There it was, the telling look.
Bill’s nostrils flared like Jake had just tracked in a pound of ripe cow shit. He folded his arms. “Well, you can make it in forty-five minutes or even thirty if you didn’t know there was a speed trap hoping you’ll do just that. It’s right before town, lying in wait just past the billboard advertising the ambulance chaser who doubles as a get-you-out-of-drug-charges-free lawyer.”
“So an hour then. Thanks for the tip.” Jake hoped for another smile out of Bill.
Instead, Bill put both hands flat on the bar and leaned forward, his voice lowering. “If you want a real tip? Don’t go to Ross.”
Jake feigned ignorance, his face carefully arranged into a look of worry. “Why not? More of that Colorado-Nebraska rivalry?”
All pretense of politeness dropped out of Bill’s voice. “You ever see that old Christmas movie? You know, that long one about the nice guy’s always saving the town’s bacon until he gets fucked over and tries to off himself, and there’s this stupid-ass angel who shows him what a shithole the place’d be without him?”
“It’s a Wonderful Life. They played it twenty-four seven at Christmas when I was a kid.”
“Yeah, that one. Well, Ross is the shittiest shithole version of that town. Even got its own villain who owns and runs everything, just like in the movie. Who was that old bastard?”
“The actor? Barrymore. That family still runs a few things in Hollywood.”
Bill shook his head and raised his eyes heavenward. “No, no, I mean the character’s name. Potter, that’s it. In the movie, he was gonna turn the town into a slum, call it Potter’s Field, slang for a poor man’s cemetery. Well, that’s what old Daddy Deal did to Ross, made the whole place a slum that he owns. He’s King Shit of Turd Hill.”
“Daddy Deal?”
“Yeah, that’s what he goes by now. Ernest Deal, that’s what his mamma and pa named him.”
Jake arched his brow. “You’re joking.”
“Right? They were either sadistic or stupid themselves. Anyway, Ernest went and spent his life trying to distance himself from that name in every way possible. Even growing up, word is he’d swindle anyone he could. Like for example, our towns have always been sports rivals. Football, basketball, girls’ soccer, you name it.” Bill squinted at Jake. “You got a problem with girls’ soccer?”
Jake leaned back, wary of the color rising in Bill’s face. “Course not. Why would I?”
“I got a little girl plays soccer, puts her whole heart into it. She’s gonna grow up and go to college on a scholarship, just you see. I won’t have anyone disparaging her.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it, Bill.” Jake raised his glass. “Here’s to your daughter and all the colleges that’re gonna try and recruit her.” He swallowed the last of his beer.
The red in Bill’s face faded. He smiled, and in that smile, Jake could see he’d won the guy over again. He filed away the information about Bill’s daughter for safekeeping. “So, what’s old Ernie Deal got to do with girls’ soccer?”
Bill laughed, not entirely amused. “Nothing, since I’m the coach and I won’t let the bastard near the games, at least when we play them here. See, back in the day, back when I was just a little kid and Deal was in high school, he went and started up his own under the table betting pool on all the small-town sporting events from Denver to Lincoln. Hell, by the time he graduated, they say he had adults in on it, important ones, and he was rumored to throw games.”
“How’d he get away with that, just being a kid and all?”
“Any way he could. The bastard’s always been coated in slime. He made friends with a bunch of other kids, therightkids, you know? Mayor’s daughter, sheriff’s son, those kids. Bribed ’em with money and drugs to hang out with him, more like—and so he got dirt on their folks.”
Jake raised his eyebrows.A regular criminal prodigy. This went back further than even Jake thought, and Jake had made it his business to dig deep. But there was nothing like gathering intel from the locals. “Ernest sure started young, didn’t he?”
The corners of Bill’s mouth quirked up. “Couldn’t get away from his name fast enough, like I said. Old Ernest. Bad seed. Bad, bad seed.”
Jake sensed the conversation slipping away and he needed to know more—about his secondary target—so he asked his next question carefully and quickly. “Why they call him Daddy Deal now?”
“That started when he got himself a daughter. Pretty girl, from what I hear. Name’s Rachael. Girl’s in her mid-twenties now. Her mamma ain't around anymore, took off when she was little. People say she left a couple front teeth behind along with her daughter.” Bill examined an already-spotless glass. “Shame about that.”
“Always is.” Bill was right—from the security photos Jake had seen, Rachael was quite pretty. Jake heard more in Bill’s voice than the standard-issue pity for a stranger down on her luck. He sipped his beer and chose his next words carefully. “So, Daddy raised her. Is Rachael more like her mama or her daddy, do you think?”
Bill took a deep breath, either thinking or reluctant to say anything else, Jake wasn’t sure which. After a few seconds more than what Jake was comfortable with, the bartender answered, “Well, she works for Daddy in his meatpacking plant, that much I know.”
Okay, not definitive, not nearly as much as he wanted, but he’d take what he could get. He’d watch out for Rachael, just as he’d planned. She was Daddy’s girl until proven otherwise.
Jake pretended to be surprised as he nudged the subject away from Rachael. “Well, shit. You telling me Daddy Deal owns the meatpacking plant?”
Bill laughed. “Boy, ain’t you been listening? Thought you saw the Christmas movie. Daddy Deal owns everything, and I do meaneverything, in Ross, from the meatpacking plant that everyone sucks tit from, down to the shacks and falling-down apartment buildings they all live in. You pay rent, you pay it to Daddy. You buy food from the crappy little grocery store they got, Daddy gets his sugar too. Same with the hardware store, the barber, the fast-food place right off the highway. Main course is the meatpacking plant, but Daddy’s got his fingers in all the pies.”
