by Dave Daren
He shook his head and whistled at the memory of days gone by. “But, once you get on the other side of thirty…”
“Well,” I laughed. “We’re still on the good side of thirty.”
Jim snickered. “Oh, the good side, huh? I’m not sure which side that is. But it won’t be long. What, you got another year left of your twenties?”
I shot him a dirty look and Vicki laughed.
“Pretty close,” she said. ”He’s almost twenty-nine.”
“Almost twenty nine?” I repeated. “So what is this grade school, where you’re like six and half, or six and three quarters…And you’re not far behind me, you know.”
“A lady never reveals her age,” she smirked with a flip of her hair.
“Uh-huh,” I said. “What’s that have to do with you?”
She smacked my arm and Jim booed at my burn.
“Uh-oh, I think I started something here,” Jim smiled at AJ.
She shrugged. “Eh, It doesn’t take much.”
“Thanks for coming by Jim,” I turned professional and shook his hand.
“You bet, Henry,” he said. “I’m going to file these with the city, and then we’ll get the ball rolling on this.
“You do that,” I nodded.
“Thanks, Jim,” Vicki said. “We’re so excited.
“And you...don’t watch that channel,” he teased.
Vicki laughed and then Jim left the office.
“We still have to meet the wedding planner this weekend,” she said. “I’m starting the guest list. Do you think we should invite Marvin Iakova? I don’t really want to because he needs to be the center of attention all the time, but we can’t very well snub the biggest media mogul in the state.”
I groaned. “I told you. I want to run off to Vegas. None of this guest list, table placard, and Save the Dates and all of this.”
“We haven’t even started the planning and you want to elope?” she laughed. “How are you going to be when my parents come into town with my brother and cousins?”
My stomach froze. I hadn’t even thought about her parents. Jooyon and Seoyon were nice enough, just a little high maintenance and snobby. Her dad was a Korean immigrant turned self-made neurosurgeon, and her mother was an entrepreneur that owned a chain of nail salons. Last time her parents were here, I felt like I spent the entire week justifying our small town lifestyle and startup law firm. I think they had originally thought Vicki was shacking up with some loser that had lost his marbles and given up every shot at success for cows and goats and yoga. I did pretty well convincing them that we had a fairly successful practice in town, and that we had become a valuable part of this community.
Well, I did well enough that the engagement announcement went over decently. But, I did overhear some rapid fire Korean that included lots of exasperated uses of the word “Sedona.” I wasn’t looking forward to revealing that we intended to spend the rest of the foreseeable future here.
“Eloping is sounding better by the minute,” I said.
“You know your parents would kill you if you eloped,” she said. “As in murder you in your sleep.”
I laughed. “Then again, so would your parents.”
“So that takes Vegas off the table,” she laughed.
“Damn,” I said. “I was looking forward to Cleopatra. High rollers suite.”
“We could honeymoon in Vegas,” she said.
“Eh,” I said. “Thought it would make a good story. Much simpler to plan too.”
“What if we still did the wedding in Vegas,” she said. “And just invite everyone.”
“That ruins it,” I said. “The whole point of getting married in Vegas is that you’re either drunk or eloping. You can’t invite half of Sedona to a Las Vegas wedding.”
“Sure you can,” she said. “We could rent out a big hall, and get a wedding package at Caeser’s Palace.”
“Nah,” I said. “Ruins the ambiance.”
“We could get married on Cathedral Rock,” she smirked.
“That’s it,” I joked. “I’m taking back my ring.”
She laughed. Cathedral Rock was where my parents got married. They met in a hippie cult run by a Hindu guru, and he officiated the ceremony. My mom wore a simple white dress, and my dad wore corduroy pants with a giant star sewn on the crotch.
“You know,” she said. “It could be very meaningful and sweet to do the wedding there.”
I rolled my eyes. “Ugh. Meaningful? Yeah, meaning I’ve become my parents? No thanks.”
She laughed. “Okay. So we want to do something that’s totally us. We should do something that has to do with our story.”
Our story consisted of me hitting on her in the break room while she wore a scandalously sexy red dress. She wore said dress to get my attention because she had seen me the night before at the Downton Abbey premiere drunk and whining over losing some chick. Years later, I had a vague recollection of seeing her at that party, but I had always remembered our friendship starting in the coffee room. Our relationship started with the murder charges. Great story on a wedding program.
“Yeah,” I teased. “We should have the wedding at the jail.”
“Oh my god,” Vicki buried her face in her hands. “I can’t even with you right now. I can’t even.”
We both worked in thought for several minutes.
“Too bad about the art gallery,” Vicki muttered. “That would be a great place to get married. Could be romantic, if there hadn’t been the whole murder outside and all.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I think that would be hard to get over.”
We let the wedding locales percolate for a while. I faxed Hal Durant the coroner’s report, and I started researching African poisons online. I spent the better part of the morning doing that, and then AJ returned with Phoenix following her on a dirtbike.
“Hey guys,” I greeted them as soon as they walked in.
“How was the meeting?” Vicki asked them.
“Productive,” was Phoenix’s answer.
He grinned at me, and then slapped down a coil bound book.
“This is the business plan,” he said.
I nodded with approval as flipped through the book. It must have been close to a hundred pages. There were charts, and graphics, and subheads, and sections.
“You typed all this out?” I asked.
I couldn’t picture Phoenix typing anything longer than a Facebook status.
“Well,” he shrugged. “I found a template online and we’ve been doing a lot of group brainstorming. So, it’s not been too hard. But the most important part, is page 92. The budget.”
“The budget,” I said.
I flipped to page 92 and looked at his final number. I knew enough about small business costs to know that his number was actually a little conservative. I scanned his itemized list and noticed a lot of costs that he hadn’t even considered.
But he stood in front of me, with his hands on his hips, and grinned from ear to ear.
“Good work, Phoenix,” I nodded with approval. “I’ll look this over, and let you know what I think.”
“Cool,” he nodded.
He shared a smile with AJ before he left the office. AJ grinned and silently opened her laptop, and I could tell she wasn’t going to get a thing done.
“How did it go?” I asked.
“Great,” she said. “Leila, Landon and I are all on board. Paradigm Productions is a real thing. I can’t believe it. Less than a year ago, I was just some girl with a blog. And now, I’m a scriptwriter for a film studio?”
“You going to leave us for a film studio?” Vicki asked.
AJ shrugged. “I don’t plan to. It’s a startup, more of a startup than this. But, if I did, it wouldn’t exactly be leaving you, Mrs. Irving, considering Paradigm Productions is a whole Irving thing.”
“An Irving thing,” I mused. “I like it.”
“And don’t let him fool you,” she winked at Vicki. “Henry’s all like ‘I don�
�t have time to run a movie studio, blah, blah, blah.’ That is some bullshit. You know, as soon as he gets five minutes, he’ll be over at the studio, poking around, with his control freak issues.”
Vicki laughed. “I know. I just hope Phoenix knows all of this.”
“Okay,” I said. “I’m not that bad.”
“Yeah?” she said. “Phoenix wants to draw up contracts for all the studio principals. We came up with notes, and I told him I’ll start on drafting those today.”
“If you can give me those notes,” I sighed. “I’ll draft those. I want to make sure that--”
Vicki and AJ burst into laughter and I realized the joke was on me.
“Fine,” I said. “I’m a control freak.”
“Yes you are,” Vicki said in a saccharine filled patronizing tone. “And we still love you.”
“I don’t even know who you are right now,” I muttered.
We silently worked for several minutes and out of the blue Vicki repeated AJ’s words.
“Mrs. Irving,” Vicki mused. “I like it.”
I smiled. I had watched her face when AJ called her that and she had appeared a bit surprised. I had never had a conversation with her about the whole surname thing, but I was glad she decided to take mine. I would like to think I was super progressive and modern, and could be all ‘it doesn’t matter,’ but honestly, I wasn’t.
“The Irving’s are moving up in this town,” I said. “It’s a good name to have around here.”
“Oh, God,” Vicki rolled her eyes. “Listen to that ego.”
AJ giggled. “So what went on while I was gone?”
Vicki filled AJ in on the James Matthews murder development.
“No,” she gasped. “This is like a soap opera. Poison? Come to think of it, he did snack a lot on stage.”
“We originally saw that on the video,” I said. “But we never came to any conclusion.”
“But if the murder and the smuggling are related,” I said. “We’ve got a much bigger case on our hands. Much bigger.”
Chapter 14
I had never been inside Julianna Spencer and Gabriel Montoya’s house. Harmony would have loved the building, I thought as I pulled up to the parking for the game night.
“It’s the Jenga condos,” Vicki quipped.
It did look like a round of that game. It was a white building comprised of about a dozen concrete rectangular boxes stacked on top of each other at odd angles. One wall of each box was an open window, giving a tinted view of the lighted inside. From the parking lot, they looked like ultra-modern apartments inside.
“This is what happens when we give in to artsy fartsy,” I said.
“My crystal ball says that in ten years’ time, we’ll own one of these buildings,” she said.
“I don’t disagree,” I said. “The way things have been going, I doubt it will take ten years.”
We walked up the sidewalk toward a glass door and I put my arm around her. She looked every bit on the “good side” of thirty tonight, in jeans, a white tank top, an open plaid shirt, and black flats. We spent our days out fighting the world and trying to make our mark upon it. Sometimes it felt good to just be young and carefree.
“I’m glad you’re on this journey with me,” I told her.
She smiled up at me with her dark eyes and creamy complexion.
“What do you think would have happened to us if I hadn’t come to Sedona during Harmony’s case?,” she asked.”If I decided you needed space and family time and all of that?”
I blinked in surprise as we neared the lobby door.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I hadn’t thought about it. I guess...well, Harmony may or may not have gone to jail, who knows. Either way I would have been miserable out here trying to defend her. Afterward, I probably wouldn’t have stayed. And you and I would have probably hooked up at some point, but it wouldn’t have been the same, and it wouldn’t have lasted.”
“It’s funny how small choices like that can change our lives forever,” she said.
“Hmm,” I smiled. “Don’t get too reflective on me tonight. We’ve gotta get through charades and headbanz, and God only knows what else.”
“You complain,” she said, “but you’ll have a good time.”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “I thought I was a big fat snob.”
“Oh you’re definitely still that,” she laughed.
We entered the building to a long a lobby with frosted glass and laminate floors, and long narrow hallways.
“She said the sixth floor, apartment twelve,” Vicki recalled and gestured toward an elevator.
We took the elevator up to the sixth floor and got off an open air alcove with a garden fountain, and patio furniture that surrounded an unlit fire pit. She knocked on door number twelve, and Gabriel opened it.
“Vicki, Henry,” his gregarious voice boomed. “Glad you could make it.”
Then he did a little folded hands bow. Gabriel was tall, and well-built, and had untamed curly black hair that reached just above his shoulders. His large dark eyes were always intense and expressive, and he typically dressed like he was appearing in a costume play. Today it was a ruffled white top, with black slacks, and I half expected him to have a sword on his hip. It wouldn’t be the first time in the last few months I had met a legit swordsman.
We had met Gabriel when he had whisked Julianna away from a nude dance troupe, that was also a five way relationship. It went well until the murder.
The one man in the midst of the relationship was found dead backstage, and all leads pointed to Julianna. We saved her ass, and she was eternally grateful. So grateful, that at one point during the case, she and Gabriel had suggested group sex with Vicki and I.
That really freaked me out. I still haven’t gotten over it.
“Gabriel,” I greeted him.
Gabriel’s face softened into a welcoming smile.
“Henry,” he greeted me in a tone ooozing with warmth.
“Good to see you again, Gabriel,” I held out my hand.
Gabriel took, my hand, grasped it, then cupped his palm over mine.
“No,” he insisted. “We don’t do that among friends.”
Then, in one quick motion, he pulled me into a full frontal hug and grasped me tightly in a bear hug.
“I’m so glad you came,” he whispered over my shoulder as he patted me.
Gabriel finally let go, and then he smiled at Vicki.
“Good to see you too, Goddess of light,” he told her.
He took her hand placed his lips to it.
“Oh,” Vicki looked surprised.
I just rolled my eyes. This was going to be a fun evening. Vicki and I followed Gabriel into the living room. The decor in the apartment was a hippie chic flavor. Bright pastels, and string lights on the wall, and paper lanterns hung from the ceiling, and pastel and beaded throw pillows covered on a hand painted futon. A handmade wooden bookcase overflowed with vinyl records, and old books, and an acoustic guitar sat on a stand against one wall. A multi-colored knit rug took up the rest of the open living room. About half a dozen couples, all in their mid twenties sat around the living room, and the volume and energy were high.
“Guys,” Gabriel called out, “this is Henry and Vicki.”
“Oh, we’re glad you could make it,” Julianna smiled and rose from her spot on the futon. She wore a green ankle length dress with beaded fringe and sandals, and had her long red hair pulled back in silver hairpins.
“We are too,” Vicki said and Julianna likewise embraced both of us in a side hug.
“I heard you were engaged,” Julianna said. “Let me see that ring.”
“Oh, yeah, it’s a huge one,” a voice came from the floor. Leila Jaxson rose from the floor to greet us. “Their grandmother was a legit Downton Abbey style British debutante.”
“Hey, Leila,” I said. “Good to see you. Didn’t know you’d be here.”
“Small town,” she shrugged. “Only so much to do
around here.”
“Oh, are you the film investor guy?” a tall Australian rose up behind her.
“Yeah,” Leila answered. “This is Henry and Vicki. Guys, meet Jagger.”
Her eyes twinkled when she said his name. Jagger was a tall, muscular Australian with frizzy blond hair that hit his mid back. He wore jeans, combat boots, and a sleeveless white tee with the Australian flag centered on it. I caught random tattoos here and there.
“Hullo,” his voice came out slight and breathy as he smiled.
“Leila and Jagger,” I said. “Perfect combination. Clapton and the Stones.”
“You know Clapton and the Stones?” Jagger stroked his chin, and I noticed the silver stud poking out.
“His dad is Moondust,” Leila bragged. “Of course he knows Clapton and the Stones.”
“Moondust?” Jagger’s eyes got wide. “That’s your dad?”
His accent was so thick, it took me a minute to decode every sentence.
“Guilty as charged,” I instantly winced at my corny use of legal jargon.
This Jagger guy wasn’t the typical Sedona rocker type. This was the real deal L.A. pack out the Forum kind of rocker. It had been a while since I had been around his type, and he was throwing me off my game.
He mimed a worshipping motion toward me.
“Moondust Irving can play,” Jagger finished with an approving nod.
“Jagger’s a lead guitarist,” she said.
Of course he was.
“What’s the name of your band?” I asked.
The smile faded, and a shadow crossed his face.
“I used to be in this band called Nemesis of Captain Hook,” he said. “You can look them up online.”
I froze at the name. Yeah, I knew who they were.
“But,” he said. “Then, they screwed me out of a lot of royalties, and I quit. And Leila had done a couple of stories on us over the years, and we talk a lot, you know. So, I decided to take some time off, you know, come out here. Get into nature, and recenter myself. Think up my next move.”
“Nemesis of Captain Hook,” I mused.
“Yeah,” he shrugged. “We’re pretty big in SoCal. You’ve heard of us?”
