Chapter 11 Colton
Colton
“She don’t look all warm and motherly,” Greg said, giving the lady sitting and waiting the hairy eyeball.
Colton didn’t disagree. Maddie definitely looked pissed off. “If Yate came and grabbed you, tell me you’d be smiling and singing ‘Achy Breaky Heart’.”
“If I sang that, Scrap, I’d hope you planted your size twelve up my bo-hiney for acting like a newborn fool.”
Colton laughed like he always did when Greg called his ass his bo-hiney. He knew his cousin did it to settle him down a tick. It worked, but then he realized something, and his anxiety kicked back. “Do you think Yate searched her bag?”
“I wouldn’t bet my life on it,” Greg said honestly. “You know how he gets whenever Dad makes him do work. Acts like he isn’t a real deputy, so why him?”
Which was so comforting since Colton was going to have to bet his life on it. “I think Uncle Ted picks him because he complains so much. None of the other part-timers huff and spew. They like the job.”
“You’re not wrong.” Greg frowned. “Yate just likes wearing the hat and having a badge. If Dad hadn’t been his friend since school, he’d be asked to turn in his badge.”
That wasn’t entirely true. Yate was good when they really needed him. He just didn’t like doing the little shit that comes with the job. Colton sucked in a deep breath, girding his loins, and grabbed his pad from the desk. “Time to put all that fancy academy training to use.”
Maddie Brown stared a hole in him when he entered. “Yep pissed as shit.” He nodded and took the seat across from her. “Morning, Ms. Brown. I’m Deputy McAllen.”
“I know who you are. It’s written on your shirt.” She pointed, and he instinctively ducked his head. “Why exactly am I here, and where is Zachariah?”
She got right to it, didn’t she? “I need to explain a few things first.”
“Ah, yes. Got to read me my rights.”
Jesus, he just wanted to figure this shit out. He wasn’t the goddamn bad guy. “No, ma’am. You’re not under arrest.”
She raised an eyebrow. “So when a deputy shows up and says you need to go with him because the sheriff said so, that doesn’t make a person under arrest in these parts?
Christ, he was going to smack the shit out of Yate. He pointed to the chain beside her chair. “If you were under arrest, you’d be cuffed to the floor, and your belongings would be scattered across an evidence table to be cataloged. We’re small, ma’am but we’re not stupid.”
“So I’m free to go?” Her glare said she begged to differ.
He shrugged and tried to let her see that he was trying here. This wasn’t just a small-town department fucking with carnies. “Yes, ma’am, you are, but if you do, you won’t learn what you really want to know.”
“Cute and smart.” Her pinched look softened.
That was him. A-fucking-dorable. “Like I said, you’re not under arrest, ma’am. You can leave at any time. Second, there’s a camera up there.” He pointed over his shoulder and waited until her eyes followed. “The video is on, and there are three mics that pick up everything.”
“So everything I say is recorded.”
“Yes, ma’am. I can’t turn it off. If that changes your mind, let me know.”
She pulled her hair down, then put it back up, and he just waited. “Where’s Zach?”
Her first salvo wasn’t unexpected, but she wasn’t as cooperative as he’d hoped. “I can’t tell you, but you have my word he’s safe.”
“Oh, that soothes me bone deep.” She watched him like a rattler watched a preacher. “I’m not under arrest, Zach’s not here, and your sheriff had someone pick me up and bring me to the station. Why?”
Colton flipped the page of his notebook and clicked his pen. “What’s really going on with the Baxter Boys?”
“Did you talk to Zach?”
Maddie Brown might just have the best poker face Colton had ever seen. Zach said she was a survivor. He wasn’t sure if that helped him or not. “He told the sheriff Jeb Baxter never confided in him.”
“That’s the God’s own truth.” Her chin dipped in a nod.
Still not being helpful. He needed to push a bit harder. “Unfortunately, as Jeb’s only heir and majority owner, we have to assume he knew what was going on and participated with his grandfather.”
She snorted softly and leaned back in her seat. “Look deputy, cut the games. Don’t think threatening Zach is going to guilt me into telling you anything. You won’t be able to pin shit on him, because he didn’t do anything.”
God, Colton hoped that was the truth. He wanted Zach to be what he’d thought—an innocent fiddle player that was having a bad time. “But Jeb did.”
“Jeb was no angel. If anything, he was his own devil.” She gave him a hard look. “Zach trusted you, and he doesn’t do that easily. He said you saw him, not something superficial. It’s too bad you two couldn’t have tried.”
Colton schooled his expression. There was a difference between not in the closet and talking about the dude he had the hots for on the job. “That’s not what we’re here to chat about, ma’am.”
“No?” She smiled and shook her head. “If you pass on that boy you aren’t as smart as I gave you credit for. Zach’s special. I’m probably being a foolish old woman talking to you, but I’ll tell you what I know. For Zach’s sake.”
She was mocking him, but according to Zach she cared about him. Colton sure as shit hoped that was the truth.
“You got to know, Jeb Baxter came into this world a nobody. Born and raised in the Shenandoah Valley to dirt-poor people. Only thing he was good at was playing the fiddle. Earned him a music scholarship to Virginia Tech. Laurel Betterman was from as old a family as the south could find. Plantations, slaves, the South will rise again, everything. Laurel went to Radford, which was an all-girls school at the time.” She settled into her story like she’d been planning to tell it for years.
“Jeb played a concert at Radford, and Laurel fell in love. Her family didn’t approve of course, but she didn’t listen to them.
Married him as soon as they both finished school. ”
She went on to explain how the Betterman family had left Laurel a small fortune, and Laurel had a little girl, Mary Elizabeth, while Jeb toured the country with a band.
“When Mary Elizabeth was seven, Laurel died in childbirth. The baby was stillborn. It changed Jeb. It also left him with a daughter to raise and very limited access to the funds in her trust, thanks to that lawyer, Lee.”
Now that was a name he knew, and his ears perked up. “This lawyer for the trust, is that Beauregard Lee?”
“That’s the son. Randolph Robert E. Lee was the original trustee.” Colton laughed, and she smiled. “I did say this was the heart of the old south.”
“My daddy’s middle name is Lee. I get it.” Look at him, gaining a rapport. Uncle Ted would be busting his buttons. “How did Jeb solve his money problem?”
“How much did the festival pay Jeb?” she shot back.
The sheriff was asking the same question, so they were getting somewhere. “I don’t know, but I believe the sheriff might.”
“Six thousand three hundred dollars. Three hundred a show for three shows a night and a seven-night stand. If you were to find copies of the contract Jeb kept for tax purposes, it says he got ten thousand per show.” She raised an eyebrow.
“Jeb’s bank account showed a hell of a lot more than what this show was worth.
Colton snorted. His ass. “Fred Jenkins ain’t got ten thousand dollars a day to pay no one.”
“I can’t speak to that, but he didn’t pay Jeb. A crime family out of Philadelphia did. Jeb received ten percent to launder the money.”
He felt his eyebrow raise up to his hairline.
A fucking East Coast crime family? Like the Sopranos kind of mob?
His possible pick-up was a mobster? What the actual fuck was going on here, and where the hell was Uncle Ted?
This was way over anything they dealt with.
They did traffic stops and arrested drunk assholes who hit their wives, for fuck’s sake.
“Where exactly did Ulmstead come into this?”
“When Zach was just little, his momma overheard Jeb talking to one of the men from Philadelphia who came in person to discuss business. She, being her daddy’s girl, charged in and told Jeb she wanted no part of his dirty scam.
She grabbed her boyfriend and drove off.
They were found inside the charred remains of the car. ”
Fuck a doodle goddamn doo. “How’d Zach escape?”
“He was with me at the time. My grandmother had worked for the Bettermans and, when Zach was born, they needed child care because Mary Elizabeth had taken over as the lead fiddle player.
I needed a job. With his daughter gone, and Zach too young to take over, Jeb had to go back to playing. Zach took over when he was nine.
“Eventually, running the show, managing the schedule, and finding ways to hide the cash he was getting got to be too much to handle for Jeb. So when Zach was thirteen, Ulmstead and his boys joined the show.”
Bully for them. Assholes. Poor Zach had been fucked ten ways from Sunday.
“Ulmstead handled travel, set-up, and take-down. He wasn’t part of Jeb’s side dealings at first, but after some years, Jeb wanted better for Zach so he got ready to leave.
He sold a quarter of the business, including the side hustle, to Ulmstead.
In another six months, he was going to sell the rest and take Zach away from this life. ”
And he thought his life was complicated. He was a fucking babe in the woods.
“Are we done?” The asshole was implied.
Geez Louise, Colton was sure as shit glad this was being recorded, because this was a goddamn story and a half. Possibly a story and three quarters. “Let me talk to the sheriff first, ma’am.”
“I need to see Zach. I need to see him with my own eyes.”
Colton did too. This time her request was softer and more urgent. It was maternal. She cared for Zach like the woman who’d raised him. He got that, but it wasn’t his call. Not even a little. “I’ll speak to the sheriff, ma’am. Just hang tight.”
He stood and sighed. What a tangled web these folks were weaving.
At least he wasn’t the sheriff.