by Lauren Carr
When asked, Catherine flashed her stunning smile and demurred, “A wise woman once pointed out to me that it took only one person to get prayer yanked out of our schools. Why can’t one person put our country back on the right path to greatness? I have to wonder if I have the strength and determination to be that one person our country needs.”
The senator’s son, Bevis Palazzi was going down in the crime books as a sexual pervert, an embezzler, and serial killer.
Further investigation of Bevis’ activities proved that he had stolen his comatose client’s money to get cheek implants, a nose job, liposuctions, and lip implants. He had also used her money to take Nick Fields on lavish trips in an effort to court him. Khloe Everest’s theater friends confirmed that the aspiring politician was a homosexual, kept in the closet by his father. According to statements from witnesses who knew the two men, Nick was not a homosexual, but he did like money and would do anything for it—even play husband to Bevis’ role of wife.
As part of his agreement for immunity and protection, Kevin Cooper filled in the blanks. “I caught Bevis Palazzi leaving the scene after he killed Dee Blakeley. He claimed it was an accident.”
The private investigator was sitting across from the Garrett County prosecutor in a state police jail interrogation room where he was staying before leaving with the US Marshal to go into protection.
The thick case files stacked up in front of him, Ben Fleming laughed. “He accidentally stabbed her over twenty times.”
Cooper chose to ignore the remark. “According to what Senator Palazzi told me, Bevis went over to her apartment to plead with her to withdraw her charges. If they had been taken seriously by the jury, they would have destroyed his father’s reputation. Then, Bevis had no hope of going very far in his own political career. All that she had to say was that it was all a misunderstanding. He even offered her a bribe. But she wouldn’t listen, and she ordered him to leave. She walked away from him, and he lost it. He grabbed the knife, and the next thing he knew, she was dead. Luckily for him, I caught him and took him home. I was agreeable. I knew a good thing when I saw it.”
“Say that to the families of the three other women Bevis killed because you didn’t arrest him for his first murder,” Ben replied.
“It’s Nick’s fault that those other women are dead,” Cooper said. “Bevis paid him very well to be with him. He offered to support him so that he didn’t have to work as a male stripper. If Nick had taken the money the first time Bevis offered it to him, then he never would have killed Amber Houston. Bevis offered an allowance plus a sports car if he didn’t follow Khloe to Hollywood, but no, Nick wanted to be a star. If he had stayed, then Tiffany Blanchard would still be alive.”
“Was it Bevis who outed Nick as being straight and ruined his career in order to get him back here?” Ben asked.
“I’m sure it was,” Cooper said. “When Nick came back, his Hollywood career was over. That was when Bevis offered him a house, a Ferrari, and a big allowance. All he had to do was be faithful to Bevis, even if he was just faking. It wasn’t like Bevis was asking for that much. If Nick had kept his zipper shut, then Bevis wouldn’t have gone berserk and killed Khloe.”
“And cut out their uteruses and put them in his freezer as trophies,” Ben said. “Face it, Bevis was a serial killer with an insane jealousy and hatred toward women. He learned that hatred from his father. You knew all about it, and you did nothing to put an end to it. That makes you an accessory after, if not before, the fact.”
“Call it what you want,” Kevin Cooper sat back in his seat and smiled. “I’ve got immunity. Hey, if it weren’t for me, the justice department would never have found out about the voter fraud, which has launched a huge investigation. In a few months, about a dozen senators and congressmen in both parties are going to wet their pants when the feds come knocking on their doors. And the justice department will be thanking me.”
“What a great American,” Ben’s tone dripped with sarcasm.
Chuckling, Kevin stretched out his arms and laced his fingers behind his head. “Hey, with all the stuff that Brooks’ clients have been mixed up in, I knew that it was only a matter of time before the authorities would eventually catch up with one of them. That’s why I kept copies and recorded everything. I’ve made myself much too valuable to send to jail. While those guys are going to jail, even if it is a country club jail, the US Marshal is setting me up with whole new life. This time next week, I’ll be fishing and working on my suntan.”
“That’s right.” Ben closed the file and stood up. “I heard the marshals have got a nice place and job picked out for you.”
Sitting forward, Kevin rested his elbows on the table top. “I know a good thing when I see it.”
“That you do.”
Ben didn’t bother shaking hands with the private investigator, whose license was then revoked since his identity had been erased. The prosecutor waited until he had left the jail and was in his car before he allowed himself to smile.
It does pay to have influential friends in high places. One of Ben Fleming’s friends happened to work for the United States Marshal’s office, in the department of placement for protected witnesses. Ben had asked her to select a very special place and occupation for Kevin Cooper. He didn’t care to know where or what Kevin would end up doing. He only asked that it be a place and job that would befit such a man.
Thirty days from the day of Ben’s final interview with Kevin Cooper, Charles Dawson was sunning himself on the private beach of his house in the Outer Banks, which was a small part of the settlement that Kevin Cooper’s attorney had recommended their client make to keep his assorted dirty dealings from being made public in court. The Mercedes convertible in his garage was part of another settlement from a recently disbarred defense lawyer. Then, there was the several millions of dollars that had been gifted to him from a mysterious benefactor. His lawyer, Ed Willingham predicted that millions more would come in after the civil trial against the Palazzi and Brooks estates.
It looked as if he would not have to work a day for the rest of his life. Maybe there is justice after all.
Charles’ grandson was burying him in the sand while he tended to his fishing pole. He hadn’t caught any fish yet, but that was okay. He was happy enough to have the sun in his face and the wind coming in off the ocean to toss his hair.
“Grandpa, I think you got a fish! Your pole!”
“I’ll get it tomorrow,” Charles said while drifting off to sleep.
Meanwhile, Kevin Cooper was freezing his butt off on a fishing boat in Alaska.
“Hey, butthead, quick goofing off and get to work!” the boat captain yelled at him when he caught him throwing up the so-called food that he had for breakfast.
Even if Cooper wanted to run off to start a new life on his own, separate from the Witness Protection Program, it turned out that he couldn’t. Some hacker had drained every penny from the millions of dollars that he had stashed away in two offshore accounts. He had nothing, and he couldn’t even report the theft. To whom do you report the theft of your bribe and otherwise ill-gotten money?
Cooper slipped on the icy deck to land face first in the holding bin for recently caught fish, which gave his crewmates a good laugh.
“Shut up, you bunch of morons! Can’t you see I don’t belong here! This was some sort of mistake! I’m supposed to be in Hawaii!”
“Quit yer bitchin,” one of them replied with a shrug. “Shit happens.”
Detective Cameron Gates and Joshua Thornton returned to their quiet life in Chester, West Virginia. The state homicide detective would have been happier if she had captured Bevis Palazzi, but she took consolation in knowing that Irving had a paw in thwarting his latest murder attempt.
Sick of hearing about Senator Harry Palazzi and his perverted son who invaded their home in a blue dress and humongous fake boobs, Chelsea ordered the news off-limits during her move into her condo on the lake. Mac and Archie joined in helping her and David.
Like small children, Molly and Gnarly enjoyed the empty boxes and packing that scattered the two floors of the condo. They took turns chasing each other from room to room.
Mac was carrying in boxes of dishes into the kitchen when David abruptly laughed.
“Care to share what’s so funny?” Mac asked him.
“Really?” David turned to him. “Plucked eyebrows? Was that really the first clue that told you Bevis was the killer? His plucked eyebrows?”
“And you tried to shrug it off saying that a lot of men pluck their eyebrows.”
Cutting open the box of dishes, David shook his head. “Not pluck. Wax, and only enough to clean them up.”
“Did you get a look at Bevis’ eyebrows?”
“The last time I saw him, he looked like his head had been shoved into a blender that had been turned on.” David opened an overhead cabinet and put a stack of dinner plates inside.
“Before Irving got his paws on him.” Mac took out a stack of salad plates and handed them to David. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Nothing has ever stopped you before.” David cut open the second box. That one contained glasses.
“How is Chelsea dong?” Mac asked him in a low voice. “She was really shaken up, and now she refuses to talk about it.”
David looked around to see if she and Archie were in hearing distance before answering, “She’s having nightmares.”
“I was afraid of that.” Mac shook his head. “Good thing Ben is being fair about it and not giving her a hard time.”
“She’s going to need some counseling,” David said. “But she’ll come through it okay. She’s strong. She’ll be fine.”
“Of course she will. She’s got you.”
“That’s exactly right.”
They bumped fists.
“Time for dinner!” Chelsea came down the stairs. “I’m starved. I hope you guys are hungry.”
“Starving,” Mac said.
“I have a six-pack of beer in the fridge for you and David,” Chelsea said. “Archie, I have a bottle of white wine for you. I also have a Chianti for dinner for you three. I’ve got my own bottled water, and for dinner, I have…” She threw open the oven to reveal a lasagna. “I made it at the manor last night and put it in the oven to cook while you guys were out getting supplies.”
They all “ooh’d” and “ahh’d.”
Delighted at the impression she gave as an ace hostess, Chelsea beamed when she announced, “And for dessert, I made a fruit torte from scratch.” She turned to the kitchen counter, only to find the torte not there.
“Maybe it’s under the packing.” David picked up loose packing paper and tossed it to the floor in search of the dessert.
Archie opened the refrigerator to look inside. “Maybe someone put it in the fridge.”
After searching the small kitchen everywhere the dessert could be, Mac asked, “Where are the dogs?”
The four of them froze. They looked at each other, and Chelsea said, “Molly would never…”
Mac went into the sunroom off the sitting room, where he saw two tails sticking out of either end of the sofa. David took one end of the sofa, while Mac took the other. On the count of three, they lifted the sofa and pulled it out from the wall.
How the two dogs had managed to take the dessert from the kitchen counter, carry it out to the sunroom, hide it behind the sofa and devour it in their own private party, no one would never know.
“Molly!” Chelsea gasped. “How could you?”
The white German shepherd’s ears lay back flat against her head. She crawled on her belly against the wall to hide behind Gnarly, who was licking the creamy filling from his snout.
“So much for Molly being a good influence on Gnarly,” David said. “It looks like the other way around to me.”
Fighting the smile that came to his face, Mac said, “Gnarly, I’m going to kill you.”
The End
REAL MURDER--BOOK EXCERPT
A LOVERS IN CRIME MYSTERY
COMING JANUARY 2014!
Prologue
Friday the 13th, August 13, 1976
Dolly’s Gentlemen’s Club, Newell, West Virginia
On the map, the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia appears like an odd miscalculation by a surveyor. For a reason that most people don’t understand, it sticks up out of West Virginia between Ohio and Pennsylvania. While the western boundary follows the Ohio River, the eastern side goes straight down to Morgantown. The most northern point of West Virginia is home to Chester, which lays in the most northern corner of the state. Go a mile in any direction and you can find yourself in either East Liverpool, Ohio, directly across the Ohio River, or Hookstown, Pennsylvania.
The next town downriver from Chester is Newell, West Virginia, which has two claims to fame. Homer Laughlin China Company, whose wares are used in restaurants and fine dining all over the world, and Waterford Race Track.
Folks would travel for miles to see the Thoroughbreds race for the finish line. This vocation brought various types of folks to Newell. There were the jockeys and other transient type of folks who took care of the horses and the business people who owned them.
If you have the bankroll for more exotic type of entertainment, say after winning from the betting of a great race, and wanted to celebrate, men in the know would head further down river, and make a left turn halfway between Newell and New Cumberland to pay a visit to Christie.
Located half a mile off the road, nestled behind a row of pine trees, on a quiet afternoon, one would think that the huge white Victorian farmhouse with a wrap-around porch was simply that—a quiet farmhouse.
They may even think the young women living there were farmer’s daughters … a farmer with a lot of daughters … who threw huge parties.
As far as the local law knew, Christie’s was a boarding house for women, who liked to throw big parties on the weekends.
There was no sign out front and they didb’t have to do any advertising, but everyone in the know knew that if you were a gentleman with a wallet full of cash, and you were looking for a good time, Christie’s was the place to go.
Fridays were always Christie’s busiest nights. Most men would spend Saturday nights with their girlfriends or wives. Friday nights, after a long week of working for their family, they would swing into Christie’s for a drink or two or three or four, enjoy the entertainment, and then go upstairs to one of the private rooms for some personal entertainment.
By one o’clock in the morning, after the girls had danced their last dance, the bar would close up and they would hustle the men out and send them on home to their families. Bart, the club’s bouncer, would sometimes have to help a customer who had too much to drink and passed out during his private entertainment.
This Friday the thirteenth, Bart was in a hurry to get out and home to his wife. During the day, he worked as a bank security guard. On the weekends, he earned extra cash under the table by taking care of Christie’s girls. A faithful husband, he could be counted on to take care of the girls who he protected like a big brother looking after his little sisters—all eight of them.
The bartender was done cleaning up the lounge. Sitting at the bar, Bart made a mental check when Cassie’s john walked out the door.
Only one more left. That tall skinny kid who went upstairs with Ava.
As a security guard, Bart prided himself on his powers of observation. He managed to keep track of the time that johns would go upstairs with the girls, which girls they went up with, and what time they left.
Bart checked his watch. He had gone up with Ava at eleven-twenty. Looking barely old enough to drink, the bartender had carded him. When Ava, a red-head who had a girl-next-door quality to her, took him upstairs, Ted, the bartender and Bart joked about it being the kid’s first time. He looked that young and nervous.
Give them five more minutes.
Even so, Bart was anxious to go home to his own woman and get away from the cigarette smoke
and floral smell and perfume.
“Hey,” he called out to Cassie when he saw her start up the stairs after wishing her john good-bye. “Can you tell if Ava is done with her customer?”
Cassie frowned. “I didn’t know she had one up there.”
“She took a john up there around eleven,” Bart said. “He hasn’t come out yet.”
“Maybe they fell asleep,” Cassie said. “The light is off in her room.” She paused. “But then, the music is on.”
Each of the girls had a record player in their room to play music in order to drown out the noise of other girls and customers in the rooms next door. The music in a room was a signal that the girl had a customer with her and not to disturb them.
“She’s not allow to let him spend the night.” Bart stood up.
The two of them went upstairs. The room at the end of the hall, Bart banged on the door. “Ava! Wake up! It’s time for your customer to go home. Wake him up.”
They waited.
“Ava!” Cassie wrapped her robe around her. “Wake up, sweetie. You know men aren’t allowed to spend the night. You don’t want to get into trouble with management, do you?”
The other girls started to come out into the hallway. A few, whose customers had left earlier, were dressed in their real night clothes, which included terry robes. Some had night cream on their faces.
They all waited and listened for Ava to respond.
“Ava!” Bart tried to doorknob. A glass door knob which was standard in the old farmhouse. The door was locked. As loud as they were, Ava should have been answering the door. Now he was worried.
Has she overdosed? Does she even use drugs?
Bart had to admit that he didn’t know Ava well enough to know if she did drugs.
He took the keys he had for the bedroom doors out of his pocket. As a guard, he had the keys for in case any of the girls got into trouble with a john, or, as in this case, possibly had a medical emergency.
He unlocked the door and forced his way inside. The lights were indeed off. The girls crowded in the doorway to see what was going on to keep Ava from answering the door.
