Here’s a Valentines’s Day story that we found hard to believe ourselves, but - cross our hearts - ITS ABSOLUTELY TRUE!

We were contacted by Johnny Love on Friday the 13th. Seems he was desperate to find his old friend and high school sweetheart of 30 years ago by Valentine’s Day. He and his two sons had tried other search companies and had exhausted every site on the net trying to find Angelique — all to no avail. Then Johnny contacted Research Etc, Inc. as his last resort to finding the girl he couldn’t forget all these years.

Let us explain Johnny’s current situation. He was feeling very lonely and down since he lost his Number One Sweetheart, his wife of 18 years, to cancer. He hoped that finding an old friend would ease some of his heartache and make his feel a little happiness again. Also, he had learned how fleeting life can be, and vowed to never let anything go unsaid because it may come too late. (When we feel most vulnerable, we all tend to reach to the comfort of happy memories of the past, don’t we?)

Research Etc. started on this lost love search, and worked all day Friday and into the night. We had promised Johnny Love we would find Angelique by noon on Valentine’s Day. And we did! This was not an easy search - not only did she have a very common last name, but she and all of her family had moved from the area she had grown up in when she was 18, and not left a trace. We finally found her living across the country in another state. She has been married for the last 25 years and has two daughters the same ages as Johnny’s two sons - but the story doesn’t end there!

Angelique and her husband are in the process of divorce, and to make matters worse, THIS WAS VALENTINE’S DAY! According to Angelique, she was totally miserable on this special day for sweethearts. That is, until an old friend from 30 years ago called her to say he had never forgotten her! Then he sent her a dozen roses with a card that read, “Long lost friends can be found again”. When we last spoke to Johnny, who was floating somewhere above cloud nine, he said he thought he just might fly out and take Angelique to dinner!

Let’s all put our hearts together and hope that two old friends, who were reunited during their darkest hours, find comfort in the kind of friendship that never dies and that they both have the BEST Valentine’s Day ever!! XOXOXOXOXIXOX!

After a miserable day of rounding up strays on the dusty and dry Double Dogtail Ranch in the hot Sonoran desert, Chase forlornly laid across his hard bunk, eyes suddenly brimming with tears as Johnny Lee’s “Looking For Love” sounded softly from the bedside radio he had just flipped on. It was definitely his song. He had never once doubted, in the two years that he and B.J. (short for Billie Jean) had been together, that she was the right girl for him, and he hoped someday they’d make it legal, get their own ranch and raise a bunch of kids. He just knew they’d live happily ever after.

B.J., with her fiery red hair, was not only the prettiest girl in town, but was also the most popular. All of the single (and some not so single) guys had their eye on her and, up until now, she had eyes for only Chase. B.J., who was a champion barrel racer, was honorable, true blue and expected no less from her own true love.

Where their troubles started was that what Chase thought of as only “kidding around” with the girls at the local saloon, B.J. considered “messing around”. She had warned him repeatedly she’d take no more, but he knew that she knew he loved only her and he figured she should know that’s just the way men are. He didn’t think she’d be mad (and if she was, she’d get over it) if he stopped by TEASERS for a few beers with the guys one night a few months ago. But when he got home (four hours late) she had packed up and gone.

Chase wasn’t too concerned at first, figuring B.J. was just pouting and hiding out with friends, but it had been over a month now, and he had exhausted all of his resources in trying to find her. He was desperate and knew he couldn’t live without her. He found a memo that B.J. had left on the refrigerator with the date and address of her Bible study meeting, along with that month’s secret code word needed to gain entry. The Bible study group had to be very discreet and secretive as they had several divorced members whose ex-spouses had many times crashed their meetings and caused such an uproar that the police had to be called in.

The night of the meeting, Chase drove across town and parked his old pickup across the street from the house where the meeting was to take place. He watched until everyone had gone in. B.J. wasn’t among them. He got out, rang the bell, gave the secret password (which that month was “Glory, Glory”) and was admitted without further question. He sat through the entire meeting without yawning.

After the meeting, Chase introduced himself as “Bob”, a medical intern, and said he was a friend of B.J.’s, and that she had invited him, several days before, to attend the Bible study with her. He had tried to call her, but the man who answered her phone said she no longer lived there, so he came on to the meeting in hopes of seeing her there. He entered into the group conversation - even examining one lady’s sore foot and prescribing a remedy - and they began to talk about poor B.J.’s hard times with her loser boyfriend, Chase, who was a real jerk, among other descriptions. “Bob” told them he had never met Chase, but from what he’d heard, agreed that he was a real snake. He then asked if anyone had B.J.’s new phone number, but they all were sworn not to reveal her whereabouts. One guy said if “Bob” would give him his phone number, he’d pass it on to B.J. along with a message and she then could call “Bob”. So Chase went out to his pickup and found one of his PRCA (Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association) cards with his real name on it, took it back inside and handed it over, asking them to tell B.J. he’d sure like to hear from her. The “loser boyfriend” then turned and left the house, leaving in his wake a room full of indignant bulging eyes and gaping mouths.

He had been moping ever since. Now, as Johnny Lee faded out, Chase listlessly picked up a copy of the local newspaper and began idly turning the pages without really seeing anything, when suddenly a small ad leaped out at him, almost as if it had his name on it: LOST LOVES, it said, PEOPLE FINDERS. Just what he needed! It must be an omen, he thought. He tore a scrap of paper from a Playboy magazine lying on the bedside table and wrote down the name of the company, RESEARCH ETC, INC., and the phone number, (480) 991-3571. He jumped in his pickup and tore to the nearest Circle K with a pay phone (his phone had been disconnected because he forgot to pay his bill) and dialed the number. A very soft and warm female voice answered and at her promptings, he began to tell her the sad story of his own lost love. She was so sympathetic, he even cried a little, but, being Chase, he couldn’t help wondering what the rest of that sweet voice looked like.

Chase gave RESEARCH ETC all of the details and the investigators went to work. He paid his phone bill and even bought a cellular phone so he could call in during the day from out on the range. He also called at night when he was the most lonesome for B.J. - mostly just to talk, and he didn’t care which of the female P.I.’s he talked to. After a few days, he was in love with them, and he would have married one, or all of them together, just to get out of his misery.

Chase began to hang out nightly at Handle Bar J’s, the local cowboy watering hole, and even had a short fling with a stunning dark-haired rodeo queen named Blaze who was half Cherokee Indian. She let him cry on her shoulder for a while, but finally, very gently and firmly, told him to hit the trail. Blaze had left too many cowboys chompin’ at the bit for her company to waste any more time on this lovesick calf. He was one sad cowboy who couldn’t even say one sentence without mentioning B.J.’s name.

Finally, after many days and nights of intensive searching, RESEARCH ETC finally located B.J.! They cautioned Chase to be very careful how he approached her as his eagerness could be mistaken for stalking, and advised him to write her a letter. Finally one night, he drove with his sister (whose integrity was above question) to the house where B.J. was staying and parked a block away, staying in the pickup while his sister went in and talked with B.J. They talked until three in the morning. Chase called RESEARCH ETC from his cellular phone every few minutes to assure them he was staying in the pickup and not intruding on B.J. The P.I.’s stayed up with him, taking his calls and telling him “Good boy” for being so patient. (By this time, he was like part of the family!)

B.J. finally consented to have dinner with Chase the next night, and after talking it out, they agreed to date for awhile until Chase could prove he was responsible and ready to settle down and make a lasting commitment.

Chase & B.J. dated for a few months and today, on Valentine’s Day 1997, RESEARCH ETC got word that a gorgeous diamond ring came along with the dozen red roses and the big question that B.J. received from Chase. B.J. said YES.

RESEARCH ETC, INC. thinks they’ll live happily ever after!

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY TO CHASE AND B.J. - AND TO ALL THE REST OF YOU SWEETHEARTS!!! WE LOVE YOU AND HOPE YOU’LL ALL BE OUR VALENTINES!!