Tobias leaned forward and spit. Tobacco juice stained the wooden plank an ugly brown at Warren's feet. "Now that's a damn shame, especially considering the most recent, more-than-generous offer I made you. Why don't you do the smart thing and sell out, old man?"
"Because this store, this land, has been in my family for more than three hundred years," Warren replied in a testy tone. "And I'm not letting someone like you come in and strip-mine it like you have the rest of the mountain. "
Tobias sighed. A long, drawn-out see-what-I-have-to-put-up-with sigh that sounded as phony as Jonah McAllister had at the Pork Pit. "Now, you know that it's not exactly strip-mining, Warren. It's called mountaintop removal, and there's nothing illegal about it. We're just getting the coal out of the ground the quickest way we know how. "
"And leaving everybody else with your mess," Warren snapped. "Like I said, I'm not interested in letting you do that to my land. My whole backyard's turned into a damn sinkhole already from you and your mining. "
Tobias's face hardened, and his mustache bristled with barely restrained anger. "I'm tired of waiting you out, old man. You can either sell out now, and get a good price for your land. Or - "
"Or what?" Warren snapped, cutting off the dwarf 's threat. "You'll send some of your boys over here to make me see the light of day? You've tried that before, and it didn't work. A couple of shotgun blasts in their asses sent your boys running for the hills. "
Tobias glared over his shoulder at his men, who all shuffled on their feet and stared at the ground.
I looked at Warren with a little more respect. Violet had told me that Warren had fought off Dawson's goons by himself, but I hadn't realized the old coot had put buckshot in their hides. Brave but stupid of him. Because Warren's shotgun and sheer stubbornness must have been part of the reason why the dwarf had decided to go after Violet instead.
Tobias turned back to face us and spit another mouthful of tobacco juice onto the porch. "All I'm saying is it would be a damn shame if something was to happen to you - or your sweet granddaughter. "
The dwarf leered at Violet, staring at her boobs like he wanted to bury his head between them. Behind him, the giants and other men did the same. Violet's face paled a little more, but she crossed her arms over her chest and lifted up her head. She wasn't backing down any more than her grandfather was.
"By the way, Miss Violet," Tobias drawled in his twangy voice. "You haven't seen my brother Trace around anywhere, have you? Short guy, looks a fair bit like me, has a stick of dynamite tattooed on his arm. Drives a great big ole truck. "
My gray eyes narrowed. Dawson had a brother named Trace? With a dynamite tattoo on his arm? That must be the dwarf that Finn had pancaked in the parking lot last night. The one whose body Sophia had disposed of.
"He was going to take care of some business for me in Southtown, over near the community college," Tobias said. "But he didn't come home last night. I thought you might have seen him, seeing as how you take all those classes at the college. "
Violet's eyes widened behind the frames of her black glasses. She'd just realized Trace was the dwarf who'd attacked her, and she didn't know how to respond to Tobias Dawson's veiled innuendos, hints, and threats. But Finnegan Lane, being the Southern gentleman he was, stepped forward and intervened.
"Southtown's a dangerous neighborhood," Finn said in a soft tone. "Who knows what could have happened to him in a place like that? Just about anything, I imagine. Rough crowd, down in that part of Ashland. Junkies, vampire hookers, pimps. Not safe for a man to walk those streets by himself. "
Tobias fixed Finn with a hard stare. "I wasn't talking to you, son. And what the hell would you know about it anyway?"
Finn smiled. "I grew up down there. "
The dwarf stared at Finn with open hostility and suspicion. The two giants and two other men sensed their boss's displeasure. They shifted forward on their feet, as if to storm past him and come up onto the porch. Tobias tensed, ready to give the order. I palmed another knife.
This was not going to end well.
But before the dwarf could tell his men to charge and take care of Warren T. Fox once and for all, Donovan Caine stepped down off the porch and pulled open his coat. The noontime sun made the
gold badge on his belt glisten next to the dark shadow of his gun.
Tobias took in the badge and weapon. The dwarf 's pale blue eyes flicked to the sedan sitting in front of the store. He knew a cop car when he saw one too. "Who are you?"
"Detective Donovan Caine. I'm an old family friend of the Foxes. "
Finn flashed another grin and pointed his finger at the detective. "Maybe you've heard of him. He was the one who killed Alexis James, that loopy Air elemental who was stealing from Halo Industries, her own company. Happened about two months ago. It was all over the news. Mayor even gave him a medal for his stellar investigative work. "
Donovan grimaced at Finn's sly, mocking praise. The detective knew what had really happened. That I'd been the one who'd killed Alexis James and her flunkies in the Ashland Rock Quarry. And that he'd accepted the credit and accolades for something he didn't even do.
Tobias Dawson knew who the detective was, all right.
The knowledge flashed in his icy eyes. But Caine's status as a member of the Ashland police force made the dwarf reconsider his options. Ashland might be a dangerous city, and the cops might be as crooked as the surrounding mountain roads, but folks still stopped to think before they took out a member of the po-po. There were payoffs to consider, bribes, chains of command. Not to mention the fact Donovan Caine was something of a folk hero in the city - an honest cop among a sea of corrupt ones. Caine's death would raise a lot of questions, even for somebody as well connected as Tobias Dawson.
The dwarf 's eyes went to Donovan, then Finn, then Warren. He didn't glance at me or Violet. Evidently us mere womenfolk weren't much of a threat. Sexist bastard.
Still, Tobias could count as well as the next person.
Five of us, six of him and his men. Not great odds, even if we were saddled with an old man and two women.