Sedona Law 2 Read online

  Chapter 1

  It was Valentine’s Day in Sedona. I had never been much for the holiday. As a matter of fact, I maintained some pretty cynical views on it. I used to call it “National Singles’ Awareness Day,” or “You Might As Well Slit Your Wrist Now, Cause You’re Destined to Die Alone Day.” The latter was a little more difficult to fit into a greeting, but I actually used it a few times back in Los Angeles.

  In my more intellectual moments, I would theorize it was a useless event to squeeze consumer spending out of a dying economy after the fervor of holiday gift card redemption had its way with the American populace. Either way, Valentine’s Day was never my thing.

  That was until this year. I once heard it said you could never spend a year better than in love. I guessed that was true. This had been the year of Vicki Park. I knew it was so cliche, but I didn’t know how else you were supposed to say it. I felt like I was on a cloud and was just waiting for it all to come crashing down.

  The early spring wind swept across the desert plain with a biting chill, and it blew her dark hair into her face. Tonight, her hair was curled in the front, so once the wind died, it fell in soft waves around her flawless and creamy complexion. God, she was beautiful. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. She turned to me with a smile playing around her Korean-American features, and her almond shaped dark eyes twinkled when she smiled.

  Vicki was fit and slender, but not like those ridiculous model types I sometimes dated back in Los Angeles. Those relationships often ended in train wrecks, but no. Vicki had depth, personality, and warmth.

  That warmth was what was sending me spiraling down into this emotional rabbit hole. When it was just the two of us, the rest of the world disappeared. Like right now. We were in a field with about a hundred people, but we might as well have been alone. She leaned over and kissed me softly, and I could have died right then and there and been a happy man.

  Then we heard the drums directly behind us like some sort of tribal war cry. I jumped and was jolted back to reality.

  “It’s part of the act, Henry,” Vicki laughed as I glanced down at the program. Then she plucked the paper out of my hand and scanned it. “They come from different angles of the venue and approach the stage to represent the different walks of life from which we all come.”

  I rolled my eyes and sighed.

  “Granola bullshit,” I muttered.

  I didn’t know how she got me to come to this thing. It was a Valentine’s Day event in a field outside of town. A stage had been set up, and there was supposed to be a dance troupe performing. Vicki decided it was the most interesting Valentine’s Day event going on in Sedona, so it would make a good night out.

  I wasn’t sure if Sedona’s interpretation of performance art was necessarily the cultural enrichment she craved, but she insisted. She packed us a full picnic, complete with a blanket, wicker basket, a bottle of wine, and wine glasses. So, we kicked backed and watched the show.

  A fully-costumed medieval jester in mime makeup pranced around the audience and gave out red roses to all the ladies. He arrived in front of Vicki, bowed low, and ceremoniously presented her a rose.

  “Aww, thank you.” She smiled as she took the rose. The mime responded with an impressive heel-to-heel ballet leap and then pranced off. Vicki turned to me.

  “And why didn’t you get me a rose?” she asked me as she raised an eyebrow in mock outrage.

  “Um … I did? They’re just … uh … invisible,” I replied.

  She just laughed. Damn mime.

  The distinct smell of marijuana filtered in waves across the field. We caught a hefty breeze, and I shot Vicki a look and she laughed. Across from us, two young teenagers were on their own blanket, quickly approaching second base. On second glance, they were somewhere between second and … third? Yikes. I turned away.

  Behind us, two small women in their fifties sat in lawn chairs. They wore tie-dyed shirts, had long gray hair, and were decked head-to-toe in the beaded jewelry from the Indian reservation truck stops along Route 66. It was also clear that they were … free … from lots of things. Including bras, and the social construct of deodorant.

  “And what’s the name of this troupe again?” I muttered as I downed a glass of wine.

  “Underscore,” Vicki read.

  About a dozen performers dressed all in black made their way toward the stage at the front of the field. Some were drumming, some were shouting, and some banging metal trash can lids together. When they all reached the front, they began jumping around like wild banshees and shouting.

  “I don’t get it,” I muttered as I leaned back onto our blanket and popped a grape into my mouth.

  “It’s about self-empowerment,” she explained as she motioned with the paper program. Dainty silver rings dotted her fingers at intervals, and a hairline-thin chain around her wrist dangled with a single charm.

  “Oh really?” I asked with a cocked eyebrow.

  “Yes. You see, each of the performers has to confront their own obstacles to self-actualization,” my date went on as she read from the program in an authoritative tone. “It’s only once they acknowledge their mental strongholds, and take power over them, that they can reach their true potential. Until then, those strongholds keep them locked up, weak, and completely ineffective in life.”

  The performers froze in various states of movement, reminiscent of a flash mob. Then one of them, a rather muscular man who was frozen in a fetal position on the ground, suddenly twitched. With a claw-like motion, he slowly rose until he stood halfway with his knees bent. Suddenly, with claws drawn, he jumped about four feet off the ground and delivered the loudest, most guttural scream I had ever heard. He landed in a cat crouch, and then the group erupted into out-of-control savage drumming.

  The entire field gave a thunderous standing ovation. Some had tears in their eyes. Three women in front of us were weeping as they leaned upon each other. I looked at Vicki. She was mesmerized. I got it. I did. But, if I felt the need to be empowered, I would rather read it in a self-help book and get it straightforward.

  “So what are the trash can lids supposed to mean?” I mumbled as I flipped through the program for an answer.

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. They’re just cool.”

  I had nothing to say to that.

  “Come on, Henry,” she chided. “You can’t tell me you didn’t like some of it.”

  I shrugged back. “Well, the trash can lids were kind of cool.”

  “Henry Irving, are you being won over to the granola artsy-fartsy community of Sedona?”

  I shot her a death look, and she giggled.

  “So, when’s the part where we get to the date?”

  With one smoldering flitter of her eyes, I remembered. Oh yeah, that was how she got me to come here.

  Vicki and I met when we worked together at a law firm in Los Angeles. I grew up in Sedona, Arizona but moved to the City of Angels to be a lawyer, much to the chagrin of my family. This has never made sense to me, since most families want their kids to be doctors and lawyers. But, who would expect any less from a couple whose names are “Saffron” and “Moondust?”

  So I, the black sheep successful entertainment lawyer, lived and worked in LA for several years. I represented actors and musicians, usually in low-level copyright disputes. I dealt with things like, “he stole the three chords from my song, and made a big hit out of it.” Minor offenses, big payoffs.

  Vicki was the paralegal in our firm who ultimately wanted to be a lawyer. She and I always had the sexual tension at work thing going on, but taking it further than the innocent flirty banter was off-limits. Dipping your pen in the office ink never ends well, and we both knew it.

  That was until, back in Sedona, my sister Harmony got herself into s
ome legal trouble. She was an amazing artist who showcased in a gallery, but she had no idea it was a front for money laundering. She was unknowingly caught in the crossfire, and for a while she was framed for murder. I came out here to help, with Vicki hot on my heels.

  Sedona’s finest in law enforcement, well, left more than a lot to be desired. They had the case all sewn up and ready to go. Apparently my sister, Harmony, who can’t even eat meat because she thinks it’s murder, or who gets nauseated at blood on television, was undoubtedly responsible for stabbing an art critic to death. Not a soul in town could be persuaded to think one degree otherwise.

  Well, all except local crime blogger AJ Castillo.

  In the interest of saving Harmony from a prison sentence, Vicki and I both took the bar in Arizona and represented her. We milked AJ for all she knew, and then we recruited her to help as our paralegal and overall investigator. With all of us put together, we uncovered that poor Harmony was at the butt end of a nasty crime trail that led all the way to the Russian mob. We succeeded in getting the case dismissed, and then it was time to go back home.

  Well, I was ready to go back home. Sort of. Vicki, on the other hand, wanted to stay. The bar exam in California is stringent, designed to keep the legal population down in accordance with supply and demand. That is, so that all the nation’s law students don’t descend upon the legendary beaches of Orange County, vying to defend Steven Spielberg.

  Vicki tried the test multiple times in California and couldn’t pass but, with a few hours of prep in Arizona, we both passed the bar here right in time to exonerate Harmony. It was a big career move for her. After that, why would she go back to California to be a paralegal, when she could be a lawyer in Arizona?

  Honestly, I would have just as soon left Sedona, but things had changed between Vicki and me. So, Vicki, AJ, and I decided to start our own firm. We opened Sedona Legal, with Vicki and I as partners and AJ as our paralegal who was studying pre-law in community college.

  I went back to Los Angeles for a couple of months, finished out my caseload, and resigned peacefully from the Sanchez Law Firm. My boss thought I was nuts.

  “Sedona, Arizona? Why?” my mentor had asked me.

  “I’m sure you have an e-mail file full of a thousand resumes of kick ass associates dying for a job here. In Sedona, you’ll be lucky to find one good lawyer. They need me.”

  He shrugged. “It’s your career. I guess you can flush it down the toilet if you want. Call me if you ever come to your senses.”

  I came back with a big moving truck, bought a small but Sedona-expensive cottage downtown, moved in with Vicki, and got an overpriced lease on a closet-sized office about a quarter mile from where we lived. After Harmony’s case, Vicki took smaller cases like wills, trusts, and minor civil suits while I wrapped up our lives in California. Since I came back, we hadn’t done much yet.

  Suddenly, a group of teenagers clad in glow stick headbands ran through the crowd and knocked over our wine bottle. They didn’t even notice; they just kept running, and our blanket now had a sizable puddle in the middle of it. The dirt underneath seeped through, and we were instantly lounging in fermented mud.

  Vicki swore and yelled after them, which turned the heads of everyone near us except the perpetrators. Then we grabbed our napkins to clean up the mess. As we tried without success to mop it up, apparently we were too loud. One of the emotional women in front gave us a fervent “shush,” and we drew disapproving stares from every eye around us.

  Geez. These people took this seriously.

  An emcee was now on stage, and he thanked Underscore. Then he announced the Sedona Film Festival. Ah yes, the Sedona Film Festival I had heard so much about in the last few weeks. My little brother Phoenix was part of a film that would be presented. It was called Weed, a comedy satire that ultimately championed the health benefits of marijuana.

  The festival would be starting at the end of the month and running for about a week. Another grand applause followed. My hands officially reeked of alcohol, and so did my arm were I had been lying. This was not turning out to be the Valentine’s I had wanted it to be.

  “And the Sedona Film Festival would not be possible, of course,” the emcee went on, “without our long-time sponsor and chief officer, Clifton Melbourne, who couldn’t be here today but sends his love.”

  A video tribute to Clifton Melbourne played. I threw booze-scented napkins into our basket while the Clifton Melbourne story played in the background.

  Clifton started with humble beginnings, and then he had gone to the Navy and fought in World War II. After coming home, he went to business school on a GI grant and worked on Wall Street for a few years. Deciding the glitzy world of finance was not for him, he came back to Sedona, where he sold real estate for forty years.

  He was essential to the housing boom in the 1990’s when Sedona was just becoming popular. He climbed city politics, and then he was approached by the Sedona Performance Arts League to establish the Sedona Film Festival. There was much resistance by the city council, but he won in 1999, and in 2001 the Sedona Film Festival was born. Now, a recent photo of Clifton at 94 filled the screen. He was smiling in his home, but he looked tired, lonely, and depressed.

  By this point, I had given up on the wine spill. I was watching with rapt attention. Vicki must have read my mind.

  She whispered in my ear, “That’s not you.”

  My heart lurched, and I turned to her with a sheepish smile.

  “That’s not how you’ll end up,” she repeated. “You are way more handsome.”

  I snorted a laugh, and she squeezed my arm. I felt her breath hot on my ear and leaned into her so I could feel her warmth.

  The lights came back up on the field and the crowd officially dispersed, so we picked up the blanket and the basket and headed toward the field entrance.

  I put my arm around her, and she leaned into me. I kissed her hair. It smelled like strawberries, and we walked through the gates of the field and into the parking area.

  Suddenly, a blue truck sped up and stopped right beside us. I instinctively grabbed Vicki. The window rolled down, and I saw it was the old woman who had been in front of us. Her face was contorted into a tight-lipped frown, and her eyes were cold and pale blue angry.

  “You two are rude!” she spat.

  Vicki and I turned to each other.

  “I’m sorry?” I responded.

  I wasn’t sure if I should engage this woman or not.

  “Just rude! They just don’t teach millennials manners, do they? When you go to a public performance, you show respect!”

  With that, she rolled up her window and sped off. I looked at Vicki, and we both dissolved into laughter.

  “Hey guys!”

  We turned to the familiar voice of AJ. My paralegal was about five foot six, with long dark hair that usually had a tint of brown in it, but she had recently dyed it midnight black. She also put streaks of blue in the front tendrils, and tonight she wore a small silver hoop in her nose. She was dressed in all black with thigh-high combat boots, black leggings, black fingernail polish, and she was practically drowning in black eyeliner.

  AJ was a vital part of our team, but I kept meaning to get Vicki to talk to her about the importance of a professional appearance. But, then again, who was I to talk? Tonight I was wearing jeans, a t-shirt, and a pair of Converse All-Stars.

  I opened my mouth to greet my paralegal, but then I realized I recognized the man on her arm.

  He was tall, lanky, and wore black-rimmed eyeglasses above a scruffy black beard. He also wore black skinny jeans and an open, black and gray long-sleeved plaid button down shirt.

  Underneath was a black t-shirt with the white Apple logo. His dyed black hair, also with blue tips, was mainly hidden under a gray beanie hat. He wore fake gauges in his lobes and had multiple cartilage piercings in both ears. He also carried a green army-style messenger bag slung across his mid-body and a paper cup from a coffee shop I hadn’t heard of sinc
e I had been back.

  Vicki and I exchanged glances.

  “Is that Landon Verhelst?” Vicki gushed as they approached.

  “Yep,” I said.

  Landon worked as a self employed graphic designer. If there was a museum painting called Portrait of a Millennial Hipster, it would look like Landon Verhelst. The first time I met him was when I hired him to create some marketing materials for our firm. It had been my experience that self taught hipsters made the best graphic designers and usually came at a fraction of the price of an expensive firm. But the package deal also included a fair amount of … personality.

  When we had our initial consultation, Landon showed me a mock up of what would be my logo. He was a good designer, I would definitely give him that, but his original concept included the Blind Justice statue on top of a Satanic goat head. It was supposed to symbolize something about the legal system working against the global elite, or something like that.

  Like I said, personality.

  He was in and out of our office over the next few months. He was also a really hard worker, but he often spent a lot of down time showing us … and by us, I meant AJ, online videos about how the Rockefellers funded the Nazis and that Haliburton had grant money to build concentration camps in New Mexico for government dissenters.

  I began pretending to listen somewhere around military airplanes spraying cancerous chemicals through the sky in an effort to get the human race down to a manageable number for government control. While I had no doubt his theories would resonate with some facet of the Sedona public, I wasn’t as sure about the Arizona Bar Association being as tolerant.

  Landon and AJ were about the same age, but for some reason I never saw it coming between those two. Maybe justice wasn’t the only thing blind around here. AJ and Landon joined us, and she was beaming a huge smile.

  “You guys remember Landon?” she asked.

  “How could I forget the best graphic designer in Sedona,” I said as I shook hands with the lanky young man.

  “Aww thanks, man.” Landon blushed at the compliment a bit, and when he spoke, a silver tongue stud flashed back and forth.