The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.

The Boaz Stenographer, written in 2018, is my fourth novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.

Book Blurb

Walt Shepherd, a 35 year veteran of the White House’s stenographic team, is fired by President Andrew Kane for refusing to lie.

Walt returns to his hometown of Boaz, Alabama and renews his relationship with Regina Gillan, his high school sweetheart, who he had ditched right before graduation to marry the daughter of a prominent local businessman.  Regina has recently moved back to Boaz after forty years in Chicago working at the Tribune.  She is now editor of the Sand Mountain Reporter, a local newspaper.

Walt and Regina’s relationship transforms into a once in life love at the same time they are being immersed in a growing local and national divide between Democrats and traditional Republicans, and extremist Republicans (known as Kanites) who are becoming more dogmatic about the revolution that began during President Kanes campaign.

Walt accepts two part-time jobs.  One as a stenography instructor at Snead State Community College in Boaz, and one as an itinerant stenographer with Rains & Associates out of Birmingham.

Walt later learns the owner of Rains & Associates  is also one of five men who created the Constitution Foundation and is involved in a sinister plot to destroy President Kane, but is using an unorthodox method to achieve its objective.  The Foundation is doing everything it can to prevent President Kane from being reelected in 2020, and is scheming to initiate a civil war that will hopefully restore allegiance to the U.S. Constitution.

While Walt is writing a book, The Coming Civil War, he is, unwittingly, gathering key information for the Constitution Foundation.

Will Walt discover a connection between the Foundation  and the deaths of three U.S. Congressmen in time to save his relationship with Regina, prevent President Kane from being reelected as the defacto head of a Christian theocracy, and the eruption of a civil war that could destroy the Nation ?

Chapter 12

Ginger Crumbley, the Rains & Associates court-reporter Regina had met at the Draper Hearing, had more on her plate than hustling from one stenographic job to another.  Since Andrew J. Kane announced his candidacy for President of the United States in May 2016, Ginger’s main role had been managing a 50-person fleet of professional stenographers. It was Ginger who made the assignments, matching the person with the best speed, accuracy, and personality, to the needs of the job.  The jobs varied greatly.  A two-lawyer two-car accident with no deaths deposition in a small firm in Moulton.  A multi-law firm medical malpractice videotaped deposition including an expert pathologist of Indian descent who struggled with the English language, particularly English diction. The assignments also included jobs inside the court system.  Rains & Associates held the contract with the Administrative Office of Courts.  Permanent stenographers, employees of the State of Alabama, those whose sole job was working for a judge, like any other employee, sometimes got sick, injured, they died or had to take maternity leave or to take care of an aging parent.  On notices sometimes less than a few hours, Ginger, on behalf of Rains & Associates, would deliver a neat and highly competent professional stenographer for a day, a week, a month, or for whatever the need demanded.

Before moving to Alabama in May 2016, Ginger lived and worked in Chicago. The 44-year-old single mother of a ten-year-old daughter worked for Chief Judge Ruben Castillo, District Court Judge for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.  That job ended in 2008 when she was drawn away by the American Center for Constitutional Allegiance, a public-interest law firm based in Chicago. 

Some talking heads considered the Center a sister firm to the ACLU. 

Ginger’s new job, with pay and benefits, was nearly three times that of her Federal employment package.  She accepted the position mainly to better provide for her daughter, but also because of her budding attraction to Zel Peterson, the Center’s lead attorney.  It had started the first time she saw him in action.  On behalf of the Center, Zel had sued Benton Consolidated High School and the BCHS Board of Education, in

Franklin County, Illinois over a long-taught Bible class.  Zel, arguing such class was a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment, the part often referred to as creating a ‘wall of separation between church and state.’

Six weeks after accepting her new position with Zel’s public interest law firm, Ginger was surprised, pleasantly surprised, to be offered a lateral move from the Center, along with Zel, to The Constitution Foundation, a moderately liberal think tank founded by

Thaddeus Colburn and three of his fellow University of Chicago Law School professors in the year 2000 after the highly controversial Bush vs. Gore presidential election.  Zel had spent over fifteen years as lead litigator of the Center fighting Constitutional battles all over the U.S. 

The announcement by Andrew J. Kane, had seeded a dreadful thought in the mind of Mr. Colburn and his Foundation: “What if Kane became

President?”

This question then seeded the brainstorming of a plan to respond to the near-absolute certainty that such a Presidency would train-wreck the U.S. Constitution and thereby America as we knew it before such election.  It was this framework that spurred Thad to transfer Zel, and his zealous and talented stenographer, to his Foundation’s newest project: Cane Kane.

“Regina, Regina Gillan?”  Ginger said with kind affection.

“Yes, whose calling?” Regina said sitting up on the edge of her bed still feeling the effects of Brandy and Sean’s romp beneath the sheets from the Harlequin romance she was reading when she fell asleep.

“It’s Ginger Crumbley, we met at the Draper Hearing in Judge

Broadside’s courtroom last week.  I was the court reporter.”

“Oh.  Yes, I remember.” Regina said, standing and reaching for her pink robe laying across her reading chair.

“Do you have just a couple of minutes. I promise that’s all it will take.”

“I guess, but I have to shower and dress and be at the Reporter in 30 minutes.  I’m running a little late.”  Regina said.

“After the hearing, you mentioned a man you thought might be interested in some part-time court-reporting.  I hate to bother you with this, but Rains & Associates is about to kill me.  I pretty much have abandoned my daughter and wouldn’t be surprised if I were arrested for child neglect.  Sorry, I’m rambling.  Would you mind giving me his name and number?”  Ginger said with her most-polished sincerity.

“I did mention it to him, but I would prefer to ask him to call you.  I have a thing about giving out private information without permission.” Regina said, naked but with one arm through the sleeve of her bedside robe.

“I understand.  I shouldn’t have even asked.  Now, I feel horrible.  I truly feel the very same way you do.  Privacy is extremely important.”  Ginger said continuing to slather on the sincerity, adding a smarmy pinch.

“Give me your number and I’ll call Walt, uh, sorry.  Well, so much for his privacy.  I’ll ask him to call you.  I’ll even try to give him a little nudge.  He really needs more to occupy his time than teaching. 

There I go again.  What’s your number?”  

Ginger gave Regina her phone number, and nearly got effusive with the ‘sorry to wake you,’ and ‘thanks for your time’ phrases.

Twenty-five minutes later, pulling into the employee’s parking lot at the Reporter, Regina, after three attempts, left Walt a message on his cell phone to call Ginger Crumbley with Rains & Associates Court Reporting at 205-495-4954, ending her call with, “Walt, baby, I promise you this call will change your life.”   

The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.

The Boaz Stenographer, written in 2018, is my fourth novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.

Book Blurb

Walt Shepherd, a 35 year veteran of the White House’s stenographic team, is fired by President Andrew Kane for refusing to lie.

Walt returns to his hometown of Boaz, Alabama and renews his relationship with Regina Gillan, his high school sweetheart, who he had ditched right before graduation to marry the daughter of a prominent local businessman.  Regina has recently moved back to Boaz after forty years in Chicago working at the Tribune.  She is now editor of the Sand Mountain Reporter, a local newspaper.

Walt and Regina’s relationship transforms into a once in life love at the same time they are being immersed in a growing local and national divide between Democrats and traditional Republicans, and extremist Republicans (known as Kanites) who are becoming more dogmatic about the revolution that began during President Kanes campaign.

Walt accepts two part-time jobs.  One as a stenography instructor at Snead State Community College in Boaz, and one as an itinerant stenographer with Rains & Associates out of Birmingham.

Walt later learns the owner of Rains & Associates  is also one of five men who created the Constitution Foundation and is involved in a sinister plot to destroy President Kane, but is using an unorthodox method to achieve its objective.  The Foundation is doing everything it can to prevent President Kane from being reelected in 2020, and is scheming to initiate a civil war that will hopefully restore allegiance to the U.S. Constitution.

While Walt is writing a book, The Coming Civil War, he is, unwittingly, gathering key information for the Constitution Foundation.

Will Walt discover a connection between the Foundation  and the deaths of three U.S. Congressmen in time to save his relationship with Regina, prevent President Kane from being reelected as the defacto head of a Christian theocracy, and the eruption of a civil war that could destroy the Nation ?

Chapter 11

Regina arrived at The Reporter early Tuesday morning, only the night janitor was there, and he was coming out of the rear entrance as she removed her briefcase from the backseat of her Nissan Maxima.

“Morning Miss Gillan.”

“And good morning to you Ned.” She said wanting once again to remind him he could call her Regina and abandon all the formality.  Instead she reminded herself this was the South, and nothing would change Ned’s instinct for respect and honor.

“I hope you have a nice day.” He said walking towards a big dumpster at the back of the employee parking lot, toting two huge garbage bags. “You gonna have a busy one given how the phones started

ringing at midnight.  Your article gonna be hot.”

“What do you mean Ned?”  Regina said turning with her briefcase walking towards Ned.

“All night, all over the building, ever since today’s paper hit the streets at midnight, phone buttons look like a Christmas tree.  My break time at 3:00 a.m., I always read the new edition.  I like your approach of telling things straight, but this ain’t New York City.”

“Chicago, Ned, not New York.”

“Not much difference to folks around here. No disrespect intended Miss Gillan.”

“None taken Ned.  Now, you go on home and try to get some sleep.  I’ll probably be here late again, so see you around 9:00 tonight.”

Just as Regina poured a cup of fresh coffee, thanks to Ned, she heard her phone ringing from her office down the hall.  It kept ringing as she half jogged, being careful not to spill her coffee.  On the sixth ring, she answered.

“Thanks baby sister.”  Belinda, her twin, only used this phrase and tone if she was extremely happy or upset.  For some reason, Regina knew it was the latter.

“To what do I owe this early morning surprise big sister?”

“Frankie called from Grumpy’s parking lot.  Your article has our little diner and my husband out of every sort imaginable.”

“Why is that?”  Regina asked, not intending to play dumb but to hear Belinda’s exact words and response.  It wasn’t like Regina didn’t expect an uproar.  She knew her brand of journalism would mix in Boaz, Alabama about as well as a gay bar or a black city councilman.

“People round here like Kane.  Frankie worships the man.  Your article made him, and the other members of Kane Tribe, look like idiots last Friday night at Brewer’s Town Hall.  The way I read it, seems like you are insinuating Frankie is a likely suspect in Brewer’s murder.”  Belinda said, cursing Regina without using the actual words.

“Belinda, you know I write it the way I see it.  I don’t have to tell you that my philosophy has always, well, since journalism school anyway, been to follow the facts, pursue truth no matter where it takes me.”

“But, I’m family, Frankie is family.”  Belinda’s voice calming some, Regina feeling her beginning to play another version of her victim’s card.  Big sister, as Regina often called her, was born two minutes before Regina, thus, she was the older sister.  However, Belinda always believed she got the raw end of the duo.  She always had to play second fiddle to Regina.  It was ‘baby sister’ who won the Spelling Bee eight straight years in primary school. It was ‘baby sister’ who was elected a varsity cheerleader in tenth grade.  It was ‘baby sister’ who had the best figure and dated the best-looking guys.  It was ‘baby sister’ who stole Walt Shepherd away from Belinda.

“Dear, are you forgetting our conversation we had the first week I moved back?  I thought we hashed through this every possible way.  We ended that little chat with us agreeing I had a job to do and that had nothing to do with our love and friendship.  I told you, and I meant it with all my heart, I want us to get back to how we were at the beginning of ninth grade, before, well, high school.”  Regina said now feeling the pressure to end the call, Claire had arrived and was standing in her office doorway waving her right hand back and forth across her throat, indicating Regina needed to kill her call.

“I do remember, but I didn’t realize that your job could affect my marriage, like accuse Frankie of murder.”

“Belinda, please don’t accuse me.  I in no way did that.  I simply wrote a chronology of the events that occurred Friday night after Kip and his wife arrived in Boaz at 4:30, all the way until he was found murdered early Saturday morning.  It’s not my fault that Frankie and crew made such a scene at the Bevill Center.  Surely, you’re not accusing me of that.”

“I got to go, Frankie just walked in.  Bye.”  Belinda said with a whisper, almost as though she was afraid.

As Regina listened to the dial tone, speculating the unfolding scene at her sister’s house, Claire shouted, “Regina, the call has ended.”  Regina just then realized she had Belinda on speaker phone all along.

What is it Claire?  What is so urgent?”

“Delton texted me and said Frankie Olinger was a suspect in Kip

Brewer’s murder and was about to be brought in for questioning.”

“How did he know this?”

“Well duh, you know he is our crime reporter and spends half of his time in Guntersville, hanging around the Courthouse and Sheriff’s

Department.”

“Sorry, I’m still learning everybody’s name and role around here.” Regina said, feeling nausea making an emergency landing in her gut.  

The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.

The Boaz Stenographer, written in 2018, is my fourth novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.

Book Blurb

Walt Shepherd, a 35 year veteran of the White House’s stenographic team, is fired by President Andrew Kane for refusing to lie.

Walt returns to his hometown of Boaz, Alabama and renews his relationship with Regina Gillan, his high school sweetheart, who he had ditched right before graduation to marry the daughter of a prominent local businessman.  Regina has recently moved back to Boaz after forty years in Chicago working at the Tribune.  She is now editor of the Sand Mountain Reporter, a local newspaper.

Walt and Regina’s relationship transforms into a once in life love at the same time they are being immersed in a growing local and national divide between Democrats and traditional Republicans, and extremist Republicans (known as Kanites) who are becoming more dogmatic about the revolution that began during President Kanes campaign.

Walt accepts two part-time jobs.  One as a stenography instructor at Snead State Community College in Boaz, and one as an itinerant stenographer with Rains & Associates out of Birmingham.

Walt later learns the owner of Rains & Associates  is also one of five men who created the Constitution Foundation and is involved in a sinister plot to destroy President Kane, but is using an unorthodox method to achieve its objective.  The Foundation is doing everything it can to prevent President Kane from being reelected in 2020, and is scheming to initiate a civil war that will hopefully restore allegiance to the U.S. Constitution.

While Walt is writing a book, The Coming Civil War, he is, unwittingly, gathering key information for the Constitution Foundation.

Will Walt discover a connection between the Foundation  and the deaths of three U.S. Congressmen in time to save his relationship with Regina, prevent President Kane from being reelected as the defacto head of a Christian theocracy, and the eruption of a civil war that could destroy the Nation ?

Chapter 10

Sunday morning, patrons of Grumpy’s Diner were weaving a Kip Brewer story that was sure to land in Hollywood.  Their imaginations were ignited by an article in The Birmingham News, “Shots Heard Round the World; Second Revolution Begins?”  The two reporters introduced their story by reviewing how in the first American Revolution, the “Shot Heard Round the World,” had been fired just after dawn in Lexington, Massachusetts, the morning of the 19th of July 1775, and quickly described the Battles of Lexington and Concord and the Siege of Boston ten days later.

In the second paragraph, drawing from a New York Time’s article, the reporters, described, in detail, how U.S. Senator Ralph Evanston from Malden, Massachusetts, was found dead yesterday morning in his luxury suite at The Kendall, the oldest hotel in Boston.  His wife, Julie, had previously attended three other Town Hall meetings but this time she had stayed at home, nursing the flu.  However, the New York Time’s article did not answer the glaring question: How did the killer get inside a highly guarded and secure U.S. Senator’s room at The Kendall?

Evanston, had come out of nowhere on the national political scene.  In November 2016, he had defeated multiple-term Democratic Senator Ed Markey.  For the prior eight years Evanston served in the General Court, Massachusetts’ law-making body.  There, he had been a virtual parrot of Markey. He even heralded from Malden, Markey’s hometown, although Evanston moved to Springfield when he was thirteen.

To Kane’s base, Evanston was a true turncoat. He had ridden into office on Andrew Kane’s coattails.  It had been shocking to most Massachusetts citizens when in July 2015, Evanston had switched parties, from Democratic to Republican.  It was a gutsy move, and surprisingly, won him a U.S. Senate seat.  Kane didn’t do so well in Massachusetts, losing to Hillary Clinton by a 2 to 1 margin.

However, after arriving in D.C., it didn’t take long for Evanston to reveal his true colors. He voted against Kane’s legislation at virtually every turn.  Even worse, he appeared often on national news programs castigating the President’s ‘deplorable tweets and elementary intelligence.’  This riled nearly a third of Massachusetts’ citizens, the 33% who had voted for Kane.

The New York Times article, in its fourth paragraph, recited the Alabama shooting of U.S. Representative Kip Brewer.  The NYT was arguing for a connection between the two deaths.  Both men were discovered within a few hours of each other.  Both men had been shot, although one from a long distance and the other from close range.  Both men were, “on the wrong side of Kane.”  And, what had 75 diners stirred almost into a frenzy, was The Times’ accusation that the shooters “most likely were embedded into the growing ranks of Kane Tribe, which, up until now, was thought to be a rag-tag group mostly comprised of rednecks.  The New York Times ended its article describing how Frankie Olinger in Alabama, and Albert Lawrence in Massachusetts, had both led a near-riot at the Friday night Town Halls Kip Brewer and Ralph Evanston had held in their respective states.

The Birmingham News (TBN) elaborated mostly on Frankie Olinger and the North Alabama Chapter of Kane Tribe.  Someway, TBN had unearthed news from Kane’s inaugural weekend in January 2017 that revealed a secret-meeting of sorts between Andrew Kane, Jr. and nearly a hundred men and women who had been hand-selected by the Kane team.  Most of these were uneducated white men.  Each of them had attended a Kane event in their home-state during the election campaign.  Each of these one hundred were openly anti-Hillary, virtually, antigovernment.  And, most important to President Kane, was that each of these had openly and consistently supported him for at least six months before he won the election.  TBN had no knowledge of what took place during that inaugural weekend meeting, but it identified both Frankie Olinger and Albert Lawrence as attendees.

Vann and I arrived at Grumpy’s Diner as the crowd was dissipating.  When I saw Frankie and four of his parrots getting up from the same table I had seen them the first time Vann and I were here, I wished we had gone to McDonald’s.  We took a seat near the far-left corner, as far away from the Olinger table as possible.  This didn’t keep the five stooges from coming over, probably to invite us to church.  I must say, Frankie looked better than the last time I had seen him with his greasy coveralls.  Now, he was dressed in a pair of clean khakis, and a blue button-down shirt with a green and yellow-striped tie.  All four of them could have been members of an older, boys band.

“You boys going to church?”  Frankie said placing his left hand on Vann’s back.

“Sorry Mr. Olinger, we gave up on myths a long time ago, although, Walt here still hangs on pretty tight to Santa Claus.”  Vann said removing Frankie’s hand.

“Typical tongue from a liberal.  Anyway, know Pastor Warren and all of us at First Baptist Church of Christ, are always extending an invite to all, even to you liberal atheists.”  

“What are you teaching today, Frankie?  Civil disobedience?” I said, recalling how close Frankie and I nearly came to blows during the last time we were together here at Grumpy’s.

“God’s for it, under the right circumstances.”  Frankie said raising his chin slightly, like he was a Bible scholar.

“Vann, you and Walt ready to order?” Gloria Brown said nudging Frankie out of the way.

“See you boys later.”  Frankie said as he and his four buddies walked away.

After Gloria left, I told Vann, “please shoot me if I ever come back to this place.  Really, shoot me if I ever mention or agree to coming here.”

“I agree, seeing those clowns doesn’t do wonders for the appetite.”  Vann said pushing his chair back and reaching for The Birmingham News laying on the table closest to the window.

The primary aim of the "Novel Excerpts" blog category is to showcase my creative writing, specifically from the novels I've written. Hopefully, these posts will provide a glimpse into my storytelling style, themes, and narrative skills. It's an opportunity to share my artistic expressions and the worlds I've created through my novels.

The Boaz Stenographer, written in 2018, is my fourth novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.

Book Blurb

Walt Shepherd, a 35 year veteran of the White House’s stenographic team, is fired by President Andrew Kane for refusing to lie.

Walt returns to his hometown of Boaz, Alabama and renews his relationship with Regina Gillan, his high school sweetheart, who he had ditched right before graduation to marry the daughter of a prominent local businessman.  Regina has recently moved back to Boaz after forty years in Chicago working at the Tribune.  She is now editor of the Sand Mountain Reporter, a local newspaper.

Walt and Regina’s relationship transforms into a once in life love at the same time they are being immersed in a growing local and national divide between Democrats and traditional Republicans, and extremist Republicans (known as Kanites) who are becoming more dogmatic about the revolution that began during President Kanes campaign.

Walt accepts two part-time jobs.  One as a stenography instructor at Snead State Community College in Boaz, and one as an itinerant stenographer with Rains & Associates out of Birmingham.

Walt later learns the owner of Rains & Associates  is also one of five men who created the Constitution Foundation and is involved in a sinister plot to destroy President Kane, but is using an unorthodox method to achieve its objective.  The Foundation is doing everything it can to prevent President Kane from being reelected in 2020, and is scheming to initiate a civil war that will hopefully restore allegiance to the U.S. Constitution.

While Walt is writing a book, The Coming Civil War, he is, unwittingly, gathering key information for the Constitution Foundation.

Will Walt discover a connection between the Foundation  and the deaths of three U.S. Congressmen in time to save his relationship with Regina, prevent President Kane from being reelected as the defacto head of a Christian theocracy, and the eruption of a civil war that could destroy the Nation ?

Chapter 9

Saturday, six hours after Sean Miller had called 911, the search began.  Twenty-eight officers from an assortment of local law enforcement personnel, including Boaz, Albertville, and Guntersville police officers, Etowah and Marshall County Sheriff deputies, and FBI, and ABI (Alabama Bureau of Investigation) agents fanned out and walked south from the Brewer’s backyard, across the open pasture, and towards the tree-line a quarter of a mile away.  Information from the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences conducting Kip Brewer’s autopsy indicated he had died of a gunshot wound from a long distance.  To Marshall County Detective Darden Clarke, an average-ability shooter could have made the shot from within the front half of the pasture, the half closest to the Brewer’s back deck.  A highly-skilled shooter would have chosen the cover from within the tree line.  For two reasons.  It was a comfortable shot, and for cover.  Given Kip Brewer was a public figure with obvious enemies as well as friends, Detective Clarke concluded the shooter would more likely be a professional, therefore opting to concentrate along the entire 700-yard tree line south of the Brewer resident.  Clarke knew the shooter had to have taken his shot somewhere along this line since the contour, slope, and elevation of the pasture prevented a straight-line shot from both the east and west sides of the nearly one hundred-fifty acre pasture. 

Thursday afternoon, a Marshall County Sheriff’s deputy found one shell casing.  It was a 30-06 cartridge. It was found in clear sight but tucked slightly under the edge of a decaying oak tree 644 yards from Kip Brewer’s back deck.  The location was accessible only by foot, four-wheeler, or horseback.  It was three-quarters of a mile from the dead-end of an old logging trail that began at Highway 179 just beyond Clear Creek Snacks & Spirits. An expert at Forensics confirmed a 30-06 cartridge could not be excluded as the bullet that killed Representative Brewer.

Other than the shell casing, the crime scene offered little else.  Just over the fence from the pasture there was a man-size depression in the grass.  At the southern end of the depression the ground was semi plowed.  Likely, the shooter’s boots, while he was laying down scoping his rifle, created two, inch deep and three-inch-wide indentations.  After the depression was photographed, videotaped, and evaluated for DNA material, an FBI marksman arrived to attempt to simulate the shooting.  After less than five minutes laying with a 30-06 Springfield rifle equipped with a Leupold VX-2 3-9x40mm Rifle Scope with Duplex Reticle, Agent Tedder declared, “easy shot for an expert, assuming he could see Mr.

Brewer standing on his back deck.  Must have turned on the porch light.”

Detective Clarke was thankful for the cartridge discovery, but knew it was frighteningly little to mount an extensive investigation.  The shooter’s motive would hold the key.  Frankie Olinger appeared centerstage in Clarke’s mind.  “Damn, Olinger had declared Brewer an enemy at the Bevill Center Town Hall.  Frankie, Frankie, you are one fucking dumbass.”

Halfway during Clarke’s return trip to his office in Guntersville, sitting, waiting for a train to pass in Albertville, he said to himself.

“Maybe I’m the dumbass here.  How could Frankie Olinger have made such a shot?  The word professional and Frankie seemed to go together about as well as oil and water.  There was no doubt the shooter was an expert marksman.  As the last train car rumbled by, Clarke asked himself, “why would a professional marksman, in this case, a professional assassin, leave the one and only cartridge he had fired?”