Page 88 of The Girl in the River

Chuck’s bony shoulders jabbed upward. “Don’t know. I admit to smoking a little weed and doing coke a few times. But I sure as hell wasn’t no drug mule.”

“Did you have enemies?” Ellie asked. “Someone who might have hurt Patty to get to you?”

“Look, I’m small potatoes around her. Maybeshewas into something illegal or got mixed up with a bad seed.” He stubbed the end of his cigarette in the can. “Why you care about Patty anyway? Sheriff in Red River Rock said he’d find whoever done that to her.”

Ellie gave him a short version. “Because we think her death may be connected to Jesse Habersham’s disappearance. And if Jesse is still alive, that she’s in danger.”

He studied the scars on his hands. “Like I said, I don’t know anything.”

Frustration knotted Ellie’s stomach. She laid her card on the table. “If you think of something that might help, please call me.”

She and Derrick stood and walked to the door, then let themselves out.

“If someone did frame him,” Ellie said, “they may have wanted him out of the way. Hyping up drug charges would have done that.”

“Or it’s possible he met another con in the pen and was so pissed off at his sister for abandoning him, that he hired someone to take care of her.”

“Yeah, but the fact that she worked with Jesse and they both disappeared can’t be a coincidence.” Ellie’s phone rang, and she yanked it from her belt and answered. “Hey, Cord.”

“I’m outside Red River Rock where a woman was found dead in her car. It went over the edge into the ravine at Lizard Creek.”

“An accident?”

“I don’t think so,” Cord said. “Sheriff Kincaid is here now. They’ve just pulled her car from the water.”

“Any ID on her?”

“Yeah, her name was Thelma Coonts.”

Ellie dug her nails into her palms. “Damn.”

“Did you know her?” Cord asked.

“We met at Moondoggy’s. She’s the waitress who told us about Patty Lasso.”

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEEN

ATLANTA

While Pixie was at the pool with that Emily woman and her brood, Kevin drove to Atlanta to do some shopping. Red River Rock and Crooked Creek had a couple of boutiques for adults and some outlet stores, but he would have nothing but the best for his little girl.

First he’d buy her some clothes, then toys. He already had a vision in his mind for her room. A white princess bed with pink and yellow tulips, frilly curtains and unicorns on the walls. It would be like her very own princess castle.

On the way to Lennox Square, he considered calling the designer he’d used in the house and asked her to draw up some plans for a playroom. Then he thought again and decided to wait. If things didn’t go smoothly with custody and he had to leave with Pixie for a while, he didn’t want anyone to get suspicious.

But he did make a call to his attorney.

“I have a daughter,” he told him then explained about Jesse being alive and having stolen his little girl from him. “I want you to start formulating a strategy against her mother so I can obtain legal custody of my child.”

Maybe they’d take a trip somewhere. Disney would be fun for Pixie, then a beach trip. A smile tugged at his lips as he imagined her in a cute little pink bathing suit and jellies, the two of them collecting seashells. He could hear the ping of them as she dropped them into the bucket and saw her little footprints in the sand, her tiny hand in his looking up at him with adoration.

She’d be a daddy’s girl in no time!

“Certainly,” his attorney agreed.

Oh, how he loved his authority. Everyone in Red River Rock respected him and his father.

Jesse would learn that, too. The hard way.

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