Chapter 2

Dan pulled up in front of the Staples and got out and stretched. He walked into the store and corralled an employee to help him with the selection of a printer. After talking to the employee for a while the young man talked Dan into buying a Canon Pixma 5000. the young man told him that the photo printers had a little better resolution but that they were limited in their ability; Photos was all that they did. The Canon Pixma could do it all. It would print very good quality pictures and it would print out letters, envelopes and any web pages that he wanted to print out. Dan agreed with the young man and asked him to get one sent to the front checkout while he did a little more shopping.

Dan browsed the store and selected the largest pack of photo paper that they had, extra in cartridges, envelopes that would hold a four by six photo, labels for the addresses and the return addresses, scissors and tape. He asked at the checkout if they sold stamps and he was told that the grocery store next door sold rolls of stamps.

After he stashed the items in his SUV he walked into the grocery store and bought a roll of stamps. He now had all that he needed. He was pleased with himself. He hoped that Adrianne would be pleased.

Dan saw a bar across the street that looked nice so he left the SUV where it was and walked over to the bar. It was medium crowded for a Tuesday night and he had his choice of seats. He sat down next to a woman about thirty-five. She was pretty and she had a very good figure. She was dressed in a pants suit and she carried herself like she knew what she wanted out of life.

"Hi, new in town?" she asked as he sat down.

"Yep, just in town for a few weeks until I get this job done and then I'm back to Dallas."

The woman looked at him for a few seconds, "That's not a Texas accent that I'm hearing."

He smiled at her, "Very observant. I was raised in Chicago and moved to Texas about four years ago."

The woman grinned, pleased that she had guessed that he was not from Texas originally, "I get paid to be observant. I'm a reporter for the local newspaper. My name is Candy Wilson."

Dan nodded and the woman continued, "You're in town for a job? What do you do?"

"My name is Dan Turner. I'm a consultant. Actually I'm a civil engineer and I consult for developers. I look for the best ways to use properties so that the developer can get the most use out of a site."

The woman got that sparkle in her eye that reporters do when they smell a story, "What developer are you working with?"

Dan grinned, "You know that I can't tell you that. If you print it in the paper the price of the property will double tomorrow. The property hasn't even been bought yet. If I say that the site can't be made profitable the sale will never happen."

"Can't blame a girl for trying," she said, "How do you like our fair city so far?"

"Pretty good I guess. I really haven't had too much time to do anything yet. I'm still working out the soil tests and the topography drawings. I did meet one of your leading citizens though."

Dan saw the woman perk up her ears, "I think his name was Judge Turnbull or Turnwood or something like that."

The woman sneered, "Oh, Judge Tunby. I guess you're working for one of the big developers then. I guess the Judge will be a couple of hundred thousand dollars richer soon."

Dan turned to her, "From the tone of your voice I'd say that Judge Tunby wasn't one of your favorite people."

"I'd love to get the Judge with his hands in the cookie jar. He's as crooked as a dog's hind leg. Nothing goes on in this county unless the Judge gets a cut. He's slick though, you can't get anything on him. He's got every asshole that means anything in this county beholding to him. That includes that sheriff. The sheriff does the Judge's dirty work. If the Judge can't convince you to do the right thing the sheriff does. The sheriff has as much dirty linen as the Judge does."