Atonement

by Winter Austin

  “How are you going to approach this?” he asked.

  A wry smile turned up the corner of her mouth. “Not the way they expect.”

  The songs changed, and the lights dimmed as a girl came out onto the stage. Once the men’s attentions shifted to the dancer, Nic slipped off the stool and sidled around the bar to a dark corner Con hadn’t noticed when they came in. How she moved without attracting attention set him back. Then again, this was probably ingrained in her during her days as a sniper.

  Quietly, Con trailed her through a door that opened into the red-lit back rooms. They passed a storage cooler and a janitor’s closet that didn’t appear to get much use.

  “The barkeep’s going to figure out what you did,” he said in a low voice.

  “I expect him to, but let’s hope it takes him a while. Do you know who the owner is?”

  “Some slimy geezer who doesn’t spend much time here.” Con avoided a stack of boxes filled with empty beer bottles. “I think the barkeep is a family member.”

  “Who probably has a rap sheet a mile long.” Nic paused outside of a closed door where the sound of hushed female voices drifted out. “Please contain your maleness once this door opens and you see all that glorious female flesh.”

  He flashed what he hoped was an irritating smile. “Would you like me to close my eyes and conduct this interview blinded? It would prevent me from seeing all that glorious female flesh and not sinning.”

  Nic rolled her eyes and mumbled something.

  “What was that? I didn’t quite catch it.”

  “How does your sister put up with you?”

  He shrugged. “She loves me, I guess.”

  Nic opened the door, and he braced for the squeals sure to come once the girls saw a man back here. Nothing. His presence was rewarded with a single gasp and a few groans.

  “Does anyone man that damn back door?” a gal with a husky voice demanded.

  “What do you want?” another spat out.

  “Wow, what a jaded bunch,” Nic said, moving further into the dressing room.

  Most of the women in the room didn’t look much older than twenty-five. Con questioned if one or two of them were even of legal age to be stripping. The one with the husky voice appeared to be pushing forty, but it could be the fact she was probably hooked on marijuana or meth and this lifestyle.

  “Usually, when a cop comes in here, someone is getting their ass arrested, and we’re getting grilled about what we saw,” Husky Voice said.

  “Well, no one is getting arrested at the moment.” Nic stood in front of a disheveled blonde Con didn’t believe was older than eighteen. “’Course, I could always bring one or two of you in on suspicion of underage drinking and”—she sniffed the girl’s robe—what little of it there was—“drug use.”

  “Oh, give it a break, bitch. We’ve heard it all before.” Apparently, Husky Voice was the ringleader.

  Con shifted closer to Nic. The vibe in the room was turning uglier. If making all of these rough-and-tumble strippers mad was part of Nic’s plan, she’d gone loco.

  She turned to the ringleader and pulled out the picture of Giselle they’d taken from her home instead of using a photo from the morgue. “I had this theory and wanted to see if I was right.” Nic held up the picture for everyone in the room.

  Con watched some of the younger women closely, waiting for a reaction. The blonde did her best to keep her features stone cold, but he spotted the flicker of recognition in the girl’s eyes.

  “I’m sure you heard the rumors that Giselle Tomberlin passed away this week.” Nic circulated the dressing room, pausing in front of each woman. “Kind of tragic. A young woman like that with a full life in front of her, and she cuts it short. On a whim.”

  The blonde clutched her robe and swallowed hard. Bingo. She was the weakest link.

  He caught Nic’s eye and winked. She cocked her head to the side and gave a subtle nod; she got the message.

  “What’s that got to do with us?” Husky Voice snapped.

  Nic stopped in front of her. “You tell me.” A chill fell over the room at the sharp edge to her tone.

  Husky Voice’s scowl deepened, and she looked Nic up and down, as if sizing her up for a fight. “I remember who you are now. You’re that shooter who killed Dusty Walker.”

  Nic didn’t flinch this time when her kill shot was mentioned. Instead, she invaded the other woman’s personal space. Was she getting past the guilt?

  “Did Giselle work here?”

  “No,” Husky Voice said, unfazed.

  “That wasn’t so hard.” Nic returned the picture to her jacket pocket. “I think I’m done here.” She turned her back on Husky Voice.

  Con stiffened when the other woman twitched as if she wanted to attack Nic, but one look at him and Husky Voice relaxed against the vanity she stood in front of. He waited for Nic to leave the dressing room before following her out. They didn’t speak as they made their way back to the front of the bar. Slipping out of the back hall, they came face to face with the barkeep.

  “No one is supposed to be back there except employees.”

  “Oh, my bad. I thought this was the way to the restrooms,” Nic remarked.

  Angry lines etched deep on the barkeep’s face. “I’ll be giving a call to your boss, Deputy.”

  “You do that. I’ll be sure to let him know about the pictures I took of the boxes of pseudoephedrine back there. I think he’d love to crack down on another meth house.”

  “There are no boxes back there.”

  “Aren’t there?”

  Con’s nerves tingled. What the hell was Nic doing? It was like she was purposely provoking the bear to attack.

  “Get out of here,” the barkeep snarled.

  Con kept a watch on the barkeep and anyone else in the joint who presented a threat as they left. Once the door closed behind his back, he pushed Nic forward until they were beside her Jeep.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  “What I do best.”

  “Piss people off to the point they want to physically harm you?”

  She didn’t even have the grace to look ashamed of her actions. “This is me, Con. You have The General to thank for that.” She moved to get around him, but he blocked her way.

  “This shouldn’t be you. It’s time you drop the tough-girl act. The people of Eider and McIntire County won’t stand for it.”

  “Maybe it’s time someone kicked them in the balls and brought them into the twenty-first century, because this outdated mentality is going to be the death of them.”

  “And you think you’re going to be the one to do it?”

  The sound of metal hinges squealing from disuse brought them to a stop.

  Nic crossed her arms and smiled smugly. “Yeah, maybe it is me.” She pointed toward the back of the building.

  Peeking around the corner was the young blonde, their weakest link. Bloody hell, there’d be no living with Nic after this.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  If this was what a smug Nic looked like, strutting across the parking lot, Con didn’t want to see her when she was wrong. He didn’t know if the young woman would discuss whatever it was she had to say if he was there, but after the way Nic provoked two people inside the bar, he didn’t want her riling this stripper and have her shut down. If the barkeep found out what they were doing out back, cop or not, he’d end any conversation. What could potentially happen to the blonde made Con’s blood run cold.

  He caught up with Nic before she got too close to the young woman. “Let me handle this.”

  “She’s not going to give you the time of day because you’re a man, and you know it. No offense.”

  “None taken. However, I’ve seen you push enough buttons for the day. I’ll take some flack.”

  “I don’t need you running interference to save me face.”

  “Far be it for me to save you face. You’ve made it abundantly clear you don’t give two shites what people around h
ere think about you. But I do, because I’ve lived here for a long time, and they trust and like me. Makes my job easy at times when they continue to think that way.”

  His jab cracked her facade, and she averted her gaze. Now he felt like a heel for saying it. He sighed. “Nic, I—”

  “Save it. You meant it. Don’t try to apologize.” She flicked her hand at the young woman. “Have at it.”

  He hesitated, trying to decide if having Nic mad at him was a good thing or not. How’d he get himself into these messes with her?

  The blonde backed into a little corner of the building, sending worried glances at the back door. “I wanna help you, but if she catches me out here, I’m done.”

  “She?” Con asked.

  “Linda, the one who you talked with in there. She runs this place.”

  That was a shocker—a stripper running her own business and still doing the job.

  “What’s your name?”

  The girl sniffed, running her hand under her nose. Before coming out here she’d put on a pair of sweats and a T-shirt. She glanced again at the back door before leaning closer. “Just call me Flo.”

  What an odd choice for a woman that young, but what did he care as long as she was talking? “’Kay, Flo, did you know Giselle?”

  She nodded. “She started working here a few months back.”

  “Why would Linda lie about knowing Giselle?”

  “She drove Linda completely mental because she’d argue with her about how things should be done and who’d she’d dance for and stuff like that. They hated each other, but Linda kept her on because she brought in customers we hadn’t seen before who paid big.”

  “How big?” Nic butted in.

  With great effort, Con had to resist scowling at her for the intrusion. Did she really not trust him to know what questions to ask?

  “Big, like guys who pass through here going to Iowa City or Des Moines.”

  “Passing through? Where were they coming from?” Nic again.

  He wanted to step in front of her and back her up so she’d butt out.

  But Flo kept coming with the answers. Geesh, she was a chatty one. “St. Louis, Kansas City, I don’t know for sure. Maybe some from Chicago.”

  Managing to catch Nic’s attention, Con frowned at her. She got the hint and shrugged, as if to say “my bad.”

  “There was this one guy who showed up a lot. Giselle spent a lot of time talking with him outside. I caught them a few times when I’d slip out for a toke.” Flo scratched at a spot on her cheek, seemed obsessed by it. “I asked her why he was so damn interested in her, and she told me it wasn’t any of my business. Until a few weeks back. She said I could get out of this hellhole and screw Linda over.”

  “How?” he asked.

  “Said this guy had some kind of escort business he ran in a city—I can’t remember which one—and wanted her to come work for him. She offered me a chance to go, too, but I had to get clean first.”

  “That was it? She didn’t tell you any more than that?”

  Flo hugged her body and curled inside herself. “She wouldn’t tell me more, not even the guy’s name, just called him the P-Man. I thought it stood for Profit Man.”

  “Why would Giselle want to do something like this escort deal?”

  “Because she wanted to get the hell out of here. She was trying to save up to move to one of those bigger cities, but she wasn’t making enough at her daytime job.”

  “Do you know if her family knew about her plans?”

  Flo wagged her head. “No. I don’t think they got along too well. She joked once that if they ever found out she was stripping, they’d all die and head straight to purgatory to start repaying her racked-up sin debt.”

  That’s not how Giselle’s mother made it sound when he and Sheriff Hamilton spoke with her. Then again, this was Eider, where people didn’t air their dirty family secrets like they did their washed socks. A rogue daughter would be a stain on the Tomberlin family. So, had Giselle’s lies and secrets piled up to the point she couldn’t take it anymore and decided to end her life? With help?

  “None of this makes sense,” Flo moaned. “Why would she kill herself when she was about to get outta here?”

  “Do you know if she had any other guys taking interest in her more than the usual?” Nic asked. She’d been quiet long enough for Con to forget she was there.

  “Not any of the out-of-town guys. A few of our locals spent a lot of time watching her; one or two would be here every time she danced. They both showed up the other night when she was supposed to be working. That was the night y’all said she died.”

  “Remember who those guys were who showed up here?” Con asked.

  Flo wrinkled her nose. “Yeah. It was Doug Walker and the mayor.”

  “The mayor?” he blurted.

  “He was here a lot to watch her. That creep is old enough to be my dad and Giselle’s.”

  A rattle behind the back door startled Flo. She tiptoed around Con, heading for the door. “I need to get back in there before Linda starts missing me.”

  He extracted a business card and placed it inside Flo’s palm, curling her fingers around it. “If you think of anything else, call me at the number on the card. And if Linda gives you any trouble, call me.”

  She nodded, her head bouncing like a Bobblehead, then she bolted inside the building.

  Con only had a second to react before Nic grabbed his arm and dragged him back to the vehicles. “Don’t say another word, get in your vehicle, and follow me.”

  Her authoritative tone grated, and he wanted to bite her head off for it. But to avoid a scene here in the parking lot of a strip bar, he did what she demanded and trailed her down the road until she pulled into the entryway to a plowed cornfield.

  Parking next to her Jeep, he got out, shut the door, and marched around the SUV. “What was that all about?”

  Nic leaned against the hood of her vehicle and crossed her arms. “I got the feeling we were being watched and needed to get us out of there.”

  “You could have mentioned that.”

  “I didn’t want our eavesdropper to know I suspected. And I needed time to process what we now know. Damn it, Con, Walker keeps showing up in this investigation in the wrong places, and not as a deputy.”

  “And you think he’s the one behind these suicides? Come on, Nic, does he cross you as the type to spew propaganda like atoning for sins?”

  “I don’t know—you’re the one who’s lived here longer, and you think you know these people. Why don’t you tell me if he’s the type?”

  “You work with him. Speech patterns like that are bound to pop up.”

  She shook her head, making the loose tendrils of hair fly. Dropping her arms, she moved away from the Jeep and paced.

  He couldn’t stand watching her like this. Her agitation might lead to another panic attack, or worse. He had to find a way to calm her down. “The night we suspected Giselle killed herself was the night I stopped Walker from pushing a fight on you in the pub. Gave him that bruise on his face. He was skunk drunk; no way he could’ve pulled off something like that. Look at it this way: he was most likely banging her. Why would he give that up and help her kill herself?”

  “What about the mayor?”

  “Apparently he likes to get his jollies off with someone other than his wife. Doesn’t mean he’s a meticulous, cold-hearted assistant to suicide.”

  She threw up her hands. “Then what does it mean?”

  Taking her hands, he gently pulled her to him. “You’re not thinking rationally. Calm down and let’s work through this. There’s some logic somewhere.”

  Nic looked at their joined hands, then shook free. She backed up a few steps and eyed him warily. Her actions cut deep. Last night when she’d pushed him away after their dance, he could chalk it up to nerves. But this time, she was purposely avoiding him.

  “There is no logic to suicide, Con.” Her voice was rough.

  A beige sedan c
rawled past, stopped, and turned around. Con groaned as he recognized Agent Hunt’s rental. Just what they didn’t need—the fed’s two cents in this conversation.

  “Does anyone answer their phones around here?” Hunt barked as he climbed out of his car.

  “Not around here, because we have no cell reception. We’re right in a hole,” Con answered. “Why couldn’t you just wait for us at the station?”

  “Because I didn’t want any unwanted ears hearing this.” Hunt eyed Nic as he handed one sheet of faxed paper to her, then a second one to Con. “I already talked to Hamilton about this, and he insisted I get the two of you up to speed.”

  Nic flipped up her sheet and waved it. “There’s been more like these?”

  Con’s sheet said the same thing; it was a duplicate fax.

  Hooking his hands on his hips, Hunt nodded. “Our little push-through on the tox screens popped some other cold suicide cases at DCI. They happened more than two years ago, and the investigators there suspected the same as you. I asked for any lab results from those cases, and this is what they sent me. I’m expecting to see the same thing from your victims.”

  Nic read the results. “Most of the victims had a mix of Ambien and Elavil in their systems. In one of them they discovered a high dose of Prednisone. Stomach contents showed a small amount of a wafer-like food and traces of alcohol. Was this how the drugs got introduced into the victim?”

  “Possibly.”

  “They were drugged.” Con felt like someone had kicked him right in the gut. His safe haven had brought in a killer. He could deal with the sense of hopelessness and poverty that led people to alcoholism and drugs, the abuse and neglect, and the occasional despair that sweet-talked someone into leaving this life. But a killer, that he couldn’t allow. “This has happened before in another town? Someone has seduced people into taking their lives over sins?”

  “What was it that Sheila Walker said in her emails with Seth Moore?” Nic asked. “Something about ... ”