by Dave Daren
“Hopefully, we can get her the answers she needs,” I told him before I glanced at Vicki. “Vic, you good?”
She winked. “I got this.”
So, a few minutes later, I left the office and walked to my car. I didn’t even realize how late it had gotten until I got outside. It was already late afternoon. I was glad I’d bought another day. I knew I would find something. We were circling around too many elements not to find anything.
I texted Harmony to tell her I was coming out there, and I asked her if she had any student named Morales. She didn’t answer right away, so I drove out to the Horizons school. I’d never been there before, and I had a feeling this would be interesting.
The campus for Horizons was a sprawling gray brick building, nestled into ample green foliage and red and orange rock. I walked up the pathway to the entrance, along hilly gravel walkways with gray cobblestone built all around. By the time I reached the front door, I’d entered deep into a natural landscape, with trees rising on the hill above, and painted desert shrubs persevered at every angle. The building, the only human ortifice in sight, was built so deep into its surroundings, it almost seemed to apologize for its existence.
The entrance was a hidden glass door, and I walked through it and was instantly greeted by piped in relaxation music and dim lighting. It almost felt more like a massage spa than a school. The lobby had that uber contemporary look, with chairs that looked more like design pieces than furniture, and abstract sculptures that made me wonder if this place was for children.
I found an employee, a fresh faced twenty year old, with a bright smile, a uniform polo, and khakis. I noticed her silver name plate read “Eva.”
“Hi,” I stopped her. “I’m looking for the student art show?”
“Yeah,” Eva smiled and patted a clipboard, “you’ll have to sign in here, and I’ll need to see an ID. Who are you here to see?”
“I’m Harmony Irving’s brother,” I replied.
“Harmony!” she exclaimed with a grin. “We love Ms. Irving! She’s just so much fun!”
I smiled. Yeah, this woman would be friends with my sister.
“I guess she’s alright,” I joked with a wink.
Eva giggled and cocked her head at me. “You’re the lawyer brother, not the filmmaker one, right?”
I chuckled as I signed in. Sure, since my L.A. years, I had relaxed from business formal to business casual, but I certainly didn’t think I looked like a filmmaker.
“Yeah,” I replied, “I’m the uptight lawyer. The filmmaker would be Phoenix, who’s in South America right now.”
“Phoenix,” she repeated with a sigh. “You guys have the coolest family ever.”
“I dunno about all that,” I said as I handed her my driver’s license. I hadn’t gotten around to going to the DMV in the last eight months, so I still carried around my California ID.
“Los Angeles?” Eva asked as she entered my information into a computer. “I take it this is not a current address?”
“Sure it is,” I joked. “It’s just a hell of a daily commute. Traffic’s a bitch.”
She laughed. “We have to put you in the system. Write down your address.” Then she handed me a sticky note, and I jotted down my Sedona address.
“Harmony’s said a lot about you,” the girl added. “She said you know people in the movie industry.”
“I did,” I shrugged, “but not anymore.”
“I’m a scriptwriter,” she explained with a smile, “or at least trying to be. Do you think sometime you could look over my script, and maybe, if you think it’s good, pass it along to someone?”
I chuckled and handed her the sticky note. “I don’t know those kinds of people anymore.”
“That’s a shame,” Eva said with a frown. “I’ve been writing this movie for two years.”
“Two years?” I echoed as I blinked in surprise. “What’s it about?”
“It’s about the year I spent as a volunteer English teacher in Korea,” she answered.
“That is a unique experience,” I mused.
“I thought so.” She nodded. “Sometimes, our students would be children who defected from the North. It was a heartbreaking story. So, I wrote this book about a North Korean family who defects into a commonwealth community like Tranquility, you know, that place where they make kombucha?”
“I know Tranquility well,” I replied.
“Oh nice,” Eva smiled, “Kristen McGrath is a good friend. She’s so great. Anyway, I spent a year writing this novel and even stayed at Tranquility for a couple of months, and came up with this really, really, solid piece of work. Then I tried to sell it. And you know publishers don’t deal with prospective authors, right?”
I shrugged. “I didn’t know that, but okay.”
I wasn’t sure why this girl was getting into all of this with me.
“So, you have to work with an agent,” she explained. “These agents require you to put together this whole proposal package, with all of this marketing material, that when it’s done right, it takes months to prepare. So, I jumped through all of their hoops and pitched the finished manuscript. And I still got a bunch of rejection e-mails. Encouraging, but rejections nonetheless. The agents all told me, it was ‘good but not great.’ Which describes half of what’s out there on the shelves these days! Come on, really. People just don’t read anymore. Sometimes, I wonder why they even teach writing in schools. It’s a lost art, you know?”
I sighed and shifted from foot to foot as I looked for a polite way out of this conversation. Why in the world was she telling me all of this?
“So,” Eva continued, “I spent an entire year dismantling everything I wrote to learn the art of script writing and rewrite the story into a screenplay. Now, I am so sick of the material. I think I hate my characters, I’m so tired of them. But the movie is finally finished, and I just need one person to get behind it.”
“Did you ever pitch it to Steele Productions?” I threw out there.
I shouldn’t have continued the conversation, but given my life this week, the question seemed to ask itself.
“Jerry Steele was a dick,” she blurted out, and then clasped her fingers over her lips and glanced around. “I’m … I’m sorry. I shouldn’t talk like that.”
“No, no,” I laughed. “I didn’t know him too well, but from what I’ve found out about him, you’re not wrong.”
“He took advantage of … ” she trailed off, glanced down at the computer keyboard, and ran her fingers along the edges.
“Yes?” I prompted gently.
“A lot of my friends … ” she finished quietly as she averted her gaze.
Now, I was interested.
“I’m investigating his murder,” I told her.
Eva looked up, and her green eyes were hard but welling with tears.
“He deserved it,” she said firmly. “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t know anything about who killed him. I really don’t. But people I knew … let’s just say … it was cathartic. This town needed to be purged of him.”
“Those are some strong words,” I remarked with a cocked eyebrow.
She wiped her eyes and drew a deep breath.
“And when you find the murderer,” Eva said, “let me know, because I would like to personally thank them for their contribution to this town.”
“Do you have any ideas who that would be?” I asked.
“I would investigate any writer or actor who ever worked with him,” she replied with a shrug.
I nodded, and she clicked around on a computer for a minute, and then handed me my ID back with a name sticker.
“The Irving Group is back in Playroom C,” she told me.
“Thanks,” I replied. “And where is Playroom C?”
“Back down the hallway that way,” she responded as she pointed off toward the right. “You’ll see the indoor playground, which is Playroom B, and then C is the door next to it.”
“Great, thank you,” I said and walke
d down the hall in that direction.
I passed through the lobby and down a long carpeted hallway. Once I got out of the lobby, it started to look more like a school. Bulletin boards and photos lined walls painted in primary colors. At the end of the hall, I reached a rotunda with the biggest indoor playground I’d ever seen.
“Whoa,” I breathed. Plastic slides, ladders, tunnels, bridges, and ropes, all in bright colors, rose so high up, I cricked my neck to follow them with my eyes. Then a climbing disc structure rose to the ceiling before it arched back down.
The playground was currently empty, so I guessed the students were in the non existent classes somewhere.
“Hey you,” I heard Harmony say from behind me.
I turned around and smiled. “Hey.”
My sister was wearing a patterned floral sundress and brown ankle boots.
“Fancy meeting you here,” she chuckled as she winked at me.
“Damn,” I laughed and gestured toward the playground. “Speaking of fancy, why didn’t mom and dad send us here?”
She laughed. “Because if they did, there would be no money left for us to eat, let alone go to college.”
“Expensive, huh?” I snorted.
She shook her head, let out a long breath, and rolled her eyes.
“Holy crap,” she whispered. “These people are loa-ded.”
“As much as I’d like to continue gossiping,” I chuckled, “I’m actually looking for a witness I think you might know.”
“Morales,” Harmony nodded, “yeah, Paul Morales is in my cla--playgroup.”
I laughed. “You almost said class.”
“Okay,” she said with a rueful smile, “we do have classes. It’s not that simple.”
“Why call them playgroups then?” I asked.
“Well,” she sighed, “it’s … a way of thinking about them. We ‘play’ together, but we play learning games. Or play outside.”
“Or inside.” I gestured.
“Right,” she chuckled. “Well, come on in and see what we’re doing. Julie Morales has been waiting around for you. She went to talk to some of Paul’s other play leaders, but you can peek around.”
I followed her through a doorway into Playroom C, where she was immediately absorbed into a conversation with a parent. I looked around. This place was huge. It was decked out in easels and paints, and there were stations for pottery and claying. Student sculptures dotted the room and even hung from the ceiling.
I noticed Starry Night covered an entire wall, and when I looked closer, I saw it was a wood tile mosaic. Most of the people congregated at the art show on the other side of the room. Black gallery boards hung student paintings, and kids and their parents reverently milled around munching on light refreshments. The children were elementary aged, and then I noticed the parents. High end designer handbags, jewelry laden fingers and silicone injections to hide the aging. Most of them were so much older than me, closer to my parents age than my own, even though I was legitimately old enough to have a child this age. I guessed that was the price of success.
I thrust my hands into my pockets and looked around at some of the art work. Wow. The kids were good. Multiple depictions of the Red Rocks, of course, some wild horses, and a fox. I browsed further and noticed some telling family dynamics. Mom, dad, and kids sat around a breakfast table, and everyone was on their phones, except for one kid who looked bored and ignored. I commended the artistic skill in clearly communicating tension.
Then I came across the most disturbing of the bunch.
“That’s my kid’s,” said a soft accented voice behind me.
I turned to find a strikingly beautiful Hispanic woman. She wore a tailored purple dress and had long, slender, legs in black heels. She had long, flowing black hair coming down in soft tresses and unbelievably gorgeous dark eyes.
“This one?” I asked as I gestured to the disturbing image. It was a painting of a decapitation.
“My Paul, he is troubled,” she said with a frown.
Her accent sounded like cursive--beautifully formed words and syllables connected on top of another, indistinct as separates.
“Paul,” I repeated. “So, I take it you are Julie Morales, then?”
“Yes,” she nodded, “and you are Henry Irving. My brother Alex told me you were coming. Come, come, we can talk out here.”
She gestured outside, and I followed her. Alex was right. She was eager to talk. She took me back out to the playland, which had accumulated a handful of other children now. We sat on the side at a bench, and she pointed to a child who’d just about climbed to the top of the vaulted ceiling.
“That is Paul up there,” she told me. “Here we can talk.”
“Geez,” I whistled. “Is he alright up there?”
“They believe at this school we must allow the children room to explore on their own,” she replied. “They cannot fully experience their own sense of personhood if they have not tested their own personal limits.”
“Hmmm,” I hummed thoughtfully.
It sounded like a whole lot of non-parenting parenting. Contrary to what you’d think from my folks, I had a lot of boundaries in my upbringing, and I turned out alright.
“Alex tells me you are asking about Jerry Steele’s death,” Julie went on as she turned to face me.
“Yeah,” I nodded and met her eyes, “I understand your husband Olliver knew Jerry.”
“He did,” she replied. “Jerry pressured him to sue Paul and Peter Wright, the construction company he’d worked for for many years.”
“So, he didn’t want to sue?” I asked.
“No,” she shook her head, “not really. Ollie loved the company. He called the guys he worked with his brothers. They were all thick as thieves. I guess, given the type of people they were, maybe that is more than an expression.”
I chuckled. “I heard they hired a lot of felons.”
“Ollie was one of them,” she told me. “Many years ago, Ollie was not a good person. He did things he should not have done, and he deeply regretted them. He went to prison, and when he came out, he was a different person. Slowly. He went to the Second Chance Men’s Center, and he worked the program.”
“Did you know him then?” I asked.
“No,” she replied. “I met him after he graduated. He went through the steps, got his certificate, and then Paul Wright took him under his wing and helped him. He loved Paul Wright. Ollie worked for Paul for years,” he said. “And then we got married, and Paul was born. Ollie became a supervisor, and everything was good.”
“So, when did things go bad?” I questioned as I cocked my head to the side.
She sighed. “One day, Ollie was on the scaffolding, and he fell. He was horribly injured. And the Wright’s were deeply saddened. They came, and they helped us. They gave him extra pay, and we got the insurance money.”
“Right,” I nodded, “I read about this in the paper. And from the story I read, Ollie switched and became greedy because of Jerry.”
She laughed bitterly. “Is that what it said? That is wrong. That is not what happened.”
“Then what happened?” I asked as I leaned forward.
“Jerry knew terrible things Ollie had done many years ago,” Julie explained. “Really bad things. Things I will not say. Things the police did not know.”
“How did Jerry know them, then?” I questioned with a frown.
“Jerry knew a man named Allen Wagenshutz,” she replied. “Allen knew many things, and Jerry owed Allen lots of money. Lots and lots of money.”
“Ahhh,” I murmured as I furrowed my brow. “Do you know why?”
“I don’t for sure know,” she shook her head, “but I think I heard Ollie say one time something about a bad film investment.”
“That sounds about right,” I mused. “How much money was Jerry in with Allen?”
“Millions, I know,” she shrugged, “and Allen had threatened to kill Jerry if he did not pay back.”
“So, how does th
at relate to Ollie?” I asked.
Julie sighed, and just then, more kids entered the playground as a wave of the art show patrons exited. Parents and nannies mingled among the playleaders while the children attacked the playland. Two young women passed by us with strollers in a discussion about child nutrition that had just about the same level of intensity that ours had about a murder. Once they’d passed, Julie continued.
“So, Jerry met Ollie in the hospital,” she told me, “and said he’d heard about Ollie’s accident and that it was a goldmine. At first he said he was doing a news story, and Ollie didn’t want to turn against the Wright’s. But Jerry was desperate and blackmailed Ollie into suing.”
“Whoa.” I blinked in surprise. “What did Jerry have on Ollie?”
“I cannot tell you,” she said as she chewed her lip worriedly, “but it was bad. Really bad. Things Ollie would have never wanted anyone to know. He used to be a different person, as I said.”
“So, Ollie sued the Wright’s to stay out of prison,” I stated.
Julie scoffed. “Prison? No. Prison would have been the least of our problems if these things came to light. It would have put Ollie, and our whole family, at the hands of very, very dangerous men. So, Ollie sued the Wrights, and Jerry got a percentage, enough to pay back Allen.”
“I see,” I muttered as my mind churned through this new information. “It all makes sense now. But … who killed Ollie?”
“Oh,” Julie said softly, “that is not a mystery. Ollie killed himself.”
“Suicide?” I repeated in shock.
“Yes,” she whispered, and tears gathered in her eyes.. “We moved to Phoenix because he was so full of shame after what he did to what he called his ‘brothers,’ that he had to get away. And a piece of him died when he left Sedona. He was never the same. That was when my son Paul found him.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I replied sympathetically.
“It has been very hard for him,” she said as she dropped her eyes to her lap. “We have moved back home, but he is still not the same. My brother Alex, you met him, has been helping with Paul. It is good, and I see glimpses of the Paul I used to know. But he is still buried deep.”
I watched the young Paul play on the playground, and he seemed to enjoy himself, but stayed isolated.
