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 26
Camilla and I dropped Amy off at the Playhouse after church Sunday morning. “There’s no good reason we should drive separate cars. It’s a waste.” Camilla had said as we were backing out of the garage and she was instructing me to drive further down Hickory Lane and pick up Amy. Only in a fictional story would this crazy scenario be taking place; a man’s fiancé and his ex-wife, becoming best of friends.
We had just walked back into the house from church when my iPhone vibrated. I didn’t recognize the number, but this wasn’t unusual. I had intentionally had Joe put my cell number on our website under my photo he had insisted we use as “the number one truth seeker.” I laid my Bible on the kitchen bar and answered.
“Hello, this is Connor.”
“Mr. Ford, you have to help me. It’s Natalie.” The woman’s voice was in a panic: high pitch, shrill even, rapid. It sounded like she was having trouble breathing.
“Settle down. Who is this?” I asked.
“It’s Paige, Paige Todd. You remember me, and Natalie came to see you.”
“Paige, I know who you are. What’s happened to Natalie?”
“I can’t find her. I haven’t seen her in over a week.”
“Have you spoken with her? On the phone, through Facebook, you know, anyway?” I asked.
“No, nothing.”
“When did you last see her?”
“Last Friday, a week ago. I didn’t see her then. She missed classes at Snead, so I called her early afternoon. She didn’t answer but called me back in a few minutes. She didn’t sound right, but said she was going out of town, that she had to get away. That’s all she said and hung up.”
“Have you been to her house to see if she is there?” I asked.
“I have twice. And, I’ve ridden by there about a dozen times this week.”
“When you stopped at Natalie’s did you speak to either her mother or father, Jake?” I asked.
“Both times it was her stepfather. He gives me the creeps. He said she had gone to Atlanta and didn’t know when she was coming back. There was something weird, like he wasn’t telling me the truth. I think it was his eyes.”
“Why Atlanta? What connection does Natalie have to Atlanta?” I asked thinking that maybe Natalie had been under such pressure she simply needed to get away a week or so. Then, I remembered what Garrett had said at breakfast last Thursday. “Is that where Natalie had her abortion?”
“Abortion? Natalie would never have an abortion. I don’t care how much pressure Alex Williams puts on her.”
“I heard she had an abortion and that was the reason you two were not going to Centre to help Gina Garrett with her creationism project.”
“I don’t know where you heard that but it’s not true.”
“Back to Atlanta. Who does Natalie know there?” I asked.
“The only person I know is a guy she met at Snead a couple of semesters ago. He came here and the two of them became good friends. But, the following semester he didn’t return.”
“If Natalie were to want to hide out around here where would she go?”
“I don’t know. Natalie wasn’t the type to go away, to hide from anything. She thrived on her social life.” Paige went silent and I resisted filling in. “Oh wait, when her and Alex Williams were going strong she told me they would slip away to a cabin his family owned on Guntersville Lake. But, I never knew where it was. That can’t be right. Natalie wouldn’t be wanting to go there. She hates Alex now. She wouldn’t go there ever again.”
“Unless she was forced to go there.” I said starting to feel Natalie might be in trouble. Paige, I have your number. Let me make a call and see if I can find out the address of this cabin. I’ll call you back within twenty or thirty minutes no matter what I learn.”
I ended our call and walked to my study and my computer. Blair had shown me how to research the county’s real estate database. The software reminded me of what I used at the Albertville Courthouse to learn about Russell Williams’ criminal record. At separate times, I entered all three names, and even the Rand Corporation. The only hits were for real estate I knew about, all in Boaz, nothing in Guntersville. It was then I remembered that Dalton was representing Sand Mountain Bank in a lawsuit against Roger Williams. I picked up my phone and pressed ‘call’ after finding Dalton Martin in my Contacts file.
“Connor, make it quick. We are about to sit down to Freda’s homemade lasagna.”
“This is extremely important. Do you know if Roger Williams owns a cabin on Guntersville Lake?” My gut was telling me Paige had been right to be concerned about Natalie.
“Yes, he does. And, I can tell you because my newest paralegal mistakenly filed Roger’s actual deposition with the court clerk. You know that’s not the way it’s done. Apparently, they do things differently in Tennessee. That’s where she’s from.” I bit my tongue as Dalton trailed on. I knew from years of friendship that if I interrupted him he would take even longer to finish his thought. It was like he couldn’t listen until he sprayed out a mouthful of sentences.
“Good. Do you remember where it is? Do you have the address?” I asked.
“Can I ask what this is about?”
“Natalie Goble. She’s missing. Her best friend, Paige Todd, thinks she might be at the cabin. Against her will.”
“It’s at Signal Point. I can’t remember the exact address. Seems like it is one of the last cabins on Signal Point Road. It ends on something like a peninsula, across from the City Harbor.”
“Thanks Dalton, I have to run. Talk later. Enjoy your lasagna.” I was thankful for Dalton and the critical information, but I didn’t want to waste any time.
“Meet me in the Burger King parking lot, south side across from Dixon Tire. I’ll be there in twenty minutes or less.” I said just as soon as Paige answered.
“I’m leaving now.”
At five minutes past one I pulled into the parking lot and Paige was already waiting. On the way to Guntersville she shared with me how two weeks ago Jake had nearly assaulted Natalie at home. They had an explosive argument over her refusal to have the abortion. It seemed that Natalie’s pregnancy was approaching twenty-four weeks, which is the time the fetus becomes viable. What I had grown to believe from my reading was the time of viability, was the time the mother was carrying a baby, a real human being, and not just a glob of cells.
Traffic on Gunter Avenue was horrible for a Sunday afternoon. Did people think it was Friday? After turning right on Highway 227 we headed towards the State Park. Crossing the bridge before reaching the feed mills on the left, I thought I was caught speeding. For some reason the cop we met wasn’t interested. I was going nearly eighty miles per hour. I drove on and turned left on Signal Point Road. In less than five minutes we had passed Signal Point Marina on the left and was sitting a hundred feet or so from the dead end and the last driveway.
The Tennessee River was to our left. To our right was a thick forest and no houses. Since passing the Marina there had been no houses at all on the right side of the road. This last driveway was at least two hundred yards past its nearest neighbor. There was no name on the mailbox, but I saw the Rand logo on the post.
I was able to drive past the driveway and onto a little stretch of grass that led into the dense grove of trees. The way I parked I felt we couldn’t be seen if someone else drove up. I got out of the car. “You stay here.” I told Paige.
“No way.” She was closing the passenger side door to my truck before I could respond. “Natalie would do the same for me. I’m coming.”
We walked through the grove for about a hundred feet and came to the edge of the front yard. If this was a cabin I would love to see a lake house as I’d heard them called. The white clapboard sided mansion was two stories. I could see the lake off behind it. The estate was magnificent.
“Let’s walk around the edge of these woods. It looks like it semi-circles the side yard all the way to the back of the house.” Paige was, I had long ago determined, the more proactive of the two girls.
Just as the front door of the mansion was about to pass out of our sight it opened, and a tall and skinny man stepped out onto the front porch and lite a cigarette.
“You ever seen that guy?” I asked.
“That’s Beanpole. That’s all I’ve ever heard him called. He works for Alex, maybe his father. I’ve seen him once at their horse farm.”
“They have horses?”
“About two dozen. High-priced stuff. I dropped Natalie off there once when Erica was out of town.”
For the time being Paige and I ignored Beanpole and walked on to the back of the house. It didn’t take long for Paige to nearly scream. “That’s her pink scarf.” Paige said pointing up at a second story window. “She carried it in her back pocket all the time. Look, I have one too.” Paige pulled a similar looking handkerchief or scarf from her back pocket.
“You know that’s hers. Look closer, see the skull and crossbones. We bought them as a kind of joke one Christmas retreat in Gatlinburg. It was the church’s annual youth trip. It was a couple of years ago. Natalie and I were still in high school. We both were in process of ditching our Christian fantasy. We found them in a store but never told the youth pastor or anyone what they represented.”
“We have to get Natalie’s attention. I’m assuming she’s up there. Probably a bedroom. It’s odd there is a metal gate looking thing over her window.” I said and found a few gravels. By now we were out of the grove of trees and were standing at the corner of a fence. The place was on the lake but also had a swimming pool. I could see through the wood planks. I started throwing the pebbles towards the window. It was a good fifty feet. My fourth toss was with my biggest stone. My mind thought of Jake Stone.
“I think you cracked the window.” Paige said. Less than ten seconds later, Natalie appeared. She saw us. Five more seconds and she raised the window.
“Help. I can’t get out.” Natalie said, something between a loud whisper and a faint scream. The metal grate over the window prevented her from getting outside, along with being two stories up. I assumed she was locked in a room, probably a bedroom.
“Stay put Natalie. We’ll get you out. How many people are inside the house?” I hollered.
“Only Beanpole for now. Hurry, please hurry.”
“Let’s go.” I said pulling Paige by the hand. She was reluctant to leave eye contact with Natalie. “Don’t worry, we’re not leaving. I’ve got an idea.”
We walked back through the grove of trees until we were directly across from the front corner of the mansion. I shared my plan with Paige and she darted across the yard and onto the giant front porch. I followed close behind her. We both reached the front door at about the same time. I moved to the side where Beanpole couldn’t see me when he opened the door from hearing Paige’s knocking. As predicted, he responded to her pounding and screaming.
“Who are you? What do you want?” Beanpole said. I could barely see the door opening.
Paige said her magic words, “I’ve come to get my matching scarf.” That’s what we had decided she would say if Beanpole was unarmed when he came to the door.
She hadn’t gotten scarf off her tongue before I rushed inside the house tackling Beanpole, clutching both my arms around him and lifting him off the ground. The two of us hit the floor hard, with him feeling my entire weight on his skinny frame.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Beanpole said trying to punch my face.
I was glad I always carried a couple of cable ties in my back pocket. If I hadn’t, I guess I could have used Paige’s scarf to tie Beanpole’s hands behind his back. I was surprised he hardly resisted. I didn’t have any trouble rolling him over onto his stomach.
By the time I finished securing Beanpole I heard Paige hollering from upstairs. I ran up what looked like a marble staircase and down a long hall. Paige was trying her best to break down a solid oak door separating her from a yelling Natalie.
“Stand aside.” I said. I backed up to the hall wall across from Natalie’s door. With all my power I rushed it and hit it with all my weight. The door didn’t budge. “Natalie, stand back and to the side of the door as far as you can. Tell me when you are in position. I’m about to shoot my gun into the door lock.”
It wasn’t but a handful of seconds when Natalie said, “okay, shoot like hell.”
It took five bullets but my Ruger SR9 once again did its job. I kicked open the door and Paige ran to Natalie.
“We need to go now.” I said walking over to Natalie. “Are you okay?”
“I’ve been here nine days. I figured they were going to kill me.” Natalie said.
“Who is they? But, come on.” I could tell Natalie didn’t have Paige’s ability to hurry. She was clearly pregnant, very visibly so.
I decided to leave Beanpole lying on the foyer’s floor. We reached my truck and backed out of the grove and was halfway down Signal Point road when we met a black Tahoe.
“That’s Jake’s.” Natalie said.
In thirty minutes I had dropped Paige off at the Burger King in Boaz. She followed Natalie and me in my truck. In another fifteen minutes both vehicles were pulling down the long driveway to Hickory Hollow. I really didn’t know what to do but felt my place in the country was the safest for Natalie.
During the entire trip back from Guntersville, all Natalie would say was Beanpole and another man she didn’t know had forced her to come to Alex’s cabin. As we walked in the back door, Natalie said, “something was going to happen tomorrow. Beanpole let it slip last night. Something about, ‘all this will be over tomorrow.’ I have a gut feeling I was going to be forced to have an abortion.”
Camilla and Emily were sitting in the den when we walked in. The four females spent the next hour talking while I was in my study on my iPhone with Mark Hale. The plan was for us to sit tight until we heard back. He was heading to 6592 Signal Point Road.
It was almost midnight when Mark called. He made a shocking statement before hanging up. “Tony and I found a tall and skinny man handcuffed with a bullet in his head. The State’s forensics team is there now. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
I didn’t sleep much Sunday night.
The Pencil Driven Life 