Billie and Brandon: Untamed

27

"Alright" Ezra said, moving the candles on the dining room table so they were at each corner. All the documents and papaers were scattered all over the table. "This should be everything we pilfered. Start looking. It doesn't matter what you pick up. Anything that can be used against the mayor counts"

"That's a lot of papers..." Maggie said tiredly, slightly rotating her injured shoulder in its splint."

"We emptied the office pretty much" Ezra shrugged, "We're lucky that he keeps all this stuff in just his desk and not in several bookcases."

"We have no choice." Brandon added, pulling his sleeves up and lifting up one of the old pages, "So let's get to work so we can form some semblance of a plan to proceed."

The rest did the same, picking up documents and reading through them. They skimmed the papaers as best as they could in the dimmed lighting, trying to make sense of the scrawled words. This went on for a while, the four working tirelessly to sift through all the papers, looking over the pages, reading the fine print, scrutinzing what the information meant and trying to make sense of it all. But as time continued to pass and no one could find anything contracts for some of the whores here and there, they grew more restless. More irritated.

Because each lack of evidence only brought them closer to the idea that maybe all their planning and all the suffering they had to go through to keep the documents was for naught.

That the documents wouldn't help them at all with their plan.

"I don't believe it..." Ezra groaned, "So many of these are utter bullshit! Accounts and bank statements and what not that don't tell us anything. They can't prove that Wesley is up to no good."

"Not to mention all these town archive documents detailing events that have happened in the past through the growth of the town. These are all the most ridicuous." Maggie added, "These town land plots don't even show us anything but the layout. It's unnecessary."

They lapsed into silence once again, staring at all the documents on the table in slight dejection.

And then Billie's head lifted in surprise as she picked up one of the documents.

"Wait..." Billie suddenly said slowly, carefully scrutinizing one of the yellowed pages along with another form, "Take a look at this. I found a land deed for Mr. Lewis's inn. It looks like he only has about .7 acres of land from his deed, yet his bank statements has him paying for an entire acre of land."

"...He's being swindled" Brandon rubbed his chin in thought, his brows furrowed as realization dawned. "We went about this the wrong way. By themselves, these documents don't make sense, but we can use the bank statements to check for any possibly discrepancies."

"We'll never get anywhere if we do this randomly, though. It'll take too long. We need to organize the papers first. Put all the bank statements together, any contracts for Bull's Sleaze together, basically anything that is the same type should go together before we start comparisons. I don't know why they weren't just kept organized in the first place." Billie gave Ezra and Brandon both dirty looks, "If you two were smart, you would have kept them properly matched to begin with."

"Why am I getting attacked?" Ezra scoffed in offence.

"How about next time, Billie" Brandon growled in response, "You try emptying an entire office worth of documents and records and keeping them organized when you're pressed for time and might possibly have to be on the run because the distraction in your plan is inadequate from lack of experience."

"Inadequate?" Billie's gaze turned molten, "That sure wasn't what you were thinking a few nights ago. I managed to 'distract' you with my supposed lack of experience, didn't I? So how inadequate am I, really?"