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 68
After sitting under a clear sky and what looked like a full moon I realized I was hungry. I went back inside and scrambled eight eggs, layering them with four slices of cheese when they were almost finished. I ate half the eggs watching Sandi devour the other half. After two slices of toast heavily spread with strawberry jam along with two glasses of milk, I sat in my chair hoping I could fall asleep. I wanted to be sitting here when Regina arrived from Chicago. It would be hours.
I quickly fell into a deep sleep but by midnight I was wide awake. I kept sitting for another thirty minutes but knew sleep had abandoned me. Curiosity had alerted me to the two backpacks I had foolishly left in the back of my truck. I retrieved them and took them upstairs to my study across from my bedroom.
I started with the backpack filled with the contents of the bottom right-hand desk drawer. These items were mainly articles from the Chicago Tribune. I scanned through a few files and noted the common theme. Nearly every article was about President Kane during his campaigning days. The other six or seven files were either articles about the U.S. Supreme Court or copies of actual cases the court had decided. For some reason, I wasn’t motivated right now to read any of these articles or cases.
The second backpack beaconed to me. I emptied its contents on an eight-foot table behind my desk. There was a dozen or more journals and the two thumb drives. Each journal had a business card plastic sleeve built into its front cover. Each sleeve contained a white card with a year number written in black ink. It was Regina’s printing I was sure. I lined up the journals. The oldest journal was from 1972. The most recent journal was dated 2017. The other ten journals started with 1975 and ended in 2014, skipping three or four years between each journal.
I started with the 2017 journal. I first scanned through the pages. It seemed there was not an entry for every day of the year. And, when there was an entry, it was relatively short, covering anywhere from a half page to a page and a half. I flipped to the end of the journal and noticed the last entry. It was dated December 27, 2017. “Talked with Walt at Walmart. He’s definitely interested and should pose little problem.”
What the heck did that mean? Sounds like I was being selected for some experiment. I turned back to the first entry, January 1, 2017. “Nineteen days till the beginning of the end.” January 20, 2017, no doubt was referring to Kane’s inauguration. For some reason I felt a desire to see what was on the thumb drives, so I only reviewed a few other entries. I turned nearly to the back of the journal and landed on December 10th. This entry was almost two pages. I read it in detail when I saw my name underlined at the top. Regina described her talk with Thaddeus about me being fired from the White House. She went into some detail about mine and her background. She also wrote about what she remembered about my religious beliefs. The next to the last paragraph she used a little journalistic psychology and described how I would be motivated to get back at President Kane, that I could be useful. The final paragraph was Regina’s summary of her and Thaddeus’ decision to channel me for ‘the courtroom.’
I set the journal aside and looked up at the revolving ceiling fan overhead. My mind was flowing clockwise with the paddles on the fan, recognizing that I had been conned, that Regina had deceived me. I was a fool for falling for her. But, my heart was resisting. It was trying to fight the wave so to speak. I stared closer at the fan and imagined the blades stopping and turning counterclockwise. Surely, I had not misread Regina. How could her smile, her look, her touch, and oh my, the sexual intimacy, have been an act? Was I that much of a fool? My heart resisted the strong attempt by my mind to answer in the affirmative. I chose to think, to almost believe, that what sinister plan Regina had started with when we met at Walmart in December 2017, had transformed into a true love and devotion for me, but that she was trapped by a power, maybe Thaddeus, or his group, that prevented her from either telling me or of breaking away. I had to confront Regina with the truth of what I had done and what I had learned.
I sat upright in my chair and reached for one of the thumb drives. My cell phone vibrated on the desk beside my computer. It was Regina.
“Hey baby.” I said as naturally as breathing.
“Walt honey, I’m leaving Huntsville now. I missed my first flight and had a two-hour layover. I should be there in an hour or so. Have you heard anything new?”
“No, not a thing. How are you?” I asked.
“Numb, maybe in shock. I can’t help but hurt for Deb, but I’m also frozen by the overriding question, ‘why would Vann be at my house in the first place?’ This is all so surreal.”
“You are coming straight here, aren’t you?” I asked.
“Of course, I couldn’t dare go home without you. Do you think we will be able to go inside?”
“I have no idea. If I had to guess, I would say no. I suppose it depends on how long it took for the State’s Forensic team to get there.
Isn’t there some way we could find out?”
“Why don’t you call the Etowah County Sheriff’s Department and see if they would tell you? Please, since I’m driving. Okay?”
“Sure, no problem. You be careful and know I’m here for you.” Now was not the time to indicate something was wrong between Regina and me.
“I know and I’m so thankful for that. Bye, see you soon.”
I ended the call and searched online for the Sheriff’s phone number. The woman who answered put me on hold after I told her what I needed. Nearly five minutes later she came back on and said that 7759 Cox Gap Road was still ‘locked’ and wouldn’t be ‘opened’ until probably late Sunday or early Monday morning. I thanked her.
I walked downstairs and made a pot of coffee. After it finished, and I filled a large mug, I returned to my study and inserted one of the unmarked thumb drives. What I learned after opening the first file quickly convinced me that Regina and I were in for a long and rough road. The file, labeled ‘Brewer,’ contained photos of what I knew were from the spot along the fence line where Kip Brewer’s killer had made the deadly shot. One photo captured the back side of Brewer’s house across a long pasture. I was impressed by how close his back deck appeared even though I knew it was over 600 yards from the shooting site. How in the hell did Regina have these photographs? And, why would she have them? But, what twisted my gut more than anything was the question, was Regina the shooter?
I couldn’t take anymore. I removed the thumb drive and hid it, along with the other one, on a bookcase behind a set of Encyclopedias I had had since I was a teenager. I then gathered the journals and locked them in the filing cabinet that housed all the research materials for mine and Vann’s book. I returned the two backpacks to my bedroom closet and walked downstairs to ponder and wait on Regina. I had to figure out what I needed to do.
The Pencil-Driven Life 