Between Black and White by Robert Bailey Page B

and paid Jack a visit. Jack said Wheeler goes by JimBone and sometimes he shortens it to Bone.” Powell shook his head and drained the rest of his beer. “Unfortunately, that’s all we got. Jack said JimBone was an acquaintance and nothing further.”
    “Do you believe him?”
    “Hell no!” Powell said, waving his hands up in the air, both of which were stained with wing sauce. In his lifetime Rick had met few people louder or more gregarious than Ambrose Powell Conrad. He had also met few who were smarter or better in a courtroom. “We just can’t find a link,” Powell continued. He wolfed down another wing and pointed at Rick. “But we will. It is a top priority of the Tuscaloosa County Sheriff’s Office and the DA to haul his ass in. We’ve been monitoring Jack Willistone’s visitor’s log, but so far we haven’t seen anything suspicious.”
    “Do you know if Andy Walton ever visited him?”
    “Not off the top of my head,” Powell said. “But I’ll check after the verdict comes back in Arrington.” Powell had just finished up the two-week murder trial of a middle school teacher named Foster Arrington, who was accused of abducting, raping, and murdering one of his students. The trial had concluded earlier today, and all that was left was the reading of the verdict. The judge had dismissed the jury for the day, so Powell had readily accepted Rick’s offer of wings and beer.
    “Thanks, man.”
    “No problem. Even if Walton’s not on the visitor’s log, it’s probably time to make a visit to Springville. With Willistone in jail, JimBone needs someone else to bankroll him.”
    Powell put a buffalo wing in his mouth, and his sauce-stained lips curved into a shit-eating grin. Rick knew that grin well. “You’ve got a plan?” he asked, incapable of stopping his own smile.
    Powell raised his eyebrows, and his grin widened. “Don’t you think Jack Willistone is getting tired of prison food?”
    “A deal,” Rick said, nodding along with Powell. “You really think Jack Willistone might deal?”
    “I don’t have a clue,” Powell said, wiping wing sauce off his mouth, but the grin remained. “But when I get through with Arrington . . . I think it’s worth a road trip to the state pen.”

15
    When Tom arrived at Bo’s office at 7:00 a.m. the next morning, he had a surprise waiting for him. Leaning against the front stoop and dressed in a rumpled coat and tie was none other than Ray Ray Pickalew.
    “Figured you’d get an early start,” Ray Ray said, curling his lips up into his patented Joker face.
    “I take it you’re in?” Tom asked, smiling at his old teammate.
    “I’m in,” Ray Ray said.
    “What made you change your mind?”
    Ray Ray shrugged. “Oh, I guess I . . . just had to pray on it.”
    “I didn’t realize you were the praying type, Ray Ray.”
    “Oh, I talk to God all the time,” Ray Ray said. “He just don’t listen.”
    Tom laughed and started to unlock the door, but Ray Ray put his hand up to stop him. “So, I’ve got some information that I think you’ll find helpful.” He sighed and wiped sweat from his forehead. “But first I need some breakfast.”
    Now that he was closer to him, Tom smelled the strong odor of whiskey. “Are you hungover?”
    “No,” Ray Ray said, beginning to walk across the street. “I’m still drunk.”

    A minute later they were sitting at a back table at the Bluebird Café, a favorite local breakfast spoon caddy-corner from Bo’s office and just two blocks from the courthouse square. The smells of bacon grease, coffee, and pancakes fueled the air, and Tom breathed them all in as he sipped from a mug of black coffee.
    “The body was moved,” Ray Ray said after the waitress had taken their orders.
    “What?” Tom asked, feeling his pulse quicken.
    “From the Sundowners Club, a little strip joint on the edge of town that Andy liked to visit. He was shot in the parking lot at the Sundowners with a twelve-gauge, and then his