Murder on the Front Nine

by Steve McMillen

  Doan and Dunn load the three workers into their cars and then Doan says, “There are two tow trucks on the way to collect the pickup trucks. I will be sure and tell Woolever and Stratten you said hello. I will also make sure Detective Concile knows you are back in trouble again. She put out a memo saying to keep an eye out for you.”

  “Thanks for your help officer and please give Sam my love,” I reply with a smile.

  “Yeah, right,” Doan quirps.

  Both officers’ get back into their cars, with the three carpenters, and leave.

  Jimmy looks at me and says, “What was that all about, this is supposed to be a nice, quiet neighborhood. When do I get to deck someone?”

  “I don’t know what happened, I was just raking the yard and then all of a sudden everything goes downhill. And I didn’t deck him, I just gently shoved him down.”

  “Yeah, with your little pink rake, Alice,” Jimmy says as he walks away laughing.

  I finish with the yard and elect to go ahead and mail Rusty’s belongings to SIL. I figure that once I do that and send them a bill along with the package, my employment with SIL will end. I will then call Judge Cadium and tell him that I know of someone who can help him with the investigation into Trever Byers murder and Rusty McRichards’ death. Me. Of course, I think I already know who killed Trever Byers but I don’t know who hired him or why he was killed.

  I take a shower, change clothes, box up Rusty’s things and I am just about to go out the door to the Post Office when my phone rings. It’s the judge.

  “Mickke D its TC, remember me, the guy with the two beautiful mermaids around the pool?”

  “Sure, I remember. This is spooky, I was just thinking about giving you a call. What can I do for you?”

  “Have you read The Sun News this morning or listened to the local news?” he replies.

  “No, I haven’t, what did I miss?”

  I used to enjoy reading the paper every morning until I got into this investigative thing with SIL and since then I have seen very little TV and I have read few newspapers.

  “Remember I told you I have had two people who I know die recently. It is now three. Another close friend of mine was killed at the beach last night. In addition, my girlfriend Cindy and the twins are gone. They packed up and moved out overnight.”

  “I’m sorry, who was killed last night?”

  “His name was Freddy Rioz. He was a friend who helped me on the boat.”

  Things are getting more complicated by the minute. Another of TC’s friends dies and the twins are gone. Furthermore, what’s this about a boat? I wonder if it’s as big and beautiful as his home at The Heritage?

  I tell him I would like to help him with the investigation and that we probably should not discuss this on the phone. I will meet him in the food court at Coastal Grand Mall in an hour.

  I pick Coastal Grand Mall because there are too many people dying around him. There’s less chance of a problem in a very public place with a lot of people and possible witnesses everywhere. But mainly, I don’t want to drive all the way down to Pawleys Island again. I just came from there not too long ago.

  He agrees to meet me at the food court. I hope he is open and forthcoming with me because I think he has not been completely truthful up to this point. Maybe this third death will help him decide he had better be upfront with someone, and if not me, maybe the police. It will be his decision.

  I have just sat down in the food court at Coastal Grand Mall when I see TC coming in the back entrance from the parking lot. I hold up my hand and he comes over and sits down.

  “Do you want anything to eat or drink before we get started?” I ask.

  “Black coffee would be great, thank you.”

  I bring back his coffee and a Diet Pepsi for me along with a large order of fries and ten or so packets of ketchup, just in case he needs something to eat. If not, the fries are all mine.

  I figure the direct approach will be the best way to get him to tell me the truth.

  “TC, if I’m going to be working for you to find out what happened to your three friends and if there is any connection between the three of them, I need you to be completely honest with me.

  He tells me almost everything without hesitation. I think he is starting to get a little bit nervous and concerned about his own mortality. He goes into detail about meeting Rusty, the coins, making the trip to Bald Head Island and finally finding the other coins in Rusty’s jacket. He keeps an ace in the hole, the boat sweep and the map.

  We agree on financial terms and shake hands.

  I’m beginning to feel like Jim Rockford all of a sudden, a real PI. I wonder if I need some type of a license.

  Chapter 37: The Assassin

  It is 2:00 in the morning as Paul Hills turns off I-95 onto South Carolina 64, a two-lane highway, on his way to his condominium in Charleston. He is going to try to relax for a couple of days before making plans to get back at SIL.

  He notices a set of headlights coming his way on this desolated, dark, stretch of road. Abruptly and without warning, those same headlights begin to swerve from one side of the road to the other. As he takes his foot off the accelerator, he notices the lights seem to go off the side of the road and start going up and down as if bouncing. He starts to put on his brakes but it is too late, the vehicle comes back onto the road, crosses the yellow line and slams head on into Paul’s Highlander.

  The headlights belonged to an eighteen-wheel, fully loaded tractor-trailer. The driver had fallen asleep and by the time he is jolted awake, he is just along for the ride. He tries hitting the brakes but he is traveling too fast to be able to stop before he collides with Paul’s SUV.

  It is very still, Paul is going in and out of blackness. He knows something is wrong but he is not sure what. His body is numb but he hurts all over. His mind is still somewhat working and he is ticked-off as he thinks to himself, I don’t believe this, dying on a lonely highway, no final gunfight, no going out in a blaze of glory, what a silly way to die and besides that, I still have never had a hole in one.

  He blacks out again. When he comes to, he sees ghosts dangling from hangman nooses held by a huge supreme puppeteer. The faces of the ghosts are of the sixty plus people he has killed during his life. They were just faces to him, not really living human beings. Their suffering and deaths meant nothing to him, a man purged of emotion and empathy many decades ago. Now he wonders if they felt the same way he is feeling now and if they are all waiting for him somewhere in the great beyond to take their revenge.

  They were right, he thinks, your life does pass before your eyes as you die, but so what, he will not live to tell anyone. He blacks out again and when he comes to this time, his mind wanders back to all the women he has known in his life. He has never been married, never been a father, and never attended his child’s baseball or soccer games. Another dangling ghost appears with the face of a lovely girl from Wisconsin named Ola. He will never know it, but he did have children, twins, a boy and a girl. He had an affair with the lovely Ola from Wisconsin. He hated the name Ola so he nicknamed her Bunny. He stayed with Bunny for about a month, but decided he was becoming too involved with the affair. It was time to leave. He left without ever saying goodbye.

  Of course, he left no forwarding address so Ola had no way to get in touch with him to tell him about his kids. She tried but no one seemed to know anything about the father of her children. He had dreams about her occasionally and every once in a while, he would wonder if maybe she could have been the one he let get away. This is one of those times.

  His thought about not going out in a blaze of glory is mistaken. This time when he comes to, he smells the smoke and senses the fire. He tries to scream but there is no air in his lungs to form the words. The fire erupts and before long, flames engulf the Highlander. Next, the ammo stored in the fake back seats begin to go off and Paul has what he wants, a final gunfight in a blaze of glory. He smiles, then drifts off hand in hand with all of his past ghosts into a
bright yet foggy tunnel, thinking about his never-to-be hole in one. The assassin is dead.

  Barry and Bill come through Charleston three days behind Paul. They remembered the neighbor in Vegas mentioning courses in Charleston. They drive around town looking for any white Highlander they can spot. They drive through condominium developments and several golf courses but to no avail. They go to the courthouse and check tax records but nothing exists for Paul Hills. Barry wants to stop at police headquarters and ask questions but Bill tells him that is probably not a good idea since their van is full of weapons, surveillance materials, and explosives. They spend the night in Charleston and the next morning travel up I-95 to Culpepper.

  As they see road signs for Myrtle Beach, Bill turns to Barry and asks, “Should we call Mickke D and see how he’s doing?”

  “No, I don’t want Mickke D involved in this any way, shape, or form.”

  “Why do you say that? I thought he did a great job finding the assassin for us. Maybe he can find him again?”

  “That’s the problem, he did too good of a job. I do not want him nosing around in this anymore. If he starts looking, he may find out a whole lot more than we want him to find out. And if that happens, do you want to be the one to eliminate him?”

  Bill is silent for a few minutes and then he says, “No, I would not relish that assignment.”

  Barry turns to Bill and says, “Yeah, me neither, but could you do it? Could you pull the trigger?”

  “I don’t know, could you?”

  “Sure, if I thought there was no other way and my life depended on it, sure, I could pull the trigger and so could you.”

  There was very little conversation between them for the rest of the trip. The thought of killing a friend like Mickke D did not sit very well with Bill. If Barry is willing to kill Mickke D then Bill is right in thinking he will be willing to kill him, as well. Maybe that was what Barry was trying to get through to him. He will do whatever it takes to finish the job, friend or no friend.

  Four days later at SIL headquarters, Bill is doing his usual checking of reports of unexplained and unusual deaths across the nation. SIL keeps a file on such things just in case they ever need the information later, for an ongoing case.

  A report comes in from the State Police in Charleston, South Carolin. It states that there has been an accident involving an SUV and a tractor-trailer. The SUV was a Highlander and the driver was dead. The part that makes it unusual is that they have been unable to identify the driver and ammo was going off at the scene of the accident. The police found burned C-4, weapons, and ammo at the location.

  Bill makes a copy of the report and takes it directly to Barry’s office.

  “Oh, my god, he’s dead,” Barry slowly stammers as a smile frays the edges of his mouth.

  “We don’t know that for sure, but it sure sounds like him,” Bill responds as a strange ill at ease feeling passes through him.

  “Well, Mr. Cutter, why don’t you see if you can confirm my beliefs one way or the other? If he is dead, we can move on to things that are more productive. We can stop hunting him and see about finding the treasure map that Trever Byers had on him.”

  “Okay, let me see what I can find out.”

  Bill leaves Barry’s office wondering if he should have kept the report to himself. If the assassin is dead, he could be next.

  When Bill gets back to his office, he looks up the number for State Police Headquarters in Charleston. He calls the number and gets Detective Susan B. Wallace. She was the person on duty the night of the accident and therefore the lead detective.

  “Detective Wallace, this is Bill Cutter in Culpepper, Virginia and I work with Special Investigations Limited. I had an accident report come across my desk from your locale and I think I may have some information about your John Doe.”

  “Slow down a minute Mr. Cutter, who the hell are you and who the hell is Special Investigations limited?”

  “Sorry detective, check your Homeland Security Code File and look up 14BOF-17,” Bill replies.

  “Hold on,” Susan says as she pulls a codebook from her locked desk drawer.

  After a few minutes of silence, she comes back on the phone and says, “Okay, so now I know who you are and that you know people in high places, what do you have for me?”

  “We have been searching for a man named Paul Hills in relation to a murder on Bald Head Island, North Carolina, several months ago and your John Doe was driving the same type of SUV as Mr. Hills.”

  “Mr. Cutter, so do thousands of other people. What makes you think our John Doe is Mr. Hills?”

  “We had spotted Mr. Hills in Panama City Beach, Florida, but he got away from us and we thought he was headed to Charleston, where he possibly owns a condo. We could not find him in Charleston and I think the reason is that he was killed in the accident.”

  “Did you check in with anybody here while you were searching for Mr. Hills?” She asks.

  “No, Detective Wallace, we usually try to stay out of the lime light, if you know what I mean.”

  “What you mean, Mr. Cutter, is that you’re one of those spook companies and you pretty much do as you damn well please.”

  “I’m sorry detective, did you get up on the wrong side of the bed this morning or are you always this pissed off? I can have someone call your supervisor if you wish, but I would rather not do that.”

  There was silence on the phone and then she replies, “You’re right, Mr. Cutter, I apologize, it’s just that the accident scene was a scary situation. There was ammo going off everywhere and then we were unable to find anything on the victim to identify him.”

  “Detective, if you don’t mind, I am going to fax you everything we have on Paul Hills and then you let me know if you think he could be your John Doe.”

  “That will be great, Mr. Cutter, and again I apologize for my rudeness. I will get back to you as soon as possible.”

  Bill hangs up, shakes his head, faxes the information to Charleston, and reports to Barry.

  Chapter 38: Mickke D

  I get up the next morning after my encounter with the carpenters and my meeting with TC, answer some e-mails, return some phone calls and plan my day. One of my e-mails was from Patti Michelle Court, one of my golf students. She is having some problems and wants a nine-hole playing lesson. I e-mail her back that I am tied up right now but I will get back to her next week. Patti has taken a series of lessons and does very well but always seems to choke on the course.

  I figure I should make a trip up to Bald Head Island and see what I can find out from the authorities at the scene of Trever Byers’ murder. Again, you always learn more in person than over the phone.

  It is another beautiful Chamber of Commerce day so I am looking forward to the trip.

  I arrive around 1:30pm on the island. The ride up is great and the ferry boat trip over to the island is exuberant. For some reason I just feel pleasant today, as if something good is going to happen.

  I rent a golf cart and get directions to the police station. On the way, I pass North Carolina’s oldest lighthouse, Old Baldy, commissioned by Thomas Jefferson. I remember when Jimmy and I were up here to play golf, he wanted to climb to the top and look around. I told him to go ahead without me. Just be sure and take pictures.

  Police Chief Marty Vette answers my knock on the door and for some reason as I introduce myself and quickly flash him my old Army Investigative License, I think I have met him somewhere before. He looks familiar to me.

  I say to him, “Chief Vette, have we met before?”

  “Mr. MacCandlish, if we have, I’m sorry but I don’t remember it.”

  At age forty-five and three wives later, my memory is not what it used to be. In addition, it has become very selective. However, I know I have met this man. Maybe it will come to me later.

  “Chief Vette, I was hired by Judge Cadium to look into the death of Trever Byers.”

  “Oh, yeah, the guy who was shot at the golf course. I wish you a lot of l
uck. I have been unable to find anything on the person who did that,” Marty replies.

  “Could you tell me what you did find, evidence wise?” I pleadingly ask.

  “Sure. I found golf cart tracks leading from the golf course over to the tidal creek where I suppose he had a boat waiting. I found the condo he had rented, paid for in cash with a name that belongs to no one. The condo was cleaner than church on Sunday morning and there was not a print anywhere.”

  He finally takes a breath and stares at me.

  “That didn’t give you much to go on, did it? Did the feds come over and take a look?” I ask.

  “Oh hell yes, they were all over the place, but they don’t like to share information. We’ll get back to you when we know something was all I was told.”

  “I know what you mean Chief; it’s like pulling teeth to get information from them. Do you think anyone would mind if I go over to the golf course and look around?”

  “Let me call Justin, the golf pro, and have him get someone to take you out to the scene of the crime. However, do me a favor, if by chance you find something please let me know. Don’t pull a fed on me.”

  I promise him I will share any new evidence that I may discover.

  He smiles as if to say, yeah right, sure you will.

  He calls the golf course and sets up the trip to the murder scene. I thank him for his help and proceed over to the golf course to meet Justin.

  As soon as his guest leaves, Police Chief Marty Vette makes a second call, “Hey, one of your old buddies is up here nosing around. He said his name is Mickke MacCandlish. I remember him as Mickke D.”

  “Thanks Marty, I’ll take care of it,” the voice on the other end of the phone replies.

  It takes me about ten minutes to get from Chief Vette’s office to the golf course. Justin is waiting for me in the pro shop.

  “You must be Mr. MacCandlish; Marty said he was sending you over and for me to take you out to the crime scene. Are you ready to go?”