Page 18 of Deadly Sins: Gluttony
“Suit yourself.”He grabbed another can out of the refrigerator and then leaned against the bar.“Let’s see now … aside from our deadbeat sheriff there’s Dwayne Sutton, Blake Dalton, and Vince Slater.There were a few others, but they weren’t as aggressive.”
“Do Dwayne, Blake, and Vince still live around here?”
“Dwayne and Blake, yeah.They’re still the same worthless wastes of space they were when we were in school.Blake more than Dwayne.He’s gotten a lot friendlier.They went into business together, opened a barbecue joint on Ravenwood Drive.”
“The Rusty Spur.”
He pointed in my direction.“That would be the one.”
“I passed by their place when I was on the haunted history walking tour.”
He slapped a hand to his knee, laughing.“You did Ichabod’s tour, eh?”
“I thought it was great.You have no idea how much I want the story he told about Esmerelda’s spirit wandering the streets of this town to be true.”
He looked me in the eye and said, “Oh, it is, believe me.”
“You say it like you’ve seen her.”
“I haven’t, but my dad swears he saw her once, and he doesn’t believe in ghosts.Or, I should say … hedidn’t.Now, he doesn’t know what to think.”
I glanced at a text message I’d just received from Cade, realizing I was running late for dinner.
Time to wrap up.
“We’ve talked about Dwayne and Blake, but you’ve said nothing about Vince.”
He crossed one leg in front of the other.“I’m afraid ol’ Vince got what was coming to him in the end.”
Got what was coming to him?
“What do you mean?”I asked.
He offered me a tight, uneasy smile, then said, “Vince Slater couldn’t have murdered Gideon.”
“Why not?”
“He’s dead.”
12
Vince Slater was dead, making him the center of my thoughts the next morning.Death by drowning at a lake just outside of town.On the surface, it looked like bad luck.But Vince was on the high school swim team.
What’s more, Greg said Vince hadn’t just run with the bullies—he’d led them, the self-appointed king of their pack.On the day he died, he’d taken his father’s boat out on the lake with a girl named Maisy Goodwin, planning nothing more than an afternoon adrift in the sun.Instead, he ended up in the water.The coroner pegged his blood alcohol level at 0.40 percent, high enough to kill most men outright.
I parked in front of The Rusty Spur and turned toward Cade.“You ready for a bite to eat and some intense grilling?”
“Always,” he said, leaning in for a kiss.
I’d been eager to meet with Dwayne and Blake all morning, and the prospect of their barbecue was a welcome bonus.
We entered the restaurant and approached a cute, young waitress with a bright smile that lit up her freckled face.“Welcome in, y’all.Two of you for lunch?”
“Yes, please,” I said.
She grabbed a couple of menus off the counter.“Follow me.”
We were escorted to a booth.I sat down, and Cade slid in next to me, and she began rattling off the day’s specials—a burnt ends platter, a smoked turkey club with barbecue mayonnaise, and smoked meatloaf with mashed potatoes and cornbread muffins.
