CHAPTER 3

"Uh oh...beware the cowboy bearing gifts..." CSI tech Bob Wisnewski saw Houston stepping off of the elevator carrying a box.

"You're just mad 'cause it ain't for you." The PI stuck his tongue out at him. "Where's my girl?"

A decidedly feminine voice came from behind him. "Nope, CJ's your girl, remember? You married her and broke my heart...had to get engaged to Vaughn." Cheryl Crawford gave him a big smile as he turned around. "By the way, your invitation should reach you today or tomorrow."

"A ha! Finally set the date, huh?" He went towards her.

"Yep, you're too late. So what's in the box?"

"Well..." He peeked under the lid. "Just got back from Texas yesterday...and Madre Rosa has been baking..."

"Ooooh!" She was fairly jumping up and down.

"Las galletas nuez de la boda de mexicana." Taking the top off with a flourish he grinned. "Do you have any idea how hard it was to keep Michael out of these?"

"How hard was it to keep you out of them?"

"Pretty hard once we ate all of the ones she made for us." He cracked up and as she reached for the box he raised it over her head. "There's a charge for these."

"What?"

"I need some information."

"On what?"

"Benzoyl peroxide – in its pure form."

"Nasty stuff – it likes to go boom."

"That I already knew. Do you know of any uses besides zits, flour, bleaching teeth, work with resins, and dying hair?"

She looked deflated and put a hand on her hip. "If you already knew all that..."

"'Cause I don't know if there's something I'm missing."

"Those are all that I know about." He lowered the box and she took a cookie. "Sooooo good."

"Enjoying that benzoyl peroxide?"

Cheryl looked down at the other half of the cookie, snatched the box out of his hand, and shrugged. Around a mouthful of cookie she spoke. "Don't care." Both cracked up. "Did you really come up here to ask me about that or just bring the cookies?"

"Both."

"Why in the world do you want to know about that?"

"I'm helping ATF with something."

"Uh oh...and it goes boom easy...not good."

"Nope. I just wanted to get your take on it...plus I had to get the cookies out of the truck."

"Well now I need to ask you for a favor."

"What's that?"

"Well, I heard that you sang at Chris and Murray's wedding..."

"Uh huh."

"Would you?"

"Would I what?" He pretended to look shocked.

"Sing at our wedding, you big goof."

"You're not having it anywhere near a dog kennel are you? Might set 'em to howling."

"Bull...I heard you were good – Michael said so."

"You believe everything he says?"

"Only 99.9% of it."

"I guess so then."

"Great. I'll have to have you audition, though." She gave him a big smile. "Just kidding. I really appreciate it. Who knew you were so talented?"

"What can I say? I'm just under appreciated." Rolling his eyes he turned. "Gotta get some work done."

"Thanks again." She watched as he threw his hand up as he stepped onto the elevator, before she swatted at Bob as he grabbed a couple of cookies from the box.

Houston got off the elevator and saw Michael with his back turned, his phone out showing pictures of his recent fishing trip in Texas to Gabby Giovanni and Richie Valdez. Sneaking up behind the lieutenant, Matt goosed him in the ribs causing a shriek which sent the entire squad room into a fit of laughter. "Lousy PI..." Michael straightened his tie. "What do you want?"

"What makes you think I want something?"

"Past history. Oh shut up, Valdez. Get to work." Hoyt pretended to be mad at the sergeant who was still laughing. Turning back towards his office he walked with the PI. "So what's going on?"

"I had a visitor at the ranch last night; Mitchell asked for help with the explosion yesterday."

"Uh oh..." He opened the door and went in, taking off his jacket before landing in the chair behind the desk. "And?"

"It wasn't the first. There were two others in the last couple of weeks: El Paso and St. Louis. But they're trying to keep it hush-hush."

"So what have you got?"

"All three contained benzoyl peroxide."

"That's the acne stuff isn't it?"

"Yep. It's some nasty stuff – likes to go boom without a detonator sometimes..." Walking over to the window he rested his hand on the ledge and looked out. "It had just been unloaded from one of the XPRS jets."

"If that had gone off when they were in flight...umm...so do they think it's terrorists?"

"Don't know."

"What about the senders or receivers?"

"The information was destroyed on all three packages." Matt watched as the cop sighed.

"How in the hell are you supposed to stop something like that?"

"Mitchell's looking into any of the manufacturers that use it who might be missing some. If we can find out where the idiot is getting it from we might be able to get him."

"Looks like the only way right now. Damn..." His phone rang. "Hoyt..." Rolling his eyes he wrote down an address. "Yeah, be right there." He grabbed his jacket. "Gotta go. Good luck with it."

"Think we're gonna need it." He left and went down the stairs to the parking garage, answering his phone as he unlocked the truck door. "Hey, Lil Mama."

"I heard you had a jealous husband after you." The laughter on the other end of the line was something he loved to hear.

"Yep – been a while. So Chris called you?"

"Uh huh..."

"Guess I better watch my p's and q's with Cheryl next." He gave a chuckle as he hit the speaker button.

"Why?"

"She said the invitation should be arriving...and she also asked me to sing at the ceremony."

"Hmmm...maybe you could retire from the PI business and become a wedding singer full time."

"Nooooo, don't think so."

"Have you learned anything else about the explosions?" She watched as Tomás played with Catey in the pool.

"Not really." He sighed. His time in Texas, even though he had ended up working a cold case for the Harris County Sheriff's Department, had been a nice break from the hustle and worry. This case had him plenty worried.

"If you need any help from me just call, baby. Love you."

"Love you, Babe. Talk to you later." He hung up, started the truck and then the thought that he didn't have the slightest idea where he was going – either in the truck or on the case – hit him. After a moment of consideration, he pulled out of the garage and went back toward his office. The answer was out there somewhere...he just needed to look in the right place. The short drive was spent going over what little they had so far. What didn't they have? First – a motive: why would somebody do it? There could be a myriad of answers to that question; a grudge, a perceived injustice, just for the hell of it...the list was pretty much infinite. Secondly – how? Benzoyl peroxide and a watch detonator...but the organic compound in the peroxide family was, in it's pure form, unstable. What he had said to Mitchell earlier about their bomber being smart could be true – or he could just be reckless as hell.

Getting out of the truck, Matt went up one floor to the lobby of the Houston Industries Building to have a talk with security about the change in the workings of his office. Walter Earhart, a long-time employee of the the company had recently been promoted to head of security and Matt went past the front desk after exchanging good mornings with a couple of the guards on duty and went down the hallway to the first door on the right. After knocking he was asked to enter and found the twenty eight year old sitting behind a desk looking through paperwork.

"Houston! Come on in, have a seat. What's going on?"

"Thought I'd come check up on you – see how you liked being the big boss."

"Huh – not really much of a change except for scheduling...and that's a pain." The face he made cracked the PI up. "Is there something I can do for you?"

"I just wanted to let you know about a change for upstairs."

"Uh oh – good or bad?"

"Well, I guess it's good: Chris is about to start maternity leave."

"Will you bring in another secretary?"

Shaking his head, Matt propped an ankle on his knee. "No...I'm really not here that much anymore. Y'all are already screening folks that want to go up there and as long as I lock it up tight there shouldn't be any problems. Just wanted to give you a heads up."

"Gonna be a lot of babies around here this fall. How's CJ doing?"

The smile that spread across Matt's face was huge. "She's great – fussing about the weight of course but I think she looks great. Well..." He got to his feet and extended his hand. "Guess I better try to get some work done. Congratulations on the promotion, bud."

"Thanks. Let me know if you need anything." The guard watched as Matt left, thinking back to when he had first been hired. Houston had seemed like James Bond to him back then.

Back upstairs, Matt hit the coffee pot and then went and pulled up BABY the computer. What hadn't he looked at? "The Faltzer brothers." He began with the elder, Alan, born in Boston to working class parents. A standout athlete, he had garnered scholarships to a private high school in the city and then at Fisher College where he earned a Bachelor's degree in Accounting. The money he had saved on tuition had gone toward starting XPRS. After a long sip, Matt looked into the man's personal life. Alan had married the former Madeline Brook Scott two years after starting the company and they were now the parents of four children. All in all it looked like the American dream; no scandals, nothing.

Typing in Edwin Faltzer didn't get him anything drastically different. A year younger, Edwin had graduated early from high school and had also attended Fisher but on an academic scholarship and graduated with a Bachelor's in Computer Information Systems the same year as his brother. The younger brother was single but once again there was no trouble to be seen.

Refilling the coffee cup, the PI leaned on the bar and thought. The Faltzer boys had gone at things the right way: they had worked hard, had a plan, and were making it pay off. One brother was the number cruncher and the other the computer whiz who most likely specialized in logistics. From what he had read there was no animosity between the two and no reason why one would turn on the other or the company.

Now where to go? He went back to BABY and began looking into the competitors of XPRS. Fortress Deliveries was the number one delivery company out there, but not by much. The younger generation seemed determined to topple them from the throne and from the looks of it there wouldn't be a long wait. Matt estimated that in the next year XPRS would have the number one spot. He looked up the NYSE numbers on Fortress: they had been declining for the last eight months due to corporate infighting, a grab for control by opposing members who had failed to secure enough votes before attempting the coup, and a deluge of complaints from customers and employees alike. Unless someone knowledgeable stepped up, they were doomed. Still, the thought of corporate sabotage against their top competitor just didn't seem likely but it was something worth keeping in mind.

Next on the list was Walderson Worldwide, in business for over a hundred years and had more than flecks of gray around the edges. Unfortunate to have had dealings with them in the past, Houston knew that a lack of interest on the part of the third generation of owners had led to insufficient capital investments in the company that threw it far behind the other delivery companies starting in the late eighties. Rumor was that the CEO, a thirty-something at the time, was more interested in clubs, coconuts, and cocaine in Miami than taking care of the business that his grandfather had started. There was finally a hostile takeover by other members of the board in the mid-nineties who had banded together to save it and by the numbers he was seeing they might yet be able to return to their glory days with continued improvement. The disgraced former CEO was now doing spots on reality shows for a living – and failing at that miserably as well.

Bruendorfer was a name the PI was familiar with: it had started out as a trucking company out of Austin, Texas and eventually expanded into the major delivery market. Although they weren't number one, the owner was in his nineties with practically no one to leave the company to when he passed and it was only a matter of time before he died and it did, too. All in all though he thought, leaning back and finishing off the coffee, not bad for a truck driver who had lost a leg in World War II and had started out with a pickup truck and just enough money for gas and oil. When he was gone it would be a sad day for the state of Texas.

Looking at his watch he decided that since it was Chris' last day for a while he would take her – and Murray if he was able – out to lunch to celebrate.