Sedona Law 6 by Dave Daren (ebook pdf reader for pc .TXT) 📕

Then, I noticed something I hadn’t before. It was a printed email chain that sounded a lot like…

“Recording contract negotiations,” I whispered.

I read the emails in detail. James was messaging back and forth to a label manager. Then, I laughed when I read the manager’s name.

“Brent Levinson,” I shook my head.

He was the label head at La Vista I had worked with on Jagger’s band. The one that was a one man Yelp listing when Johnny Hawthorne had asked about the best strip clubs in Orange County.

“Brent Levinson?” Vicki said. “From La Vista?”

“Yeah,” I said. “You’ve met him?”

She rolled her eyes. “He used to grab my ass every time I saw him.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” I said. “But he and James were in contract negotiations as late as last month.”

“No kidding,” she said. “Just James? Not the band?”

“Looks like it,” I said. “From what I can tell from these emails.”

“James had a record deal with La Vista?” AJ asked.

“He was working on one,” I said as I read the emails in greater detail. “They couldn’t agree on a signing bonus amount.”

“Did he ever get one?” Vicki asked. “You have his bank statements.”

I pored over the statements, and couldn’t find any deposits from Arista, or any amount close to the numbers in the emails. The emails referenced the contract being sent.

“There’s nothing here,” I said. “He didn’t get the money.”

“So he didn’t sign,” Vicki concluded.

“Not necessarily,” I said. “It could have still been in offer status when he died. This is just one chain of messages. There could be others.”

“We need that contract,” Vicki said.

“What would that prove though?” I asked as I stroked my chin.

“I don’t know,” Vicki said. “But we need it.”

“Kelsi,” I said. “Kelsi would know.”

“But,’ Vicki said. “She’s fragile. I’d rather not call her unless we need to.”

“What email address is it?” AJ asked.

“It’s an AOL account,” I said.

“Got it,” she said. “I just sent you the login.”

“What?” I asked as an email from AJ popped in my email.

“In all that junk she sent us,” AJ said, “one of them was a spiral where James had written down a bunch of passwords and logins. I created a spreadsheet out of them just in case we needed them.”

“You have all his passwords?” I asked. “To what else?”

“It’s mainly to email accounts,” she said. “His credit cards and bank logins, which she had already given us anyway. His Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon.”

“Wow,” I said. “I guess if she gave them to us…”

“She doesn’t know she gave them to us,” Vicki said.

“She asked us not to call her, though,” I said. “So if she wants minimal contact, I don’t see any problem with using the information to get the information we need for her case. Besides, she insisted that she already gave us everything she had. So, she wants us to use whatever information she gave us.”

“Fine,” Vicki said. “I still think it’s a little shady.”

“I would agree with you,” I said. “If she hadn’t asked us not to contact her.”

I pulled the login for AOL mail, and plugged in the login AJ sent me.

“And I’m in,” I announced.

“And what’s there?” Vicki asked.

“I’m still not sure,” I scanned the list of messages.

It had been a few weeks since his death, and his unread emails had piled up. Most were junk mail. Credit card offers, subscriptions to music equipment catalogs...I scrolled through page after page and didn’t find anything that was a real message. I wanted to see if there was anything else besides the La Vista contract that would be of note. Finally, I gave up and searched his inbox for Brent Levinson. Bingo. There were several message strings.

In one subject line, it read “Contract Offer for James Matthews.”

“And this is what we need,” I said.

I opened the message and downloaded the attachment.

“What date did they get back from Africa?” I asked.

“The sixteenth of last month,” AJ answered.

“Jesus,” I said. “The contract’s dated the fourteenth. He got this in Africa.”

I printed the contract out and read it. It was a standard La Vista contract. I had labored intensely over the one with Jagger’s band, so I knew every clause and provision in their standard agreement. I also knew which sections Brent would or wouldn’t amend.

“He wasn’t taking the band,” I announced. “He was firing them all, and doing a six month residency in Vegas, and then going to L.A. to record for Arista.”

“What a massive dick,” AJ commented.

“It gets worse,” I said. “He was getting a five hundred thousand dollar signing bonus.”

“Wow,” Vicki laughed. “So why was he going to Vegas? Why not just dump Vegas and sign on with Arista?”

“Because,” I said. “From the email conversations, he already signed the deal with Vegas before the deal with La Vista was finalized.”

“Okay,” Vicki said. “So Kelsi was about to get rich. So why was she screwing around with the manager?”

“The manager that he had a contract with?” I asked.

“The bullshit contract,” Vicki concluded. “That he was about to screw.”

“Did she feel guilty?” I wondered. “Fuck it. I’m calling her.”

I pulled out my phone and found Kelsi’s number. She answered pretty quickly.

“Kelsi,” I said. “Henry Irving. How are you doing today?”

“Great,” her tone was flat. “I’ve had cops at my house every day this week, and I desperately need a vacation, but I can’t leave the county. My life is a wreck.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. “I hope I can make your day better. Did you ever hear from Brent Levinson about that check?”

There was a pause on the line.

“Who? What? Check?” Kelsi stammered. “What are you talking about?”

“Brent Levinson, La