Free Red Ochre Falls by Kristen Gibson

sprung up the
walk and into the back office. Fran, an assistant funeral director in training,
told me Garrett was at a graveside service and would be back this afternoon.
Ryder was meeting a family, and Hank had already left to begin his holiday
weekend. She had no idea where Stanley was at the moment, although I thought I
heard her murmur something about a coffin.
    I snagged the keys
and headed upstairs. My to do list was pretty long, so I texted Garrett to say
I picked up his keys and planned to stop by the garage later. My instincts told
me Garrett would find something, so I got started on Chloe’s case early. I
called her mom who was understandably distraught, but helpful. She gave me a
contact number for Chloe’s office, and her address.
    A clerk at the
office I called didn’t help much, but only because he didn’t know me, and
claimed he couldn’t give out confidential information. The clerk did, however,
slip and tell me the name of a lawyer working the case with Chloe, Ted Oxley.
    Mr. Oxley, a
practicing attorney, headed the college Law Club, although not a professor. I
knew him from a mock trial Chloe and I participated in a few years back. His
business was listed online. I figured there was no sense in letting the
Maserati sit around all day, so I headed over there to ask Ted about the case.
    As soon as I
parked, I texted Jos and told her we needed to meet ASAP. A guy got out of a
car near me and went inside the office building. I didn’t recognize him, but he
looked like he belonged there. Suit and briefcase.
    The elevator dinged
when it reached the third floor, my stop. The doors opened, I stepped off and
looked at the black lettering on the marquee to see where Ted Oxley’s office,
suite 307, was located. His assistant notified me he was in conference with a
client, offered me a beverage and a magazine while I waited.
    I glanced over the
headlines, but decided to check messages and play with my phone instead. The
messages indicated mom and Aunt Eileen were making good progress; Jos would be
spending the weekend with her family; and Garrett wanted to catch up before he
left for the holiday. While everyone else had Labor Day plans, mine looked to
be pretty quiet. Maybe I’d unpack, curl up with a book, or watch chick-flicks
and eat popcorn until Tuesday. Three days is enough for a person to binge on
whatever they wanted. I’d have to decide later because Mr. Oxley’s client left,
so it was my turn to see him.
    “Good to see you.”
Mr. Oxley shook my hand and walked me into his office. He signaled for me to
take a seat then walked around to his desk and sat in an expensive looking
leather office chair.
    “Sorry to hear
about Chloe.”
    “Me too. I wondered
if you knew anything about her recent cases.”
    “Well, we did work
together on a couple cases, but I hadn’t talked to her much lately. From what I
understand, she’d been given some clerk work on a high profile case to stop a
casino build. Normally, you can’t stop a build like this once it starts, unless
you’ve got a pretty strong case.”
    Oxley lifted his
arms off the chair. They came to rest on the desk and he pulled his hands up
until only the fingertips touched. From the way it looked, he was either going
to pray, or tell me more bad news. “Chloe had come to me for help, but I’m
afraid I couldn’t offer her much. The next thing I heard, she…she’d killed
herself. Maybe she couldn’t handle the pressure. Mattie, you know what it’s
like.” He threw that last part in unexpectedly. I was a bit shocked by it, but
answered quickly.
    “Yes, I do know the
pressure can be overwhelming. But Chloe was different, she didn’t bend to it
quite as easily as I did.” I felt my statement was a good recovery considering
it sounded a lot like he was taking a jab at me. He knew pressure was part of
the reason I left school and hadn’t been back, before now. The college work
wouldn’t have been so bad, but financial pressures and family