.”
“Do you want to pull out the microfiche again?” she asked. I’d examined old newspaper articles before, especially when I didn’t have computer time reserved.
“Maybe,” I said, although going through microfiche was beyond tedious. If I performed searches on the internet, I could at least rule out many of the results.
“Tell me what