Southern Justice, Part 68

I’m Fixin’ To present part 68 of Southern Justice:

The sheriff tore the sheet of paper with the numbers Chris had provided off the pad, folded it and put it into his shirt pocket. He handed the pad back to Chris and said, “That’s pretty good detective work, Mr. Adams, but I’m going to have to check it out.

“Please do,” Chris told him. “Pep Boys will have a record of the transaction and all the numbers recorded in their computer.”

Later, as they were driving out of the Pep Boys parking lot with a printed copy of the records of Chris Adams’ car being serviced, Agent Motes said to the sheriff, “Well, it appears as if Adams and Osborn are both in the clear, which leaves us with absolutely no suspect.”

“I’m afraid you’re right,” the sheriff agreed. “If I’m any judge of character, that young Adams fellow is not a killer, and I would venture to say the same about Ms. Osborn. Any suggestions?”

“Yeah, I have two,” Agent Motes said. “First we canvass all the rental car agencies in the area and get a list of names of everyone who rented a black Mustang on last Monday or Tuesday. Also, I’m going to put Ms. Osborn under surveillance to see if we can pick up some kind of lead. She appears to be innocent, but I have a feeling that she’s still connected some way, some how.”

This decision by GBI Agent Motes turned out to be instrumental in saving Patty’s life.

Back at Pic-Ric Products everyone returned to work after patting Chris on the back.

At the end of the day he made a halfhearted attempt to straighten his desktop before heading toward Patty’s office, where he found her doing the same thing, but with much better results. That’s when he noticed the phone card lying on her desk. Picking it up and examining it he asked, “What’s the phone card for?”

“Oh, I bought it so I could call you from the law library last week. Cell phones never work in there.”

“Hey!” Chris cried out excitedly, “there’s more proof. You called me twice—once while I was still at work and again around seven-thirty at home. There’s got to be a record of those calls, which gives us even more proof!”

“We don’t need it,” Patty told him. “You’ve already proved my innocence. Thank you darling,” she said before giving him a quick kiss.

“What a day!” Chris exclaimed. “Hormel was supposed to come take the company away from us and we were both murder suspects, but it ended just like any other day.”

“Trust me,” Patty said as she slipped on her jacket, “Hormel would have been here today if his client wasn’t dead. By the way, I just left a message with his office I would be paying him a visit tomorrow morning. Come on, let’s go home.”

At that very moment, B. Wendell Hormel was staring in amazement at the message pad on his desk in disbelief. It told him that Patty Osborn, vice president of legal affairs at Pic-Ric Products, had called to advise him she would be arriving at his office at ten o’clock tomorrow morning for a conference.

He knew that this could only mean that she had gone to work for his adversaries, but jut to confirm it, he placed a phone call to her number at Pick-Ric Products and listened to Patty’s outgoing message. Then, he hung up without leaving a message as several scenarios came to his mind.

What the devil could she possibly want? Had she been working for them while still working for him? They had to know about Jackie since the sheriff had said he would notify Rick Junior. That had to be it, he thought, it was about Jackie.

The day Patty had been fired by B. Wendell she had faxed a copy of Jackie’s will to her home, before delivering it to the county courthouse where she had filed it listing herself as the executor.

So that on Tuesday morning, June 13th, she arrived at Hormel’s office armed with the will, as well as the file containing the information from the handwriting experts opinion on his forgery of Rick Senior’s handwriting.

Her enthusiasm was slightly dampened when Ray McKenley met her in the reception area, leered at her and said, “Hey, doll, you look really great!”

She ignored his remark and icily said, “Would you please advise Mr. Hormel that I’m here for our meeting?”

“Oh, he’s expecting you. He asked me to bring you directly to his office. Just follow me.”

(tmdunagan@aol.com)