Page 37 of Out of the Shadows
“Something important must be in there.”
“There are thirty-seven boxes that Charlie left with a friend. I might be able to convince Jack to pick them up and we can go through them, see what’s so valuable.”
“Family law reveals a lot of dark secrets. Some of the files won’t be public record. It’s highly unethical for Vincent Hedge to store the documents in such a manner. They should have been destroyed, or sent to another law office.”
“Charlie was alive and well Saturday morning when he brought the items to his friend’s house. But that’s the last person I can find who saw him.”
“Where are you now?”
“Heading to Laura’s to relieve Jack.”
“Be careful.”
Margo smiled. She was thirty-three and had been in the Army for six years, a private investigator for more than eight, and was well-trained with all manner of weapons, and still her mom worried.
“I promise.”
Chapter Thirteen
By the time Jack returned to Laura’s house with his overnight bag, the kids were asleep and Laura was talking with Margo in the kitchen.
“All quiet?” he asked.
“Yep,” Margo said.
Laura said, “You don’t have to stay. Logan is overreacting.”
“It’s just a precaution.” Jack checked the back door. The handyman had been working on the door when Jack left a few hours before. The work was good, the lock secure. The new frame needed to be painted, but for now this would suffice.
“I talked to Beth,” Laura said. “She doesn’t want those boxes in her garage.”
Jack glanced at Margo, who said, “I hadn’t told Beth and Bob about the break-in, so when Laura mentioned it, the woman freaked.”
“I shouldn’t have, I didn’t think—”
“You can share that information with anyone you want,” Jack said. “Laura, call Beth and tell her someone from Angelhart Investigations will pick up the boxes first thing in the morning.”
“I can get them if you let me take your truck,” Margo said.
“I was thinking Luisa and Tess could bring them to the office. Mom and Tess would know best the value of the information.”
While their mother had been a lawyer for more than thirty years—first as a prosecutor, then in private practice—Tess had also gone through law school and passed the bar, but her specialty, contract law, hadn’t excited her as much as being an investigator for her mother’s firm, before they started the family PI business.
“Good idea,” Margo said.
“I think Beth would feel better not having the boxes in her garage,” Laura agreed. “She sent her kids to friends’ houses tonight she was so nervous.”
“A good precaution,” Jack said, “though I think Margo’s right. If whoever wants that information knew it was at the house, they would have already taken it.”
Margo stood. “Jack, you look like crap, and I know you’ve been up since four this morning. Sleep, I’ll take a look around the property and take the first shift.”
“Do you really think that’s nec—” Laura began and cut herself off when both Jack and Margo turned and stared at her.
“Okay, okay,” she said. “I’ll try and accept the fact that Charlie got himself into a mess and that—maybe—someone thinks I’m involved.”
“Most likely,” Jack said, wanting to ease her mind a bit, “they came here to look for whatever was in the storage locker, didn’t find it, and won’t be back. But if they think you’re a line to Charlie, they could return, so it’s better that Margo and I stick around for the next day or two.”
She nodded. “I need to go to the clinic tomorrow morning. We rescheduled all the appointments, but I have a surgery at seven a.m. I need to be there.”
