A Grant County Collection by Karin Slaughter Read Free Book Online

his post.
    He turned, his hand on his gun. Tension radiated from him like a bad odor.
    She held out her hands. 'I'm on the job. Chill out.'
    His voice shook. 'You're Detective Adams?'
    She did not recognize the man, but even if she had, Lena doubted she could say much to calm him. His face was ashen, and if he did manage to pull his gun, he'd probably shoot himself in the foot before he managed to aim it at anyone.
    'What's going on?' she asked.
    He clicked his shoulder mic on. 'Detective Adams is here.'
    Frank's response came almost immediately. 'Send her around the back.'
    'Go through the five-and-dime,' the Uniform said. 'The back door to the cleaners is open.'
    'What's going on?'
    He shook his head, and she could see his Adam's apple bob as he swallowed.
    Lena did as she was told, walking through the front entrance of the Shop-o-rama. There was a cowbell over the door, and the loud banging set her teeth on edge. She reached up and stilled the bell before entering the empty store. A half-filled shopping basket sat in the middle of the center aisle as if a shopper had abandoned it in place. Someone had been putting up a neon green sign advertising a special on suntan lotion, but it had been left hanging by one corner from a thin wire. All the lights were on, the neon pharmacy sign brightly lit, but the place was deserted. Even the yellow-haired freak who was always at the desk in the back office was nowhere to be seen.
    The doors to the stockroom made a sucking sound as she pushed them open. Rows of marked bins lined the walls from floor to ceiling: toothpaste, toilet tissue, magazines. Lena was surprised some enterprising kid from the college had not figured out the shops were wide open and unguarded. She had worked at Grant Tech for a few months and knew from experience that the bastards spent more time stealing from each other than they did actually studying.
    The back door stood wide open, and Lena blinked at the unrelenting sunlight. Sweat dripped down the back of her neck, but she was not sure if that was from the heat or her own apprehension. Her shoes crunched the gravel as she walked toward the cleaners, where two uniformed cops stood guard. One of them was a shortish, attractive woman who would have probably had Lena's job if Lena had not come back. The other was a young man who looked more skittish than the guy by the cruisers.
    Lena pulled out her badge and identified herself, though she knew the woman. 'Detective Adams.'
    'Hemming,' the cop said, resting her hand on her gun belt. She stared openly at Lena, managing to convey her distaste despite the circumstances. She did not introduce her partner.
    Lena asked, 'What's going on?'
    Hemming jabbed her thumb toward the cleaners. 'They're in there.'
    Inside, the cool air almost immediately dried the sweat on her neck. Lena pushed past the rows of laundry that were waiting to be picked up. The smell of chemicals was overwhelming, and she coughed as she passed the starching area. The industrial ironers were still turned on, heat coming off them like an open flame. Old man Burgess was nowhere to be found, and it seemed odd that he would just leave things like this. Lena turned off the dials on the ironers as she passed, watching a group of men fifteen feet away. She stopped at the last machine when she recognized the tan pants and dark blue shirts of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. They had gotten here fast. Nick Shelton, Grant County's GBI field agent, was standing with his back to Lena, but she knew him from his cowboy boots and mullet haircut.
    She scanned the room for other Grant County cops. Pat Morris, a detective who had been recently promoted from patrol, sat on top of a dorm-size refrigerator holding a bag of ice to his ear. His carrot red hair was plastered to his head. Thin red lines of blood cut across his face, and Molly, the nurse from the children's clinic, was poking at them with a cotton swab. Aside from a Uniform over by the folding table, Frank