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 Case of the Perfectionist Professor, written in 2018, is my sixth novel. I'll post a chapter a day over the next few weeks.
Book Blurb
Late on New Year’s Eve in the small town of Boaz, Alabama, Snead State Community College teacher Adam Parker was found dead slumped over in his car. A preliminary investigation indicated the fifty-year-old biology professor died of a heart attack. Marissa Booth, Adam’s daughter and Vanderbilt School of Divinity professor, didn’t agree.
Four days later, Marissa hired the local private detective firm of Connor Ford to investigate her father’s death. She declared local police officer Jake Stone had likely murdered her father. She pointed Ford to a multi-month Facebook feud between Adam and several local people, including Stone and Boaz City Councilman Lawton Hawks. The controversy allegedly related to Adam’s research that contended that, in layman’s terms, long-term indoctrination caused actual genetic mutations that directly affected future generation’s ability to reason.
Over the next year, Connor Ford discovered multiple and independent sources of motivation to quiet and possibly murder the controversial professor. Ford learned that a civil lawsuit and widespread public outcry had effectively run Adam out of Knoxville, where he was a biology professor for over thirteen years. Ford also learned that Adam had become the number one enemy of Roger Williams, a self-made local businessman, and his son Alex, who is a Republican candidate for governor of Alabama. Adam had discovered Alex and Glock, Inc., the Austrian-based gun manufacturer, was exploring not only the possibility of setting up a large facility in Boaz but also supplying pistols for Alex’s highly touted and controversial ‘arm the teachers’ proposal.
Connor Ford has his hands full enough with these suspects. Add in his need to determine whether Lawton Hawks and Jake Stone are friends or foes of Roger and Alex, which accentuate the pressure no normal small-town private detective can handle.
Will Connor’s discovery there is a link between Dayton, Tennessee, and the 1929 Scopes Monkey trial and a rogue group of CIA operatives bend Connor and his two associates to the breaking point?
Read this mystery/thriller to find out if Adam Parker was murdered and how, and what role the long-standing controversy between science and religion had in destroying the life of a single perfectionist professor.
Chapter 2
Joe was looking at my collection of crime and legal thrillers along the back row of my office when I returned from escorting Marissa out the back door.
“Have you read all of these?” Joe had been with me for two years. Even though he was still an apprentice investigator (according to NAPI’s standards–National Association of Professional Investigators), he was on track to becoming a real Sherlock.
“Certainly. Several of them twice. A few, like “A Time to Kill,” by Grisham, three times, at least. And, those are just my hardbacks. I have a few hundred other ones on my Kindle.”
“I used to read a lot for pleasure, now seems all I do is study. You were lucky not to have had to take those darn State Board exams.” Joe said, scanning the back cover of “An Unsuitable Job for a Woman,” by. P.D. James.
“I agree, but you don’t have a five-year apprenticeship like I did. Most of the old heads, even though there was no legal requirement, wouldn’t dare turn a youngster like you loose with a case until he’d spent half-a-decade as a sidekick. Now, put James under your arm and let me hear if you’re close to untying a knot.” I said reminding myself this subject was growing a little weary. The closer Joe’s two-day test got, the more he seemed to verbalize how unfair it was.
“Funny. I met with Hannah, Hannah Knott, yesterday afternoon. Our meeting ran late so I didn’t come back by the office.” I really liked him. For several reasons, but one was he was considerate. Over my nearly fifty years I had seen that characteristic evaporate.
“Sit and speak.” I said pointing to the round oak table in the corner of my office, behind the two leather wingback chairs across from my desk. He took my advice and held on to one of my favorite crime novels of the 1970’s.
“Coffee?” Blair came in holding two large cups of coffee. She didn’t have to ask. Considerate. I love that both members of my staff learned this invaluable trait.
“Thanks Blair. I think she’s going to be a keeper.” Joe said, allowing his eyes to follow her out of my office. I couldn’t fault him for noticing. He was twenty-eight and single, and in between girlfriends. Blair, also was single, but seemed oblivious to her stunning beauty. I hoped the two stayed focused on their work.
“How did it go with Hannah. Yesterday?” I asked. Mrs. Steven Knott had been a client for several months. Steven is the Minister of Music at First Baptist Church of Christ in Boaz. Hannah suspects her husband is having an affair. So far, we have been unable to verify her suspicions.
“Finally, a breakthrough. You’d think she would have found an opportunity to look at Steven’s iPhone several times over these last two months. The man is insanely mechanical. I’m glad our client is patient. Yesterday morning, while he was in the shower, where he normally always has his cell phone, in the bathroom that is, Hannah heard his cell phone vibrate. He had left it in his underwear drawer. She suspects he got distracted when she, as she often does, pops in unannounced to try and distract him.” I had trained Joe to be thorough, but somethings could be left out in the retelling. Just get to the relevant stuff.
“I assume Hannah got a look-see and found some evidence?” I asked.
“Yes, Steven’s iPhone vibrated because he received a text. It was from, you want to try and guess?”
“No, why don’t you just tell me.”
“Peyton Todd. Obviously, she was in his Contacts or Hannah wouldn’t have known who was sending the text. Peyton said, ‘Don’t forget the tickets. Can’t wait.’
“Tell me about Ms. Todd. I assume you have tracked her down?” I said, guiding Joe a little more than I should have to.
“That was easy. I called Blair. You know she knows everybody, lived here all her life, never even moved away for college. Her and Peyton were semi-close during high school. She’s Kurt Prescott’s assistant at Sand Mountain Bank.” Joe said sharing a story his grandfather had told him. Sand Mountain Bank, originally, was a local bank formed in the 1930’s, operating until the mid-1980’s or so. Until, it was bought out by a big holding company, Southtrust Bank I believe. Two years ago, Kurt Prescott, a great-grandson of one of the original founders, returned to Boaz from Atlanta to re-charter SMB. From all I’d seen, it had been a good idea. I had a personal account there and they always seemed busy. I really liked the new building they built on Billy Dyar Blvd., next to the pharmacy. Bank Row, as it was being called, now had nearly as many banks as Boaz had churches.
“What else did you learn?” I asked.
“That’s pretty much it. That’s big isn’t it? Just learning her name. Now, we know who Steven is having an affair with.” Joe’s mind must have followed Blair all the way to her desk because it certainly hadn’t stayed in his head.
“We do?”
“Well, not for sure, but I think that’s a reasonable deduction to reach.” Maybe Joe was thinking. A little.
“We need confirmation. Let me ask you. You know I’ve deliberately stayed passive about this case, allowing you to lead and manage. What is the end game here?”
“Do you mean, what does Hannah want to accomplish?” Joe asked.
“Certainly, it’s her case, her life. We work for her. She sets the agenda.”
“I have to say I’m not really sure. It’s a weird case. Hannah’s a weird woman if you ask me. It seems she wants to know for sure Steven is having an affair. Then, she can confront him to see if he will be remorseful, repentant. I think Hannah wants her marriage to work.” Joe said.
“So, she’s not after blood, not wanting to grab the kids, the money, and throw Steven’s ass out in the cold?” I knew this would be what most women would want or should want.
“It’s the Christian thing to do, she says.” Joe was like me. We both had grown up in churches, Southern Baptist Churches, but neither of us hardly ever attended. We both simply shed that set of clothes. For me, it was over twenty-five years ago. For Joe, it was maybe six or seven.
“Back to your investigation. You’ve been tailing him for over a month. You haven’t learned anything to support Hannah’s suspicion?” I asked.
“Not really. Like I said, he is mechanical to a fault. His life is rather boring. He’s at church six days per week by 8:00 a.m. Monday through Friday’s he goes to Health Connections for about ninety minutes to work out. Saturday’s, well, I haven’t been following him much on the weekends.”
“Health Connections? Ninety minutes? Sounds like you might want to look under the hood. Especially now that you suspect Peyton is his girlfriend. Maybe, they are meeting there, sitting in the spa for ninety minutes. Maybe, ambling over to the linen closet. Who knows?” I said, wishing I had taken a little more active role in Hannah’s case.
I spent the rest of the afternoon at my desk drafting a report for Dalton. He and Trevor, Trevor Nixon, one of Dalton’s law partners, were in the early stages of a capital murder defense in Jackson County. They had hired me to conduct a preliminary investigation, mainly locating a few potential witnesses and preparing a written profile of their backgrounds. Dalton wanted my report by Thursday afternoon for his meeting with his chief capital murder case investigator, Bobby Sorrells from Dothan. He was scheduled to be in town Friday morning.
At 5:00 p.m., I was finishing my first draft when Blair came in and said she was leaving unless I had something else for her to do. I said I was okay. She lingered in my doorway like she had something to say.
“Here’s the rule around here. If you want or need to say something, just let it flow, assuming it’s just us clowns here and no clients.” I said wanting her to feel welcome and a vital part of our operation.
“I don’t want to get any one in trouble, but I think Joe likes me. I would be okay with it too, in liking him, but now is a bad time. You know, when I interviewed, I told you about my divorce and that I might never get over it. I really feel Joe is a good guy but I’m nowhere ready for another commitment, not even just to date.”
“Why tell me? Why not tell Joe?” I asked.
“I kind of think of you as a father figure and I don’t want to hurt Joe’s feelings. I thought you might drop a hint or something, nothing to make him think I didn’t like him.” Blair said.
“Thanks. I suppose I should take your ‘father’ comment as a compliment. I’m just glad Camilla doesn’t think the way you do.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I get it now. She is a lot younger than you, isn’t she? I bet she’s not much older than I am. I didn’t mean.” I think Blair would have continued digging herself deeper into a hole, except that for the voice coming from the back door.
“It’s just me.” Camilla said. She always said that about this time every day.
“Come on in. We’re in my office.” I said as though she couldn’t figure that out on her own.
When Camilla stood in my doorway, she said, after seeing Blair, “Oh, I’m sorry. I thought you were alone. I didn’t see Blair’s car.”
“It’s not here. In the shop. Mother is supposed to pick me up about now. I’ll go look for her.” I could tell Blair was embarrassed.
“It’s nice of you to come by and see your dear old dad, Camilla.” I hardly ever ignored an opportunity to be a comedian of sorts, or to put someone on the spot. Blair’s face turned red.
“Dad, do you still think of me as your favorite daughter?” Camilla asked. I think she knew what I was up to.
“I certainly do. You’re thirty-two and I’m nearly fifty. I’m old enough to be your dad.” I said.
“Blair, don’t you think I’ve got a good-looking father?” Camilla asked, as Blair was putting on her jacket and gathering her purse and cell phone.
“Ya’ll are making fun of me. Connor, I didn’t mean to imply that you are too old for a young woman, just that I needed someone, a wiser someone, for advice.” Blair now had reached my door and Camilla had moved across and was leaning against my crime and legal thrillers.
“Kind, sweet, considerate, and competent. What more could I want in an assistant. Blair, my dear, we were only joking, having a little fun. You stay exactly the way you are. You’re perfect for Connor Ford, Private Investigations.”
After Blair left and I heard the back door close, I got up and walked over to Camilla. Her lips were ever more of a thrill than any one of the hundreds of novels lining the whole back side of my office. Other than a little temper that she so far had managed to cage, she was near perfect for me. Tall, brunette, shapely in just the right areas, and a true romantic. We made a good pair. She was the best thing that had happened to me since my divorce over five years ago. Camilla, I fully believed, was a keeper.
The Pencil Driven Life 