Jeffrey felt the same way. He'd assumed Burg was one of the good guys, but the GBI agent had apparently been taking money for years. 'Is he saying anything?'
'Not a peep,' Nick answered. 'Bob's not stupid. He knows he's not going to see daylight for a while, and he's not about to rat out a damn skinhead.'
'You didn't find anything about Hank contacting him?'
'Bob didn't write down jack, man. Even if he did, we'd need him to testify, and there's no way he'll flip. Those Nazi fuckwads are everywhere. Bob's gonna be sleeping with one eye open for the rest of his life.'
Jeffrey guessed that was some kind of payback.
'How's Lena doing?'
'Fine,' he answered, glad to be talking about something else. 'She's gonna need therapy for her lungs, but she should be ready to go back home by the middle of next week.' He added, 'They moved her to the same hospital as Hank last night.'
'How's he doing?'
'Better. Still not out of the woods yet. What about Bart – he doing any talking yet?'
'Shit,' Nick mumbled, standing from the desk. 'He's doing nothin'
Jeffrey laughed for the first time in days. 'He really thinks he's gonna walk away from this?'
'His lawyer indicated he'd be open to probation with time served.'
Jeffrey laughed again. He was suddenly looking forward to seeing Fred Bart.
Nick turned serious. 'I want your read on the lawyer. Something's going on there.'
'All right,' Jeffrey agreed. 'You got the goods?'
Nick handed him a folder, then reached under the desk and buzzed the door open. Jeffrey followed him to the back, thinking that even though only a few days had passed, the building had an air of neglect to it. Don Cook wasn't exactly a leader, and it was going to take someone with a strong personality and a lot of experience to help the town recover from Valentine's betrayal. Jeffrey gave the man two months before he stepped down, took his retirement and went fishing for the rest of his life.
A tripod with a digital camera on top stood outside the small conference room. Nick rapped his knuckles on the door as he opened it.
'Finally,' Bart said, as if he was glad to see them.
Jeffrey threw the file Nick had given him on the table, then he held out his hand, introducing himself to Bart's lawyer. The man didn't offer his name, and Jeffrey guessed from his expensive suit and fancy haircut that he was more at home in Atlanta than Elawah County.
Nick indicated the camera. 'Just let me get this set up.' He whistled under his breath as he placed the tripod at the head of the table, moving it just so, acting like he had all the time in the world. Jeffrey knew he was just trying to make the dentist antsy, but the technique was working on Jeffrey, too. By the time Nick was finished, Jeffrey was almost squirming in his chair.
Nick sat down beside Jeffrey, opposite Fred Bart and his lawyer. For the sake of the camera, he said, 'I'm Nick Shelton with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. Beside me is Grant County Chief of Police Jeffrey Tolliver, who will be leading this interview. That okay with you boys?'
The lawyer nodded. He was a burly man, his hair shaved close to his head. Jeffrey wondered if he had something tattooed on his scalp.
Bart said, 'Can we get this over with?'
Jeffrey opened the file on the table. He fanned out the photographs they had found in a folder on Jake Valentine's desk. Judging from the charred debris in his wastebasket, there had been more photographs, but Valentine had taken care to make sure it was only Fred Bart and Boyd Gibson implicated in the surveillance photos. The sheriff had been telling Jeffrey the truth when he said he'd called the GBI. Nick's office had logged a call on his voice mail about an hour before Jeffrey and Sara had gotten to the jail. Valentine had sounded giddy as he laid out the case of the drug-pin dentist.
Fred Bart barely glanced at the photographs. The pictures were grainy, but they still managed to tell a story. Jeffrey tapped his finger on the top one, which showed Fred Bart with Boyd Gibson smoking cigarettes outside an abandoned-looking warehouse. Behind them, a drug transaction was taking place. Another photo showed Bart in his Jag passing off a stack of money to Boyd Gibson, All the photos pointed the finger at Fred Bart as being the meth mastermind in town with Gibson as his muscle.
Bart blustered, 'Obviously, those have been doctored.'
'I'm sure you can find an expert to tell that to a jury,' Jeffrey admitted. Jake Valentine had done a good job setting up the dentist. If Lena hadn't seen the tattoo under the sheriff's arm, no one would have questioned Valentine's evidence – or Bart's death in his own homegrown meth lab, courtesy of Clint Jones.
Jeffrey told him, 'Your bank account shows a cash deposit of over two hundred thousand dollars Friday morning.'
'I was in my office with patients. I have no idea what you're talking about.'
'You mean your office where they found enough meth to powder a ski slope?' He paused. 'Jake was ready to hand the GBI the bust of a lifetime.'
Bart shook his head slowly side to side. 'I have no idea what you're talking about.'
Jeffrey laid it out for the man. 'You're looking at the death penalty.'
The lawyer interjected, 'My client is cooperating in every way he knows how.'
'He shot a man in cold blood in front of a police detective.'
'She was high,' Bart protested, much as Nick had predicted. 'With the amount of chemicals in that room, I'm surprised she even remembers she was there. You know what she did to Jake. She cut off his hand! That's not the action of a thinking person.'
Jeffrey thought it was the action of somebody who didn't want to die. 'You injected my wife with a sedative.'
'Jake would've hurt her if I hadn't knocked her out. Mark my words. He was a violent man.'
The lawyer stiffened. Jeffrey would have missed it if he hadn't been watching.
Jeffrey asked Bart, 'How were you protecting Charlotte Gibson in the back of that Escalade?'
'I've already told your friend here that wasn't me,' Bart insisted. 'I was at home watching TV that night.'
' Lena 's willing to make a positive ID.'
Bart flashed a smile. 'It's my understanding that the perpetrator of that crime was masked.'
'Yeah,' Jeffrey agreed. 'But it's hard to hide behind a mask when you've got little ferret teeth.'
Bart covered his mouth with his hand before he could stop himself.
Jeffrey said, 'Tell me about Boyd Gibson.'
