Home for the Haunting(82)
“You see,” Graham said in a low voice. “I’m not the only one worried about you.”
“I know. You’re right. So, let’s go talk to Monty.”
He gave me a pained look. “I thought we were going to talk to some mystery guy, then going to dinner.”
“We are, but it’s still early. The fellow I want to talk to isn’t far from Monty’s house. You’ll be my backup.”
“Okay, so go over this whole thing for me one more time, will you?” Graham asked. As we drove back across town, I gave him the lowdown as far as I knew it. It was helpful to hear myself talk aloud about the situation. As I spoke, I thought about what Kobe said about Ms. Lee receiving money from Dave, and how he’d reacted when I mentioned telling her about his behavior. And the gun, and how the house that burned was right next to hers . . .
We pulled to a stop at the corner of Noble and Dover streets. Graham remained silent. I looked over at him and realized he was trying not to chuckle.
“What?”
Now he let loose with a little whoop.
“What?”
He held up his hands in surrender. “Hey, far be it from me to second-guess the crime-solving, ghost-catching queen of the construction trade. But little old Ms. Lee, the retired schoolteacher? You seriously think she masterminded some sort of drug-payoff/murder scenario? This is the woman with the model railroad in her illegal add-on porch? The one with the three-legged cat?”
I could feel my cheeks flame.
“I’m just trying to keep an open mind,” I mumbled. “I may be a crime-solving genius, but if you’ve noticed, so far my genius pretty much arises from accidents. I haven’t actually guessed the perpetrators before they, you know, try to kill me.”
Graham looked suddenly serious. “Yes, that part I’ve noticed.”
“Anyway . . . if Monty can walk . . . maybe he really was part of this. I don’t even know what to make of that.”
“You drive me insane, you know that?”
I did my best to channel Cookie, copping what I hoped passed for a coquettish smile. “In more ways than one, I hope.”
He reached out and pulled an unruly corkscrew curl. It bounced back immediately. It annoyed me, which he knew perfectly well.
“Let me assure you,” he said as he pulled me into the circle of his arms, which pushed the annoyance right out of my consciousness. “You drive me crazy in any number of ways. This one happens to be my favorite.”
We shared a long kiss.
When I finally pulled away, he started to lean in for another kiss, but then pulled back with a resigned look on his face.
“You’re plotting, aren’t you? Fess up. While I’m getting carried away kissing you, you’re thinking about your next move in whatever crazy investigation you’re conducting. Might as well tell me what it is.”
“It’s not that big a deal, really. I just want to talk to the local drug dealer. Real quick. Kobe told me where I could find him.”
We were in a dicey neighborhood. There was a group of young teenagers sitting on the steps, and I thought about Ms. Lee saying that kids as young as ten were sometimes recruited by gangs.
A young boy, no older than Kobe, came to the passenger-side window. Graham leaned over me and spoke to him.
“Have you seen this woman?” I handed out the photo of Linda.
“We’re not cops, and we don’t care what you’re doing here,” said Graham as he handed him a twenty. “We’re just friends, looking for this woman. There’s another twenty in it for you if you take the photo to your friends and ask them about her.”
After a few moments an older teenager approached the car. He walked cautiously, approaching the vehicle sideways, his hands down at his sides, as though ready to pull a piece if he needed to. He grabbed the money.
“Yeah, I seen her,” he said. “A regular. Not for a while, though.”
“What did she buy from you, do you remember?”
“All she bought was oxy and pot. She wasn’t what you’d call hard-core. Just, like, a user.”
• • •
“Well, that was a bust.”
“And I’m out forty bucks,” Graham commented.
“I’ll pay you back.”
“What did you expect to learn?”
“Just what she was on, I guess. And to be sure she really was an addict—you never know. Everyone keeps saying that, but I didn’t feel like I knew for sure. Oxy isn’t an opioid, is it?”
“I have no idea. This isn’t my area of expertise.”
“You seem to know how to get dealers to answer questions.”
“I’ve seen TV. And offering money comes in handy in a lot of scenarios. So, now we go to dinner?”