Cruel Comfort (Evan Buckley Thrillers Book 1) (11 page)

Evan hadn't worked out what he was
going to do next to try to move forward with his case, so he decided to go to
the office and take a good look at the McIntyre photographs. He ran into Tom
Jacobson in the parking lot.

'What the hell happened to you?' he
said getting out of his Volvo.

'Our friend, Hugh McIntyre, caught
up with me.'

'I hope he looks worse.'

'Afraid not. He blind-sided me with
a baseball bat and I never got another chance. Luckily he was interrupted or I
don’t know what would have happened.'

'He's definitely got it in for you. Persistent,
too. You need to be careful.'

'Don't worry; I'm about to get onto
it now.'

'Just let me know if you need any
stronger painkillers. How's the "Clayton Case" coming along?'

Evan shrugged. 'I'm not sure. The
more I dig, the more complicated it becomes. Nobody knows a thing, but, despite
that, they all manage to point the finger at each other. They’re like a bunch
of kids.'

Jacobson smiled knowingly at Evan.
'So the Police aren't complete idiots then?'

'Not complete, no,' Evan conceded.
'It was actually one of the detectives who came to the office who put her onto
me.'

'Really? That was good of him. He
must have some faith in you.'

'I'm not sure if I'm grateful or
not.'

'At least you haven't got your face
busted up because of it. Anything in particular that's holding you back?'

'A couple of things. Did you ever
hear anything about Robbie Clayton running off with another woman?'

'I heard the rumors,’ Jacobson said
carefully, ‘and some of them were a lot nastier than him just running off with
her.'

'I know; Linda told me.' Jacobson
raised his eyebrows. 'She's very forthright. You didn't mention them.' He
didn't mean it to come out as an accusation, but he could see that Jacobson
took it that way.

'I'm not a gossip, Evan, and that's
all it was.' His tone of voice implied there was no room for disagreement.
'Insensitive bastards spreading tittle-tattle and not giving a damn what harm
it might cause. I'm sure some of them actually enjoyed the hurt they caused.'

'There's a chance there could be
some truth in it.'

Jacobson looked surprised. Evan told
him about Barbara Schneider and how she'd disappeared about the same time.
Jacobson thought for a moment and said, 'The Schneiders were patients of mine.
The husband was very odd. I don't know if I ever believed a word he said. He
wasn’t who you’d call Mr Oral Hygiene, either.'

‘You know what they say; bad breath
is better than no breath at all!’

Jacobson laughed. 'Isn't there a bar
with a name something like that?’ He clicked his fingers a couple of times.
'The Hog’s Breath Saloon in Key West, that's it, what a great bar. You can’t
beat beer and oysters.’

‘Used to be better, before the
cruise ships started going there. The whole town is full of fat Midwesterners
now.’

‘Nothing lasts forever. Anyway,
where were we?’

'You said the Schneiders
were
patients - what happened?'

'They just stopped coming. I thought
they'd moved away or found someone cheaper, that's all.'

'Were they married?'

Jacobson frowned. 'Yes, why?'

'Because Max Schneider says that
Barbara was his sister, not his wife.'

Jacobson's eyes widened. 'That's
ridiculous. I know people who were at the wedding.'

'He says she was playing around with
other men before she disappeared. It's probably a story he's made up to make
himself feel better. He's not quite all there.'

'As I said, he never was. I can
definitely understand her running away from him; but Barbara and Robbie...no, I
can't see it.' He shook his head emphatically.

'Apparently some of the rumors say
Robbie and the woman he ran off with - whoever she was - killed the boy.'

Jacobson’s face darkened. 'I know, I
heard it all at the time. It's amazing what you hear when you've got someone in
the chair. Sometimes I feel like going just a bit too deep with the drill to
teach them a lesson.'

Evan winced at the thought of it. They
were outside Jacobson's office now. 'Don't waste your time on that one, Evan.
It just didn't happen. What was the other thing that's bugging you?'

'It's nothing to do with the case;
just me being nosy really. The bus driver, Carl Hendricks, lives in this
beautiful old farmhouse with acres of land and barns and who knows what else.
How the hell did he do that on a bus driver's wages?'

'Nosy or jealous?'

'Both, probably.'

'Either way, I couldn't say off the
top of my head, but I know someone who might know. I'll look into it and get
back to you.'

Evan's office hadn't been trashed
either which was a relief. His computer was still on his desk. He fired it up
and found the photographs from the Stanton file and was just about to start
going through them when Tom Jacobson walked into his office.

'That was quick,' Evan said. 'I
might offer you a job full time.'

'No, I haven't had a chance to ask
about Hendricks yet, but I think I might have found out why friend McIntyre is
so jumpy.'

'Jumpy isn't the word I'd choose,'
Evan said, 'more like homicidal.'

Jacobson dropped a copy of the local
paper onto Evan's desk. 'Read that.'

Evan picked it up. It was folded
open at the business section and it didn't take long for him to spot the news
item Jacobson was talking about. There was a picture of Stanton and McIntyre
standing smiling with an older man Evan didn't recognize. The headline read
"Suicide Jeopardizes Bailout Deal". Evan started reading.

"The recent suicide of Kevin
Stanton has potentially jeopardized critical funding for local software
development company, McIntyre Stanton Associates Inc. Kevin Stanton and Hugh
McIntyre started the business five years ago and, through a combination of
cutting-edge products and innovative marketing solutions, have built it up to
the point where it now employs almost fifty staff. However, the recent downturn
in the economy has put the company under increasing financial strain and the
business now requires an urgent injection of capital. A potentially life-saving
deal has been brokered, but not yet signed off, between the company and local
entrepreneur, Frank Hanna, for a rumored seven-figure sum. Hanna, a self-made
multi-millionaire is the father-in-law of Mr Stanton, who tragically committed
suicide last week. Stanton's suicide has been attributed to severe stress
caused by the company's financial situation. In an interview yesterday, Hanna,
who is said to be very close to his son-in-law, said: "I just can't
understand why Kevin did it. I know it's been a really stressful time, but the
deal was almost there. If the lawyers had just got their fingers out it would
have been a done deal weeks ago." Asked whether the deal would still go ahead
without Stanton, Hanna said: "I have every confidence in Hugh McIntyre. I
just need a little time to think it all through now Kevin is out of the
equation." Mr McIntyre was not available for comment and the company's
bankers refused to comment on whether they would continue to support the
company if the deal falls through."

Evan dropped the paper onto his desk,
leant back in his chair and stretched his arms. 'Ha! That would explain it.'

'It certainly would. Reading between the lines, it sounds like Hanna is having doubts about the future of the
company without Stanton.'

'And if he found out McIntyre was playing
hide the salami with his daughter...'

'Which was the
real
reason
his favorite son-in-law topped himself...'

'He'd pull out of the deal in a
flash.'

They grinned at each other. Evan
swivelled back and forth in his chair.

'Then the good-time bankers would
pull the plug and McIntyre would lose everything. He's probably given personal
guarantees; might even have put his house up as security,’ Jacobson said.

'That's why he's desperate the
photographs don't come to light. He wants to make sure all the copies are
destroyed.'

Evan got up to get a glass of water
and pop some more painkillers. Apart from a little residual tenderness, he was
feeling okay below the belt but his head still felt like it had been used as a
football.

'I just can't understand why he
would be so stupid.' Jacobson said. 'With your whole future in the balance, why
risk pissing off the one person who can save you for the sake of a quick screw
in some seedy motel.'

'People like that can't help
themselves. It’s like the politicians. They're arrogant; they think they're
smarter than everyone else and won't ever get caught.'

'I bet he's asking himself if it was
worth it at the moment.'

Evan was tempted to show him the
photographs so that he could make his own mind up, but professional integrity
prevailed.

'It’s not just a case of getting the
photos back either,’ Jacobson went on. ‘You made a fool of him in front of her,
so his machismo demands revenge.’

Evan touched his nose gingerly.
'He's had that already. You know, after last night, I feel like calling this
guy Hanna and putting him in the picture. That'd serve him right.'

'I can't say I blame you -
unfortunately if you did and the company goes down the pan, fifty other
innocent people would lose their jobs too. It's not just McIntyre.'

'I'd forgotten about that. Not that
I'd really do it.'

Jacobson picked up the paper and
waved it in front of Evan. 'Now you know what's going on, you need to decide
what you're going to do about it. You need to convince McIntyre you're not a
threat. And you'd better hope Hanna signs the deal or McIntyre is going to be
looking for someone to take it out on.'

‘It‘d be easier to blackmail him and
leave copies in a safe deposit box with instructions to send them to Hanna if
anything ever happened to me.'

Jacobson gave him a disappointed
look, like his favorite son had just been caught playing with himself in
public.

'I don't mean for money,’ Evan said
quickly. ‘Just to keep him off my back.'

'Even so, blackmail is blackmail. Or
is that whitemail? Anyway, it's not your style.'

'You're right. Thanks for your help
Tom,' Evan said as Jacobson turned to go. 'See if you can be as quick with the
Hendricks assignment I gave you.'

He ducked just in time as the
newspaper whistled past his damaged ear.

Evan couldn't just sit around and
wait to see if Jacobson's network of neighborhood busy bodies would throw up
any information. The question of how Hendricks was living where he was had
really got under his skin, and he was going to have to do some digging himself.

He decided to take a drive over to
the county recorder's office and dig out the property deeds to see if he could
get any information. They would show who transferred the property to him - if
it was his parents that would explain it, but, if not, Evan had a lot more
digging to do. He wasn't sure why he was so keen to find out; even if he
discovered Hendricks had bought the farm out of the proceeds of doing something
illegal, it wouldn't move him forward with his investigation, unless Hendricks
had kidnapped Daniel and sold him to a pedophile ring.

The clerk at the recorder's office
who showed Evan how to use the system was a real old battle axe and he hoped he
wouldn't have to ask her for help. He started out searching for Hendricks' name
in the grantee index but came up with nothing for the property called
Beau
Terre
.

That wasn't a good start so he
searched the grantor index. There were plenty of Hendricks's but none for the
right property. Presumably that just meant Hendricks' folks hadn't passed the
farm to him, so he got hold of it some other way. Unfortunately that meant he
was going to have to enlist the help of the battle axe. He found her at her
desk working her way through the largest bag of potato chips he’d ever seen. He
explained his problem to her.

'That sounds like a real nice
place,' she said, shaking loose the crumbs that had been stuck to her chin. She
licked her finger and dabbed at them where they'd landed in her lap.

'It is,' Evan agreed.

'I bet it's got a big barn and one
of those post and rail fences too. Maybe some horses.'

'Two barns actually. And a big porch
with a rocker. Not sure if there are any horses, but I think there could be
chickens.' He couldn't help himself.

She’d been sitting there nodding her
head absently, munching contentedly through her potato chips, her eyes glazing
over as she contemplated the idyllic scene he described. Until he mentioned the
chickens.

'I hate chickens. Lizards with
feathers, if you ask me. Little bastards shit in your flower beds and eat all
your plants. Never eat the damn weeds, mind.'

Looking at her, Evan was mighty glad
he wasn't a chicken right then. He shrugged, as if sorry that he was unable to
offer an answer to her problem. 'Chickens will be chickens.'

'Used to chase poor old Billy Bob
all round the garden and peck him half to death.'

'Billy Bob?'

She picked up a framed photo and
handed it to Evan. He expected to see some poor hen-pecked husband being mobbed
by a gang of angry chickens but instead it was a scruffy pooch.

'He's in the big kennel in the sky
now, God bless him.'

'Sorry to hear that,' Evan said
replacing the photo and wishing he'd never mentioned chickens. At least she
didn’t back hand it across the room or call the dog a whore.

'Funny name. Is it Italian?' she
said.

'What? Billy Bob?'

'No - Beau Terre, stupid.'

'Probably French.'

‘I’ve never been to France. Been to Paris, Texas.’

Time to put an end to this nonesense

'Are there any reasons why I can't
find the property deeds?'

'Well, there's a couple of reasons
that could be,' she started, in a painfully slow delivery. Evan was aware that
people said all the blood goes to your stomach when you're eating, which
doesn't leave much for the other bodily functions, but this was ridiculous.

'First of all, it could be that
nobody by the name of Hendricks ever bought or sold a property called Beau
Terre.' She paused, waiting for Evan to acknowledge that he had finished
absorbing this piece of earth-shattering information and was ready to move on.
He bit back any kind of a wisecrack response, nodded and said 'Uh huh.'

Satisfied that she had effectively
got her first point across, she continued. 'It could also be that the purchasor
- what was his name again?'

'Hendricks.'

'It could be that Mr Henderson never
recorded the deeds.'

Evan didn't bother correcting her.
'Is that usual?'

'No. Most folks notarize and record
them but you don't have to.'

Evan realized that she was waiting
for some response from him. 'Any other reasons?'

'Could be the records haven't been
updated yet. How long ago did you say?'

'Ten years at least.'

'Should be done by now.' She said it
like she was just about to check on the cookies in the oven. It was completely
matter-of-fact, without a hint of irony. Despite that, Evan suspected she might
be wrong if her colleagues worked at the same pace as she did. Maybe he'd come
back in another fifteen years or so.

'There must be some records relating
to the property. Any other way to find them?'

'Depends if you've got the PIN.' Did
that mean
Pain In Neck
Evan wondered; I've certainly got one of those.

'Sorry, I don't even know what that
is.'

Now she looked at him like
he
was the idiot. He was sure she was about to ask what they taught kids in school
these days. Now that they'd dropped manners from the curriculum.

'That stands for Property...
Identification... Number' she said, beaming at him at the opportunity he’d
given her to display her superior knowledge. She was also displaying little
bits of potato chip in the gaps between her otherwise yellow teeth.

'Ah.’ He put on his best
I have
seen the light
face and asked, ‘where could I get hold of one of those?'

'I can get that for you if you
like...' She smiled almost sweetly.

Ask and you shall receive! Couldn't
we have got here a bit faster?

She put the property address into
her system and came up with the number in two seconds flat. Armed with this
vital new piece of information Evan headed back to his terminal, fully
expecting to have the answers he needed in the next few minutes.

Once again he was disappointed. He
found the property easily enough but the only property deed listed for anything
like the right time frame was a transfer listing George and Mary Saunders as
the grantors and Jason Saunders as the grantee, which had taken place twelve
years previously. There was no mention of Carl Hendricks at all.

He made a note of the details and,
with a heart as heavy as lead, he made his way back to the clerk's desk and explained
his latest problem to her. She looked at him with something akin to pity,
clearly wondering how this poor boy managed to dress himself in the mornings.
But at least the bits of potato chip were gone from her teeth. For one
heart-stopping moment Evan thought she was about to embark on the same
rigmarole all over again, but she seemed a bit sharper now - presumably the potato
chips were now digested and the blood was now coursing through her whole body,
brain included.

'It's more than likely this Saunders
sold the property to your friend Hendricks who hasn't bothered to record it,
for reasons best known to himself.'

Probably so that the tax man doesn't
get to see his ill-gotten gains, Evan thought. The clerk looked as if she was
keen to take up their conversation about Hendricks' farm from where it left off
before, so he thanked her and beat a hasty retreat.