Mark Cotton

Two Bits Four Bits Mark Cotton

Buddy Griffin, a recently retired homicide detective, returns to his hometown of Elmore, Texas to attend a high-school reunion and becomes embroiled in a murder investigation when his high school sweetheart finds her husband, the president of the local bank, shot dead in their swimming pool. Rumors of the dead man's infidelities lead Buddy to a missing female bank teller and a safe deposit box full of dirty money linked to the local mob. As he digs deeper, Buddy discovers the real motive for the murder may stem from a struggle for control of a twenty-year-old videotape of a United States Senator with an underage prostitute. TWO BITS FOUR BITS is a mystery set in the flat dry landscape of West Texas where the horizon is defined by pump jacks and oilfield equipment instead of trees and hills, and blackmail is a game best left to professionals.