Sedona Law 5 by Dave Daren (romantic novels in english .TXT) 📕

“I knew that,” I replied.

“And he did one of those ex-po-say thingies one day about this construction company,” he continued. “He made them sound real, real bad, and it caused the whole company to shut down, and all kinda people lost their jobs.”

“Well, that would upset some people,” I said.

“Yup,” Horace said. “And so now none of those guys, and none of the guys who know those guys, like him, and they all got bad, bad beef with him. ‘Specially the owners. They like to go to the bar and talk shit about Jerry Steele all night long.”

“So, what was the name of this construction company?” I asked.

“Uh,” he squinted his eyes as he searched his memory, “Wright Way Construction, owned by Peter and Paul Wright. I don’t know how to get in touch with them, being as they went bankrupt and all, but you might be able to find them on the Internet or something, or they’re always at the bar. You could chance it that you run into them.”

I knew which bar he was talking about. Slingers. It was a cowboy saloon, complete with spurs and bar wenches. My casework had taken me there a few times, and I was sure I would have to patronize it again.

“Okay,” I said, and I noticed AJ scrawling away. “That’s a good start. Anyone else you know of we should talk to?”

“Yup.” He placed his hands on his hips and again searched his memory. “You might want to get in touch with Clare Clearmont, too. She might know something.”

“Who is she?” I asked.

“That’s his ex-wife,” he replied. “He had a baby with her a few years back. Well, I say baby, he’s probably coming up on middle school now. Gee, they grow up fast.”

“Do you know how to get in touch with her?” I asked.

“I know she does yoga at that new snooty shop downtown,” he answered. “That’s all I know.”

“LotusWorx?” I asked.

“Yeah, that’s it!” Horace said with a snap of his fingers. “That’s where all the rich snobby ladies go to buy their booty shorts for the gym.”

I smirked as it occurred to me all the women in my family apparently qualified under Horace’s definition of rich and snobby, though my mom and sister were far from rich.

“Then,” Horace went on, “there’s a few others you might want to talk to. Here, let me write it down.”

AJ handed him a piece of paper, and he wrote down a list of about twenty names and narrated each one.

“You talk to all these people,” he told me, “and I guarantee you’ll find what you’re looking for.”

I looked over the list and was sure he was right.

“This really is half of Sedona,” I remarked and raised my eyebrows.

“I told you,” he chuckled. “Throw a rock.”

“Thanks,” I said again.

“You bet,” he replied with a smile and a wink. “Anything for you, Henry.”

“Come to think of it, Horace,” I mused and furrowed my brow, “how did you get in here?”

“Oh,” he glanced at me quizzically, “the side door.”

“The side door?” I echoed.

“Yeah,” he said and gestured over his shoulder. “There’s a side door over there, and it has one of those keypads that opens it.”

“So, you have a keypad code?” I asked.

“No,” he looked at me in confusion, “I used Jerry’s code. Everyone has that code. It’s his license plate.”

AJ and I glanced at each other, and I cleared my throat.

“Where is the door again?” AJ asked Horace.

“This one right here,” he said.

He took us down a hall and toward a side door. Then he opened it and showed us the keypad on the other side.

“See?” he said. “It’s TGF 146. You just enter it right in there. I can’t believe you didn’t know that. I thought everybody in the whole town knew that.”

“Well,” I said, “I guess we do now. Thank you for showing us.”

“Anytime,” he replied. “Well, I got to get back to my stuff.”

“Good luck, Horace,” I said as I clapped him on the shoulder.

He smiled. “Good luck to you, too.”

Then he disappeared into the building, and AJ and I looked at each other.

“Well,” I said, “we’ve definitely got our work cut out for us.”

“That’s good,” she chuckled dryly, “because we have, like, no time.”

Chapter 5

Tuesday morning, Vicki, AJ, and I were in the conference room, surrounded by the breakfast of champions--donuts and coffee.

“Sugar,” Vicki remarked. “Great way to start the morning.”

“We’re going to need it this week,” I said. “We’ll have a company wide gym week once this is over. But, now, we need the sugar rush.”

AJ stood at the whiteboard with a donut in her hand.

“So,” she said, “based on Horace’s list, this is what I’ve compiled.”

She gestured toward columns and boxes she had drawn up.

“There are three categories of people,” she continued. “We have personal, we have business associates, and we have news casualties.”

Vicki and I laughed at the last category.

“I didn’t know what else to call it,” AJ giggled. “So, under each of these categories, we have four to five contacts. Now, here’s the thing. I have found full or partial contact information on all of these people and entered it into our contact list, which is of course, synced to all of our phones.”

I smiled and nodded. “This is good. This is really good. How did you find all of this?”

She shrugged. “Following Facebook leads, and a lot of these people either I know, or I know people who know them. So, it was just a lot of phone calls.”

“Perfect,” I said. “Have you contacted any of them?”

“No,” she shook her head, “that’s our next step. We need to set appointments with all