I held up my hand. “I’m not trying to speak ill of him, but I need the truth. If he’s gotten into any altercations that you know of, borrowed money, come into a lot of money recently.”
Jalen shook his head. “Theo’s a straight-shooter.”
“You said that his wife died of cancer three years ago. Treatments can be extremely expensive.”
“I covered them,” Jalen said, the muscle in his jaw popping again. “My employees all have good health insurance, but I know that not everything gets covered. I have what I call ‘grants’ where if an employee or their immediate family have certain medical emergencies, they can apply to have some, or all of the costs covered.”
I was impressed but pushed it aside. He wasn’t the focus of the case.
“I’d like to take the case,” I said, “but I need to be clear about something first. I don’t care who’s hiring me, who’s paying for it. My goal is finding Meka and bringing her home safely. I’ll probably step on some toes, ask things that people don’t want me to ask, and they definitely don’t want to answer.”
“I’m okay with that,” he said.
“I’m not a cop. I’m not collecting evidence to be used in court. That means no search warrants, but also that a good defense attorney would most likely get anything I find thrown out if there are charges to be brought. I’ll ask questions, follow rumors. I don’t need corroboration to follow a lead, and I don’t need to read anyone their rights. I don’t make arrests. It’s all about finding Meka.”
Jalen nodded. “If there are any legal issues, we’ll take care of that later. Bringing Meka home is my top priority.”
“Then we’re on the same page.” I held out my hand for him to shake. “I’ll get one of our standard contracts, then take some contact information from you. I’ll also want to come to your place of business tomorrow and talk to your employees. They probably don’t have anything to do with this, but I want to be thorough.”
“I appreciate that.”
The moment he clasped my hand, electricity shot up my arm. I barely suppressed a shiver. Damn. If he wasn’t a client, I’d be having a whole other conversation with him. As it was, I made a mental note to ask Adare the policy on hooking up with former clients.
A girl could dream, right?