Page 4 of T-Bone
“I don’t know!” I scrubbed my hand down my face. “What I want is to say whatever it takes to set him free so I can take my time and beat him to death the same way he did to Alina.”
“I’d help you brother, but you’d be the prime suspect and I’m too pretty for prison.”
“Foster care is as close to prison as I ever wanna get, which is the only reason that fucker gets to keep breathing.”
“So you’re going to tell them to keep him locked up?”
I nodded. “Yeah. I have to.” I looked up at the sky, letting the bright sun temporarily blind me before I turned to Pike. “If he gets out, man. I just can’t have him free in a world where I don’t have Alina.” Truthfully, I was worried about what I would do if the parole board was dumb enough to set him free.
“Come on, I’ll buy you a beer.” He nodded towards the clubhouse.
“You gonna buy me a free beer?”
He grinned, “And a shot if you ask real nice.” He smacked my arm and laughed. “Come on, let’s chill before the crazy starts.”
I enjoyed a few drinks, but I couldn’t stop thinking about that fucking parole board. My sister who never got a chance to grow old.
It was all fucked so I drank another beer and focused on the Steel Thunder Moto Rally. That would get me through the next four days, and I’d figure out the rest when the time came.
Chapter Three
Faith
My hotel room looked as if I’d been living in it for two weeks instead of two days. After leaving the police station, I drove around town to see what else had changed in the years I’d been away, to reacquaint myself with the place that had taken everything from me. Red Rock was more dilapidated than I remembered, there were more vacant businesses, more signs reminding people that even more businesses were shutting down. There wasn’t, however, a shortage of strip clubs, bars, gambling dens, and liquor stores, the hallmarks of a town in decline.
It was exactly what I expected to see the moment Red Rock PD shut down the investigation into Chloe’s death and Gemma’s disappearance. No town that fell under the spell of easy, dirty money survived very long in the aftermath. I couldn’t prove it three years ago, but I knew the powers that be in Red Rock were in the pocket of the bikers who dominated the town, and now the remnants served as another piece of evidence.
After a depressing stroll down memory lane, I went back to my hotel room and dug into the life and death of Ashley Monroe. Female, age thirty-two at the time of her death. She was an artist, who’d seen success in the past few years and had recently started selling some of her more popular works on t-shirts and handbags. She rented a two-bedroom house on a residential block in Red Rock, which was my first stop after two cups of black coffee and a stale bagel.
I approached a small craftsman with a green door and potted plants on the porch. A petite woman with a head of short, curly hair stood staring at the place. “Excuse me, are you Justine Simmons?” She turned with a dazed expression and an absent nod.
“I am. Can I help you?”
“I’m Faith, a private investigator looking into what happened to Ashley. Did you know her well?”
“Not really, no,” she sniffled and wiped her damp eyes. “Ashley was the kind of tenant you hope for, quiet and easy. She was my renter for the past seven years and she always paid on time and didn’t give me any problems.” Justine shook her head, still in shock over the sudden death, and probably the crime scene tape still blowing in the wind.
“Anything unusual happen with Ashley in the past few months? Past year?” If she had Gemma for the past few years, where was she now?
“Not unusual but recently, about two and a half years ago she stopped calling for repairs and became more self-sufficient, I guess? I didn’t think much about it at the time. It’s important for a single woman to know basic home repairs, right?”
I smiled. “My father made sure I knew how to change a tire, snake a drain, and turn a screwdriver and a wrench.”
That made her smile. “That’s what I figured, you know? After a bad breakup or a death we have to learn to do the things we relied onhimto do. She paid the rent on time and kept the house, so I didn’t think anything of it. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay Justine, you have nothing to be sorry for. Often, it’s the small details, the ones we don’t think are importantthat end up being important. Did Ashley go through a breakup recently?”
“No.” She answered in a firm tone. “She told me about a relationship that ended badly but it was four or five years ago. Said she was happily single and had no plans to change it anytime soon.”
I nodded and jotted down a few notes for later. That tracked with her social media status and spending habits. “One last thing Justine, does Ashley have any family?”
“Yeah, a half-brother, I think. She used him as an emergency contact. I can look up the details and get them to you when I get back home. All I remember is that he lives in Steel City.”
Holy shit. My first real lead.
“Thank you, Justine. I know you didn’t know Ashley well but I’m sorry.”
“Me too. She was so young,” she sighed and covered her face with both hands.
