One Foot in the Grave

by Denise Grover Swank

  “I agree that he’s a good man in many ways, but I deserve more than he’s willing to give me.” As soon as the words left my mouth, I regretted revealing so much, but I also needed her to understand. “I don’t have to tolerate a man who is only willing to meet me part of the way. I deserve a man who’s all in.”

  “Like Marco?” she asked, her gaze drifting over to him. He was bussing another table and chatting with customers. “He’s a good man, Carly, but he’s not Wyatt.”

  “Maybe that’s what I like about him.” This conversation was beyond inappropriate, especially on the dining room floor. I handed her my ticket book. “I’m going to give my cash to Max. He’ll help you cash out for the both of us before you go.” I started to walk away but turned back. “Oh, and you did great, Ginger. Thanks for helpin’ out.”

  Nodding, she grinned, although there was a slightly uneasy edge to it—like she knew she’d overstepped. But the next moment, she turned to ask one of my customers if they needed a refill. She was a natural.

  Untying my apron, I walked behind the bar and handed my money to Max, telling him that Ginger was taking over. “I’m not sure if I’ll be back by five,” I admitted. “I feel like I’m racing a ticking time bomb.”

  He gave me a serious look. “Don’t worry about us. We’ll deal with things here. Just clear Wyatt’s name.”

  “I’ll do what I can,” I said.

  I found Marco dumping off another batch of dirty dishes in the kitchen. We parted ways so he could wash his hands and I could change my shirt in Max’s office. Then we met at the back door.

  He held up a large paper bag. “Lunch.”

  “Good idea,” I said, following him out the back door to the parking lot. “I didn’t realize how hungry I was.”

  “Who said I got some for you too?” he asked, looking back at me with a sparkle in his eyes. I gave him a fake shove, and he grinned, but it quickly slipped away. “You’re right about taking your car,” he said. “We’re more likely to get noticed in mine.”

  “Okay.”

  I got into the driver’s seat and Marco got in beside me. He handed me a turkey sandwich, while he opened a cheeseburger.

  “When I told Tiny we needed lunches to go, he said he’d handle yours.”

  Tiny definitely knew what I liked.

  While we ate, I told Marco everything I’d learned from Wyatt and Abby, saving the information about Mitzi’s husband for last.

  “Mitzi’s husband is a sheriff’s deputy. Paul Conrad. He works the night shift.”

  “Paul Conrad?” he asked in disbelief.

  “So you know him?”

  His face hardened. “He’s an asshole.”

  “How long has he been in the sheriff’s department?”

  “Longer than I have.”

  “So it’s possible he was on the force when Wyatt was arrested?”

  He turned to glance at me. “You think he was Heather’s mystery boyfriend?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “He ticks some boxes.”

  Marco was silent for a moment. “Let’s talk to Dick first, then figure out where to go from there.”

  “Agreed,” I said. “I’m glad you’re helping me, but we can’t let anyone know. It has to look like you’re only with me for support. If you don’t ask questions, then maybe they can’t nail you for investigating.” It was a thin argument, but at least it was something.

  “We’ll give it a try,” he said.

  When we reached Ewing, Marco gave me directions to the used car lot. I pulled into a parking space about five minutes after two. We got out of the car, and a man in his mid-thirties walked out. He was several inches shorter than Marco, and the front of his button-down shirt stretched across his belly. He had light brown hair and a tan.

  “Marco?” he called out as he headed toward us.

  “That’s me,” Marco said, reaching out his hand as the man came to a stop in front of us. “And this is Carly.”

  The man shook Marco’s hand. “Dick Stinnett. Thanks for reachin’ out. What are you and your wife looking for? A family car? We got a real nice minivan in last week.”

  Marco frowned, and I wasn’t sure if it was because Dick had ignored me or suggested we get a minivan. Maybe both.

  “Actually, Dick,” Marco said in a congenial voice, “we’re here about Heather Stone.” Then he added, “We’d like to ask you a few questions.”

  The smile on Dick’s face froze in place, and he glanced between us. “Are you with the Ewing Police?”

  “No,” I said, deciding this was a good place for me to take over. “We’re friends of Hilde Browning, and we’re trying to figure out what happened to Heather.” It wasn’t the full truth, but she had told us that she wanted to know what we discovered.

  His face paled. “I thought the police were lookin’ into it.”

  “The sheriff,” I corrected. “But Hilde doesn’t quite trust them to conduct a fair and impartial investigation, so we’re talking to people who knew Heather, trying to get an idea of what happened.”

  He swallowed. “And you want to talk to me?”

  “Hilde said you were one of her friends.”

  He rocked his weight from the balls of his feet to his heels and back. “I wouldn’t say we were friends.”

  “The current owner of Max’s Tavern says he remembers you coming in with Heather.”

  “We were always with a group, but that doesn’t mean she was my friend.”

  “So then how would you describe your relationship?” Marco asked.

  I cast a warning glance at Marco. He wasn’t doing a great job of staying silent, and I wasn’t so sure it had been a good idea to take a direct approach.

  “I knew her through Mitzi. I didn’t really like her,” he said. “No offense to the dead, but she was kind of a bitch. Bitter as the day is long. Couldn’t stop talkin’ about how the Drummonds screwed her over.”

  “Did she give details about how they’d screwed her over?” I asked.

  “She would whine about wasting her time on Wyatt, even when she was with him. After his arrest, she shifted to whining about his parents not payin’ her money to say she hadn’t seen him steal the baseball and that she was the one who’d driven the car. Then they finally agreed to pay her on the condition she left town, and she coerced Mitzi into throwing a going-away party for her.”

  “So Mitzi didn’t want to host the party?”

  “Hell, no. Mitzi knew she’d be stuck providing all the food and alcohol, and she’d just lost her job at the Mountain View Lodge and hadn’t found a new one. She couldn’t afford to host a party, but Heather always had a way of getting what she wanted.”

  “Who else was at the going-away party?” I asked.

  “Mitzi, Heather of course. Anna Faith Kennedy, Kyle Timmer, and May McMurphy.” His face flushed.

  “You and May were romantically involved at some point, weren’t you?” I asked.

  “After Heather left, but not for long. She set her sights on Franklin Tate, and when he became available, she dropped me like a hot potato.”

  “They got married,” I said.

  “They did, although we weren’t talkin’ at that point. I heard she got divorced before her first anniversary. She’s remarried to Pete Agnew, and last I heard, they’re living in Piedmont.”

  “Were Heather and May friends?” Marco asked.

  “Heather really wasn’t friends with anyone,” Dick said. “But I think she got as close to people as she was capable of. She was too narcissistic to be a real friend.”

  “Did she have any enemies?”

  “Lots of people felt used by her, but all she had to do was circle back in their orbit and they’d fall under her spell again. Me included.”

  “So you don’t know of anyone who held a grudge against her?” I said.

  He shrugged. “It’s complicated. I know people were annoyed with her, but I don’t think anyone wanted to kill her.”

  “How well did you know Wyatt
?” I asked.

  “Not well.”

  “But you saw him when he showed up at her going-away party,” I said matter-of-factly, leaving little room for argument.

  He grunted, then nodded once in lieu of a yes.

  How did he seem?” I continued.

  “He seemed agitated at first, insisting he had to talk to Heather. She laughed and told him he’d better get his closure now, as she was taking off the next day. They went into a room together—at that point he didn’t seem as angry. He just seemed tired.”

  “Did he look like he was drunk?” I asked.

  He made a face. “No. He was pissed when he first showed up, but he wasn’t drunk.”

  “It was rumored that he was drunk, but it wasn’t anyone who was at the party who told me. It was a friend of a friend.”

  “Let me guess,” Dick said in disgust. “You heard it from Abby.”

  I didn’t respond.

  “Mitzi told a lot of stories after Heather left, saying Wyatt had been drunk and he and Heather had sex in the room.” He shook his head. “Never happened. Heather was shouting at him too much for that to have happened. We could hear them through the door.”

  “Do you know what she was shouting about?” Marco asked.

  I shot him a dirty look.

  Dick lifted his shoulder into a half shrug. “That she’d wasted her time on him. That she deserved more than five thousand and she had a plan to get it.”

  Marco glanced at me, eyebrows raised.

  “Do you know how she planned to get more money?” I asked.

  “I wasn’t privy to Heather’s schemes,” Dick said. “Nor did I want to be.”

  “Was Heather’s new boyfriend at the party?” I asked.

  “I’d heard rumors of a new boyfriend, but I never saw evidence of him,” Dick said. “He never showed up at anything. Heather claimed he was private and wasn’t ready to go public with their relationship.”

  “Do you know his name?” Marco asked. “Surely she called him by something.”

  “Yeah, she had a nickname for him.” Dick scratched his head. “It was different…what was it? Peep.”

  “Peep?” Marco asked as if baffled.

  “Do you know if Heather stayed at the Mountain View Lodge with her boyfriend?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “I’ve got no idea. Honestly, I tried to know as little as possible about what she was up to. If you want to know more about her personal life, you should talk to May or Mitzi.”

  “When did Mitzi start seeing Paul Conrad?” I asked.

  His brow shot up. “So you’ve heard about Paul, huh?”

  “Yeah,” I admitted.

  “About a year after Heather left. Mitzi stopped hanging out with us then. Paul had just gone through a divorce—in fact, I think they started seein’ each other while he was in the middle of it—and he didn’t waste any time controlling her. He works for the sheriff’s department, and he fits right in.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “There’s a core group of guys who are power-hungry assholes. If they don’t like you, they’ll torment you and make your life a living hell.” He made a face. “And before you think I’m bitter because they busted me for something, you can back right on down that tree. They’ve left me alone, but I’ve seen them make other people’s lives hell. Many of them moved away. Some of them are in prison on trumped-up charges.”

  I shot a look at Marco before shifting my attention back to Dick. “You’re kidding.”

  “I wish I was. But Paul Conrad’s part of the good ole boys club.”

  While I knew that there were corrupt deputies, it was eye-opening to hear Dick talk about it. Did Marco know any of this was going on?

  “Do you happen to know who Paul Conrad was married to before Mitzi?” Marco asked.

  “Yeah,” Dick said. “He was married to Tammy Hershey. She works at the thrift store.”

  “Helping Hands Thrift Store?” I asked. The cashier there had been named Tammy.

  “Yep. That’s the one. I saw her in there last week. She was working at the register.”

  “Short dark hair?” I asked.

  “Yeah, that’s her.”

  I couldn’t think of any more questions to ask him, so I cast a glance at Marco, who gave a small shake of his head.

  “Dick if you think of anything that will help, would you give me a call at Max’s Tavern and leave a message?”

  “You work at Max’s?” he asked, looking like he was having second thoughts about talking to us so openly.

  “Carly does,” Marco said, “but we’re here for Hilde. My mom has been friends with her for years.”

  That seemed to appease Dick, but he still looked nervous. Like maybe he’d said too much. “Yeah. If I think of anything, I’ll call.”

  We thanked him for talking to us and got back in the car.

  “We’re headed to the thrift store next, aren’t we?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” Marco said in a gruff tone as he buckled his seat belt. “Paul Conrad’s involved in this, and we’re going to find evidence to prove it.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Tammy was working at the register when we walked into Helping Hands Thrift Store, and she recognized me right away. “Hey,” she called out. “Did that recorder work out for you?”

  She didn’t have any customers, so I headed straight toward her, which was a one-eighty from the plan Marco and I had come up with—to buy something and talk to her as we checked out, but this seemed like a more natural segue to asking her questions.

  “Actually,” I said, stopping in front of her, while Marco stayed a couple of feet behind me to my right. “It did, but I was hoping to get some more tapes.”

  “I’m pretty sure we don’t have any here, but you can check in the back.” She thumbed toward the electronics section.

  “Actually, that’s not why I’m here,” I said hesitantly, hoping I wasn’t screwing this up. “I’m Carly and this is Marco,” I said, gesturing to him behind me. “And we’re friends of Hilde Browning.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know any Hildes.”

  “Hilde is Heather Stone’s aunt,” I said.

  She shook her head again. “Should I know her?”

  “Heather’s body was uncovered at the Drummond resort construction site,” Marco said.

  “Oh, I heard about that. Awful business, but I’m not sure what it has to do with me.”

  “We heard your ex-husband is now married to Heather’s best friend,” I said. When she didn’t respond, I asked, “Were you previously married to Paul Conrad?”

  She made a face as though she’d just eaten something sour. “What do you want to know about that bastard?”

  “I’m going to take that as a yes,” I said.

  “Oh, that’s him all right. Fucking asshole.” Her eyes narrowed. “This Heather’s best friend was Mitzi Ziegler?”

  “Yeah,” I admitted. “We heard that he was sleeping with Mitzi while you two were getting divorced.”

  She snorted. “Much sooner than that. And I’m sure she wasn’t the first.”

  “You think he had other affairs?” Marco asked.

  “I know he did,” she said in disgust, “although he would never admit it. But I found more than a few receipts for the Mountain View Lodge, so I followed him there one night. He went into a motel room for a few hours, and when he came out, he was with some woman.” She shook her head. “Would you believe he still tried to deny it?”

  “Was it Mitzi?” I asked.

  “No,” she said in a stern tone. “That was months before he was sleepin’ with Mitzi.”

  “But you don’t know who that woman was?” I asked.

  “No. Never figured it out. I think he stopped seeing her after that…or he was more careful. He got sloppy with Mitzi.”

  “If I showed you a photo, would you recognize her?” Marco asked.

  “I don’t know,” Tammy said, pursing lips.

  �
��Could you take a look and see?” Marco asked as he pulled out his phone and let her have a look at it.

  She handed the phone back to Marco. “I don’t know if that was her or not.”

  “Do you know if Paul took a trip to Tulsa about eight years ago?” Marco asked.

  She squinted up at him. “What? No. Paul hated to travel. Although he took Mitzi to Atlanta after we got divorced. He never took me, even after all my beggin’.” Her jaw clenched. “Bastard. I left him after I caught them in my bed. My attorney petitioned for me to get the house, and the judge granted it to me while we were in mediation, but a few weeks later Paul broke in and claimed it was his. He had several deputies with him to have me physically removed, so I moved in with my mother.” She shuddered.

  I could have told her any judge would’ve had him thrown out, and maybe it was even true, but something about the way she glanced at the door told me she was still afraid of him. Marco must have picked up on it too.

  “Did he ever raise his hand to you?” he asked.

  She cringed and embarrassment washed over her face.

  “I’m going to take that as a yes,” I said. “No need for you to relive any traumatic experiences.”

  Nodding her thanks, she kept her gaze on the counter.

  “Does he still bother you?” I asked.

  She hesitated, then said, “From time to time. When he’s drunk.”

  “Do you think Paul’s capable of murder?” Marco asked.

  Her eyes lifted and locked on Marco’s face. “Why would you ask that?” Then her eyes lit up with understanding. “You think he killed that Heather girl?”

  “We didn’t say that,” Marco said in an even tone. “I’m just wonderin’ how much of a danger he is to the public.”

  “He’s got a temper, and I suppose if he was mad enough… yeah. He could kill someone.”

  Marco pulled a card out of his pocket and handed it to her. “Tammy, I’m Deputy Sheriff Marco Roland.” When fear filled her eyes, he lifted his hands and gently said, “Although we don’t work together, I know your ex-husband, and I’ve never much cared for him. I detest men who abuse their strength and power. If you ever run into any trouble with him, please contact me using my personal number. I’ll help you as best I can.”