Chapter Fifty-Four
Quinn arrives in Beaver City late afternoon. The nursing home is in a nondescript building off the interstate. He doesn’t have an appointment, isn’t sure about visiting hours, so this could be a waste of time.
At the front desk he’s met with a heavyset woman who wears too much makeup. She looks lazily up at him. She’s reading Star magazine, which has the headline JONBENéT MOM FLEES HUBBY AS COPS CLOSE IN.
“Can I help you?” she asks unenthusiastically.
“Yes, hi,” Quinn says, channeling some aw-shucks charm, then a lie: “I’m here to see my grandfather.”
The woman frowns. “Visiting hours end at five.” She eyes the clock on the wall. It’s 5:03 p.m.
Quinn does his best to look downtrodden. “Darn it. I’m in town for only today, visiting everyone before my next surgery.” He gestures his scar. “I was in the army and…”
Piling on the lies isn’t ideal but he thinks that sympathy is his only hope of getting to meet with the sheriff.
She thinks for a moment. “My son was in the service. That happen in the Gulf?”
He nods. Another lie; it’s easier than explaining Somalia.
“My son did two tours. He’s never been the same.”
Quinn feels like crap for lying. He gives her an understanding nod, one that acknowledges that combat changes you forever. That part is the truth at least.
“What’s your grandfather’s name?” she asks at last.
“Colton Rupert,” Quinn says.
“Ah, Colt. He’s a curmudgeon, that one.” She smiles like it’s endearing.
“That’s him. All those years as a cop I guess.”
She picks up the phone, says something.
“Take a seat,” she says to Quinn.
A few minutes pass, and he’s starting to worry that Colton Rupert has called his bluff.
But soon, a slight Black man with a mustache in a nursing home uniform retrieves him.
“Your grandfather is a trip,” the guy says, as he escorts Quinn through the nursing home. “Asked me if I’m in the Crips or Bloods.”
“Sorry about that.”
The guy shrugs, like he’s used to casual racism.
He knocks on the door then enters. “We’ve got a visitor for you, Colt.”
“They already told me that,” the man grumbles. He’s in a wheelchair facing out the window. He doesn’t turn around.
“I’ll leave you to it,” the guy says, shaking his head on his way out.
When the door is shut, Colt Rupert says, “I got no grandson so you have thirty seconds to tell me who you are and what this is about before I call the police.”
“My name is Quinn. I’m a private investigator. I’m here to talk about the Megan Tucker case.”
The former sheriff spins around in his wheelchair quickly, examines Quinn. “About damn time.”