A Good Kind of Trouble (A Trouble in Twin Rivers Novel Book 1) (22 page)

"Is Dani single?" Gordo asked, his voice choked from the pepper spray.
 

Christ
. Ben closed his eyes. Could his day get weirder?
 

He opened his eyes to see Dani running back with a large bottle of imported water. Ben took it from her as they approached the Camry. He unlocked the car and helped Gordo to sit in the passenger seat, his feet stretched out onto the sidewalk. Ben grabbed a clean t-shirt from the laundry basket in the backseat and splashed the cool water on it, then pressed it against Gordo's face. Gordo exhaled a relieved sigh.
 

Dani knelt next to Gordo and placed her hand on his arm. "I'm so sorry. I thought you were with the stalker."
 

"It's fine," Gordo said, his voice still choked and now muffled by the fabric. "No problem."
 

"No, no, it's a problem. I feel terrible."

"Yeah, me too," Gordo said. "I mean, I feel pain, but I feel bad that I startled you. I was trying not to scare you. It's a bad neighborhood."
 

"So you guys are friends of Lindsey's?" she asked.
 

Ben introduced himself and Gordo. Gordo reached out blindly to shake Dani's hand, but Ben caught him centimeters before his friend shook the young woman's breast. He steered Gordo's hand to Dani's.
 

"Nice to meet you, Dani," Gordo said from under the sodden t-shirt.
 

She giggled. "Nice to meet you, too, Gordon."
 

Charlie sighed behind Ben. "A lawyer, huh?"
 

"I'm afraid so," Ben said.
 

"Hmm. You helping Lindsey on this stadium story?"
 

"When she'll let me," Ben said.
 

Charlie smiled and flashed a set of perfect white teeth. "Well, it's good to have reinforcements."

Chapter Eighteen

"Watch the doorway."
 

Ben had let go of his friend for a second to open the door and Gordo immediately veered to the right. He grabbed at Gordo's arm but too late and his friend careered off the doorjamb with a thud that spun him nearly one hundred eighty degrees.
 

"You're a terrible seeing-eye dog," Gordo said, still clutching the wet cloth to his swollen eyes.
 

"Sorry," Ben said, taking Gordo's elbow and steering him into the office building. The security guard at the front desk stood, worry crossing his face. Ben gave him a smile and reassuring nod. "Everything's fine."
 

The guard followed them to the bank of elevators and hit the button for him. "You need me to call anyone?"
 

Ben shook his head as the elevator opened, and he hurried Gordo in before any Stanton & Lowe employees saw them. As the mirrored doors closed, Ben got a good look at himself—suit covered with grime, hair sticking up after rolling on the ground, several smudges of dirt streaking his face. Gordo appeared to be his hostage, both hands clutching the damp cloth over his eyes.
 

They got off the elevator and Ben peered down the hall in both directions. A small group of people were gathered near Gordo’s office. He turned the other direction, leading Gordo to his office instead. It would be better if he didn't have to explain their appearances to any coworkers.
 

Sharon stood as Ben approached, standing between him and the door. As he got close, her expression changed from disapproval to confusion. The normally smug, condescending expression had slipped completely, replaced with something akin to disbelief as she took in Ben's appearance and the disheveled associate he had led down the hall. For the first time since he'd met her, Sharon seemed to be at a loss for words.

"Sharon, please call Dave Hogan and have him come to my office. Now."
 

She backed away and picked up the phone to dial Dave's secretary. Ben led Gordo into his office. He helped Gordo to the big leather chair behind the desk.
 

"How are you feeling?"
 

Gordo lowered the wet t-shirt and tried to focus on Ben through eyes that were bare slits.
 

"Oh, just lovely," he said. "Come on! I feel like I just shaved with a blowtorch!"
 

"Right," Ben said.
 

He went to the door and asked Sharon to track down a fan, then saw Dave walking quickly down the hall. He held the door open for Dave and shut the door behind them.
 

Dave paused in the middle of the office, his mouth open, staring at Gordo. He slowly turned to Ben and took in his dust-covered suit, then looked back at Gordo, who lowered the t-shirt from his face and tried to open his eyes to see Dave.
 

"What the hell happened to you two?" He leaned in closer to examine Gordo's red face. "I'm going to guess this is unrelated to the deposition."

Ben nodded.
 

"Lindsey?" Dave asked.

"I can see why you'd think so, but no. At least not directly."
 

Someone knocked at the door and Ben opened it to find Sharon holding a desk fan.
 

"Can I get you anything else?" she asked. The sight of Ben and Gordo must have been pretty shocking, since this was also the first time Ben could remember Sharon knocking on his office door.
 

"Know a cure for pepper spray?" he asked. Sharon’s eyes widened and she shook her head. "Never mind. Thanks, Sharon. This is fine."
 

Ben put the fan on the desk, aimed it at Gordo's face, and set it on high. Gordo leaned forward and sighed as the cool air hit him in the face.
 

"Feeling better?"

"A little."
 

"Again. What the hell is going on?" Dave sat on the edge of the low bookcase. After Ben summed up the morning for him, Dave asked, "So do you have any idea why Stanton would be at Lonnie Corcoran's office?"
 

"No idea. We certainly don't use Corcoran as an investigator. We don't represent him, either,” Ben said. “How about Bear O'Bannion or ValCorp.?"

It was a hunch, but his gut told him that Stanton was neck-deep in something slimy. And that was territory that O'Bannion knew well.
 

"Sure," Gordo said. "Stanton had me do some research for O'Bannion about a year ago."
 

Ben looked at Dave, and the two men turned to Gordo.
 

"Oh. Maybe I wasn't supposed to say anything about that," Gordo said.
 

Dave shook his head. "No, it's okay. Remember any details of the assignment?"

"Some. I had to work over an entire weekend to get it done," Gordo said.
 

Dave ran a hand over his face, then rubbed his neck, messing up the line of his impeccable tailored dress shirt. "I haven't heard Bear's name come up as a client before. Seems like something Stanton would boast about, getting a client like that."
 

He nodded toward Ben's computer. "To be safe, let's check the records, see if Lonnie Corcoran or Bear O'Bannion pop up."
 

Gordo's eyes widened, but only a fraction. "Is that kosher? To be snooping on a partner’s clients?"

"I'm a partner with this firm. Ben almost is. You did the work. We need to know if there's a conflict with representing Lindsey."

"We're not representing Lindsey," Ben said. Though that could change. She was highly likely to get into trouble again.

Ben rolled the desk chair containing Gordo out of the way so he could work on the computer. Gordo fumbled blindly until his hands fell on the desk fan. He picked it up and pointed it at his face.
 

Ben opened the conflict-check software to run the names Bear O’Bannion and Lonnie Corcoran through the company's roster of clients, past and present. No matches.
 

Dave elbowed Ben out of the way. "Let me do this next part."
 

He exited the software and logged Ben out of the computer system. Then he logged in again, this time using his name and password. Dave scrolled through several screens before Ben realized what he was doing.
 

"Billing records?" he asked.
 

"When did you do that work for Stanton, Gordo?" Dave asked.
 

Still facing the fan, Gordo gave some dates, relating what he remembered about Stanton running him all over the property records clerk's office and creating corporate entities.
 

"I'll be damned," Dave said in a low voice. "Gordo's right."

"Hey!" Gordo turned away from the fan. "I'm right here."

"I just mean, I should have known about this." Dave patted Gordo's shoulder, sending up a plume of dust. "How are you doing, slugger?"

"I'm okay," Gordo said. His voice didn't sound as choked and his color wasn't as angry a shade of red as it had been earlier.
 

"So it looks like Stanton billed Gordo's work to O'Bannion," Dave said. "What sort of research did you do?"
 

"Mostly property title searches, but also preliminary work setting up LLCs and incorporation documents for real estate holding companies." Gordo patted his face with the wet t-shirt and squinted at the screen. "I wrote a few memos to Stanton on properties, zoning, ownership, tax records—you know, the usual stuff he doesn't want to have to deal with."
 

Dave nodded and patted Gordo’s arm, suddenly seeming ill at ease. “Hey, why don’t you lie down in my office until you’ve recovered.”

He helped Gordo to his feet and led him to Ben’s door. “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” he told Ben quietly.
 

Ben closed the door behind them and returned to his desk, leaning back in the leather chair. His gaze fell on the computer screen where Dave was still logged in to the firm's server. As a partner, Dave had access to records that weren't available to associate attorneys and other staff—archives of client work, billing records. Had he meant to leave himself logged in?
 

Ben glanced at the closed door. He could get fired for using Dave's access to restricted records. On the other hand, his boss may be working with an investigator to threaten a reporter who was covering corruption by O'Bannion—his boss' client.
 

He opened the server files for client records and began digging.
 

An hour later, he’d pieced together enough to make him highly suspicious of Stanton’s behavior. He was closing up the billing records as Dave let himself back into Ben’s office.
 

"Gordo’s resting in my office. Sorry it took so long. He made me get him a sandwich,” Dave said, taking the chair across from Ben. He rubbed his face. “I thought we should talk without him here. What did you find?”

"I looked at the work Gordo did for Stanton, but I could only go so far. Bear's file is locked up tight. Even you don't have access."
 

Dave leaned back in the chair. "That’s interesting."

"Stanton had Gordo create multiple business entities—either corporations or limited liability companies and all in Nevada. All were wholly owned subsidiaries of other corporations. Clearly, they're shell corporations, but it was all done by the book," Ben said.
 

Three new corporations—Vanda, LLC; Laelia, LLC; and Miltonia Inc.—were all owned by the same parent company, an existing corporate entity, Cattleya, Inc.
 

"Do those names mean anything to you?" he asked Dave, who shook his head.
 

"What the hell is a Vanda?"
 

“No clue," Ben said. "Anyway, the other six entities have generic names and are structured so three of the corporations are parents to a new subsidiary. Have you heard of Central Street Holding Company, Mission Street Company, or Valley Properties? Each of those has a subsidiary with a similar name."
 

Dave shook his head again. "It was designed to hide the true ownership of the property. Not usually necessary, but not illegal. What's Bear trying to hide with the shells?"

Ben let out a frustrated sigh.
 

"I'm not sure. The other thing Stanton asked Gordo to do was research all the properties ringing the arena site—tax records, ownership, estimated market values. The thing is, this was about three months before the arena site was made public."
 

Dave let out a low whistle. "That's not good."
 

"If Bear was speculating on where the arena would be built, he was really good at it. More likely, he knew something," Ben said. "Unfortunately, there's more. Three of the corporations bought up most of the commercial property around the arena site within a few weeks—fast deals, too. Looks like short escrows, probably cash sales."

Dave's eyes widened. "How many properties changed hands?"

"If this were a Monopoly board, Bear just bought up all the properties except for the utilities and the railroads."
 

"That requires a lot of capital, which O’Bannion has," Dave said.
 

Ben continued walking Dave through his discovery. A few weeks after the buying spree, a handful of the properties were sold again, and the sales continued. A dozen properties were recently sold or were pending, according to the latest bill the firm sent to Bear.
 

"Bear's flipping them," Dave said, nodding. "Makes sense. If he had nonpublic information, he'd know how to leverage that into quick profits."

"That's not what's going on. It gets weirder."

Dave groaned and put his head in his hands.
 

"You'll probably want to stay in that position for this part," Ben said. "When the properties were resold, they were bought by the other corporations Stanton created for Bear."
 

Dave raised his head, his expression confused. "Bear bought the properties from himself?"

"Yeah, that confused me, too," Ben said. The two men stared at each other. Ben could tell Dave was as troubled as he was about this twist. "You're the tax attorney. Would there be any advantage to Bear for buying and selling properties among different businesses he owns?"