Motor Mouth - Janet Evanovich [44]
The Citation touched down and skimmed over the asphalt runway. Five thousand five hundred feet long. It was a small airport used only by private planes. Hangars lined up on one side, with a terminal building in the middle. The NASCAR hangar sat at the far end. The sign on the terminal stated that this was NASCAR country. And it was accurate. NASCAR fans are all over the place, in every state, but you couldn’t throw a stick without hitting one in greater Charlotte. NASCAR was on bumper stickers, personalized license plates, shirts, hats, flags, dog collars, jackets, lamps, clocks, boxer shorts, bobble-head dolls, and pajamas.
Hooker’s black Blazer was parked by the Stiller Racing hangar. We loaded Beans into the back and watched Gobbles walk to a rusted-out Jeep.
“What happened to your ’vette?” Hooker asked him.
“Wife got it in the settlement. She painted it pink.”
“Ow,” Hooker said.
“I appreciate all you did for me,” Gobbles said. “I’m sorry I got you into this shit. I didn’t think it would turn into such a cluster fuck.” He searched through the duffel hanging on his shoulder and came up with the remote. “I still have this. Maybe it’d be better if you keep it…in case something happens to me.”
Hooker pocketed the remote; we got into the Blazer and followed Gobbles out of the lot.
“Do you think he’ll be okay?” I asked Hooker.
“No. I have one of those Felicia feelings about Gobbles. I don’t think his problems are over.”
Corporate headquarters for many of the race teams are adjacent to the airfield. Hendrick, Penske, Roush, Huevo, and Stiller had campuses that housed engine shops and fabrication buildings, R & D centers, transporter bays, museums, corporate offices, and the main assembly buildings where the race cars are put together.
Stiller runs three full-time Cup cars and two Busch cars. At any one time, there are sixty race cars in the shop with two hundred new engines ready to race. The lighting is brighter than daylight, the floors are spotless, the inventory mind-boggling.
The season was over until mid-February, and the race-shop complex was a ghost town.
“Do you need anything at the shop?” Hooker asked.
“Nothing that can’t wait,” I said. “I’m looking forward to getting home.”
Hooker took 85 north and got off at the Huntersville exit. If Disneyland had been built by the Gap, it would look like my Huntersville neighborhood. It’s a contrived town with stores and restaurants at the ground level and apartments above. Surrounding the town are condo complexes. It’s actually a wonderful place to live, especially when you’re new to the area. The joke around the shops is that this is the place race-team members live when their wives throw them out of the house.
Hooker pulled into the lot behind my building, and his phone rang. The conversation was short, and he didn’t look happy when he hung up.
“That was Ray Huevo,” Hooker said. “Your purse got turned over to him, he found the gearshift knob in it, and as he puts it…something was missing.”
“That answers a few questions.”
“Yeah. Ray knew the chip was in the knob. And he wants the chip back. He said we could give it to him the easy way or the hard way.”
“Did he elaborate on the hard way?”
“No. But I think it might involve a lot of bleeding.”
“Maybe we should give him the chip.”
“That’s not going to prevent the bleeding. This has gone too far, and we know too much,” Hooker said. “Not only do we know about the chip, we know about Oscar.”
“I don’t like the direction of this conversation.”
“I think we’re in a lot of trouble. I think we need to find out exactly what functions the chip performs and then go to NASCAR and the police with it. Better a live shoe salesman than a dead race-car driver.”
“We’ve withheld information on a homicide,” I told him.
“We’ll deal.”
“I know a guy at the university in Charlotte who might be able to help us. This