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Just as I was turning the “be back at” sign around, my phone rang from inside my purse. I pulled it out and looked down at the screen.
Josie.
“Hi, Josie,” I said after I’d touched the green button to accept the call. “What’s up?”
“I got the name of that trust for you — you know, the one that was trying to buy the Bigelow mansion.”
Excitement surged through me, even as I told myself for the umpteenth time that day that I really needed to hold my horses. There was a very good chance the trust would be yet another dead end.
“What is it?” I asked.
“It’s called The Lightman Group. I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean, though. I went ahead and Googled it, and all I found was that it was incorporated in Wyoming. The names of the officers are all private.”
I had to wonder why a trust that had been incorporated several states away was doing business in Globe. It didn’t seem to make much sense to me. Then again, just because the trust had been incorporated in Wyoming didn’t mean the people involved actually lived there. I was the first to admit that what I didn’t know about finance could fit in an area roughly the size of Arizona, but even I knew people often incorporated in states halfway across the country if the rules of incorporation there were more favorable in terms of the fees required or the privacy benefits being offered.
Since she’d sounded almost apologetic about not being able to dig up more information for me, I said quickly, “That’s all right, Josie. That’s way more than I had to work with a few minutes ago. I’ll try to do some digging on my own and see if I can find out anything more.”
“All right.” She paused and then said, “Do you think there’s something to this trust that I missed?”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “It’s just that it keeps pinging my radar for some reason, so I figure I might as well try to find out as much as I can. If it turns out to be a dead end, well, I’ll move on to something else.”
She agreed that sounded like a good idea, and we ended the call. Afterward, I headed over to the counter, phone still in hand, mind working furiously.
Was it worth consulting the Tarot or my pendulum over this? For some reason, I got the impression my normal methods of divination wouldn’t be of much use. I could always call up Grandma Ellen in the crystal ball, but again, I sensed that wasn’t a very good idea. Most likely, she’d tell me — as she had in the past — that I had all the clues I needed right in front of me, and it was my job to put them together.
Fine. I’d try a much more earthly way of getting the information I needed.
A quick scan of the sidewalk outside the shop told me no one was loitering in the area, preparing to come inside. I scanned through my contacts list and touched the entry for Calvin’s cell phone.
He picked up right away, which told me he was probably in the station and not out in the field, chasing meth heads or rogue cows or whatever else might have called him away from his desk. “Selena? Is everything okay?”
I suppose I should have expected that reaction, since we generally communicated via text when we were working. “Everything is fine,” I assured him. “I was just wondering if you could do something for me.”
“What is it?” he asked.
Should I be offended that he hadn’t said “sure” right away? No, it was smart of him to be cautious, especially since I didn’t know if what I was asking was strictly legal.
“Police have access to special databases, don’t they?”
I could tell from the way he didn’t answer immediately that he was trying to figure out what sort of favor I was asking of him. “Some,” he said cautiously. “But it’s not like we’re the FBI over here or something.”
“Could you find out who’re the officers of a particular out-of-state trust?”
“Officially, no,” he replied. “But….”
“But?” I probed.
“One of my guys here is pretty good at getting around internet security, if you know what I mean,” Calvin said. “Give me the name of the trust, and I’ll see what he can do.”
“Oh, that would be amazing,” I replied. “It’s called The Lightman Group, and it was formed in Wyoming. But that’s all I have to go on.”
“That’s enough. I don’t know when I’ll have something for you, because Ben has his own duties that keep him pretty busy, but if we find anything, I’ll be in touch.”
“Only for that?” I asked, my tone arch.
Calvin chuckled. “Okay, there’s a pretty good likelihood I would have been calling you this afternoon anyway. I was wondering if you’d want to come out to my place this evening. I can barbecue.”
Two nights together in a row? Over the past few months, we’d seen each other several times a week, but we’d never had dinner on successive nights. Our relationship had obviously moved to a different level, and now I wondered if he wanted it to take yet another step forward.
