To help Tracy plan for her future? Or was he conniving to steal what had once been his?
She put that stack back, too, then sat motionless for a moment and listened to be sure she had more time to investigate. Janya would be looking for her soon. There was only so much time a woman could contemplate a waterfall, even for a good purpose.
When her ears said all was still calm outside, she dived into more piles. Notes this time, not maps and not house plans. Just notes, and she thought they might coordinate to the codes she’d noted on the maps. Again, though, she couldn’t make heads or tails of what CJ had written. He’d been doing some sort of research, she could tell that much. He seemed to be ticking off things he had checked. But beyond that, she was in the dark.
Her time had run out. Janya was going to have a hissy fit when she realized Wanda was making herself comfortable in the living room, instead of playing Peeping Tom at the window. She got up to leave and did a quick check to be sure she’d put everything back the way she’d found it. That was when she noticed a file folder more than half-hidden behind a sofa cushion. She realized she had probably dislodged it when she sat. Now she was torn. She didn’t have time to discover what CJ Craimer thought he should hide from view.
But she didn’t have the willpower not to.
She tugged the folder from its hiding place and opened it, expecting more Happiness Key documents. Instead she realized she was reading papers on Creative Development and Investment letterhead. Copies, and not particularly well made ones, as if whoever had done the work had been in too much of a hurry to center the paper or find a setting that would have made for a cleaner copy. She held the folder closer and leafed through the pages inside. A picture emerged. Each page was documentation on the sale of a residence. Basic information at the top, like owner’s names, address, square footage, name of subdivision and lot number.
Below that, the price paid and the new owner’s name. So maybe these houses had been bankrolled by Creative Development. Nothing strange about that, although why CJ had bad copies in his possession, and why he had them hidden, was more interesting.
She looked more closely at one. Under the price paid, she noted an appraisal price that was substantially higher. So maybe somebody got a good deal. Then she saw a list of problems with the house, plus estimates for repairs and renovations, some of them substantial. The next line was most puzzling. A bank—not Creative Development—was listed as mortgage holder, then the amount of the mortgage appeared, which looked to Wanda as if it was the entire appraisal figure. That was when she noted the date. This transaction had occurred several years ago, when real estate was booming and banks were clamoring to give away money to anybody with a beating heart.
Had Creative Development bought these homes recently to rehab them? Or maybe the new owner was a contractor who worked with Statler. But how could a dilapidated house be a worthwhile investment now, at a time when every residential block in town either had a short sale or foreclosure sign in front of at least one house? Was Edward Statler simply a genius who could pick up houses cheap with no money down, renovate them, then sell them for a handsome profit? What was that called these days? Flipping? Sure, Florida was full of homes that probably needed to be flipped, but in this economy, who was going to buy the finished product?
More important, why did CJ have these pages hidden away? What did any of this have to do with him?
She didn’t think twice. She removed one of the sheets, folded it, then folded it again until it, too, fit inside her bra. Then she finished looking through the file. The pages at the back were something completely different. These were simple loan applications, like the ones with which a buyer started the loan approval process. Again, she didn’t think. She grabbed one—these were copies, after all, so who was she going to hurt?—and folded it quickly to stuff beside the other. She turned to hide the file where she’d found it.
That was the moment when she heard voices.
“I can’t believe you want to be here while the party preparations are