Crepe Factor by Laura Childs Read Free Book Online

feel Babcock mulling over this new information and was determined not to say another word until he spoke.
    â€œHow do you know about this?” he asked.
    â€œGabby told me. Apparently Martin Lash accosted her husband a while back. He threatened to smash windows in his showroom or something bizarre like that because Stuart sold cars that Lash considered to be gas-guzzlers.”
    â€œSo you’re telling me that Stuart Mercer-Morris might have done Lash in?” There was a hint of irreverence in Babcock’s voice.
    â€œNo, of course not,” Carmela said. “You know Stuart, he considers chess a violent game. But it could be somebody of that ilk. A member of the business community who’s been threatened by Lash and his merry band of environmentalists. From what I understand, Lash was a pushy, confrontational type of guy.”
    â€œNot anymore he’s not.”
    Carmela didn’t say anything. Babcock had a point.
    Babcock continued. “Your old boyfriend Quigg Brevard has quite a nasty temper, too, from what I understand.”
    â€œHe’s not my old boyfriend.”
    â€œThen what is he?”
    Carmela had to think about that for a moment. “An acquaintance?”
    â€œHah!” Babcock said. And promptly hung up.
    *   *   *
    Carmela set the phone down. Her mind was spinning and she wondered if Babcock had even taken her seriously. Even if he hadn’t, she felt like she was standing in the eye of a hurricane. She’d promised to help Quigg, but Babcock would go completely batshit if he thought she was meddling. Even worse, Babcock had always been a little jealous (okay, a
lot
jealous) about her dating Quigg, even though it had been a few years ago. So what was a girl to do?
    Well . . . it probably wouldn’t rip the fabric of the universe too badly if she did a teensy bit of poking into the Environmental Justice League, would it?
    Carmela’s fingers flew across the keys of the front desk computer as she ran a quick Internet search. And what she discovered surprised her.
    Lawsuits!
    From several news stories, she discovered that the Environmental Justice League was embroiled in over a dozen lawsuits. There was one with a group of real estate developers who wanted to fill in a small amount of wetlands, another with a commercial alligator farm, and yet another with an oil and gas exploration company.
    Carmela was hitting the Print icon so rapidly that she was afraid the printer would jam. Still, she kept gathering her clutch of evidence.
    â€œWhat on earth are you doing?” Gabby asked. She was peering across the counter at Carmela. “Printing patterns or something?”
    Carmela gathered up her sheets of paper and tamped them all together. “Let me tell you something, Stuart wasn’t the only business that Martin Lash and his Environmental Justice League went after. These are all articles I found about lawsuits.”
    â€œLawsuits against . . . people?” Gabby asked.
    â€œIndividuals, companies, an unincorporated city, you name it,” Carmela said.
    â€œSo Lash was a litigious type of guy.”
    â€œLash either had a brother-in-law who worked pro bono or he had an entire law firm on retainer. Because it looks like he was going after everybody to protect those wetlands.”
    Gabby indicated the papers Carmela clutched in her hand. “Are you going to pass this information on to Babcock?”
    â€œI already told him that Martin Lash was the executive director of the Environmental Justice League. And that he threatened Stuart.” She riffled the papers with her index finger. “So maybe I’ll hold on to this information for a while longer. Let him conduct his own brand of investigation.”
    â€œAnd then you’ll . . . ?” Gabby was suddenly interrupted by the
da-ding
of the bell over the front door. “Oh,” she said as Jade Germaine strolled