Murder Deja Vu

“Back to the PI How do you know this?”
    “He’s used him multiple times over the years.” Stroud finished his drink and waved at Chaz, but the kid was already there with a replacement. “I make it my business to know what Robert Minette is doing, has done, and predictably will do. It’s called survivor’s instinct.”
    Clarence wondered why Stroud needed survivor’s instinct where it concerned Minette. “How did Dana survive?”
    Harris took a minute, as if he were deciding what bordered on breaking a trust. “Dana wasted too many years with that creep.” He looked around, waved at Chaz. “I need something to eat or you’ll have to wipe me up with a sponge.”
    Clarence marveled at the man’s capacity. He’d have been under the table if he’d put away what Stroud guzzled in the short time. Chaz came over and Harris ordered a steak. Clarence decided to join him. He hadn’t eaten all day and could feel himself getting tipsy. He didn’t want to lose his edge with the editor, who obviously revved his mouth like a Formula One engine when he drank too much.
    “Dana made three mistakes,” Stroud continued. “First, she married Minette. That was the biggest one of all. Then she had an affair. I’m not talking out of school. Everyone knows. When she divorced Robert, he made sure they did, in spite of the humiliation it caused. Vengeful bastard. And third, her affair wasn’t with me. Not that I didn’t try. Now it looks like she’s made her fourth mistake, and she and Reece Daughtry will wind up in prison. Makes you wonder, doesn’t it, whether the woman knows how to pick the right man?”
    “She could do worse than Reece.”
    “Oh, that’s right. You’re his friend. I didn’t think he had any. He’s not what I’d call warm and fuzzy.”
    Clarence ignored the disparaging remark. “You think Reece murdered that girl?”
    Harris closed his eyes and massaged his fingers over the lids. When he opened them, he blinked a couple of times. “Hell, no. Why would any sane man leave a woman like Dana to screw a little country redneck? Doesn’t make sense. It’s not like he wasn’t getting any.” He broke off a piece of roll from the basket Chaz brought. “I’m sloshed.”
    “Quit drinking.”
    “Drunks don’t quit until they pass out. I try to save that for when I get home, but sometimes I don’t make it. I come here because they know me, and if I hit the table, they take care of me. It’s not even humiliating anymore.”
    Clarence had known a few alcoholics in his day, but most couldn’t admit their problem. “Why don’t you get help?”
    “I have. Let me think—is it three or four times? Four, the marriages are three. I get them confused sometimes.”
    “Were you in love with Dana?”
    “Yes, but that’s not why I drink. I drink because it makes me forget things.”
    Clarence didn’t want to hear Harris’s long sad story. Everyone had one. Reece had one, and he never resorted to booze to purge his demons. “Tell me about Minette. What do you have on him?”
    “Very astute. But then I’m an open book, aren’t I?”
    Chaz brought dinner. Clarence cut into his steak. Perfectly charred—black and blue, exactly the way he liked it. Stroud struggled to maneuver his knife and fork, but he managed to get enough into his mouth to take the edge off the liquor.
    “What do you have on him?” Clarence repeated.
    “Hmm, better not. I need the job right now. You can find out. You’re a good detective; I can tell. It shouldn’t be hard to dig up someone in Minette’s old firm in Charlotte.”
    “My boss is doing that as we speak. My guess is Minette had something to do with the disappearance of a witness. Am I close?”
    Harris hesitated long enough to give credence to Clarence’s guess. “That’s a possibility.”
    “Don’t be coy.”
    “I’ll tell you this. If Robert did contract to make a witness disappear, no one could prove it except the person who did it. Then we have a deal between two devils, each offering the other protection. That’s how Robert does business. Personally, I’d like to think Robert did it so one day he’d have to pay, but I’m not that naïve.”
    “You think Harry Klugh had something to do with the murder?”
    “I’m not saying either one of them had anything to do with any murder. I’m saying I’d check him out. There’s not a moral bone in that man’s body.”
    “Did Minette have a poison dart aimed at the governor to get this