A/N: Hope everyone is enjoying the story. I appreciate people sticking with me. :)
Chapter 26
Sheriff Koch's Office, Friday at 2:30 pm
"So did Sheldon give you anything good?" The Sheriff asked after the partners had entered his office and closed the door.
"He's clean but I'm having suspicions about the Sheriff at the time, Art Haberly," Booth filled him in; sitting in the same seat he sat in earlier in the morning.
"What kind of suspicions?" Koch wanted to know.
"He told Sheldon that he only had two weeks to wrap the case up. Something so high profile would normally have a shortened solve time simply because everyone would be working on it. Yet only one detective and the coroner seemed to be doing all the legwork. Usually we call that a cover up," Booth said bluntly.
"You think Art was on the take?" Johnny raised an eyebrow.
"It would explain the doctored records and missing weapon. I never found anything inside the file indicating someone ran down the serial number on the gun. Now at first, if it was ruled a suicide there would be no reason to but the moment murder was suspected then someone should have run the serial numbers. Conveniently there are no serial numbers mentioned in the file and the weapon is missing. Even if we wanted to run the serials without the weapon we couldn't. Someone who knew where to look for where the information was stored removed it," Booth explained.
"That someone being the detective or the sheriff," Koch nodded.
"That same person could have doctored the medical examiner's report at the same time. Anyone who comes asking about the report at a later date would never know it had been doctored," Brennan said.
"So Art was dirty. It will be awfully hard to prove it with him gone and all," the Sheriff reminded them.
"Yes it will be but maybe we won't have to. If we follow what Leonard Setter told Detective Rumpl, we may get lucky. I think it's time we made a trip to Seaford Construction and have a look see at their records from when Burt Seaford was murdered," Booth told the Sheriff as he stood.
"Good luck. We're running out of time. Didn't Caroline give you until the end of the day today?" Koch wondered.
"We have until midnight. After that she's handing the papers over Seaford's attorney in the morning," Booth nodded.
"Well I hope you find what you're looking for. This guy certainly has gotten away with a lot over the years. It'd be nice to know he'll finally be paying for it," Johnny smiled slightly and Booth and Brennan left his office.
Seaford Construction, Friday at 3:15 pm
"We need to see your company holdings back in nineteen seventy-nine," Booth flashed his badge at the receptionist.
"Let me get Mr. Cray. He'll know where to find such things," she didn't smile as she picked up the phone and called the new boss in his office. Mr. Cray was standing before them in short order. Though he only stood at about five foot nine inches tall, the former construction manager was a formidable looking man, which is probably why Seaford Construction jobs got done so quickly.
"You need records from seventy-nine?" Cray didn't beat around the bush.
"Yes. We need to know what properties were owned by Seaford Construction, that includes places being rented out as well," Booth explained.
"They'll be in the basement, follow me," he said. The group headed for the elevator and Cray pushed the button to send them to the basement. Once they exited the elevator, he led them through winding piles of cardboard boxes full of paperwork.
"All right, everything from earlier than nineteen eighty-five should be in here," the current boss of Seaford Construction told the partners as he swung open a door that had obviously not been opened in a while.
"And how exactly are these sorted?" Brennan asked looking at the stacks of boxes. She counted ten stacks most that had six boxes per stack.
"By client," Cray said.
"We need a year, we don't know which clients we are looking for," Booth told him.
"Then I wish you the best of luck. No one working here currently worked back earlier than eighty-five. None of this was put on the computer since its over twenty years old," the man looked at them apologetically.
"Ok then, Bones call up your Squint Squads that were put on hold. We need some serious help," her partner said.
To Be Continued…