With Helen confirming the gambling angle, I felt I was making progress. For some reason, my gut kept telling me that Simon Atkins, one of Cooper’s guys and the son of Garrison Palazzo, was somehow involved. There was just something about him that didn’t seem quite right. Helen’s refusal to try and contact Palazzo when she and Tom had known him was making it all the more strange. I only met the man once, but it was weird how I kept running into him everywhere—at Betty’s, at the store, and now here. Weird. Maybe I was biased because he was an ass the first time I met him and now held a grudge, but, hey, I really didn’t have much else to go on. The easy way to find out about him would be to ask Cooper. After all, Simon worked for him and surely he had thorough background checks on all of his employees. It did pose a small problem, however. First of all, I didn’t want Cooper to know I was still investigating. Maybe he really believed me before when I told him I would share information.
