Carly Laden

By Vicki Lee Zell

Carly Ruth Laden married the man of her dreams. Dorian is a man which any woman would say yes to. He is a man Carly believes to be her "Knight in Shining Armor". Carly trusted Dorian until she discovered a dark secret. Carly vanishes without a trace. No one knows what happened to Carly. Her parents are worried. Her older brother, Decker, suspects Dorian of foul play. Sergeant Boils and Sheriff Rising, along with Sheriff Boot come together and join forces, and Dorian becomes a prime suspect. That is until Dorian's body is discovered bludgeoned to death, his throat slit open, his body drained of its blood. One character among the strange cast of characters within the story knows what happened, and soon... YOU the reader will know the climatic ending of a surprising twist without the fairytale ending.

• Language: English
• Publisher: vlzbooks
• Release date: May 16, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201300029

Vicki Lee Zell

Hello Reader, and welcome to my page. I don't know about you, but I love a good mystery. A well told story should take us on a journey packed with excitement page after page and not weigh us down. I like books that dive into the storyline. I want to know what's coming, what's next, not every color of every character's whatever. I try leaving as much as I can to the reader's imagination. Like when you talk to someone on the telephone who you've never met. Their voice alone gets you wondering all about the person. Their hair color, eye color, facial expressions, the way walk. If everytime you talked to someone over the phone and they described themselves to you, you'd never get to the good stuff. That's kind of how my stories go. I am telling you a story to keep you in the dark until the very end, and then surprising you with a WTF kind of attitude. I want to shock you, hold you close, wrap your imagaination to get you to have an imagination. 

Book preview

Welcome Reader

Take a seat. Get comfortable and listen up to a tale of mystery and woe as told through the eyes of unlikely characters, but kind folks all the same. Strange things sometimes happen in small towns. Small-town folks are quiet folks who lead simple lives. Hardworking individuals who preserve little out-of-the-way villages with mom-n-pop shops seem to be dwindling as time progresses with the increase of electronic gadgets. Dorothy Mae Wilcox has called a town gathering at the church. Folks are fixing to discuss what they believe took place out there at Laden Lane. Some folks like to sit and listen while other folks like to put in their unwanted opinion. It's only fair everyone gets a chance to tell their side of the tale to what happened, or, to what they (think) happened, out there on Laden Lane. Grab a beverage. We got coffee, tea, and sodas. Or you can partake in what folks in our neighborhood partake in. Some good old moonshine. Crazy Clem over there in Helmsdale sure likes to partake now and then. The folks over in Burl call fellas like Clem dilly-dallies because folks from Helmsdale don't do much but dilly-dally.

Oh, it's true. We got some simpletons, awe right. They’re just a bit crazy is all, same as you and me.

LADEN LANE

Carly Shiffer drove her silver-gray Corsica along Mount Boulevard in Carmingden, listening to Jack Nugent disc jockey for CBNY radio. Any female who listens to Jack will tell you, Jack's voice is one of the sexiest to ever grace the airwaves of talk radio. Jack's voice alone could, and more than likely did, get single and married women thinking twice about their lives, whether the men they are married to or just on a social basis could top what Jack could do for them in the bedroom. Stop that, Carly whispered; you shouldn't be thinking about Jack; you're a married woman. Carly smiled in the rearview mirror then turned her focus back on the road. The song torn between two lovers played on the radio. Oh, sure, Jack, just what us girls need to hear with your sexy overtones, Carly said as if anyone were there in the car to hear, then leaned forward and pushed the off button on the radio.

Carly Ruth Laden married Dorian Shiffer and became Carly Ruth Laden Shiffer. Twenty-seven years of age, Carly was not what you would call stupid. Naïve. Gullible. Perhaps. But not stupid. Aware Dorian could have any number of desirable women, Carly believes Dorian stayed true to those sacred marriage vows they bestowed upon one another. Vows, like; I shall love no other. I shall be faithful, sincere, now, and forever. Vows they shared with a church full of devoted Baptists. Reverend Hoer. Dorian's mother and father and Carly's mother and father. Between sit-ups, running on the treadmill, doing a few curls and crunches, Carly had made several attempts at phoning Babs before leaving the house, worried why her mother did not answer these calls. It was Friday, their day to cruise the flea market in Burl. For the past two years, Carly-n-Babs joined forces and cruised the famous flea market in the small town of Burl, where Carly was born and raised the first twenty years of her now twenty-seven-year life. The stoplight at the intersection of Delmar and Willis went from green to yellow to red, so Carly applied the brake pedal to bring the Corsica to a relaxed halt. The streets were quiet, and Carly saw no vehicles in her rearview mirror. Along both sides of the street, cars parked bumper to bumper. Do the owners of those vehicles know something... Carly wondered? The quiet on the usually busy street was an eerie quiet. Two teenage girls made their way along the sidewalk with their ponytails swaying as they walked, talked, and giggled, and Carly thought of her friend Melissa Stand from the seventh grade who she called M.

Melissa had moved to Burl in the summer of '97 to live with her aunt because her mother had died, and her father was unemployed, having a rough go at life. Carly-n-Melissa shared a friendship within the halls at school. In the spring of '98 when summer recess was around the corner, Carly-n-Melissa agreed to meet at Burl's annual picnic. However, plans don't always work out as planned. Friendships sometimes end abruptly without notice. Melissa's father, Joseph Stand, decided to bring Melissa and his sister-in-law to Texas. Carly discovered this bit of news in a letter after having worried as to why M never showed at the picnic. No one bothered mentioning Joseph had moved M and her aunt to Texas. Carly assumed it was because she was a child and didn't deserve the respect of knowing such gossip if we're to speak the truth. Babs wasn't aware Melissa moved away. Gossip crossed the lips of every Baptist in Burl during those Sunday afternoon luncheons at Mel's Diner when gossip run fluently over parishioners’ lips. But only after church services, however, mind you. It was there you learned of the who's, what's, where's, and how's of everything.

A month after Melissa moved away, Carly spoke with M on the telephone, but we all know long-distance relationships, however close, eventually, lose track as time marches on. The phone calls stopped. Letters were written less often. Melissa and Carly moved on in their lives. Not sure who stopped writing first, M or herself, Carly realized that it didn't matter. What was over, was over.

Carly rolled the driver's side window to let the morning air inside. Although refreshingly chilly despite the morning sun above in all its glistening glory, it was the remedy Carly was looking for. The traffic light turned green. Carly drove through the intersection and headed for the on-ramp to Freeway 81 suspecting the Freeway would be buzzing with commuters going in and out of the city to dead-end jobs, Carly supposed most hated, but such is life. According to the digital clock on the dashboard, it was eleven-thirty. Those calls still weighed on Carly's mind. She had stuck by the ten-ring rule, always let the phone ring a full ten rings before hanging up, but her mother never answered. Where could Babs be?

Barbara Jean Leigh Laden, Carly-n-Decker's mom, Drew Laden's wife, got the nickname Babs after having been introduced to Drew through mutual friends at a coed dance at Halverson High School's gymnasium on the outskirts of the town of Helmsdale. Drew said very polite-like, nice to meet you, Babs and the nickname stuck like glue as did Drew Laden. During their second encounter at a Burl High school rally on the outskirts of the town of Burl, Drew knew Barbara was the woman he was going to marry. Folks in Burl and Helmsdale whispered rumors, but it was not so romantic as all that. Still, that old belief in love at first sight certainly did apply, and as they say, whoever they are, the rest is history. 

On June 23rd in the year of our Lord 1985, Carly Ruth Laden, Ruth being Drew's mother, came into the world at precisely five o'clock in the evening. According to the astrological sign of Cancer Carly was a strong-willed individual who would one day display great wisdom, so read the dinner placemats at Bo's Oriental Cuisine, the restaurant Carly-n-Dorian frequented those first months of their courtship. The last restaurant they dined at before... it... happened.

Carly was fond of the fortune cookies given with every meal because inside each cookie there was a quaint Chinese proverb printed on a tiny slip of white paper. On the other side of the paper were six numbers Carly played in the New York State Lottery. The closest Carly ever came to winning was having three of the six numbers which meant Carly won herself a free ticket. As was Carly's form of luck. For love, too, had taken a backseat. Now eight months and counting, Dorian had still not made love to her. Any wife would be suspicious especially knowing her husband worked with ninety percent of female coworkers. Dorian's boss was a woman named Shaw.

It was thirty miles from Carmingden along Freeway 81 to Woolabee Circle. Presently, two traffic lights made the four-lane divided Freeway a steady drive. Progress as we well know is an essential part of growth, so when more traffic lights were installed along the freeway, Carly assumed someone had bitched long and hard because construction got underway and Freeway 81 was no longer a pleasant drive but had become a royal pain, and I am sure you know where. 

Road crews tore up the old to lay new to turn around and tear up the new to lay newer. When Carly verbalized any complaint about the recent construction Dorian would reply with a hint of sarcasm as to how at least not all our tax dollars supported the vacations of those Washington Bureaucrats, to which Carly made no remark but remained silent.

Laden Lane got its name despite the disapproval of a few of Burl's residents. Joan Samos was one such resident. A right busybody if ever there was. Folks call Joan, Sixty Minutes because if Joan corners you, you can bet Joan will talk your ear off for one solid hour. George Quackenbush, who folks call, Old George was the crop duster for all the local farmers. Joan and Old George have a way about them. A talk-in way, that is. Old George will tell anyone who has a mind to listen how Laden Lane from high above in his airplane looks like a giant snake traveling through the woods surrounding Laden’s Estate. Old George calls the area where the Laden's park their automobiles the snake's head. George says the Laden's Castle, what George calls the Laden’s house, is the snake's eye. Crazy Old George sure has a notion. Few folks put stock in Old George's rambling but let Old George flap his jowls cause those ramblings don't make much sense anyhow. Why the crazy fool swears up-n-down he's seen them alien space craft's and knows doggone well those govern-men-pricks are keep-in them green alien bastards hidden in Area 51. Townsfolk from Helmsdale and Burl believe Old George to be wrapped a bit tight. A wee bit too tight so most folk’s figure.

Laden Estate sits near a mile back off the main road surrounded by a shroud of thick forest pines and other various trees and shrubs. The fall foliage is indescribable when all the trees and shrubs resonate colors of gold, orange, red, and brown. Shades of purple can be found in some patches. It's truly a breathtaking array of natural beauty. The road stretch-in north to Helmsdale and south to Burl is Thurston Road, and this is where Laden Lane runs off from. Helmsdale is nowhere near a city but a tad larger than Burl. Shops line the streets, like Cuddy's Supermarket and Patsy's Bar named after the great country-western singer, Patsy Cline. Still, none of these shops compare to the active support like that of Burl's flea market. Burl's population is no more than ten thousand, so most folks reckon. Folks who live there got dairy farms, pig farms, some got horse farms. These folks got the idea of a flea market, and tourists from miles around flock like geese just to browse the market. In turn, these tourists support the mom-n-pop shops seeming to fade rapid-like nowadays. Dilly-dallies, what folks from Burl call the folks from Helmsdale, filter through the tourist crowds every weekend because they know the flea market offers everything from soup to nuts. Anyone can buy, sell, or trade whatever they have a mind to. Anybody with imagination can rent a booth and come out with what they call a substantial profit. Folks sell-in their wares agreed a part of their earn-ins goes to the church ‘cause the good Lord’s been all right. Some may not think this to be true, but that small town of Burl got what folks call notoriety.

The drive along Laden Lane is a sweeping tunnel of immense beauty. The C-curve, not the S-curve, shaped more like the letter C. See. Well, that C-curve is about halfway along Laden Lane where Carly run' err Mustang in the woods come in close to slam it into one of those giant pine trees. Carly was sure a lucky pup that day. Must be the Lord was watch-in over Miss Carly? After that C-curve, the lane runs yet another quarter mile and then spills into the park-in area, what Old George calls, the cobra's head. That area has a grassy knoll with a five-step concrete block lead-in up to the concrete sidewalk lead-in to what Old George calls the Laden's Castle. House or Castle, depend-in on how you look at things, sits on a hill some hundred feet from the park-in area. It's shore big, so Old George might be correct. It does kinda look like a castle sit-in strong and willful with two big pillars give-in it a massive look-in strength. Sorta reminds you of Tara, in Gone with the Wind. That gal was pretty but didn't have the lick a sense God give her. Drew planted as many trees as he had chopped down, to give back to Mother Nature what he took. In the fall season, the woods are colorful, making Laden Estate near picture-perfect. Like one of them Norman Rockwell paint-in’s, you see in a museum. Who in tarnation would ever guess among such a backdrop of beautiful acreage there was some downright evil?

THE FIGURINE

The traffic along Freeway 81 flowed smoothly. The exit to Woolabee Circle was just ahead, and a mile further was Thurston Road. A half-mile more was the turnoff onto Laden Lane. Carly-n-Babs was close as mother-n-daughter and shared the one common fear we all share. Death. That which we tend to lock away in our minds. Babs believes she will be the first to leave this earth because no parent wants to outlive their children. Only what we perceive of natural origin sometimes is not the case. Carly-n-Babs’ love Drew-n-Decker same as you love who you love. Still, no man can understand the inner sanctum which two women share. Babs adores Drew with all her heart, even when she would like to knock Drew upside his head. Drew's a right-good husband, provider, and is wonderful to Carly-n-Decker. Babs is the first to admit how sometimes it is hard to love Decker but loves her son all the same. Decker was three when Carly was born, graduated top ten in his senior class then went into the United States Army where he graduated with an honorable discharge. Decker was single by choice. He says he could never find a woman to suit him. He says grow in up under the same roof with two remarkable women made it near impossible for women to meet such exacting standards. Men will tell you Decker's a flatterer. Women on the other hand have an entirely different opinion. A chemist at Allow Chemical, there he makes a decent wage and honest living. Too bad Decker has him such an uncontrollable temper.

Carly noticed along Thurston Road there was an orange-n-white pickup truck resembling a telephone lineman's truck parked a few hundred feet from Laden Lane's turnoff. There was no lettering or advertisement on the truck which seemed odd because most businesses, small or gargantuan advertise some form of logo for commercial purposes. Turning left onto Laden Lane Carly stopped and stared through the driver's side window wondering whether she should investigate, supposing the driver was hurt, lying unconscious on the seat. Get a grip, Carly told herself and released the brake easing the Corsica forward, believing the truck belong to the telephone company because the lines were always down whenever the slightest storm blew through that area. Carly couldn't help feeling something wasn’t copasetic. The truck stayed within her thoughts up until she reached the park-in area. Pull-in in the space near the grassy knoll Carly's overactive imagination, crazy head folks call it, got Carly thinking crazy. What if... Babs was being held captive and that was why Babs didn’t answer the phone? Which sort of made sense ‘cause Babs did live in uninhabited land by her lonesome after Carly-n-Decker moved to the city and Drew stayed busy at Nights Construction. This thinking prompted Carly to open the car door before shifting the Corsica in the park position. Carly swung her long legs to step out and the Corsica rolled back on its wheels, so Carly swung her legs back inside, slamming the gear shift in the park position, then fell up against the bucket seat realizing she could have slipped under the Corsica's wheels and been squashed like Tippy had been squashed by that tanker truck a long time back. Shaking herself the way a wet dog shakes itself after a much-needed bath to dismiss the tension she built inside herself, Carly stepped out of the vehicle, only this time, be-in sure she had the Corsica in the park position. She put on the emergency brake just to be positive. As Carly made her way up the five-step concrete block of the grassy knoll, she swore a pair of eyes were watching her, so stepped up her pace to the front porch. As she made her way up the stairs the front door opened and, on the porch, standing five feet five inches dressed in a three-piece tan-colored suit with matching shoes stood Babs.

You're late, Babs told Carly. I was getting worried. 

Babs always worries when Carly drives Freeway 81.

I worked out this morning, said Carly, stopping on the top porch step. Dorian bought handheld weights, bench weights, walkers, and sliders, and gliders, and put the exercise equipment down in the basement at two twenty-two, Dorian and Carly’s home on Delmar Street in the city of Carmingden. Dorian-n-Carly exercised religiously those first months, then Dorian began slacking off, arriving home later from the office and, on weekends, went out of town on business to return on Monday. Carly thought nothing about this until she realized how many months had passed.

Should we skip the market? You look tired, said Babs, noting Carly's unease, and Carly assured Babs as she made her way down the porch steps to the sidewalk, she was fine but was wanting to tell Babs how worried she was, but having had suffered her parents something awful with her crazy notions when she was a child, Carly decided to keep quiet. You’re sure, you’re, okay? Babs nagged the way some mothers nag when overly concerned. Babs snatched her purse from off the door handle and pulled the front door to close. I tried calling but the phone is out. I swear if we had a storm last night, I slept through it. Babs rattled on as she and Carly made their way toward the grassy knoll.

The grass isn’t wet, said Carly, noticing the dry lawn. Drew was if anything a stickler when it comes to his lawn. The blades of grass had to be mowed and trimmed to perfection. Drew was a man set in his ways. But what men aren’t? There’s a truck on Thurston Road doing repairs, Carly told Babs as they made their way down the five-step concrete block of the grassy knoll.

What a beautiful morning. Smell that mimosa, said Babs, taking in a deep breath through her nose. I should get champagne for the coming New Year and make mimosa cocktails.

How’s Daddy these days? Carly asked Babs, talking to her mother over top the Corsica’s roof.

Your father’s just fine, Babs said opening the passenger-side door, lowering herself down on the passenger’s bucket seat, pulling the safety harness to fasten herself in place while Carly stood thinking she saw something in the woods, so took a moment to scour the woods. Babs wrestled with the belt strap, grumbling what idiot made it their business she had to wear a safety harness. It was her life as was it her mother’s. Babs felt Pamela should have been allowed that right of choice in getting a shot to help ease her into the Lord’s hands, so she didn’t have to suffer needlessly. Who makes the rules you cannot do as you wish with your own life? Barbara was an advocate for a human’s right to choose, firmly backing any doctors looking to fight for that right of choice. Carly lowered herself in on the driver’s bucket seat seeing Babs struggling with the strap.

Let me help you, Carly told Babs, taking the strap, fastening it in place. There. Safe and ready to go.

Carly, are you sure you’re, okay?

Mother, I told you, I'm okay.