Dani Hayward P.I.: The Joshua Franklin File Read online

It was almost an hour before the Chief's secretary announced that Chuck Davis was on line two.

  "Hi Chuck. They must have been busy up there today."

  "I wish that was the reason," was the gruff reply. "I've been on the phone trying to get information on your mystery lady."

  Harold Lindsay frowned. "You mean she's not a P.I.?"

  "Oh she's a P.I. alright," Davis confirmed. "And has been, in good standing, for the last ten years. But that's all I could get. I couldn't find anything else on her."

  "Nothing?" The furrows on the man's forehead deepened.

  "Nope. Usually, I can get all the information I want with one phone call to a friend in D.C. When he hit a dead end I called another friend who has a higher clearance."

  "And?" the Chief prompted when the man on the other end of the line didn’t continue.

  "I got the same thing from him. They have no statistical information on her, not even a state of residence."

  Harold Lindsay hung up the phone with a disgruntled sigh. He was no further ahead than he had been. "Well," he said, a slanted smile curling his mouth as he picked up the business card and reread the information on it. "There's more than one way to find out about you." His hand jetted to the phone again, this time dialing only two numbers.

  "Captain Thompson." The tenor voice on the other end of the line was a solid one.

  "Jerry, come up to my office a minute."

  "On my way Hal."

  The Chief was staring out the window when, two minutes later, his office door opened and a tall, silver-haired man entered. Lindsay met the snappy gray eyes that still held the dedicated glint thirty years in the department had not been able to diminish.

  "You wanted to see me Chief?" the newcomer inquired as he eased the door closed.

  Lindsay returned to his desk and handed over the woman's business card. "Ever heard of this lady?"

  Jerry Thompson examined the nondescript card. "No. Should I have?"

  "Not likely. She says she just got into town."

  "We need another P.I. around here like we need another hole in the head," the Captain grumbled, silently recalling the trouble he'd had with gung-ho gumshoes over the years.

  Harold Lindsay relayed what Dani Hayward had told him during their short meeting and the lack of information Chuck Davis had found.

  "Sounds like we've got a mystery lady on our hands."

  The Chief steepled his fingers thoughtfully. "What have we got in the way of old cases? Something we've investigated the hell out of."

  "I'd say the Franklin case would be the one we worked the most."

  "Ah yes," Lindsay recalled the eight-year-old case. "The Franklin kid changed his alibi and sent us right back to square one."

  "I still think he had something to do with it," Thompson sniffed disgustedly. "But more than fifty witnesses, including the judge's son, saw him at the racetrack that evening."

  The corners of Harold Lindsay's taunt mouth twisted devilishly. "I wonder how far Dani Hayward would get with Jeremiah Franklin.”