Saturday - The Prologue

He woke to the mid-range, constant chirping of the sparrows or wrens in the trees in his backyard. His mind registered that it must be just after 5AM given the amount of light beginning to bring the new day to being. That thought was confirmed as he looked over at the bedside clock radio that digitally reflected 6:15, which he automatically reduced by an hour since he had not adjusted the clock the week before for the switch to Day Lights Savings Time.

Frank Calhoun tried to mentally retrace his steps from the night before, but the cloud from the wine made clarity an iffy proposition. He remembered meeting Donovan at The Italian Cellar, and how they were joined after dinner by Donovan's girlfriend, Holly Logan. Holly had called Donovan on his cell phone during pre-dinner drinks to say that her boss had asked her to make some last minute adjustments to a contact proposal that had to go out Fed-Ex that evening and that she wouldn't be able to join them until later. When she did arrive, she had brought along the much-talked about Melanie McDermott, and the wine flowed like water.

In a fleeting moment of uncertainty, Calhoun looked over to his side. No. He was alone.

Melanie McDermott had come home to Cedar Rapids two years ago after divorcing her husband and dot-com company partner with a settlement that made her divorce lawyer-shark the talk of Silicon Valley. Somehow, Holly's boss at Capital Asset Advisor's in Iowa City had connected with Melanie and she immediately became CAA's largest client. Although Holly did not work directly on Melanie's portfolio, she had sat in on a number of the early meetings and, since Holly was the only other female in these meetings, there had been some natural bonding. The friendship went in to full blossom when they met unexpectedly at the start of the Drake Relays Marathon that first Spring.

Calhoun rose from his bed and slowly made his way across the room to the bathroom. He flipped the light switch on and looked in the mirror. His now three-day old beard was flecked with gray, his hair was crinkled with sleep. The squinty eyes showed redness. Life had not been unkind to Calhoun, but it was mornings like this that reminded him that he was no longer the 35 year bullet-proof party animal from his earlier years. "Jesus," he said aloud. "What in the world made us order that last bottle?" Thinking of the question to himself, the answer was pretty easy to discern: the first 4 bottles.

Everytime over the last 18 months that Holly had included Melanie in one of their social gatherings, Calhoun was left with conflicting feelings. Some of these events had been just casual meetings for drinks after work. Some had been at formal civic functions. At some, they were both there as singles. At others, they were there with dates. Never were they anyplace as a couple. Calhoun had lived near the edge at times, but he didn't date the subjects of his investigations. He wasn't that stupid. And the empty bed showed that at least that part of his professional resume was still intact.

He stepped into the shower and turned on the water to as hot as he could stand. Although it was Saturday, he had no choice but to head back to the office to follow up on the call that had come in from San Mateo late yesterday afternoon. An analyst with the California Attorney General's office had uncovered a disturbing email on the hard drive of an old computer that had come to them on a subpoena from an Enron-related case. The email was from Melanie's former husband/partner Anthony Carmondii and the receipient was a systems engineer who had work on the code for the software that had been the big breakthrough for the company. As Calhoun's luck might have it, the systems engineer was now working on a high-profile contract with the University of Iowa. For free. Since he too had taken a truckload of money out of his deal with Carmondii.

The shower made him feel human again. As he dressed, he though again of last night. He recalled how Melanie had lightly kissed his cheek as they left the restaurant, and had squeezed his hand saying, "Frank, we really should do this more often. Are you ever going to ask me out on a date?" He had just smiled in answer. It was tempting.

He wondered how much she knew of the details in her former husband's incriminating email.