Nut opened his mouth to protest, but Liam reached over and pulled the glass of beer out of the other man’s hand. Nut watched Liam drag the glass away and frowned.
“Fifty bucks,” Nut said. Liam pinned him to the wall with a glare until Nut squirmed. “I’m sorry, okay? You make do with what you have, and I was short this morning.”
“Short on beer funds.”
“Yeah, well. How the hell did you know anyway?” Nut asked.
“You’re the only person outside of the investigation that knew I was in town.”
Nut nodded, dropping his head so that he looked at the pitted tabletop. Liam slid the beer back in front of him, and Nut raised his eyes again.
“I want to ask you a few things,” Liam said.
A smile broke out on the man’s stubbled face, and he grasped the beer. “Sure, whatever you want to know, buddy.”
Liam glanced around the room to see if their table was being observed. The rest of the diners and drinkers seemed to be immersed in their own conversations; he caught no one eavesdropping or even looking in their direction.
“Tell me about the Shevlins.”
Nut tipped the glass to his lips and sucked down almost half its contents in a few swallows before wiping his mouth on a stained sleeve. “Rich as rich could be,” Nut said, lowering his voice. “Kind of the flagship couple for Tallston—old money and good looks combined. Jerry was born with two silver spoons, one in his mouth and one up his ass. His daddy was a land baron of sorts, owned thousands of acres across the river. From what I understand, he leased it to crop farmers, mostly wheat if I remember right.” Nut paused to slurp more beer. After stifling a belch, he continued. “His daddy sold most of the land about twenty years ago, and Jerry became a businessman before he was twenty-five.”
“What did he do for a living?” Liam asked.
“One of them day traders or some shit,” Nut said. “Invested in God knows what.”
“How about his wife, what was she like?”
“Easy on the eyes, Karen was. Don’t remember quite when she moved here. Don’t recall seeing her around much before she became Jerry’s girl in high school. They were homecoming king and queen, got married right out of school. Only thing that marred their perfect life was the death of their first child.”
“What happened?” Liam asked.
Nut finished the last of his beer and set the glass down on the table next to Liam’s elbow, staring at it until Liam motioned to the waitress to bring another. When the empty glass was gone, Nut took a long pull from the fresh brew and sat back in his chair.
“Where was I?”
“They lost their first child.”
“Oh yeah. Rumor was that their first boy died of complications at birth. There’s a little tombstone in their backyard where they buried him. That sobered them up a little, and it must have been too traumatic for them to go through it again, since they adopted Eric years later.”
Liam’s mind hummed with flickering thoughts. Connections like strings began to attach themselves to a bleary map in his head. “Did Jerry or Karen have any enemies in town? Did he have any business deals that went wrong?”
Nut drained more of his beer and appeared to search his mind, his dark eyes rolling almost straight up at the ceiling. “Not that I know of. The deal with Colton must have gone through fine, since the project across the river is still scheduled to start soon.”
“Colton Incorporated? Is that what the signs are for all over town?”
“Yep. Colton is out of Sweden somewhere, I believe. Huge paper company with depots all over the US. They purchased the land across the river from the Shevlins over a year ago. Talk around town is they’re gonna tear down the old foundry and build a processing plant for pulp and whatnot. I suppose they’ll use the river for transport—that’s why they chose the spot.”
“How does everyone feel about the plant going up in a small town like this?” Liam asked, something catching on a burr in his mind.
Nut shrugged and nearly finished the second beer. “Mostly good. Be more jobs created. There’s a small activist group that’s trying to stop it from going through. They say that by cutting down the trees on the other side of the river it’ll damage the ecosystem or some bullshit. Buncha hippies, if you ask me. I’m sure that big shot from Colton is fit to be tied about these murders, though. Something like this might put a hold on the city’s vote that’s coming up.”
“Who’s the big shot?”
Nut finished his beer, and without prompting, Liam had another brought to their table. “Name’s Donald something or other. He’s rentin’ a big place on the south side of town, right smack on the river. He and his team of suits have been here for a few weeks, buttering up the local government, I assume. The mayor’s got his head up his ass, so he’ll believe anyone with a little money to wave around under his nose.” Nut sipped his beer, and Liam saw the other man’s pupils tightened to pinpoints under the influence of the alcohol. “You know that shithead wanted to cut the local soup kitchen out completely? I mean, there’s not a lot of us around town without places to go, but you can’t take that away from us. Some of my friends aren’t as industrious as I am, and they count on at least one meal from that place every day.”