Four Courtroom Dramas

By Robert Trainor

Four Courtroom Dramas contains four recent novels of mine, all of which can be purchased separately: The Trial of Eugene Bishop, The Black Swan, Presumed Dead, and Annabel Poe. 

The shooting of Derek Kramer, a thirty-two-year-old white man, leads to the arrest of Eugene Bishop, a black undercover cop who is charged with first degree murder. The day before Derek Kramer was killed, he had been fired from his job, and that night, he made a number of threats that were directed at those he had formerly worked with. Eugene Bishop had been with Derek when he made the threats to commit mass murder, and the prosecutor is concerned that Eugene's defense is actually based on a concept called jury nullification.

Jury nullification occurs when the members of a jury believe that a defendant is guilty but choose to acquit the person because they feel the law they are being asked to uphold is unjust or because they believe the punishment for the crime is far too harsh.

In the end, the results are not quite as clear as some might like, but this only means that the reader is the real juror in this very challenging case where the scales of justice are so evenly balanced between the competing forces of the law and the safety of innocent people.

In The Black Swan, lust, incest, and murder form the backdrop of this novel where Kaitlin Devers, a beautiful seventeen-year-old woman, is charged with murdering her mother. The trial seems to be an easy one for the two prosecutors who have been assigned to the case. After all, Kaitlin has confessed to the crime, her fingerprints are on the murder weapon, and just thirteen hours before Stacy Devers was murdered, Kaitlin told her uncle that she was going to murder her mother.

But Kaitlin's lawyer has a surprise that may overturn what appears to be the obvious outcome of this case. And this surprise is the black swan--a metaphor to describe an event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight. To put it very simply, a black swan event is an event or idea that no one saw coming. But will it be enough to save Kaitlin?

Essentially, Presumed Dead is a murder mystery, but the mystery is not so much who committed the murder. Maybe, in fact, there was no murder at all, but what always remains mysterious until the very end is the underlying psychological motivation of Smoky Jacobs. What did he actually do, and why did he act the way he did? For instance, it never makes a good impression when, in front of the jury, you attempt to strangle your own lawyer--especially when you're on trial for smothering your wife to death!

My maiden name was Annabel Poe, but then I married Dirk Peabody, and in an unfortunate burst of romantic enthusiasm, I consented to have my last name changed to Peabody. I say unfortunate because it wasn't long before I developed an inferiority complex and found it most difficult to survive in this strange and forbidding world.

However, after I was arrested and charged with murder, a very dark side of my personality emerged when I was thrown into the limelight and had to defend myself against a number of powerful people who were determined to send me to prison for the rest of my life.

It was only after enduring the mockery of the crowd and the taunts of my persecutors that I was able to spring a trap that took everyone completely by surprise. Relentlessly tormenting the judge, who physically assaulted me and called me the biggest piece of trash to ever enter her courtroom, I came away from my trial with my dignity intact. Perhaps, now, my accusers have realized one very obvious thing about me:Sass me and I'll sass you back. .

• Language: English
• Publisher: Robert Trainor
• Release date: Feb 20, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224456123

Robert Trainor

Over the past twelve years (since I retired at the age of 59), I've written nineteen novels, four novellas, four non-fiction books, and seven anthologies, all of which you can find in the Kindle Store. Instead of writing a biography of myself, which seems rather irrelevant, I would prefer to write a biography of my books. Here, in the order in which they were written, is a brief sketch of the plots, themes, and subject matter of these books.1/ The Voice of the Victim describes a series of murders in a small city. I've always felt a great deal of empathy for the victims of violent crimes, especially those who are murdered by guns. What, I wondered, would these people say to us if they could speak? When reading this book, it is important to remember that my intention, from first page to last page, was to present the voice of the victim. And, to me, this voice is not a straight-line accusation of weapons and murderers but tends to veer to a pervasive mockery and total indictment of modern culture. This novel is much different than anything else I have written, and there will be many who will object to what the "voice" is saying.2/ Some Things Are Sweeter than God is somewhat along the lines of a classic murder mystery but is certainly not one of those books where the conclusion is some wild revelation that no sensible reader could ever discern beforehand. The protagonist is a forty-year-old woman lawyer who, in her role as a public defender, is required to represent a man who is accused of brutally murdering his ex-girlfriend.3/ The Road Map to the Universe is a well-constructed novel--at one time, I was a tournament chess player, and this book required a great deal of planning and analysis. Essentially, it's a highly unusual murder mystery, but the perceptive reader may be able to identify a standard plot theme lurking in the background. The Road Map also examines an interesting philosophical question: In a universe of four billion galaxies, what relevance, if any, does the human being have?4/ The Great Barrington Train Wreck, a truly offbeat social commentary, includes a unique type of murder mystery and is one of my favorite novels. Although I almost never include anything from my own life experience in my books, I was, just like the protagonist in the Train Wreck, homeless for many years. So I'm familiar with the lingo and attitude that some of the homeless have. This is a catchy, captivating book where the plot seems to materialize out of thin air until it becomes the elephant in the room. Also, to my mind, this tale could describe what happens to Holden Caulfield, the anti-hero of the Catcher in the Rye, as he approaches forty. It's not all peaches and cream! Especially when he falls in love with the daughter of a millionaire, and even more especially when he ends up on death row.5/ Your Kiss Is Like the Sweetest Fire describes a teenage romance between Jaime and Renee, who were adopted at a young age into the same family. It seems illogical to me, but in almost all states, the law views a sexual relationship between adopted siblings who live in the same family as a crime of incest--exactly as if they were related by blood. So Jaime and Renee have this difficulty to contend with, and also, their mother and father are both rather repulsive characters who are totally incapable of helping them. Wait until you meet Renee--I love her.6/ Requiem for the West is partially based on an apocalyptic poem that I wrote during the 1990's. Ten thousand hours is a lot of time to spend on a seven-hundred-word poem! Requiem is also an examination of some apparently abstract themes that seem highly relevant to me: 1/ The pervasive role of explicit sexuality in our culture and the very different ways that people react to it; 2/ The often farcical, Dilbert-like nature of the modern workplace, in this case a college; and 3/ Is doomsday just around the corner? The 1960-2000 version of myself considered a nuclear apocalypse to be inevitable, but nowadays, I'm ambivalent.7/ Frontier Justice was easy to write because once Adriana Jones arrived on page 10, she took over the book, and all I had to do was keep up with her as she overpowered every obstacle that crossed her path. I hadn't intended for that to happen, but that's the way life goes sometimes. Do I agree with, support, condone, or advocate Adriana's way of doing things? Difficult questions. Adriana is my creation, so I have to take some responsibility for her, I suppose, but I look at it this way: To be true to a character, one has to let the person speak and act in a way that is appropriate to his or her personality. I just can't legislate them into political correctness! Adriana didn't just overpower the other characters in Frontier Justice--she also overpowered me. I really like this book--I wish, as a writer, I could think of more characters who are as dynamic as Adriana.8/ A Tale from the Blackwater River is a novella that is meant to be a satire on a certain kind of story that is showing up far too frequently nowadays, but on another level, it's just kind of a humorous tale that was a lot of fun to write. This book is written in the first person by a forty-two-year-old woman named Alanda Streets. I almost published it under the pen name Alanda Streets because I thought some people might say that no woman would ever write a story like A Tale from the Blackwater River, but for those who feel that way, I hope you will ask yourself this question: If the name Alanda Streets had been on the cover of the book, instead of mine, would you have felt that a woman couldn't have written it?9/ The Blackwater Journal is another Alanda Streets novel--this time, she is only sixteen. I couldn't seem to get away from Alanda--she does have a spunky survivor's attitude towards life that appeals to me. In this book, she has to call on all her resources when her evil father imprisons her in a room and tells her that she has only a week left to live. As the days pass by, the terror mounts on her own personal death row. Does Alanda escape? Maybe so, maybe no.10/ Love Letters (Soaked in Blood) is another murder mystery that has a humorous undertone, which many will probably miss. The problem with writing a murder mystery is that anything that can be thought of has already been done about a thousand times. The only original idea left would be to have the most obvious suspect turn out to be the murderer. Think of it--that's probably never been done! And so...maybe you can guess the rest.11/ The Book of the Dead is about a man who goes to his 25th reunion and meets his high school sweetheart. The two of them embark on an impulsive twenty-four hour car ride that will take them through three southern states and bring them face-to-face with death. This is a tale where the boundaries of ordinary reality are stretched out a little bit! I'll leave it to you to decide whether The Book of the Dead is a fantasy or a reality.12/ Destroyed by Malice sees the return of a character who played a minor role in The Voice of the Victim. He's the world famous novelist Barker Drule, but unfortunately, he (and his wife) exit the book on page 1 when they are gunned down in their driveway. It isn't long before detective Jeff Willard is convinced that the murderer is a member of the Drule family. Perhaps it's Lenore, the older daughter, who was, years ago, secretly raped by her father; perhaps it's the beautiful Raylene, who wrote a novel about a rape victim that her father managed to have the publishing industry blackball; perhaps it's Ricky, the cocaine-addicted son who is desperate to get his hands on his father's money; and perhaps it's Dalton Drule, Barker's irascible eighty-two-year-old father who just happens to own the gun that was used to murder his son. In the end, when the truth finally comes out, there will be very few left to tell the tale.13/ How to Write an Imaginative Novel takes you through the whole process of writing a novel and then uploading it to Kindle. Among the many things covered are: Where will you find a plot? What is the best way to find names for your characters? How important is it to punctuate your book correctly? Is there a quick way to learn punctuation and sentence structure? What is the best way to write dialogue? What kind of things should one avoid in a novel? What is the significance of the first draft and why is it so important? How does one begin a book so that it immediately commands the reader's attention? How does one revise and edit a novel? Is it possible to create the cover for your book without spending any money? How does one convert a book to the correct format so that it can be uploaded to Kindle? And finally, how does one upload a book to Kindle?14/ I Ching 2015 contains a complete translation (minus the Confucian commentaries) of this ancient Chinese classic. Also included are detailed instructions on how to consult the I Ching using either yarrow stalks, coins, or dice. (For those who have been using coins, one should be aware that a significant error has crept into the method that many people use to cast an omen. This error, which involves using either three or four similar coins will seriously affect the accuracy of the omens you receive.) Additionally, there is extensive advice on how to interpret an omen. By using the correct method of interpretation, you will be surprised at how much clearer omens become. As part of this advice, I have posed a number of questions to the I Ching and have then interpreted the omen I received. Finally, for each hexagram, as well as many of the lines in each hexagram, I have included my own observations as to the essential meaning of these hexagrams and lines.15/ Blood and Blackmail is an elegant murder mystery with an unusual plot twist that took me some time to piece together. For those readers who enjoy the challenge of solving a crime before the final chapter arrives, this novel should provide you with a truly interesting puzzle. I doubt many people, if any, are going to see the underlying deception that runs throughout this tale because...if I say anything else, I might help the reader unravel this mystery, and I certainly wouldn't want to do that!16/ Fairy Tales by Martians takes a humorous look at the theory of evolution. Science, of course, claims that the human being originated from an amoeba that eventually became a tadpole that eventually became a frog and so on and so forth. However, I just can't conceive of the fact that ten million years ago, two frogs mated in a swamp and because of that event, I eventually arrived on the scene. What kind of a genealogy chart is that? Neither does the seven-day religious version of events appeal to me, so what I'm left with is a very cynical view of both the religious and scientific theories concerning the origins of our existence.17/ The Book of Dreams repeats a very old idea that has been used in many a novel. But here, in this murder mystery, the idea is taken to another level entirely and contains a twist that not many will see coming. The clues are there, starting with the poem in the Preface.18/ The Dark Side of the Moon is a tale about an attractive high school teacher who falls in love with one of her students. However, Carolyn Black is nervous that her sexual liaison with the student will ruin her career. Eventually, she tries to break off their relationship, but when he threatens to commit suicide, Carolyn is faced with an excruciating dilemma.19/ The Murder of Nora Winters was inspired by John Dickson Carr who wrote a number of locked-room mysteries. In this type of mystery, the murder victim is found in a room that does not allow the killer any means of exit. The doors and windows are all bolted from the inside, and it's considered very poor form for the author to create a room where there are sliding walls or secret panels. The solution to the murder of Nora Winters is, I think, relatively simple, but I've woven in enough deceit and misdirection to confuse all but the most astute readers.20/ The Vanishing Victim is a tale of a psychiatrist and a troubled woman who comes to him for counseling. What she reveals to him proves to be a confession to a brutal crime, but he is unable, because of the doctor/patient privilege, from revealing this crime to anyone, including the police. But even more troubling is that the woman's confession, although it contains a number of factual inaccuracies, turns out to have a terrifying reality of its own.21/ The Fatality Game follows a series of innocuous crimes in a rich neighborhood that seem to be more pranks than anything else. But when a woman is murdered in her bed, Detective Cody Barnes realizes that there is something evil lurking under the placid veneer of swanky mansions that are inhabited by millionaires. And when Cody becomes romantically involved with one of the earlier victims, the beautiful Lucinda Kane, the case begins to take on a life of its own that will eventually lead to the deaths of three more people.22/ How to Write an Intelligent Murder Mystery describes some of the adventures I encountered while I was writing murder mysteries (of my twenty-one novels, thirteen are murder mysteries.) This is a somewhat unusual instructional book that attempts to relate the problems encountered in the writing of a murder mystery to the more general problem of writing fiction in today's market where any new novel is almost instantaneously buried under an avalanche of new novels.23/ The Real Meaning of Life is definitely one of my favorite books. It's written in the first person by Patrick Devlan, a twenty-seven-year-old guy who writes murder mysteries. But his father, who is dying of pancreatic cancer, wants Patrick to write something that will take his readers to a "better place." Patrick decides to follow his father's advice, but a few days later, his roommate's pregnant girlfriend is murdered, and Patrick becomes entangled in a real-life murder mystery. Eventually, after his roommate is convicted of the crime and sent to death row, Patrick is faced with a dilemma that will lead him to the discovery of the real meaning of life.24/ Flight 9525 is a non-fiction book that attempts to answer the question as to why there is so much suffering in the world. For the most part, this book bypasses the usual political, psychological, and social reasons for suffering and examines the following: If God is real, then why do human beings suffer? Why would an all-merciful, all-loving, and all-powerful Being permit its creations to suffer? The usual explanations, such as the hypothesis that God granted man free will, don't answer the question at all. In fact, this is a question that's never been answered satisfactorily.25/ The Scriptwriter is the tale of a man who becomes entangled with three different women. There's the incredibly beautiful woman, the incredibly rich woman, and the incredibly homeless woman. Which one will he choose? Events, mishaps, and character flaws lead him to an interesting decision.26/ The Murder of Marabeth Waters contains a considerable amount of subtle black humor and describes the investigation that ensues after a prostitute is found strangled to death. Detective Devin Driver is quickly able to focus on a suspect; not only did this man send a threatening note to Marabeth, but also, her blood is found in his car. As it turns out, the real murderer lurks elsewhere, and unfortunately, Devin isn't a particularly perceptive detective, so it isn't surprising when the wrong person is convicted of the crime. However, even if Devin had been Sherlock Holmes on steroids, he undoubtedly wouldn't have solved this murder.27/ The Trial of Shada King--a district attorney in Hartford, Connecticut, is charged with manslaughter in the shooting death of the man who had raped her ten days before the shooting. Shada claims that she acted in self-defense, and since she was wearing a recording device at the time of the shooting, her claim of self-defense seems to be valid. But why was she wearing the recording device? The prosecuting attorney is convinced the crime scene was an elaborate stage production that was intended to deceive those who would be listening to the tape and that the victim was murdered in retaliation for the rape.28-34/ Finally, I have seven anthologies on Kindle that combine complete versions of many of the books listed above: Four Novels, 5 Novels, Four Murder Mysteries, The Blackwater Novels, Dark Tales, Six Novels, and Five Murder Mysteries. The purpose of the anthologies is that it gives the reader a chance to buy, for instance, five novels of mine at the rock-bottom price of $2.99.I spend a great deal of time revising my books. After finishing the first draft, I go through the book at least eight more times--first page to last page. Each journey through the book is slow and painstaking--no less than three hours and no more than thirty-five pages a day. From my experience, the kind of errors that pop up on some of the later readings can be rather surprising, if not downright alarming! I particularly look for inaccurate punctuation, lackluster sentence structure, and inaccurate or repetitive vocabulary. I also do not permit confusing sentences to stand--I can't imagine that any reader will want to read a sentence twice because I couldn't find a way to explain myself clearly.Finally, I would ask you all to keep an open mind about novels by an author who has no brand name. I am quite unusual because I do not advertise myself in any way, shape, or form (outside, I guess, of this little biography). My books are well-written, entertaining, and thought provoking, but they are often truly original, and I worry about the page-six syndrome. That's the point where some readers abandon a book by an unknown author because of a single sentence, idea, or attitude that seems amateurish to them. Have faith that there are some genuine diamonds in the Kindle arena and have faith that your instinct to buy one of my books was a good instinct. If you read any of my books to the finish, I think you'll feel that your time was not wasted because these novels are not cheap imitations--they are real creations.

Book preview

THE TRIAL OF EUGENE BISHOP

COPYRIGHT 2019 

BY ROBERT TRAINOR 

INTRODUCTION

The shooting of Derek Kramer, a thirty-two-year-old white man, leads to the arrest of Eugene Bishop, a black undercover cop. After initialing denying any involvement in Derek’s death, Eugene changes his story and claims that he shot Derek when he was threatened with lethal force. But the evidence at the scene doesn’t seem to support his claim of self-defense, and he is charged with first degree murder. 

The case against Eugene is based entirely on circumstantial evidence, which leads to a contentious and difficult trial that hinges on how the jurors interpret the rule that applies to circumstantial evidence. This rule states that before you may rely on circumstantial evidence to find the defendant guilty, you must be convinced that the only reasonable conclusion supported by the circumstantial evidence is that the defendant is guilty. If you can draw two or more reasonable conclusions from the circumstantial evidence and one of those reasonable conclusions points to innocence and another to guilt, you must accept the one that points to innocence. 

Obviously, this instruction is favorable to the defense, but the prosecution has another hurdle to overcome in this trial. The day before Derek Kramer was killed, he had been fired from his job, and that night, he made a number of threats that were directed at those he had formerly worked with. Eugene Bishop, along with a few others, had been with Derek when he made the threats to commit mass murder, and the prosecutor is concerned that Eugene’s defense is actually based on a concept called jury nullification. 

Jury nullification occurs when the members of a jury believe that a defendant is guilty but choose to acquit the person because they feel the law they are being asked to uphold is unjust or because they believe the punishment for the crime is far too harsh. An obvious example of jury nullification would be a mother who murders, in cold blood, a man who had been convicted of raping and murdering her daughter. The woman makes a full confession to the crime, and there is even a videotape of the mother shooting the man, but the jury acquits the woman because they cannot bear—and do not think it is just—to send the mother to prison. 

Thus, the prosecutor must contend with the possibility that some members of the jury may feel that Eugene, although he may have technically committed murder, saved many lives. In the end, the results are not quite as clear as some might like, but this only means that the reader is the real juror in this very challenging case where the scales of justice are so evenly balanced between the competing forces of the law and the safety of innocent people. 

CHAPTER ONE

(The following conversation, which was taped, has been edited in order to remove a number of exceptionally vulgar words and expressions.) 

A Thursday night towards the end of a forty-hour work week, and it wasn’t unusual for some of the guys to head over to a bar after they punched out at four o’clock. Two of them—Dallas West and Joel Raskins—walked over together from the factory they called the dump, and they were soon joined by Derek Kramer, who had been delayed because he was summoned into the boss’s office around three-thirty. 

Noah’s Pub was the kind of bar that catered to working guys—it was, especially at this time of day, rather loud and rowdy. Most definitely, this wasn’t the place where you brought your new girlfriend so that you could have a pleasant chat over a glass of wine; in fact, on this particular afternoon, there were only two women in the place—one of them being Sheila Kraus, who had been a bartender/waitress there for years and knew how to handle all the roughnecks who came in looking to get hammered on the sauce. 

Derek had brought somebody with him—a black guy he introduced to the others as Desmond. Hey, said Dallas to Derek, what did Hank call you into his office for? Are you still employed at the dump, or did he set you free? 

Before Derek could say anything, Sheila arrived with a large pitcher of beer and a shot of whiskey, which she placed in front of Derek. What’ll you have? she said to Desmond. 

I’ll have a vodka on the rocks. 

Derek downed the shot of whiskey and poured some beer into his mug. Turning toward the bar, he shouted, Bring me another shot, Sheila. I’m going to get smashed tonight. 

Yes sir, Sheila shouted back at him, in an amiable tone. She always made it a point to cater to these guys’ whims because once they got loaded, they were fantastic tippers. 

Sheila arrived at the table carrying a tray that had two large pitchers of beer, two shots of whiskey, and a vodka on the rocks. 

There! said Sheila as she placed all the booze on the table. That ought to hold you all for fifteen minutes. 

Not if I have anything to say about it, said Derek as he downed one of the shots of whiskey. 

Sheila was used to him—he was one of those guys who always had to prove how much liquor he could drink. Actually, she thought he was kind of pathetic. 

After Sheila left, Derek said, The reason I brought Desmond here was because I thought you’d like to meet him, Dallas. Didn’t you say you were looking for something? 

Maybe, said Dallas, in a cautious tone. 

Desmond has connections, said Derek. I know because I’ve dealt with him before—like lots of times. You can trust him because if he was a narc, I would have been busted a long time ago. 

Desmond leaned over to Dallas and said, We can talk about it outside in a few minutes—there are too many people around right now. 

For sure, said Dallas. But...what have you got? I’m not really into weed if that’s what you’re thinking. 

I got everything under the sun and the moon, baby. It’s just a question of price, but like I said, we’ll talk about it later. 

So what happened? said Joel to Derek. Did Hank put you on probation for all that stuff we pulled last week? 

Derek downed another shot of whiskey—his third—and a dark and menacing look passed over his face. Some people don’t deserve to live. And maybe they won’t! 

What did they do? said Dallas. Fire you? 

You bet they did, said Derek. What happened was Hank brought me up to Carlsen’s office and— 

It’s never good when they bring you to the CEO’s office, said Dallas. That place is like an execution chamber. 

That’s what I kept thinking as I was riding the elevator up to his office. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so nervous and edgy in my whole living life—like I was walking into a trap. When they brought me into Carlsen’s office, I wanted to walk over to him and punch him in the face, but they actually had a security guy in the room. They’re all lucky I didn’t have a gun on me—I can tell you that. 

Was this because of you mouthing off to Hank last week? said Joel. 

I guess so—I mean, when I was on the elevator, I knew what was coming. I don’t know why, but I kept repeating the craziest thing to myself. Maybe if I ever meet up with a psychiatrist, I can ask him what it means. What I kept saying to myself as I rode up the elevator was ‘My name is Lee Harvey Oswald, and I work for the Viet Cong.’ 

Man, that is pretty far gone, said Joel. It doesn’t even make any sense. 

Sure it does, said Derek. The whole way up on the elevator, I felt like I had been ambushed by the Americanos. But we all know how Oswald and the Viet Cong did when they went up against those turkeys. And guys like Hank and Carlsen are real Americano turkeys. 

What did they say to you? said Dallas. 

It was like this big formal thing where they were reading me my execution warrant. I’d supposedly done this and that, but mostly, what I had done was to show them disrespect. Like Hank Remmings deserves respect. He’s nothing but the scum of the earth, and we all know it. 

I always hated that guy, said Dallas. He ought to go out and buy a whip. 

Remember, said Joel, when they sent him away for a couple of days to some management training session in Richmond? 

Ya, said Dallas, and when he came back, he gave us that stupid lecture where he basically told us that we were all lazy drug addicts. 

At least we got off the line for a half hour, said Joel. 

I’d love to shoot him right in the head, said Derek. I mean—BOOM. Just put the greasy sucker out of his misery. Can you imagine the look in his eyes just before I pulled the trigger and said, ‘Sorry, Hank, but I’m firing you!’ 

That’s why workplace shootings happen, said Joel. 

Ya, said Derek, they always blame the worker, but it’s the bosses who are the real cause of it. 

Just then, Sheila arrived with another shot of whiskey for Derek. Having a rough day, sweetie? she said, with a wink. 

Every day is a rough day for Derek, said Dallas. He’s like a terminal case. 

Where’s that woman of yours? said Sheila. I bet she knows how to get you smiling. 

Ain’t no woman gonna get me smiling tonight, Sheila. Not when I’m not bringing in no money anymore. 

Sheila pulled up a chair and sat down next to Derek. You look like you got murder in your heart, Derek. I’ve seen you looking bad before but never anything like this. 

I do have murder in my heart, said Derek, in a morose tone. I know it would ruin my life if I went into that place and shot a few people up, but there are some people who really don’t deserve to live anymore. I mean the world would be so much better off if a few of those jerks had a bullet put into their heads. 

Like who? said Sheila. 

Like everyone who works upstairs at Herring Enterprises. 

Honey, said Sheila, don’t talk that way—it won’t do you no good. 

Besides, said Desmond, somebody my mother knows works upstairs at Herring. She’s not a boss though—she just works in sales. 

Then maybe I’ll leave her out of it, said Derek. The only two I really want are Remmings and Carlsen. Plus I wouldn’t mind taking out Bergman and Harrison. 

Don’t forget Wilkes, said Dallas. He’s got to be one of the worst. 

I guess I’m going to need a list, said Derek. But don’t worry, Desmond—I only do targeted hits, so there usually isn’t much collateral damage. Derek laughed in a malicious way. 

Derek, said Sheila, I know you’re only mouthing off, but you shouldn’t talk this way. People might hear what you’re saying. 

So what if they do? said Derek. I couldn’t care less. What am I supposed to do? Just let these bozos in suits get away with firing me? Who do they think they are anyways?  There ain’t nothin that gives them the right to fire me—I’ve been there way longer than they have. 

You have to put it behind you, said Sheila. You don’t really have any other choice. 

Oh yes I do! said Derek in a hostile tone. Pointing his index finger at Sheila’s head, he said, POW! 

Sheila jumped up from her chair. Don’t you ever do that to me again—you hear? 

Derek stared at her and then he laughed. Or what are you going to do? 

Derek! said Joel. Don’t talk that way to Sheila. She’s never done anything to you, so leave her alone. 

You’re not the only one with a gun, mister, said Sheila to Derek. And I don’t take kindly to people threatening me. 

I wasn’t threatening you, said Derek in a scornful tone. You think my finger is loaded with bullets or something? 

Nobody does that to me, Derek. Nobody! 

None of them had ever seen Sheila so angry. Just let him be, said Joel to Sheila. He didn’t mean anything by it. 

Fine—let’s see when you get your next drink, said Sheila, who turned away from them and went back to the bar. 

You should watch your mouth, said Joel. It’s always getting you into trouble. 

You think I’m bluffing? said Derek. 

If you’re not bluffing, said Joel, then you really shouldn’t be talking about it. 

Why not? said Derek. 

Because then everyone would know who did it! said Joel, in an exasperated tone. 

That doesn’t matter, said Derek. If I go in there and shoot those jackasses up, my life is as good as over. The only question in my mind is whether their lives are worth me spending the rest of my life in prison. 

It could be worse than that, said Joel. You might get the death penalty. 

They never carry out an execution in North Carolina, said Derek. When was the last time they ever executed someone? It must have been at least ten years ago. Besides, there isn’t all that much difference between life in prison and the death penalty—either way, you’re a dead man. 

You need to cool down, said Dallas. I know how rotten it is at Herring, but at least you don’t have to go into work tomorrow. That makes you the lucky one in my opinion. 

That’s the best way to look at it, said Joel. Just let them have their little power trip—it shouldn’t be hard to find a job that’s better than the ones we have. 

I’d so much love to go in there and point a gun at Carlsen’s head, said Derek. Maybe I wouldn’t go so far as to pull the trigger—but just to see the look on his face! So what would they give me for that? A years’ probation? Big deal. 

Don’t do it, said Joel. It’s not worth it. 

Derek folded his arms across his chest and said, Just wait until tomorrow. Anyone want to take bets on who will be alive and who will be dead? Ain’t no one gonna tell me what to do. 

CHAPTER TWO

Before continuing, I think it would be helpful to the reader if I gave brief descriptions of the principal characters in this case. 

At the time when the principal events described in this book occurred, October 2015, Derek Kramer was thirty-two and had worked at Herring Enterprises Incorporated (HEI) for almost eight years. Herring Enterprises employed almost two hundred and fifty people, most of whom worked on the ground floor of a large open area that produced metal parts for various automakers. Derek was one of the many machinists who were employed by HEI, and because his job required a fair amount of expertise, he was paid rather well for someone who had never completed high school—almost forty grand a year. 

Derek was considered to be very capable and efficient at the work he did, but he had run into a number of disciplinary problems during his time at HEI. He was invariably opposed to suggestions from his superiors about how he could improve his speed, which was somewhat below average. Derek’s argument against improvements to his work was quite predictable: He maintained that the new methods being proposed to him would lower the quality of the work that he produced. It was true that his work never failed to pass quality control, but as the years went by, he seemed to become increasingly passive-aggressive and by 2015, his output was only 70% of what it had been two or three years previously. 

It was also well-known to management that he mocked anyone who held positions of authority at Herring. He wouldn’t mock these people to their face, but Hank Remmings, who was Derek’s boss, was well aware of Derek’s combative streak. How could he miss it? Like the time he walked by Derek’s work station, and just after he had passed, he heard him spit. Not a quiet spit, if there is such a thing, but a loud and contemptuous one. Or how Derek would mutter some racial or sexual slur when Hank would pass by him. These slurs would not be loud at all—just loud enough that Hank could pick them up. Another thing that Derek liked to do when Hank was around was to belch in an obnoxious way. After a few months of this kind of behavior, Hank became fed up with the guy, so he fought back against what he perceived as insubordination by giving Derek two warnings. The warnings didn’t have anything to do with the spitting, the slurs, or the belching because those kinds of things were difficult to quantify and were open to interpretation—Derek could always claim that all these incidents were either in Hank’s imagination or had nothing to do with him personally. Rather, Hank wrote him up for being excessively slow at producing what was expected of him. 

For Hank, it was all part of a preconceived plan: He wanted to get rid of Derek, but because of all the new governmental regulations and restrictions that pertained to firing a person, he felt he had to tread carefully. Knowing Derek as he did, he figured that by calling him out on his production rate, it would affect Derek negatively and cause him to slow down even more—which is exactly what happened. Thus, with two warnings already having been given, Hank felt he was on safe ground when he terminated, with a month’s severance pay, Derek’s employment on Thursday, October 15th, 2015. 

Derek was a good looking guy—he stood about six feet tall with straight brown hair that fell to his shoulders. When he put his mind to it, he could be quite charming, and over the years, he had a number of serious relationships with women. But his latest relationship, with Kara Olsen, had been his longest lasting one to date—a little over three years. The two of them lived in an apartment on the west side of Cranston, North Carolina, which was a large suburb of about fifty thousand people that was located fifteen miles southeast of Raleigh, North Carolina. 

Derek liked to do a fairly wide variety of drugs—alcohol, grass, and occasionally cocaine, but he was not unduly excessive in his use of them. True, he would sometimes get drunk after work on Friday night and have a brutal hangover the next day, but he was not a person who could be considered an alcoholic—on most days, he would have three or four beers, and while that might seem like a lot, it was a common ration among the men that he worked with. Usually, he’d have a joint or two while he was drinking, and as far as cocaine went, he could take it or leave it. The white stuff was too pricey for his taste, but if it was offered to him, he wasn’t about to refuse. 

Eugene Bishop was twenty-nine years old, and unbeknownst to almost everyone he knew, he worked, using the street name of Desmond, as an undercover cop for the Cranston Police Department. He had been employed there for three and a half years and mostly dealt with the increasing drug trade in Cranston and the adjoining suburbs of Raleigh where dangerous drugs, like cocaine, heroin, and oxycodone had become much more prevalent. 

Eugene was born in California and had attended UCLA where he majored in criminal justice and graduated with honors. He worked for four years as a security guard before he moved to North Carolina in order to be closer to his mother who lived in Raleigh. Eugene was just short of six feet, and he was built like a football player with broad shoulders and a thick neck, and he gave off an impression that he was quite muscular and not one to be tangled with. He had a commanding but non-threatening presence—at least until he felt threatened. On the few occasions that had happened, he had not had any trouble, what with his suddenly stern and not-to-be-messed-with voice, at getting the other person—or persons—to back down. He always carried a small revolver with him, but he was proud of the fact that he had never even had to pull it out of his pocket, much less use it. 

He was, truth be told, a remarkably successful undercover cop. He had already broken up two significant cocaine rings in the Cranston area, and there were numerous smaller dealers that had been put out of commission by him. Because of his success, the Cranston Police Department did everything they could to prevent him from having to appear at any trials that arose out of his cases. Somewhat lenient plea deals were thus proposed to some defendants in order to avoid a trial where Eugene would be forced to testify; and other than shifting Eugene around to some of the neighboring suburbs and even into Raleigh from time to time where he helped the Raleigh Police Department, Eugene was still a very major player in the Cranston cocaine scene—much to the detriment of those who dealt the drug. 

Eugene had never married, and his only serious relationship since moving to North Carolina in 2011 had flamed out after two years when his girlfriend couldn’t take living with a guy who had such a spooky job. But over the past few months, Sharleen Harris, a black woman who lived in Raleigh and worked in a rape crisis center there, had come into his life, and the two of them were planning on a marriage in April or May. 

Kara Olsen was the live-in girlfriend of Derek Kramer. She was twenty=nine, three years younger than Derek, and had led a tempestuous life. A native of the Raleigh area, she had dropped out of high school during her junior year and run away to Atlanta, Georgia, with a twenty-year-old-guy she met in a bar. She quickly became pregnant but put the baby up for adoption when her boyfriend abandoned her a few weeks before she was to give birth. 

Kara lived on the streets in Atlanta for a little over seven years and made most of her money as a prostitute, but after being severely beaten by one of her tricks, she moved back to Raleigh where she met Derek at a bar in 2012. Although Kara had found a job working in a factory that made paper towels, she was barely able to make the rent. Not only was the pay only a dollar above the minimum wage, but she also liked to carouse around the bar scene in Raleigh and was not above doing a few lines of cocaine from time to time. 

Derek had come into her life as a kind of blessing—he made plenty of money, and his apartment was way better than hers. He was also, in her opinion, a good guy—steady and dependable, but even more importantly, he had never threatened her physically and was usually a very mellow person. About the only thing that ever seemed to upset him was his job—he often complained to her about his boss, Hank Remmings, and when Derek was really upset about him, he would storm around the apartment, curse, and slam doors, but he never carried over that anger to her. 

About a month after she moved in with Derek, Kara gave up her job in Raleigh and found work as a waitress that was within walking distance of the apartment she shared with Derek. Three weeks before Derek was fired, she had met Eugene when he came over to the apartment. Derek had been interested in purchasing a small amount of cocaine, and Eugene had sold him a gram for the bargain-rate price of eighty dollars. Kara hadn’t trusted him because of the questions he had been asking Derek, and she warned him to stay away from Eugene. He’s an undercover cop, Derek. I know how those guys operate—he’s just using you to catch somebody else who’s further up the food chain. 

But, said Derek, why would he be selling me the stuff? What would be the point? You’re being too paranoid. 

Maybe so, but please don’t bring him around here anymore. OK? 

Sure—don’t worry about it. 

Derek didn’t bring Eugene to the apartment again, but since Eugene had promised him a small take on the action, he began to introduce him to some guys at work. Meanwhile, Eugene was working on a plan to set some guy up as a dealer at HEI, and then, once the dealer had maxed out his client list, he was planning on busting the whole lot of them. 

Liane (pronounced Leeann) Haines was a prosecutor in the Wake County district attorney’s office—Wake County was a large jurisdiction that covered Raleigh and the surrounding towns. Liane was thirty-seven and had worked as a DA in Wake County for eight years. She was rather tall—five feet nine—and had a wiry, athletic build with blue eyes and straight dusky blond hair that fell to her shoulders. 

Liane, especially at trial, presented herself in a business-like, no-nonsense way and was usually very matter of fact and logical in her presentations to the jury. She was rarely folksy or emotional but built very strong cases that were founded on logic and a coherent presentation of the facts. It was true that she would occasionally lose her temper at a trial, but although she would sometimes push things to the limit, she had yet to be cited for contempt of court. Well respected in the DA’s office, she was often handed cases that were deemed difficult or had drawn extensive interest from the public. 

Born in Virginia, Liane had graduated from law school at the University of Pennsylvania before working in the DA’s office in Richmond. But eventually, when she was attending a legal seminar in Raleigh, she had met her future husband, David Haines, and without much urging, she chose to settle down with him in Cranston. She had given birth to two children—Samuel and Stacey—in 2009 and 2011, and except for the many stresses that came with her job, she lived a fairly normal and happy life. 

Eugene was a frequent visitor to her office, and Liane had worked with him on many cases. There were four full-time undercover cops, and Liane far preferred working with Eugene than anyone else. In her opinion, he was a real pro. He gathered evidence in a thorough way, and he knew all the legalities that were involved in his line of work. And neither did he come into her office with a nickel-and-dime case where she was supposed to prosecute some sorry loser who had been caught with a couple of grams of cocaine. It didn’t take Liane long to realize that Eugene always went for the big fish in the pond, and when it came to nailing the big drug fishes, Eugene was a master fisherman. 

CHAPTER THREE

At 7:36 A.M. on Friday, October 16, 2015, a 911 operator in Cranston received a call from a woman who said that there was the body of a man, apparently dead, on one of the paved trails that run through Evergreen Park. About five minutes later, a patrol car, along with an unmarked car driven by detective Evan McCaffrey, arrived at the scene and found a man lying on his back in the middle of a small paved trail. He had been shot twice in the chest, and Evan was quickly able to determine that the man was dead. 

Evergreen Park, as its name implies, has many thick stands of evergreens, along with mostly impenetrable woods that lie on either side of the many paths that cut through a forested area that has been untouched for many years. It was not a particularly large park—perhaps three quarters of a mile from east to west and a mile from north to south. The western edge of the park borders Route 45, which leads up to Raleigh, while the eastern edge borders Lake Memphis—a small lake that was no more than a mile long. Numerous trails, converted from old logging paths, ran mostly in an east-west direction through the park until one reached the high cliffs that overlooked the lake. 

Here, there was a parking lot where sightseers could leave their cars, but Evergreen Park was rarely frequented by the locals and almost never by visitors from out of state. It had only one access road, which was marked by a small sign, so the most frequent users of the park were locals who lived nearby and used the park either for exercise or to walk their dogs. 

The body of the dead man had been found on one of the two narrow paved paths that led from the parking lot down to the main trail that runs through the park. Once Evan had determined that the man was dead, he quickly took note of two very obvious clues that were lying near his body. First, scattered around within ten feet of the victim were a number of twenty-dollar bills—after a couple of minutes of searching, Evan found ten of these bills. The second clue was a gun that was lying about two feet away from the victim’s right hand—Evan was quickly able to identify the gun as a Ruger 9mm pistol. It seemed odd to Evan that the murder weapon had been left behind at the scene of the crime—that was something that murderers hardly ever did. 

It didn’t surprise Evan when he came up with no other evidence in the immediate vicinity—it hadn’t rained in days, so there wasn’t likely to be any footprints by the side of the paved path, and there was nothing near the body, except for the gun and the twenty-dollar bills, that would indicate that the perpetrator of the crime had left anything behind. But if the Ruger had been the murder weapon, the murderer may have picked up the shells because Evan, after searching for five minutes, was unable to locate them. 

Evan leaned over the victim, and with his gloved hands, he checked to see if the man, a white male who was probably about thirty, had been carrying any identification. After he had turned the victim’s body slightly so that he could reach into his back pocket, Evan was shocked to see yet another gun, a 22 caliber pistol, which had been lying under the body. So who did this gun belong to? The victim? 

Evan soon found the man’s wallet, which contained forty-five dollars, and he also discovered a driver’s license that had been issued to a Derek Kramer. Looking at the dead man, Evan felt reasonably certain that the victim was the man whose face was on the driver’s license. 

Violent crimes were quite unusual in this area of town, and Evergreen Park, because it was three miles from the city and wasn’t particularly easy to access, didn’t see the kind of drug activity that was common in the parks that were closer to Cranston. Puzzled, Evan searched through the pants pockets, as well as the jacket pockets, of the victim, but they were empty, even of car keys, so Evan assumed that Derek must have walked to the park, which meant that he probably lived nearby. 

Once the medical examiner arrived and told Evan that the victim had been dead for no more than ninety minutes, Evan walked up to the parking lot and talked to the person who had made the call to 911. Her name was Sally Whittier, and she had walked to the park early that morning like she almost always did. She had, she told Evan, arrived about seven-fifteen and had walked to the overlook to watch the sunrise. On the way to the overlook, she had been passed by a red truck, and when she arrived at the overlook, there had been a blue Toyota parked there. She was pretty sure who the driver of the Toyota was—most likely, it was Harry Ellison who was somebody she had met and chatted with a few times during her trips to the park. However, the man in the car was sitting with a woman, so Sally moved to the other end of the overlook and watched the sunrise before she proceeded down the path that led to the central path that ran through the park. About halfway down the path, which fell rather steeply from the overlook, she had seen the body of a man, after which she had immediately dialed 911. Other than that, Sally didn’t have any information to offer—she hadn’t heard any gunshots and neither had she seen any other person while she was in the park. 

Before doing anything, Evan took a couple of minutes to think about what he had discovered so far. If money wasn’t the motive, which seemed likely because of the two hundred dollars found on the ground, as well as the forty-five dollars in Derek’s wallet, then what was the motive? It had to be either connected to drugs or some kind of sexual jealousy. For a guy Derek’s age who dressed in jeans and seemed, at least at first glance, to be rather normal, it was almost always drugs or sex that caused them to be murdered. And since the killer had left a fair amount of money behind, sexual jealousy seemed a bit more likely than drugs. Of course, there was always the possibility that it had been a random killing, but random killings only became a factor in investigations when all the usual suspects—lovers, friends, and drug associations—had been eliminated. 

Ten minutes later, Evan arrived at the address listed on Derek’s driving license. The house was a duplex that was located on Weaver Street in the west end of Cranston. The middle-class neighborhood was a pleasant one with wide sidewalks, tree-lined streets, and large stately houses—now turned into apartments or duplexes—that had been built at least sixty years ago. 

Evan noticed that there were two names on the mailbox near the front door of Derek’s apartment, with the other name being Kara Olsen. Must be Derrek’s girlfriend. There was no buzzer, so Evan knocked on the door, and within a few seconds, it was opened by an attractive dark-haired woman who was dressed in jeans and a grey sweatshirt. Puzzled, she looked at him and said, What do you want? 

Ma’am, said Evan, I work for the Cranston Police Department. Does Derek Kramer live here? 

She looked at him suspiciously. Do you mind showing me some identification? 

Evan pulled out his police ID and showed it to her. Leaning forward, she peered at it carefully before she said, Derek isn’t here right now. 

Is your name Kara Olsen? 

Yes, but do you mind telling me what this is all about? 

Could I talk to you inside? 

She gave him a long and hostile look. Alright, she said at last. But like I said, Derek isn’t here right now. 

No, thought Evan, Derek isn’t anywhere right now. He followed Kara down a short corridor until they turned and entered a messy room that had a TV, two tables, an old beaten-up black couch, and a couple of straight-back chairs. Scattered throughout the room were at least a dozen empty beer bottles and two half-filled bottles of whiskey. 

Pardon the mess, said Kara, but last night was kind of a rough one—not that we drank all this last night, but Derek...what is it that you want to talk to me about? 

First of all, are you Derek’s girlfriend? 

Yes, we’ve been living together for three years. 

Kara, there’s no easy way to tell you this, but Derek was murdered this morning. 

Kara, who had been standing, collapsed onto the couch and screamed, Oh my God! It can’t be. No! 

Evan looked at her with compassion. This was hardly the first time that he’d made a death notification, and other than being shot at, which had happened to him once, it was the worst part of his job. 

Kara covered her face with her hands and began to sob in a loud and convulsive way. Finally, after a couple of minutes, she took her hands away from her face and said, Are you sure? 

There was, by now, no doubt in Evan’s mind that Kara had nothing to do with Derek’s murder. Just about one hundred percent, said Evan. After we’re done here, I’d like you to come down to the morgue and identify him. Such an awful thing to have to ask her—how many people really want to look at the murdered body of their mate? 

I can’t believe this has happened, said Kara. Derek didn’t have any enemies that I know of. 

Do you mind answering a few questions? 

Alright, if you think it will help, but I really don’t know anything. 

Perhaps you could begin by starting with yesterday afternoon—I assume that Derek slept here last night? 

Yes, he always sleeps here...I don’t know exactly what time he came home last night because I was waitressing and didn’t get here until nine-thirty. He was kind of drunk and very upset when I got home because yesterday afternoon, just before he left work, he was fired from his job. 

That was kind of a rough double whammy, thought Evan—get fired from your job on Thursday and get fired from your life on Friday. Quite the coincidence—probably too much of a coincidence. Where did he work? 

At Herring Enterprises. 

What did he say to you about getting fired? 

Not all that much, but what he did say was pretty much what you might expect. They’ve been out to get Derek for the past year or so with all these phony complaints about his attitude and things like that. Anyways, he’d gone over to Noah’s Pub with some of the guys he works with after he got fired, so he was pretty much lit up by the time he got home. 

Can you tell me the names of the people he was drinking with? 

He mentioned Dallas—I can’t remember his last name—and probably Joel Raskins was there because he hangs out with Joel a lot. 

He didn’t mention anyone threatening him or anything like that? 

No, said Kara, nothing like that at all. 

What time did you all go to bed? 

It was around midnight, and although I wouldn’t say that Derek had sobered up, he was starting to get there a little bit because once I got home, I was able to talk him out of getting really plowed. 

What happened this morning? said Evan. 

I was the first one up—it was around six-thirty. I was just coming out of the bathroom when I heard Derek talking on his cell phone. I wasn’t in the room, so I couldn’t hear what he was saying. A few minutes later, I was downstairs fixing our breakfast when he came rushing into the room and said that he had to meet someone. I said, ‘Like now?’ Because except for work, Derek never went out early in the morning. And he said, ‘I won’t be long—maybe an hour or so.’ 

Any idea who he was talking to on the phone? 

No idea, but...that must be the person who murdered him. Right? 

Could be, said Evan. Do you know if his cell phone is here at the house right now? 

No—I saw him put it in the pocket of his jacket just before he left, said Kara. 

Unless he had missed something, Evan hadn’t found a cell phone when he was searching Derek’s body. You’re sure? said Evan. 

Positive. 

OK, if it does turn up, please let us know. 

Sure—anything I can do to help. It won’t bring Derek back, but I’d love to see the guy who did this pay for it. 

Kara, do you know if Derek owned a gun? 

I doubt it—if he did, it was hidden away somewhere. There was this one time a couple of years ago when he was thinking of buying a gun, but I talked him out of it because I’m terrified of those things. 

What kind of a car did Derek drive? 

He didn’t have a car—what he had was a red 2014 Ford Ranger. 

But I assume he walked when he left here? said Evan. 

No, he took the truck—I heard it pull out of the driveway. 

You did? 

Kara walked over to the window, pulled back the curtain, and said, Ya, it’s gone—I know it was parked outside last night because I saw it when I got home from work. 

Actually, as he thought about it, that made sense to Evan. The park was a little over a mile from the house, and if Kara’s recollection of when she woke up was accurate, Derek couldn’t have left the house much before ten of seven. Given the fact that he had probably been murdered around seven, or just slightly after seven, it seemed very unlikely he had walked to the park. And also, there was the fact that Sally Whittier had told him that a red truck, undoubtedly being driven by the murderer, had passed her just after she entered the park. 

Kara, I know you’ve said that Derek didn’t have any enemies, but can you tell me—do you think he was involved in drugs? Before Kara could answer, Evan said, Please don’t be afraid to tell me of any suspicions that you have. I’m not in the least interested in any drug crimes that Derek may have committed—obviously! All I’m interested in is finding out who murdered him. 

Kara looked him in the eye for some moments before she said, I don’t really know. I think he may have done some cocaine, but he certainly wasn’t a heavy user or anything like that. Recreational, you might say. 

But like you said, doesn’t it seem odd for him to have left the house so early this morning? 

It was odd, but that doesn’t mean it was connected to drugs. 

Can you think of any other reason why he would have left so early? 

Kara thought about this for some seconds. No, but that still doesn’t mean that it had anything to do with drugs. 

But do you think it’s possible? 

I suppose it’s possible, but I wouldn’t call it likely. From what I know, any cocaine that Derek picked up—and it really wasn’t much—would just be from chance encounters at a bar. 

CHAPTER FOUR

By Monday, October 19th, the forensic investigation into the murder of Derek Kramer had been concluded, but it didn’t yield a great amount of evidence. A mostly intact bullet had been recovered from Derek’s chest, and the medical examiner was able to determine that it had been fired from a .357 Magnum revolver. Since revolvers don’t eject shells, this explained why no shells had been found at the scene, and it also meant that there were three guns involved in the murder. 

Because of the powder burns located to Derek’s chest area, the medical examiner felt that he had been shot at very close range—maybe three to four feet. As far as the two guns that were found at the scene, the only fingerprints that were lifted off them belonged to Derek. Both of the guns appeared to be stolen—the serial number on the Ruger had been filed off it, which was common with stolen guns, while the 22’s serial number had been reported stolen in July. 

Meanwhile, outside of Derek’s wallet, nothing had been found on the victim—no keys to a vehicle and no cell phone, which meant, in all probability, the killer had taken them. Derek’s truck had been located on the day following the murder on a residential street about a mile from downtown Cranston and two miles from the site of the murder. It had, of course, been dusted for prints, but the only prints on the door handle, steering wheel, and gearshift belonged to either Derek or Kara. There had, however, been a strand of hair found on the front driver’s seat of the truck that did not match the hair color of either Derek or Kara.  Furthermore, the medical examiner had been able to determine that the hair belonged to a black person, and when Evan talked to Kara about this, she couldn’t think of any black person who would have been in Derek’s truck—especially the front driver’s seat. The shaft of the hair did not include the root, which meant that the DNA analysis would be somewhat limited in its scope (the best that could be hoped for was not an individual match but a match to a maternal blood line). 

Finally, repeated attempts to call Derek on his cell phone met with a message that sent the caller to voice mail. Neither was the phone in use since attempts to track it came up with nothing, and Evan suspected that the killer had destroyed the phone—most likely because there was something on it that the killer feared could be traced back to him. Or her—but due to the nature of this murder, Evan would have been very surprised if the shooter was a woman. 

Evan began by interviewing Dallas West and Joel Raskins. Both of them were fairly typical factory workers who weren’t at all enthusiastic about being interviewed by a cop. Interviewed separately, they both gave similar accounts of what had occurred at Noah’s Pub on the last night of Derek’s life. Derek had drunk a lot, maybe six shots of liquor, along with a couple of beers, and both men said that Derek had been extremely upset about being fired. Joel volunteered the information that Derek had threatened to go into HEI and commit a workplace shooting. 

Did you take his threat seriously? said Evan. 

No, not really, said Joel. Derek said a lot of things that he didn’t mean—that’s what got him into so much trouble at work. 

Do you know if he owned a gun? 

I never heard him say that he did. 

Besides Dallas, was there anyone else with you? said Evan. 

Sheila—she’s the bartender—came over for a few minutes, but I don’t remember anybody else. 

Do you have any idea who might have murdered Derek? Did he have any enemies that you know of? 

Joel thought about this for some seconds before he said anything. No...but...I don’t know how to say this, but like I said, Derek liked to mouth off a lot, and that can get you into trouble if you say the wrong thing to the wrong person. So it’s possible that...but I don’t have any idea of who it could have been. He was a really good friend to me, and just about everyone at work liked him because he was one of those guys who never had a good thing to say about any of the bosses. That goes a long way at a place like HEI. 

Following his talk with Joel, Derek went to Noah’s and found Sheila. He had talked to her a few times over the years—she was reliable, didn’t play any games with him, and was often a good source of information. 

I guess you’ve heard what happened to Derek Kramer, he said to her. 

Serves him right, she said. He was in here the night before he got shot to death and was basically threatening to kill all the bosses at Herring. 

You heard him say that? said Evan. 

Loud and clear. But when he put his index finger to my head and said ‘POW,’ I just about snapped. I’m not taking that from nobody. Sheila gave him a nervous look and said, That doesn’t mean I killed him. 

The thought never crossed my mind, said Evan amiably. Did you know Derek much? 

We never saw each other socially, but I knew him well enough. He was one of those average white guys who work in a factory—cynical, bitter, and loud-mouthed. 

Do you think there’s any chance he was serious about going into Herring and shooting the place up? 

Derek? No...I don’t think so—mostly, he was all mouth. I suppose if he had been drunk enough, but I’m talking a fifth of liquor in a couple of hours. 

Did you notice anyone else at their table besides Dallas West and Joel Raskins? 

Some black guy was there. He calls himself Desmond, but I’m pretty sure he’s a narc. 

What’s he look like? said Evan. 

He’s an impressive specimen. Looks like a football linebacker—you know, about six feet and all bulked up. He’d probably destroy anybody he got into a fight with. 

How long was Desmond at Noah’s? 

Quite a while, said Sheila. It might have been as long as two hours. At one point, he disappeared outside with Dallas, and when he came back in a few minutes later, he was alone. It must have been about five minutes after that when Joel left, and then Desmond and Derek talked for maybe ten minutes before they both split. 

Did they leave here together? said Evan. 

No, Desmond left first, but Derek stayed for another shot before he left. 

Evan knew right away who Sheila was referring to when she was talking about Desmond—he’d worked with Eugene Bishop on a couple of cases and liked him. Some of the undercover cops in Cranston were almost as shady as the drug dealers they were trying to send to prison, so it was often difficult to tell which side of the fence they were really on. But from everything that Evan had heard and observed, Eugene was a real straight arrow who had the trust of everyone in the department. But besides that, he was also very capable—he knew the ins and outs of the law and really understood how to put a case together. It was curious that neither Dallas West nor Joel Raskins had mentioned that Desmond was at the table drinking with them—undoubtedly, they were trying to cover up something. 

Shortly after talking with Sheila, he met up with Eugene at the police station, and over a cup of coffee in the break room, they talked about Derek. 

I heard you’re working the Kramer case, said Eugene. Making any progress? 

Not a great deal, at least so far. A waitress at Noah’s Pub told me you were with him on the night before he was murdered. 

Ya, Derek brought me over there because he wanted me to meet one of his running buddies. 

So you’ve known him for a while? said Evan. 

Not long—maybe a month. 

What was your interest in him? 

I met him in a bar in downtown Cranston—he just came up to me and asked if I knew where he could score some coke. I guess someone told him I was a good guy to ask. Anyways, I told him that I didn’t usually sell grams, but if he could connect me with someone who was interested in buying ounces, I’d give him a good price for a gram. He said he might know somebody, so I gave him a phone number where he could reach me. 

And that’s why you were at Noah’s on Thursday night? said Evan. 

Ya, Kramer called me Wednesday and said that he had found someone and that we could hook up at Noah’s. Actually, I met Derek just as he was walking into the bar. 

Who was the guy who wanted to purchase the coke? 

His name is Dallas West—he works at HEI. Later, while Kramer was getting lit up on shots of whiskey, Dallas and I went outside and discussed a purchase. He wanted four ounces, and I told him that I could sell it to him sometime this week. We haggled over the price a bit, but after I came down a couple of hundred bucks—no sweat off my back, right?—we agreed to meet at Noah’s tomorrow night. 

What about when you were drinking with them? Did Derek say anything that could help me figure out who murdered him? 

No, it was much more the other way around—he was threatening to go into HEI and blow a whole bunch of people away. 

I heard about that—did you take his threats seriously? 

He’d just been fired, so I assumed that he was blowing off some steam. It wasn’t really like the kind of thing where you could arrest the guy. Do you have any theories about why he was murdered? 

It doesn’t make much sense to me—it doesn’t look like it was a robbery, and from what you’ve told me, I doubt that it had anything to do with drugs. 

Why’s that? said Eugene. 

Because he’d found his supplier, said Evan, with a laugh. 

True enough, said Eugene. Something sexual? 

No, he was in a committed relationship. 

Then the only thing left, said Eugene, is a random killing, or maybe it was a case of mistaken identity. 

No, neither one of those possibilities seems likely to me.  Kramer was killed at very close range so that rules out mistaken identity. As for a random killer, nothing we found at the scene really fits that scenario. 

Looks like you’re going to have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure this one out. 

Do me a favor, Eugene—see if you can find out anything from some of your contacts. Someone in this town knows who did this. 

Will do. 

Before leaving for home that evening, Evan spent some time trying to reconstruct what might have happened in Evergreen Park. It was very strange to have three guns involved in a murder. Neither of the two guns found at the scene had been fired—one of them, the 22 caliber gun was loaded, but the other one, the Ruger 9mm pistol, didn’t have any bullets in it, so it was difficult for Evan to come up with any scenario that could account for the guns. A firearm purchase that had devolved into a murder? This made some sense except for one very obvious fact: Regardless of whether the victim had been the seller or the buyer of the firearms, the shooter would not have left the two guns behind. If you’re about to rip a guy off by murdering him, you don’t leave the booty behind. About the only way Evan could account for this possibility was if the killer had been surprised by something and had fled the scene before he was able to retrieve the guns. But Evan didn’t have much faith in this idea—it seemed more like a desperate attempt to force the facts into a plausible version of reality. 

It was also interesting that the killer had left the scene in Derek’s truck. This meant he had walked to the park but had thought it safer to leave in the victim’s vehicle—an action that entailed some risk. But after thinking it over, Evan decided this was rather clever and showed that the murderer had put some thought into his actions. Walking into the little-used park in early dawn wasn’t likely to attract any attention, but walking out after having murdered someone might. Even more to the point, it was fairly risky to drive one’s own car to the park where it might be seen in the parking lot. Much safer would be to leave in the victim’s vehicle. 

So in Evan’s mind, the sum total of all this information was that the two guns found at the scene were excellent potential clues, but unfortunately, he didn’t have anything to match those clues up to—either practically or theoretically.  The guns couldn’t be traced to their previous owners, so it seemed as if the investigation was close to being at a dead end. Somehow, thought Evan, Derek’s murder must be connected to his having been fired from his job less than a day before he was shot to death. But what was the connection? He couldn’t figure it out. 

CHAPTER FIVE

On Tuesday the 20th, Evan followed his last remaining lead and drove to the house of Harry Ellison who lived about three miles away from Evergreen Park. Around ten in the morning, Evan was able to talk to Harry about what he might have seen on the day of Derek’s murder. Harry, an older man in his early seventies, lived with his wife who was out shopping. 

Sir, said Evan after they had taken seats at a large oak table in the kitchen, I understand that you may have been at Evergreen Park last Friday morning. 

How in the world would you know that? said Harry, in an amiable way. 

Sally Whittier was pretty sure that she saw you there. 

Sally! Sure, I know who you’re talking about—at least I think I do because I don’t know her last name. The Sally I know is tall with red hair—is that the person you’re talking about? 

She’s the one, said Evan. 

So if she said I was there Friday morning, she’s probably right because she undoubtedly has a lot better memory for days than I do. Now that I’m retired, the days all seem to merge into each other. What is it that you want to know? 

Are you aware that someone was murdered in Evergreen Park early that morning? 

No, I wasn’t aware of that at all. Nowadays, Ethel and I hardly ever watch the news because it’s too upsetting. What time did it happen? 

Somewhere around seven in the morning. 

Really? That means I must have been there when it happened because my wife and I often go there to watch the sunrise. Can you tell me whereabouts in the park it occurred? 

It was near the parking lot, said Evan, on one of the little trails that lead down to the main path. 

Which trail? If you were walking down from the parking lot, would it have been on the left or the right? 

The right, said Evan. 

I was over more towards the left-hand path, so maybe that’s why I didn’t hear anything. 

Were the windows in your car open? said Evan. 

No, said Harry, it was too cold for that. But I did see something—I don’t know whether it’s connected to what happened, but now that I know someone was murdered, you might be interested in what I saw. 

What was it? said Evan. 

When we drove into the lot, a red truck was parked there. I drove beyond the truck and parked about twenty-five feet from it. Ethel had fallen asleep, and I was just kind of daydreaming when I saw a man walk over to the truck, open the door, and get in. 

Can you give me any idea of what time it was? 

Probably about ten past seven. I’m pretty sure of the time because the sun wasn’t up yet, and I know it comes up around seven-twenty. 

Can you tell me what this man looked like? 

I got a good look at him, actually, because just before he opened the door to the truck, he turned and looked towards our car for a couple of seconds. He was a black man, probably about thirty, and he was wearing a dark blue windbreaker. I remember that there was something frightening about him, or maybe that’s just my imagination, but I did feel uneasy about him. He’s not the kind of guy that you’d usually see at Evergreen Park. It didn’t make any sense to me that he’d be out walking in the park at that time of day. 

Did your wife see him? said Evan. 

No, she had fallen asleep, bless her soul. 

"So let me see if I