And it begins...

Written: 1/3/02

Location: Trey Vincent Private Investigation Services

Trey Vincent has a door with his name on it:

Trey Vincent
President/Owner

Right there in gold plating on the second floor of the agency he owns and founded: Trey Vincent Private Investigation Services. Since joining jOlt, he has not had much of a chance to keep up with day-to-day operations, but he hasn't needed to. After all, Shaggy is in charge there now.

Yes, Shaggy. His name is Shaggy. He legally had his name changed. Like Prince or Madonna, he goes only by one name. If Trey cared, he'd find out why. But he doesn't. As long as Shaggy keeps the bucks rolling in and solving people's boring problems (missing people, stolen money, adultery, etc....), Trey can just focus his effort into jOlt. Providing jOlting television the likes of which have never been seen.

Trey slams the door shut and heads to his dark oak desk. He glances at the boarded up window where his telephone made a nasty exit weeks ago.

'Still not fixed. Bastards,' he mumbles out.

He still doesn't have an office phone. Luckily, he isn't in the office much these days.

Trey takes a seat in his high-backed leather chair. A new envelope marked URGENT is sitting on his desk. He picks up the large yellow envelope, turns it over and rips it open with his finger. He grabs a stack of papers from inside and pulls them free. After briefly looking at the pages, he stacks them, face down, on his desk.

A knock at the door interrupts his scanning.

'Yo,' Trey says indifferently.

The door opens enough for Shaggy to fit his head through. 'The rumors are true. You're still alive.'

'How did you get this?' Trey asks, sounding amazed, as he holds up the papers he has been reading. 'This is phenomenal.'

'I've got a master hacker. He can get into anybody's hard drive. She left it wide open.'

Shaggy fully enters Trey's office. Shaggy is looking sharp in a gray three-piece suit and black tie. His hair is slicked back and tied into a ponytail. The first time Trey met Shaggy, he thought he was meeting Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails. Shaggy and Trent share a very similar facial resemblance.

Trey looks at the framed picture on his desk of a woman who looks like a cross between Carmen Electra and Tiffani-Amber Thiessen.

Taylor Thompson.

Soon to be his again.

'Once I get her squared away, we've got to deal with Lance Knight.'

'I've got some buddies...' Shaggy says before trailing off. Knowing Trey doesn't care about the process, only results.

'Excellent,' Trey says smiling widely.

Trey kisses the picture of Taylor and returns the frame to its place.

'There has got to be a chink in Knight's armor,' Trey says calmly. 'Everyone's got to learn that no one fucks with me.'

NEXT CHAPTER: Driven >>