Chapter Four

Phil stood looking down on Pine Hollow's resident blabbermouth, Melanie Atwood. He repeated his question.

"What do you mean you saw Stevie in the tack room with a guy?!" he said.

"Stevie was in the tack room whispering with a guy!" repeated Melanie, "Just what I said."

Phil turned and headed toward the tack room. out of curiosity, Melanie followed along behind him.

When they got there thought, the tack room was empty. Then Phil spotted Stevie grooming Belle. he walked over to her.

"Who is he?" he asked

"The guy you were flirting with in the tack room!" snapped Phil

"What, how?" started Stevie, then she saw Melanie half hiding behind the tack room door.

Stevie Leveled a glare at her before answering Phil.

"I wasn't flirting with anyone in the tack room!" she snapped back

"You were seen!" insisted Phil

Stevie sighed,

"Look," she said, "I was talking to someone in the tack room, but I can't tell you who or why. You've just got to trust me when I say that I'm not cheating on you in any way!"

Phil nodded, but Stevie wasn't sure if he actually believed her or not. After he went to take care of Teddy, Stevie leaned back against the wall and sighed.

Suddenly Stevie got an idea. She took out her phone and texted Jason.

"Jason," she wrote, "I'm going to ask Ashe to come up here. She may get stonewalled when she tries to investigate her father's case. But she can get you into talk to her father at the jail."

Jason texted back, "Good Idea. I'm going to talk with your postmaster Carl Dixon. Now that I've got some leverage on him maybe and can make him talk."

"Keep me posted." Replied Stevie, "No pun intended!"

Jason teleported to the post office. When postmaster Dixon walked into his office, he was more than a little surprised to find a teenage boy waiting for him.

"Mr. Dixon," said Jason, "We need to talk."

"About what?" replied Dixon, "Who are you?"

"Who I am is not important right now." Replied Jason calmly. He held up the envelope with the FOI request in it. "What is important is this."

Jason could tell by Dixon's reaction that he recognized the envelope

"This was sent by a certain party who wanted to look at the police report on the Carmichael case.," said Jason, "Problem is, it never seems to have never left town."

Dixon looked nervous.

"You know tampering with US mail is a federal offense." Said Jason, "So I think you'd better tell me what you know about the Carmichael Case."

"Get out!" snapped Dixon, "Get out of my office!"

Jason smirked as he got up and left. He may not have gotten Dixon to talk, but the visit wasn't a total bust. He now knew that Dixon was definitely involved and he was sure that he had started the ball rolling by simply making Dixon nervous.

As soon as Jason was gone, Dixon made a phone call.

"It's me," he said when the call was picked up, "tell your boss we've got a problem, some kid has been snooping into the Carmichael case."

Dixon listened as the other person spoke.

"No, it's not the Lake girl…it's some teenage boy playing detective."

"No, I don't know who he is, but somehow he got into my office without being seen and he has the FOI request that I intercepted and had thought you buried where it couldn't be found!"

Jason had just left the post office when he got a text from Stevie asking him to meet at JB's Jason texted back that he was on his way and Teleported there. he materialized on a vacant side street. Hurrying around the corner he entered the restaurant. He found Stevie waiting in a corner booth a large basket of French fries in front of her.

"What's up, Stevie." He said sliding into the booth facing her. Neither of them noticed someone who got up and ran out the door!

"Ashe is on her way here," replied Stevie, "she should be here in a couple hours."

"Good," said Jason, "I've got a feeling that things are about to start happening on my end too." He proceeded to fill her in on his meeting with the town postmaster.

"Judging from his reaction to that envelope, I'd say that your illustrious postmaster is in this little conspiracy up to his eyeballs!" said Jason taking a fry out of the basket Stevie scooted toward him.

"But why?" said Stevie, "Why would so many people conspire to send my uncle to jail?"

"That is the big question," said Jason, "Motives for crimes usually come down to one of three things: Love, Money, or Revenge!"

"Well Lake technologies was and is a valuable company," said Stevie, "So, money, as a motive; is a definite possibility."

"Um Stevie," said Jason, "I have to ask something difficult of you and Ashe."

"What is it?" asked Stevie, "we can ask Ashe when she gets here."

"I need to talk to Ashe's mom, your aunt Maddie." Said Jason,

"Actually," said Stevie, "She's Ashe's step-mom. Ashe's real mom passed away 4 years ago. Maddie was still in the process of adopting Ashe when this happened. So, the judge had no choice but to send Ashe to Arlington with grandma and grandpa Lake.

Jason nodded in understanding

"Still, she had a big motive to want Lydia Carmichael out of the way since she apparently believed that story about Lydia having and affair with your uncle."

"Yeah, but I'm sure she's innocent!" insisted Stevie

"I'm sure your right." Said Jason, "I have to my job the right way and that means looking at all the possibilities."

Stevie nodded,

"I understand." She said.

Jason was about to thank Stevie. When suddenly they were both interrupted by a familiar voice.

"See Phil," cried Melanie who was pointing at them from just inside the door of JB's "I told you I saw Stevie here with a guy!"

Before anyone could stop him, Phil stormed up to Jason and threw a punch.

"Phil no!" cried Stevie, but it was too late, the punch connected, but fortunately it wasn't hard enough to do anymore than knock Jason back against the seat.

Lisa and Carole came running in,

"What's going on?" asked Lisa. As Stevie jumped up and got between Phil and Jason who was rubbing his jaw.

Stevie turned to Lisa with a glare on her face.

"What's going on is that I'm gonna kill your sister!"

TO BE CONTINUED…Please Review