The Investigators, Inc. The Case of the Grandchildren. Chapter 1. Beginning.

Well, everyone is out of the clinic now, though a couple of the girls are still moving around slowly so they won’t be going on any cases just yet. The police let us keep the money that Jacques had given us which will go toward our orphan fund, cat fund, equipment fund, training fund, inventions fund and clothes fund.

Sienna does pay for all of our expenses, but whenever we are able to do it, then we like to do it. The police told us something else too, those men killed out at Jacques house were not killed by each other, they were killed by a sniper, or snipers, with high power sniper rifles. That is interesting because it’s the second case where that has happened.

I called Aari, Hannah and Jazzy together for a little meeting about that very thing. Jazzy was here visiting for a few days which is why I could let her in on this discussion. She has a lot of knowledge she can share with us. “I would say there is more than one sniper,” said Aari, “someone wants the top people of some of the larger gangs to be eliminated. Maybe someone wants to take over their territories.”

“That is very possible,” agreed Hannah. “Yes, very true,” said Jazzy, “but it also seems like someone could be sending you a message. Perhaps letting you know that they could kill your team just as easily.” “Yes, I thought of that too,” said Aari, “another interesting point is how do they know where we are and what we are doing? In both cases they struck right at the end. How did they know it was at the end?”

“Yes, I was thinking about that too,” said Hannah, “do they have a way of listening in to our plans? Or is someone giving them information? Personally I think they have a way to listen in to our conversations, and that’s a bit of a scary thought.” “All three of you have contacts,” I said, “please check around and see what you can find out.” Later, right after lunch, an older car drove up.

Meow, meow.= Old car, not have much money, we should take case and help out old people. I looked at Muffin. Meowr.= Yep, me agree, they need help. “You two have certainly changed a lot,” I said, “what happened?” Meow, meow.= Me know when people are true and not disgusting themselves. “You mean ‘disguising’ Muffin,” said Jennifer. Meowr.= Muffin just say that.

“I agree with Muffin,” said Jennifer, “these people are genuine and need help.” “Please stay by your car, give your name and state your business please,” said Milena, first in English, then French. The man spoke a little English and gave their names as Gabriel and Josephine Besson. He said they were in trouble and needed help. We let them come in and sat in the library having tea and listening to their story.

Misty, Cristy, Sienna, Jennifer, Kat, Sky, Aari, Galyna and myself were in the library with this older couple. Their one son and his wife had died a year ago leaving behind two young children, a boy aged 6 and a girl aged 7, though they are now 7 and 8. The grandparents just naturally took over raising the children. Their daughter-in-law had one sister, plus her parents, but none of them wanted the children.

Then suddenly, around a month ago, their daughter-in-law’s sister, Camille and her husband Tony, decided to take the children. Unfortunately the grandparents were not the legal guardians, they didn’t know they needed to be since they were the grandparents. So, Tony and Camille could easily come and take the children and were made the legal guardians. Then they wouldn’t let the grandparents even see the children, but that’s not the worst of it.

A week ago the children disappeared and the police said perhaps the children ran away. Tony and Camille told the police that the grandparents took them, which they are claiming they did not. The police were satisfied that Gabriel and Josephine are innocent, but Tony and Camille are not and they want the grandparents arrested. Gabriel and Josephine can’t afford a lawyer, but Tony and Camille are quite wealthy and are now suing the grandparents for abducting the children and causing terrible trauma and health problems for Camille.

Then Gabriel mentioned something quite interesting, Tony and Camille have twice taken in children to look after them while they wait for adoption, and in both cases the children disappeared within the first year they had them. For some reason the police are not making a connection here and that is strange. The grandparents live in a small village close to Valence here in France while Tony and Camille live in Milan, Italy. Tony is Italian and has 6 brothers, no sisters.

The grandparents didn’t know what kind of occupation Tony had, but Camille is a photographer. I asked for their last name and Gabriel said it was Mancini, so Cristy was at work right away checking on him. Sienna said she would have very good lawyers working for them right away, so they need not worry about what Camille and Tony are doing to them. Gabriel said no to that, they just could not afford any lawyers. Josephine said her husband was a proud man and doesn’t like to accept charity.

I told them both not to view this as charity, it is something to help their grandchildren. I also said not to worry about paying us, we have a fund that pays for cases when people can’t afford it themselves, and again, it is not charity, it is about those little children. During the conversation we discovered they had quite a large, old house to I asked if we could send 4 of our girls with them for protection.

I impressed upon them that they could be in danger and their grandchildren need them alive and healthy when they return. They gladly accepted the offer of help, so I picked Katresa and Amerie from Sky’s Bad Girls, Aasta from Misty’s team and Delphine from my team. Josephine had a very hard time speaking English which is why I picked girls that were fluent in French. They would be spending the night with us then heading home in the morning.

We also discovered that their son and his wife died from a gas leak in their flat just over a year ago, which was not so odd, until Gabriel mentioned that his son worked for the local gas company. Okay, now it’s odd. I also asked if we could send a couple of our cats along, something that overjoyed Josephine. So, Muffin and Storm will be going with the girls too.

After they left in the morning we had a leader’s meeting to coordinate our plans. It’s still an open police investigation for the missing children, so officially we can’t get involved in that one, even though we’ll still be looking for them. We go at this from the point of helping Gabriel and Josephine fight these ridiculous charges against them from Tony and Camille.

The one thing that bothered all of us was that Camille was a photographer and they had other kids missing from their care. Not a good combination. And I just don’t understand why the police have not made a connection between all these missing children. I think it’s time to let Misty and her team get out there and tackle a case on their own, more or less.

To Be Continued. ©2025 Steve McLeod.