Catherine Nelson - Zoe Grey 02 - The Trouble with Theft Read Free Page B

something about Stan I
liked, and he must have known then that he was dying. I knocked a big chunk off
the price of the Mercedes, and he threw in the Scout.
    Talking around an
ever-present cigarette between his lips, Stan had told me he’d purchased the
thing new in ’77 and, being a mechanic, he had done all the work himself. With
one glance, it was obvious it had been impeccably—and lovingly—maintained. The
Scout is a thing of beauty. It’s hunter green with a white removable hard top.
The interior is an Army-tan color. Everything works as well as it had the day
it rolled off the manufacturing floor.
    And almost everything
is original. Shortly after Stan died, the lock on the tailgate busted—the
truck’s way of mourning, no doubt. I never replaced it because I knew Stan would
never approve of anything less than an original Scout part, and my half-assed
attempts to locate one had turned up zilch. But the open tailgate had been how
the kidnappers had succeeded in grabbing me, so I’d gotten serious about
repairing it. My new mechanic, Manny, had fixed it for an exceptionally
reasonable price.
    Later, I’d also had
Manny install a new soft top, a sailcloth Replace-a-Top, kidnappers be damned.
I’d debated but ultimately gone ahead because I wasn’t sure Stan would be
disappointed. The thing looked amazing. Besides, I was carefully storing the
hardtop; it could go back on at any time.
    The second addition
was a small toolbox bolted to the floor behind the backseat. This fugitive
recovery gig required certain equipment, and not only did I not want to haul it
around with me if I didn’t need it, but I didn’t want it falling into the hands
of anyone else. Three of the handguns I own had been used by bad guys for bad
reasons; I wanted to make sure that didn’t happen again.
    The weather in Colorado
is predictably unpredictable, but by this time in June, it’s pretty much
guaranteed to be hot. Today was no exception. At ten a.m., it was upwards of
ninety degrees. I rolled up the sides of the soft top, wincing once or twice at
the strain on my shoulder, then climbed back in the truck.
    I motored out to
Prospect and headed east to Sideline Investigations and Bail Bonds,
conveniently located about a mile from the detention center. Sideline Investigations and Bail
Bonds is owned and operated by a retired cop and his long-time friend. Wesley
Meeker had been a cop in Orlando, Florida, for fifteen years before moving his
family to Fort Collins, where he worked as a detective for another fifteen
years. Shortly after he retired, he realized how incredibly bored he was and
started taking on private cases just to keep busy. He is a born investigator,
and it’s turned out that’s all he really knows how to do.
    His friend Mickey
Sands had been an investment banker in Florida until the whole market/economic
crash/crisis thing. He got out just before everything went belly-up and decided
Colorado was as good a place as any to spend his golden years. But he could
only play so much golf. He ended up dabbling in a few business ventures here
and there until his best friend made passing mention of a private investigating
firm.
    One thing led to
another, and soon they were set up with an office. Sands worked on running and
building the business while Meeker did the investigating. Within a year, they’d
hired two associates to handle their growing caseload. A year after that, Sands
pushed Meeker into bail bonds because there was such money to be made. Meeker protested
on principle, believing there was something wrong with a former cop helping
criminals get out of jail, and left a large part of that to Sands. Now
the partners had six full-time investigators and four full-time bond
enforcement agents. There are others, like me, who work on a case-by-case
basis.
    In looking for whoever
had stabbed and killed my client, I’d gotten on the trail of Tyler Jakowski,
a.k.a. Tyler Jay. Tyler Jay had been Larimer County’s number-one most