2 comments/ 26611 views/ 14 favorites Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 01 By: WifeWatchman The chronological order of my stories is as follows: Todd & Melina series, Interludes 1-5, Sperm Wars series, Russian Roulette series, Case of the Murdered Lovers series, Case of the Murdered Chessplayer series, The Swap series, Interludes 6-10, The Murdered Football Player Series, Case of the Black Widow series, Teresa's Christmas Story, The Case of the Black Badge series, A Case of Revenge series, Trilogy Series, Dark Side Of The Force series, Caught In The Act series, Case of the Murdered Bride series, The Credit Card Caper series. The Hot Wives Investment Club, Ch. 1. Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas. This story contains graphic scenes, extreme language, and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial or racist language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above. Part 1 - Prologue "Hap-ppy Birth-day... tooooo... yooooo... As the singing died down, I leaned over and blew out the 31 candles on my cake. It was October 26th, and it was my birthday. The cake was a large, rectangular red velvet cake with that delicious white cream-cheese frosting, one of my very favorites. On top, written in red, were the words "Happy Birthday Iron Crowbar!" and a long red crowbar in red frosting beneath the words. We were in the back room of The Steakhouse. The party was being hosted by John "Jack" Colby, and was not that large. I'd been given a birthday cake at Headquarters, and all the Detectives and many Patrol Officers streamed through, consuming the six(!) large birthday cakes that had been brought in. So tonight it was just me, Laura, our babies Carole and Jim, my mom Phyllis, Cindy Ross and Jenna Stiles, Tanya Perlman and Baby Pete and Barry Oliver (they're sure spending a lot of time together, I thought to myself), Martin Nash and Sandra Speer, Jack Muscone, Paulina Patterson and her husband, Melina and Daniel Allgood, Chief Griswold and his wife, and Molly Evans, who was now looking very heavily pregnant, as she indeed was. Teresa Croyle had been invited but had sent regrets, saying she had a previously scheduled mission that she couldn't get out of. Todd and Jeanine Burke had also sent regrets. I wondered if they weren't coming because Melina and Daniel were here. Daniel was somewhat breaking the protocol of not associating with Police while running for Sheriff. I had told them to get their asses to the party: if anyone objected, just tell them Melina came to her sister's husband's birthday party and that was that, so be it. Melina looked very happy, and I was happy to see that. Molly had been put on 'restricted duty' with the Midtown Police Force, so she was going to stay up here, and at The Cabin, and deliver my baby at University Hospital. Jack Muscone had broken up with his girlfriend, and so I suggested he spend time talking to my mom. I might have mentioned to him that my mom was a Cougar, and a lot of college guys seemed to hang around her. He got the hint, and was sitting next to her and talking to her all through the party. Some humor came when Chief Griswold was holding Carole. She became inquisitive of that strange feature upon his face, his large handlebar mustaches. The Chief was very patient with her, and as she felt them she emitted a piercing laughter. The Chief could be a very good grandfatherly type when he wanted to be, I noted. Meanwhile, Carole was thoroughly entertained in discovering and exploring strange new things... - "Here, take this." my wife said, handing me a 'gray viagra' pill, then added "Why don't you put Carole to bed, and I'll get changed." I knew what that meant: she was finally medically cleared to have sex, and she was going to put on something hot and sexy for me. In addition, she had not let me into our marital bedroom all day, so I knew she had a big surprise for me. Once Carole was in her crib and sleeping, I headed back to the bedroom. A lovely sight awaited me. Laura was wearing a filmy silver-white see-thru teddy, and my God! did she look hot in it. She was also wearing very high heel silver slides with a clear strap over the toes and a nearly invisible clear strap around the back of her heels to keep them in place. I felt myself growing throbbing hard. "Now let me show you your birthday present." Laura said as I came into the bedroom and closed the door. The bed's headboard was against the wall to my right. On the wall to the left, facing the bed, was a huge flat TV screen mounted to the wall. Playing on the screen were images of people fucking; my wife had put what looked like a porn tape on the DVD. "Think that'll help us in our fucking?" Laura asked seductively, whispering into my ear. "Yeah..." I said, "though the way you look tonight is all I need to get fired up." I took my wife into my arms and kissed her mouth deeply. "Thanks, baby." "Does the actress in this next scene look familiar?" Laura asked. I looked at the TV. It was my wife, and she and the college stud Nick Eastwood were making out, hotly kissing in her little bedroom near her office. I felt my wife's hands undoing my shirt buttons and undressing me as I watched. My cock throbbed at the sight of a handsome young stud making out with my wife. It made me want to do the same with her, and my tongue twined with my wife's as we deeply kissed again, my cock throbbing, my whole body on fire. "Mmmm, now I want to eat some pussy." I said, once I was stripped naked, my thick cock standing straight out, taut and iron hard, due to Laura's soft hand gently jacking the shaft. My wife allowed me to walk her backwards to the edge of the bed. Once she fell upon it, she arranged herself with her head on the pillows and her long, luscious legs spread wantonly. Her pubic bush was growing back, but she was keeping it very trimmed and above her labes. Still, the contrast of the dark patch of hair, her white skin, and the brown and pink pussy below was just more stimulation adding to my heated arousal. I slid down onto the bed and eased myself between my wife's spread legs. Normally I'd start at her elegant feet and kiss and lick my way up her magnificent legs, but tonight we were both too horny and aroused. I did kiss Laura's inner thighs, working my way towards her sopping wet slit, her cuntlips engorged and begging for my oral attention. I pushed Laura's legs up and back until her knees were next to her big, milk-filled breasts and her feet in her high heels pointing straight up into the air. Then, famished with sexual hunger, I dove in. "Ohhhhhh!" my wife moaned as I made first contact with her slit. I licked from the bottom of her pussy near her 'taint' and up to her clit in one long, luxurious lick. It had been weeks since I'd tasted this wonderful pussy, and it was heaven for me as well as for her. I immediately began eating her more deeply, sucking her cuntlips until they were distended and wide open, letting my tongue harshly lash her clit to make her groan, then sliding my tongue as deep into her cunthole as I could get it, orally exploring her cunt-cave, knowing how good it was going to feel to sink my cock balls-deep into her depths. - "Okay honey, it's time. Fuck me, fuck me with that big hard cock of yours!" my wife gasped. Laura had come hard twice, her juices gushing into my mouth as I greedily lapped them up. I mounted her, trapping her legs beneath my arms as her hand reached down to guide me into her. I had generously lubed her cunt and my cock as my tongue strummed her clit, using my fingers to get the slippery lube deep into her pussy. We knew the lube was needed for the long, hard fuck we were anticipating. "Oh, yes! Oh God yes!" Laura gasped out as I thrust into her, sinking almost all of my meat into her pussy with one hard stroke. I pulled back until I was nearly outside of her, then shoved my iron hard rod back into her until our pelvises smacked together. "Oh God, darling, it's so wonderful having you back inside me!" Laura gasped, joy and pleasure in her ragged voice. "Fuck me with that beautiful cock!" I suited my deed to her words as I began pumping into her with a smooth, steady rhythm. I didn't want to fuck her too roughly, but it was hard holding back. I wanted to be inside this woman, I wanted to pump my cock in and out of her forever! "Oh geez, Laura, it's so good to be back inside you!" I moaned. "Oh God, I love you so much!" I bent over and kissed her mouth, not a deep kiss but a gentle french-kiss with our tongues battling right at our touching lips. "Mmmmm, I love you so much, too!" Laura replied, her voice barely a whisper. "How does it feel inside me? Looser?" "It feels great." I said. "Not really looser, but I feel like I'm going deeper than I ever have before." "Keep fucking me, darling, keep sinking that big hard thing balls-deep!" Laura said. With her legs trapped under my arms, she couldn't really respond to my thrusts, but I felt her clutching her cuntwalls at me as I would pull out, as if trying to keep me inside. The added pleasure, as well as the sight, smells and sounds of mating with my beautiful wife, had me reaching the crest far faster than I wanted. "You might as well pull out and come in my mouth." Laura said. "Your sperm won't do any good down there, anymore." I could sense that my wife still felt some pangs at not being able to have more of my children, but I wasn't worrying about that at the moment. "Whose birthday is it, baby?" I grunted. "It's mind, and I'm going to come inside your hot cunt. Do you know how good it feels for me to shoot my load deep inside you, baby? It's the best feeling in the world, and I'm going to feel it right now..." I began pumping harder and faster. Then I lowered myself until my full weight was on Laura's chest and abs, and slid my hands down to clutch her luscious asscheeks, pulling her hard into me. "Oh yeah, here it comes... oh yeah, oh God, OH GOD DAMN!! UHHH!!" Blast after blast of hot semen shot out of my cock and deep into my wife's eagerly receptive pussy. Swirls of gray and red-hot mists blinded me as I let my mind go fully into the ecstasy of my release into the incredible woman beneath me. When it finally was over, I was gasping for breath as I nuzzled Laura's neck. I released her legs, still lying fully on her, and we kissed deeply and lovingly for long minutes... - I was lying on my back, Laura kneeling by my right side, her mouth deeply sucking my cock. The 'gray viagra' had been productive, and I'd gotten hard and ready again very quickly. I was idly watching the sex scenes playing out on the large TV screen. Laura had strung together a long sequence of various recordings, including some of her and myself making love. "I think you'll be interested in the one coming up." Laura said. As her mouth descended upon my shaft again, I looked up at the screen. To my surprise, it was a tape of Trish Donolan and other Hedonists being fucked hard and deep by two young studs, including Trish's friend Catherine 'Cat' Clausen. The one fucking Cat was unknown to me, but I recognized the boy fucking Trish as my nephew Todd's buddy Teddy Franklin. The action on the screen was hot, and watching it as my beautiful wife deeply sucked my throbbing cock was very intense... - It was some time later. Laura was riding me, enjoying undulating her luscious body as she ground her cunt against my cock that was impaling her to the hilt. I was not responding hard, letting my wife do the work, knowing that she really enjoyed doing this and had come twice already. I did suck her big breasts as they hung over my face, swallowing the milk that flowed from her nipples. Only the eerie light of the TV screen bathed the room in a bluish glow, as the lamps had been turned off. Laura's body was blocking my view of the screen, but I'd rather watch her anyway. Then I felt a strange sensation wash over me, something between sleepy dreaming and unearthly clarity of vision. I was seeing and feeling Dr. Gloria Searles, the gorgeous black-haired woman with the fantastic legs, riding me, fucking me. I let myself revel in the dream, wanting to feel myself inside Gloria, wanting to fuck her, mate with her, wondering if I could induce the cold bitch in her to melt and take me inside her in sinfully adulterous passion. I was sure going to try to seduce her, I thought dreamily... - "Guys, what are you doing?" Cindy asked as Molly and Jenna walked around The Cabin. Molly was staying in The Cabin as she awaited the impending birth of my baby in two to three weeks. Cindy and Jenna had come over after the birthday party to shoot the bull and have a few drinks. Much girl-talk ensued. "I heard that Old Man Bonniker built secret passages into this house." Jenna said. "It was rumored he had a secret wine cellar, too, which was a safe room he could hide inside of." "Oooooh, let's go look for it." Molly had said. That had prompted Cindy's question as she watched her lover and her sister knocking on wall panels. "Guys, this is Don's house!" Cindy said. "Yes, it is." Molly said. "And I want to know what secrets he's hiding from us, don't you? Like where all the other crowbars are kept." "C'mon, you're intruding on his privacy." Cindy said, feeling uncomfortable. "Well, come help us, then." Jenna said. "Hmmm, if there were a secret cellar, I think Mr. Bonniker would've had it dug into the mountain itself. Let's look in the front bedroom and the TV room." Jenna explored the small downstairs bedroom, which was actually more my study, while Molly tapped on the walls of the TV room that adjoined the greatroom with its huge wall of windows. They explored the upstairs, unerringly finding the closet behind the wall in the master bedroom. They looked around downstairs again, going through the nearly-empty closets. But they did not find the secret panel that led to the cave dug into the mountain, the front part which was a wine cellar, and behind another secret panel was my little room where my electronic eavesdropping devices fed into and my ultra-secure computers were. However, if they'd found the rooms, they'd have found nothing... I'd removed all the equipment from the secret room a couple of months before. The stuff was in storage behind a secret wall panel in my mother's basement apartment, waiting for me to find a new location to set the stuff up. And I had no way of knowing how fortunate my actions would be... After giving up their search, Molly headed off to bed, dreaming of being deeply fucked by my cock, feeding off the energy I was sending into the Universe as I fucked Laura. Cindy and Jenna fell asleep on the sofas downstairs... - "So how was your work today?" Tanya asked as she put her sleeping baby son in his crib. "Pretty good." said Barry Oliver, who was climbing into bed after undressing, admiring Tanya's hot body in the nightgown as she turned and stepped over to the bed. "We're getting the process CNC machines in place, and Todd has secured more financing for us. I don't know how he does it, but he charms them all and they can't wait to throw money at him." "That's good." Tanya said, slipping into bed and snuggling up with Barry. "How are the new hires doing?" "That's been pretty hard." Barry said. "We've found three that once worked under what I call suspicious circumstances... a couple that were once at DynaCorp, Seth caught them rather quickly, and we suspect they'd be moles. But then I caught another couple that had been in places like Langley, Virginia, and at a couple of Universities where 'certain' projects were going on." "It's good you're catching on to them. Don has been worried about that." said Tanya. "He's trying to put the pieces together of what he thinks is an industrial espionage ring operating here in the County, as well as other places. The FBI asked him to work with them on it." "Yeah, he's right that there are people out there who love to steal industrial secrets..." said Barry, "... and some of them are working on behalf of that same Federal Government. They're really trying to penetrate us. "Speaking of 'penetrating'," Tanya said sexily, letting her hands and lips explore Barry's young body, "let's put the company aside and concentrate on you penetrating me." "Sounds like a good plan." Barry said as he rolled on top of the sexy policewoman. His penis, throbbing hard and just under seven inches in length, easily found Tanya's sopping wet slit, and he indeed penetrated her- balls deep, burying his meat to the hilt in her womanly heat. He began a smooth, steady rhythm of fucking, and Tanya began moaning as pleasure coursed through her body. Barry's scientific precision and skill translated well to the bedroom, and he fucked her with skillful pistoning action, his ass bouncing up and down as he thrust deep into her again and again... Part 2 - Undercover(s) Operations "This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" yelled the lovely redhead reporter from outside the Hyatt Hotel north of Town. It was 7:00am, Oct. 30th. "Channel Two News is following the big Board meeting of BigPharmaCorp today! CEO and Chairman of the Board, multi-millionaire Donovan Donolan, is expected to make remarks on BigPharmaCorp's earnings today, which are expected to show tremendous, record profits for wealthy shareholders. There is plenty of security for the Board and Shareholders here at the Hyatt Hotel, as the possibility of protests from environmentalist groups, as well as Occupy groups protesting the widening gap between the haves and have-nots, is always an issue." "In other news," continued Bettina, "while the BigPharmaCorp Board elections are expected to be easy and not challenging, the same cannot be said of the political elections in the State and in our own Town and County. In the Coroner's race, Dr. John Quincy Kelly has taken a lead over incumbent Coroner Steven Lester Haines, after Coroner Haines was formally reprimanded by the Town & County Council for releasing a photo of the murdered Diane Lang before Police had notified her next-of-kin of her death. "But all eyes are on the extremely important State Senate race, between Democrat Katherine Woodburn, former owner of KXTC, and TEA Party Extremist Republican John Cummings. The race is a dead heat, and State and Federal dollars are pouring into the County in campaign advertising. SBI Director Jack Lewis has told Channel Two News that this race may be the most important in State history in determining the future of the SBI and the safety of the Citizens of the State. This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" I'm not sure what was more interesting... Bettina and her microphone, or watching the beautiful Detective (J.G.) Joanne Cummings sputter with anger at the negative aspirations assigned to her cousin John Cummings by the deeply biased Press. Have I mentioned that I am not alone in my hatred of the Press? - "Can I talk to you in your office?" Lieutenant Teresa Croyle said to me as KXTC was showing a taped Sports report by Chuck Pringle. "Sure." I said, looking towards Cindy as I said with emphasis: "Let's go now. I don't need Chuck Pringle to tell me what my Wildcats are going to do to the Bulldogs on the football field this weekend." Cindy looked daggers at me as Teresa and I headed out the door towards my office. "Better set up a lunch date with your wife." said Lt. Teresa 'Cunt' Croyle once we were in my office and seating ourselves. "The photos from our undercover surveillance are in File 10-30-C." In the early morning hours of this same day, Oct. 30th, Vice Detective John 'Grubby' Paul had made contact with two black men, and they'd gone to a house on the border between the Industrial/Warehouse and the Southwest Ghetto districts of Town. Grubby had worn a tiny camera that looked like one of his shirt buttons, and Teresa, wearing all black, had snuck onto the property with a high-powered camera, taking pictures. They were hoping to see a drug exchange and could get photos. Obviously with Teresa trespassing, we could not use these particular photos for full evidence, but we hoped to get probable cause for a larger sting operation. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 01 "Instead, it was a sex party." Teresa said, as I brought up the file on my desk computer. "But the women are interesting... for criminal observation purposes that is." I opened the file, which was password-protected. The photos were taken from both inside and outside. Some showed a large, muscular, athletic black man in his late 20s or early 30s, having sexual intercourse with Trish Donolan, wife of BigPharmaCorp CEO Donovan Donolan. Trish and her husband were swingers with the Hedonists, and also had formed their own smaller swinging group. "If Law Enforcement doesn't work out for you, Teresa," I said, "you have a career in porn photography." The pictures Teresa taken were extremely clear and graphic, showing the huge black snake penetrating Trish's white snatch. "No doubt." Teresa said with a straight face as I continued to peruse the pictures. The second woman was Gloria Cagle, the white girlfriend of a black man named 'T-Mac', who was the lieutenant of the rapper 'T-Square'. T-Square controlled most of the black crime in the southern part of Town. I could see in several pics that Grubby Paul was sitting in a chair getting his seven inch root wet, as Gloria was riding his cock hard. Grubby was a lucky man, I thought, as some of the photos showed him sucking Gloria's magnificent breasts. I truly had rarely seen better breasts than Gloria's: all natural, big teardrop shape, large brown nipples that begged to be sucked... "Poor Grubby." I said. "Undercover work is so tough on him." "It will be if he gets caught up." Teresa said. "Which I am concerned about." The third woman was older, with a head full of curly, almost frazzled, black hair with some gray mixed in. She looked to be in her 50s, but was very attractive, and her body was in shape and very hot. She was wearing sheer black stockings and a garter belt, and what appeared to be high heel suede black pumps. Her legs were long and shapely, and as she lay on the second bed in the bedroom, getting pumped by powerful black man, who was younger and slimmer than the first, those long shapely legs looked really good pulled back and spread wide to accommodate her stud's powerful fucking. The pictures were explicit, and hot. The black men were fucking the white mature beauties with their extremely large cocks. My sex-professor wife had told me that the myth of black penis size was just that, a myth... but just as there were some white men blessed with huge penises, like my nephew Todd, there were likewise black men who were exceptionally well-hung. These two men were hung, and they were fucking the hell out of these lovely white women with their big black snakes. Teresa had been right: the photos were arousing me, but it was not my wife I was thinking about; I was lusting for some sweet ebony pussy. "Okay, Teresa," I said, putting my lewd thoughts aside as I tried to control the hardening of my cock in my pants, "I agree with you about Grubby Paul... he was 'made' by the local black gangsters. Why is he on this mission?" "Because these are out-of-towners." Teresa said. "They came in from the City, and we don't think they know who Grubby is. Also, sir, Grubby wanted to do it. We wanted to find out if they were making contact with local drug pushers. Last but not least, Grubby thought that if anyone who knew who he was came in, they'd lose trust in those City guys, maybe not do business with them. And I had Davis and Kirkpatrick close by, just in case Grubby got into any trouble, warrants be damned." "We do need to be more careful about Grubby exposing himself like that." I said. "So who are these guys from the City?" "The first guy, the one fucking Trish Donolan," said Teresa, "is known as 'Black Magic'. He was rumored to have been a semi-pro football player, but other than a tryout with an NFL team, from which he was cut, we can't find a record for that. He's got money, which has attracted Drug Enforcement at every level of law enforcement, but we've found nothing on him so far- until last night, possibly. The second guy, we're not sure about yet. I'm inquiring with Detective Ventura in the City to see if he is on their radar screens. "Well, as I'm sure you know," I said, "Gloria Cagle is T-Mac's main squeeze, so she is either stepping out on him or she is the go-between contact." "That was one of the two things I wanted to get your input on, Commander." Teresa said. "Is Cagle a contact, or is just part of a sex party? We're not sure we didn't stumble onto some decadent but relatively innocent fun. And then there's Trish Donolan... is she involved with the black drug trade, or is she just into black men sexually? Remember, she was one of the bitches that led Margo Bailey straight to the drug pushers, in that particular case your nephew Ned was involved with. So I really wonder what her presence is about." "Trish is a swinger, that much we know." I said. "She may just get off on interracial sex. I've heard Janet Riordan is also addicted to black men. Must be something in the water." Teresa laughed, such as a laugh from 'Teresa Cunt' was. "So, who's the other woman?" I asked. "The older one with the great pair of legs." "You would notice that." Teresa said. "But that's the second thing I need to ask you about: her name is Susan Wexler. She's a Captain in the City Police Force's Drug Squad. Supposedly one of their very best, and has been for years. I'm afraid we might have stumbled onto her doing an undercover mission." "She's undercover... or under covers, all right." I said. "No wonder she gets the results she does. So what's the issue?" "If she's undercover, I don't want to 'out' her and expose her to the criminals." said Teresa. "But it also occurred to me that she might not be undercover, she might be dirty. If we contact her unit and they don't know about her mission, a mole might expose her -or- a snitch might tip her off. If we go to their I.A., we might be doing her an injustice, and again- a mole might tip her off, or tip the bad guys off. I can tell you that when I was working with Midtown I.A., the guys there did not trust the City's I.A." I was very proud of Teresa Croyle: she had really thought about the possibilities and made no assumptions either way. "That's excellent thinking, Lieutenant Croyle. Excellent." I complimented her. "So the question is how to discreetly determine if she's on a mission; and if not, if she's dirty or just having some good sexual fun." "Yes, sir." Teresa said, her eyes showing no emotion at all; no gleam of amusement nor sexual interest, nor hardly any professional police interest. In some ways, that was good. But we still had not gotten her completely away from being 'Teresa Cunt'. "Hmmmm," I said, thinking. "We can't use Robin Ventura or 'Sapper' Warren, or even let them know. They'd be in deep kim-chi if they were investigating a superior officer and she's not guilty of anything. And like you said, I'm not fully trusting of their I.A. Department, either. Tell you what, I'll think about it, and we'll resolve it soon. I glanced at Teresa, seeing the obvious signs of fatigue. I said "Meanwhile, Lieutenant, you and Detective Paul are to go home and get some sleep. If I see you in this Headquarters before noon, I'll fire your asses... or better yet, I'll let Lieutenant Ross fire you." I was kidding about firing them, but not about them getting some sleep. "Oh sir, not Lieutenant Ross, anything but tha-at!" Teresa said, pretending to beg, teasing me back for the 'Ross' reference. She'd definitely come a long way from the way she was night Margo Bailey had died. And of course she and Cindy would take bullets for each other... - "You bitch." Trish Donolan woke up out of a deep sleep. It was her husband, dressed fully in his $5000 suit for the Board meeting, standing next to the bed. In his hand was a manila envelope with photographs that had been inside. "Huh, wha?" she asked sleepily. "What the fuck are these?" Donovan said, his voice low and menacing. As Trish fully woke up, Donovan threw the photos into his wife's face and upper chest. "Tell me what the fuck these are, bitch!" Trish sat up, looking accusingly at her husband, as she picked up the photos. A shock ran through her as she saw that they were of her being deeply fucked by that black stud 'Black Magic' the night before. "I told you I was going to a party. What's the fucking problem?" Trish said. "You didn't tell me you were going to be fucking niggers at that party." Donovan said. "I trusted you, and you betray me and our marriage by fucking a nigger? And you let him shoot his filthy nigger seed inside you?" "What's your problem with that?" Trish said. "We've been swinging for years. And I've been taking black pipe for longer than I've known you! You know what they say: 'Once you go black, you never go back.'." "God damn it, bitch!" Donovan said, furious anger on his face. "If I'd known you were a nigger-lover like this, I never would've married you. I'd have let you stay on the streets, you God-damned whore. And this is why we didn't make it into the Libertines... because you're a fucking slut for nigger cock! Going around and hanging out with those drug pushers-" "Get the fuck over it, asshole!" Trish yelled back, whipped to anger herself. "You needed me and my daddy's money, or you'd be mopping the floors at BigPharmaCorp instead of running the place! And if you don't like it that I fuck big black cocks and like them better than your little tool, then tough shit! You were the Libertines' problem, not me! And I'll hang around who I damn well please!" "Like Margo Bailey?" Donovan shot back. "Yeah, you had her hang around, and look what happened to her. You and that Cat Clausen bitch took her to visit your nigger lovers, and she ended up dead. You better watch out the same thing doesn't happen to you!" "I'll take my chances." Trish said. "And those black studs sure fuck me better than you do, you puny little shit eater!" "Why you-" Donolan said, then caught himself. He exhaled. "I... I don't have time to deal with this now, not today of all days. I'll deal with your cheating, nigger-loving ass when I get back home." "Yeah, right." said Trish, menace in her voice. "Go play like you're a big-shot, which we both know you aren't. Be the coward you are and run away." His face red and his vision near blinded with furious anger, Donolan stopped himself from doing what he ached to do. Instead, he turned on his heel and left the room. Having heard the shouting within the house, neighbors were watching as the wealthy industrialist got into his expensive Mercedes car, slammed the door shut with the tight finality of sealed metal, and scratched off, the loud noise getting the attention of anyone who wasn't already watching... Part 3 - The Hot Wives Investment Club (Author's disclaimer: the following is fictional and does not represent nor should be construed as stock market trading or investing advice. Investing in the stock market carries risk, and investors should not trade based upon the fictionalized information below. The author assumes no responsibility for the trading success or failure of others.) "The meeting will come to order." intoned Myrtle L. James at precisely 7:30pm on October 30th. The meeting of the County Ladies Investment Club was being held in the so-called 'boardroom' meeting room of the River Valley Country Club, the same room that Anthony Warner had convened some of the DynaCorp Board on the night he was murdered in the parking lot. All of the sixteen women in attendance at the meeting had their cars parked in the covered parking lot, denoting their wealth and status. It was obvious from looking at most of the beautiful trophy wives why it was nicknamed the 'Hot Wives Investment Club'. Their ages ranged from the 30s to the 70s (maybe more, no one was sure how old Myrtle L. James was), and the majority of them were married to some of the County's wealthiest men. A few were independently wealthy. After the attendance report and last meeting minutes were read by the secretary, Dr. Carolyn Muncey, and the financial report was read by the Treasurer, Ms. Barbara Langram, University Trustee Myrtle L. James led the meeting through the Club's existing stock equity holdings. Covered calls were to be sold upon their Microsoft (MSFT), Union Pacific (UNP), and Chevron (CVX) holdings. Stop loss prices were determined for several other stocks that the Club membership feared might drop. Then came the call to discuss what new equities to purchase, as there was cash for only one major acquisition at the time. And that's when the fight began. After several members made suggestions for other stocks, it became apparent that there were only two stocks in real consideration: Apple (AAPL) and Netflix (NFLX). The members were evenly divided between the two. Over the next hour, the discussion became a little bit heated and was on the verge of getting ugly. "Why don't we buy some of both." suggested Helena French, a lovely woman in her early 40s, who was also a member of the Libertines Swing Club with her husband. "Oh no, there is no way we should buy AAPL." said Trish Donolan, leading the fight for the NFLX side. The debate went on for several minutes, and appeared to be a standoff. At precisely 8:30, Myrtle L. James suggested that the group take a break and have some of the dessert that was available on the side table. The women talked in small groups, some going out the side door where the kitchenette and restrooms were, some in back of the main meeting room, some at the speaker's table talking to Myrtle L. James. At precisely 8:45, the meeting was called back into order. But not everyone was back. "Where's Trish?" asked Joan Knightley, a magnificent hot blonde in her 30s who was married to the very wealthy CEO of Crown Chemicals, and was also Dr. Bonnie Karpathian's assistant in the University Psychology Department. "I don't know." said Catherine 'Cat' Clausen, who was Trish's best friend. Her name 'Cat' partially came from the fact that she and Trish were two of the cattiest, meanest women in the County. "I think she just went to the bathroom. I'll go check." Catherine was relatively short, cute and voluptuous, with a mane of black, heavily curly hair like Dr. Bonnie Karpathian's; in fact, the two women could be confused for each other at a distance. She got up and went to and through the kitchenette door, which opened into the main room, prohibiting the members from being able to see inside the kitchenette. It was also a self-closing door, and all eyes were on it as it shut behind Catherine. "YAAAAGGHHHHHHHHHHH!" The piercing scream was Cat's voice, and had come from the kitchenette, and all of the women rushed to the door... then screamed themselves when they saw the sight behind the door: the bathroom doors opened outward into the kitchenette, and when Caroline had opened the one on the right... ... the body of Trish Donolan, which had been leaning against it, fell out into the kitchenette. Myrtle L. James rushed up and felt for a pulse, but it was too late. Trish Donolan was dead. To be continued. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 02 The chronological order of my stories is as follows: Todd & Melina series, Interludes 1-5, Sperm Wars series, Russian Roulette series, Case of the Murdered Lovers series, Case of the Murdered Chessplayer series, The Swap series, Interludes 6-10, The Murdered Football Player Series, Case of the Black Widow series, Teresa's Christmas Story, The Case of the Black Badge series, A Case of Revenge series, Trilogy Series, Dark Side Of The Force series, Caught In The Act series, Case of the Murdered Bride series, The Credit Card Caper series. The Hot Wives Investment Club, Ch. 1-2. Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas. This story contains graphic scenes, extreme language, and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial or racist language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above. ***** Part 4 - The Crime Scene I arrived at the River Valley Country Club at 9:15pm, Oct. 30th. Sr. Patrolman Rudistan stopped me at the entrance to the parking lot. "Can I see your badge, young officer?" Rudistan said jovially. I knew he was kidding, but I showed him my badge anyway. "Sure, Sergeant Rudistan." I teased back, knowing (but he not knowing yet) that he was going to be promoted to Sergeant on November 1st. "Okay, Rudistan, you can let residents of the subdivision in so they can get to their homes, but no one goes out, and the Press does not come in at all, clear?" "Roger that, sir." Rudistan said. "We've already got it covered." I drove on, confident that Rudistan indeed had the traffic situation under control. There were already four police cruisers and an ambulance in the parking lot, all with lights flashing. I got on my radio and ordered that someone come out and turn off all the 'blinkenlights'. Not like they'd bring the dead back to life, and they only served to get the Media's attention. Patrolman Hicks came outside quickly and resolved the situation to my satisfaction. I went through the front entrance, which was two large, heavy doors with a really nice glass inlay. The meeting room was immediately to the left, and entering those double doors (more normal sized, and solid wood), I found myself in the back of the room, looking forward towards the speaker's table up front. I saw a side table with desserts on the right. Against the far back wall were two sets of double doors, with the projector screen between them on the wall. Those doors led to passageways that led to closets, a/v equipment and cleaning equipment rooms, those rooms being behind the wall covered by the projection screen. Those passageways led to a back hallway that had a door to the outside and the covered parking deck... where Anthony Warner had met his fate months before. The passageway went on around to offices and a hallway that led back to the main areas of the Club. As I entered, I saw a number of women, some sitting, some sobbing, some being interviewed by officers. When they noticed my presence, the room suddenly became quiet. "Commander, they're waiting for you in the back room." said Lt. Cindy Ross, coming up to me. But I didn't move immediately. "Ladies," I called out, so that all could hear my voice, "I know you have had a shock tonight, and I appreciate your patience and staying here to help us out. I hope we'll be able to let you go home shortly. I also appreciate your cooperation in allowing the police to look into your handbags." Police had been doing so, searching for the murder weapon, and I'd already received a phone call from Cindy about their complaints. I'd told Cindy to tell them that if they protested, we would get warrants... and they and their handbags could wait at Headquarters for those warrants. No, I didn't say they'd be arrested, but the inference was enough that they were cooperating, and so far, no one had given any back talk. "What was that about?" Cindy asked as we went through the door to the kitchenette. "Some of the wealthiest and most powerful wives in the County are in there." I said. "I definitely want to get on their good side to the extent I'm able." "Oh." Cindy said. "I thought you were flirting with some of them. They way most of them looked at you, they'll be flirting with you as soon as they get a chance." "Maybe." I said. "The perks and curses of Command. Okay, J.R., whaddya got?" I asked the youngish Crime Lab leader. He and the Crime Lab were dressed in Tyvex suits. Because of the contracts we had with other counties, we were able to afford the Tyvex suits so that our people didn't contaminate the crime scene. It was the Crime Lab leaders' call if they should wear the Tyvex or not. This scene definitely warranted it. To the right of the main meeting room, to the speaker's left, was a door that led to a kitchenette area. Inside that area, I saw that to the right was a door that led to a service entrance for waitstaff, in front of me was the kitchen sink and counter, and to the left were the two doors to the two unisex restrooms, each meant to service one person at a time. Halfway through the right side bathroom doorway was the deceased, lying as she had fallen. There was a pool of blood on the bathroom floor, and some on the tile of the kitchenette area from her throat wound. Inside the bathroom, the toilet was on the right and the sink on the left. There was a small trashcan under the sink. Not only was there blood on the floor, but it had sprayed all over the back and left wall of the bathroom, some to nearly the ceiling. "Throat slit." said J.R. Barnes. "Hand over her mouth, slice across the throat with what looks like a very sharp knife, maybe a heavy one like a sendoku knife. But here's the thing, Commander: she didn't die immediately. She was dropped, but she managed to crawl to the door, tried to raise her hand to open the door, then expired and sank down, leaning against the door. When the door was opened, she fell out." J.R. had pointed to various blood smears on the door and marks in the blood on the floor as he told the story. "Oh, but this is interesting." I said. "She was facing to the left when she was attacked. Now if she were standing at the sink, wouldn't she turn to the right to see who was coming in? And if she were standing near the potty, she'd again likely be turned to the right by her attacker coming up behind and grabbing her." "Yes sir." J.R. said. "You're correct, though maybe in grabbing her, the assailant spun her around." "That's a thought." I said. "So our assailant must be fairly strong, as he or she did not totally surprise the victim. So, who was it that met her unfortunate end here?" I asked, though I recognized the woman. "Trish Donolan." said Detective Diana Torres, who had been looking around the kitchenette while her partner Martin Nash interviewed women in the main room. "Forty-six years old, married to Donovan Donolan, who goes by 'Mr. Donolan', but his apparently few friends call him 'Donovan'-" "Is that an assumption, or do you have data, Miss Torres?" I asked. "Data, sir." said Torres, grinning. "I wouldn't risk the Wrath of either of you Iron Crowbars by speculating." "Smart Detective, you are." I said, grinning back. "Sorry I interrupted. You were saying?" "Yes sir," said Torres, "he's the CEO of BigPharmaCorp. And I'm sure you remember from the recent Murdered Bride case that she was a Lightsource Industries employee." "Yes." I said. "Do you remember exactly what capacity she was in with Lightsource?" "Sorry, sir, I'm not prepared on that." said Diana. "Neither am I, but that's okay: we'll refresh our memories on that soon enough." I admitted. "So, who called it in?" "Geez, sir," said Torres, "our phones lit up like Christmas trees. The 9-1-1 system got eight calls about it, our Duty Desk got four, and Lieutenant Croyle got two." "Croyle?" I asked, surprised. "From who?" "I'm not sure, sir." replied Torres. "She just called Lieutenant Ross, who told me that when she told me to get over here." "I see." I said. "Okay, J.R., what else have you found on the body?" "Not much." J.R. said. "We took fingernail scrapings, and we're processing the scene for prints and stuff." "Was anything of interest found in any of the ladies' purses?" I asked, looking around at the ceiling and cabinets of the kitchenette. "I don't suppose we'd be lucky enough that the murderer just stuck the murder weapon into someone's purse? "No sir." said Torres. "No weapons, except a few handguns, and their owners have carry permits. We've confiscated them for now." "Be damn sure to give them their weapons back when we let them leave." I said. 
"Sir, are you sure?" Torres asked. I wheeled on her, harder than I meant to. "Detective," I said, "this victim was not shot, unless J.R. changes his story in there. We have no reason to keep their weapons at this time. Make sure to give them back when they leave." "Yes sir." Torres said, looking disappointed. I knew that there was a big debate nationally, not only about gun rights, but about confiscation of them by police at scenes like this. I, for one, did not want to deprive law-abiding citizens of their lawfully carried weapons, but I knew that others in my own Force and elsewhere were of a decidedly different attitude. "J.R., has anyone searched above the ceiling tiles, especially in the bathroom?" I asked. It was a hanging ceiling with tiles and fluorescent lights. "Not yet, sir." said J.R. "We'll be doing that after the body is removed." "All right." I said. "I'll leave you guys to it. Let me know if you find anything spectacularly interesting." "Commander," J.R. replied, "I always find everything about a crime scene 'spectacularly interesting'." "I can't debate that." I said, smiling, as I walked back into the main room. Cindy Ross came up to me. "We've interviewed nearly everyone." she said. "The stories are the same: they were having a meeting, they went on break, came back, Donolan wasn't there, one of them went to look for her, found her in the bathroom dead, screamed, they all rushed in, saw the body, screamed themselves. We've also interviewed all of the Club employees, who are all still here." "Is there anyone that stands out that I need to talk to?" I asked. Cindy had this look like 'we can do this', but I knew that I was a Commander partly because I knew how to interview suspects and watch their faces in ways the other Detectives didn't, so sorry. "No sir." Cindy replied. "All right," I said, "But I do want to talk to two people: the person that found the body, and Mrs. Myrtle L. James. She's a University Trustee, so I want you to meet her. Let's go." I walked over to the speaker's table up front, behind which Myrtle L. James was still seated. "Mrs. James," I said. "I'm sorry to trouble you, but I need to ask you a couple of questions." "Why hello, Commander." said Myrtle James. "I haven't seen you since your recent promotion. Congratulations. And I am so happy to hear that your wife has recovered so well from her surgery." "Thank you, ma'am." I said. "May I present my partner, Lieutenant Cindy Ross." "Oh... the Medal of Valor recipient?" Myrtle L. James replied, her eyes lighting up. "It's such an honor to meet you, Lieutenant, such an honor!" the old woman gushed as she stood up, took Cindy's hand in hers, and vigorously shook it. "Thank you, ma'am," Cindy said, blushing modestly as she always did at such praise. "I'm sorry we're meeting under such difficult circumstances." "Yes, so very sad." Mrs. James said as she sat back down. "Now what can I help you with?" I pulled up a chair and sat down next to the University Trustee. "Can you tell us what happened in the moments leading up to finding Mrs. Donolan?" "Yes." said Myrtle L. James, and I knew that of all the attendees, her mind would be the sharpest and most observant. "We started our meeting, we began a debate of which of two stocks to buy. It got a bit... exciting for a few minutes." "What do you mean by that, ma'am?" I asked. "Sometimes arguments happen." Mrs. James said. "Tonight we had a pretty strong one." "On a scale of 1 to 10, how strong was this one?" I asked. "Oh, about a '7'." she said. "We've had worse." "Did it get personal?" I asked. "Oh no, nothing like that. It never gets personal, as long as I'm moderating the debate, anyway. What's said in private beyond my hearing, I couldn't tell you." "So what happened next?" I asked. "At 8:30 I called for a break in the discussion." Myrtle said. "People were milling about, getting some dessert and coffee from the side table, talking in groups, using the restroom and so forth. At 8:45 I called the meeting back to order and everyone came back in... except Trish. After a moment, someone... Catherine, I believe... yes, it was Catherine, she was putting her handbag down when I asked where Trish was, and she said she'd go check and see if Trish was still in the bathroom..." "I see." I said. "Mrs. James, let me ask some background information, if I may. How does your club choose what stocks to buy?" "We have to agree by a two-thirds vote of the members present. With sixteen members, that means we need eleven votes." "And if there were only 15 present?" I asked. "Then we'd need 10, as it's based on the persons present." she said. "But I cannot remember having less than the full 16 at every meeting for at least a year." "So how do these disputes get resolved?" I asked. "Usually ladies give their presentations on what they think we should buy." Mrs. James said. "Usually we pick out one or two among the selections that everyone agrees pretty well on, and it's an easy vote. On some occasions, like tonight, we had a stronger argument between two stocks, Apple and Netflix. Usually when it's that evenly divided, someone suggests buying a half-position of both, but tonight... in fact, it was Trish that was very adamant about not buying Apple. She shot down the idea of buying both... in fact, she seemed more against buying Apple than for buying Netflix, if I remember the way she was talking." "Any reason for her taking that attitude? Of not buying both, of being against Apple?" I asked, out of simple curiosity. "No, no reason that I know of." said Mrs. James. "She didn't say during the public debate, and I didn't get a chance to talk with her during the break." "I see." I said. "Okay, ma'am, can you tell me how the membership of the Club works?" "Yes, but let me start at the beginning." said Mrs. James. "We began about six years ago, with twelve women each contributing five thousand dollars. Within the next six months or so, eight more women came in, contributing $5000. At that time, we realized that 20 was too many, but we didn't expel anyone. We made ourselves into an LLC and a Trust, and distributed 16,000 shares evenly. One woman, Mrs. Bonniker, passed away. Her family was paid out the cash value of her shares, and the shares distributed to the rest of us." Mrs. James continued: "We then had three other ladies leave over the next couple of years, and we paid them out and distributed the shares until we had sixteen women with 1000 shares each. That number seemed to work well, so we set our membership limit at sixteen." "Have others wished to join your group?" I asked. "You've done very well, from what I've heard." "Yes, we have a waiting list." said Mrs. James. "And the value of the fund is about $2.5 million now." I noted Cindy's look of shock and worked hard to hide my own surprise as I said "So for someone to buy in, they'd have to come up with nearly $160,000, wouldn't they?" "No, Commander, not quite." said Myrtle. "They could do that, or they could pay $10,000 and their shares would only be worth a pro-rated amount. Over time, their re-investments can be used to pay to increase their shares to full par with everyone else's. It's pretty complicated, and we have a lawyer and CPA do all of that for us. We've only had two women leave since we incorporated. Well, one of them died... Mrs. Bailey." "Margo Bailey?" I asked, surprise in my voice. I remembered how, a year and a half before, Margo had been taken to the Hospital E.R., and had subsequently died of a drug overdose. (Author's note: Please review 'Case of the Murdered Chessplayer, Ch. 03-04, for the Margo Bailey death.) "Yes, that was her." said Myrtle James. "She was the closest we ever came to expelling a member. She had serious drug problems, but she got clean... for a while." "Yes, I remember her death." I said. "I hate to have to ask this so shortly after Mrs. Donolan's death, but I really must: what will happen to Mrs. Donolan's shares?" I asked. "I understand. Her heirs will be paid their fair value." said Mrs. James. "We'll have to have a CPA determine that amount within a couple of weeks. Then the first person on our waiting list will be offered the chance to buy the 1000 shares from the Club." "Do you know who that person is?" I asked. "No, I'd have to have our lawyer look that up. Mrs. Olivet- I'm sorry, Mrs. Burke, of that Women's Law Firm, is our agent. She handles all of that and doesn't tell us, to keep things fair. Only she and her two partners know." "Thank you very much, Mrs. James." I said. "And I'm sorry for your Club's loss. Now who found the- er, Mrs. Donolan?" "That would be Cat- oh, that's her nickname. Catherine Clausen is her name. She's Trish's best friend. She's right back there." I saw the woman to whom Myrtle L. James was pointing, and I excused myself, listening to Myrtle tell Cindy that she so hoped to get to talk to the younger woman, if only Cindy would come to a Ladies Auxiliary meeting. To my happiness, and my surprise, I heard Cindy promise to come to the next meeting. "Oh, Cindy, while I'm talking to this witness," I said, "would you call Paulina for a warrant to get all the video footage from the Country Club and the area, then secure it-" I broke off. "I'll call Jenna; she's waiting up for me as it is." Cindy said. "Er... Don? You all right?" I exhaled. "Yeah... yeah." I said, trying to recover my emotions. "I... I was just remembering when Anthony Warner was killed outside, and... and Pete Feeley had secured all that video before I even asked..." Cindy patted me on the back of my shoulder, understanding. "I'll get right on it." she said as she dialed her cellphone. "Oh," I said, "while you're at it for warrants, ask for these also." I told Cindy what I needed to do, what I was looking for, and why. I went to the chairs in the back row and introduced myself to Catherine 'Cat' Clausen. She had black hair, curly, was short and somewhat voluptuous, but very pretty. But her nickname was 'Cat' because it was said she and Trish were friends, partied together, and were known to be a mean pair of bitches at times... the 'cat claws' would come out. "Mrs. Clausen," I said, "I understand you found Mrs. Donolan?" "Call me Catherine, or 'Cat', please." she replied, her eyes looking at me invitingly as she spoke. "And yes... yes, I found her." "Tell me what happened?" "We took a break from our meeting. Trish and I were talking in the kitchenette with Carol Carlington about the debate over which shares to buy. Carol wanted to buy AAPL, which Trish had opposed-" "Let me interrupt you with a question, if I may." I said. "Was Trish normally this... defensive in her arguments? By that, I mean did she normally argue strongly and uncompromisingly?" "She usually was set once she decided what she wanted to see happen." said Cat. "But tonight I'd have to say she was really determined to not buy the AAPL stock." Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 02 "Do you know why? And do you know why she didn't want to go along with the compromise to buy some of both?" I asked. If Cat was surprised that I knew that much already, she didn't show it. "No sir." she said, her eyes giving pointed looks at my crotch then back to my eyes. "She never said to me." "Did she and Carol Carlington argue about it?" "No," said Cat, "in fact, Carol seemed to have been persuaded by Trish." "Thank you." I said. "So you were saying, about finding Mrs. Donolan's body?" "Oh!- yes..." said Cat. "When the meeting was called back into session, Trish didn't come back into the room. I went to see if she was in the restroom and if she was all right..." Cat burst into tears despite efforts to hold them back. "I understand." I said. "How close to the body did you get?" "Not close." Cat said. "I opened the bathroom door, she fell out and I jumped back in shock." "I see." I said. "So you didn't go into the bathroom, or step in any blood, did you?" "Not... not that I know of." said Cat. "And I didn't go into the bathroom; Trish was blocking it when she fell out." "Just one more question: how was Trish feeling during this evening? Did she seem to be all right? Did she seem worried or distracted by anything?" "Oh, no." said Cat. "She seemed fine. Certainly nothing different than I've ever seen." "Thank you, Mrs. Clausen." I said. As I got up, I accidentally kicked Cat's handbag, a very large black leather bag, on the floor. "Oh I'm sorry, is that your handbag I just kicked, Mrs. Clausen?" "Oh yes, that's mine." Cat said. "That's all right, it's almost empty. Your officers searched it already." "Thank you for your cooperation with that." I said. Just then, Cindy came up. "Commander, a lot of the women's husbands are trying to come in. Rudistan has them outside the gate, and they're getting angry." "Thanks, Lieutenant." I said. "Go back outside and tell them their wives will be out shortly. Make sure they know you're a Police Lieutenant. Use your blue crowbar if needed. Don't let them give you any shit, no matter who they are." "One other thing." Cindy said. "J.R. asked earlier if we need to search the women's cars before they leave. I asked Jenna to get a warrant to cover that when I called her." "Yep, do that before letting the cars leave the premises." I replied. "By the way, get a patrol officer to find Carol Carlington and bring her to me. Thanks, Cindy." "She's up there talking to Detective Torres." Cindy replied, pointing to the blonde woman standing with Torres near the dessert table. I nodded and Cindy stalked off. I went up to Carol Carlington. "Mrs. Carlington, I'm Commander Troy." I said. "May I ask you a couple of questions?" "Certainly Commander." said Carol, looking me up and down, her eyes going to my crotch a couple of times. "I understand that you were talking with Trish Donolan and Cat Clausen during the break?" "Yes, we were." said Carol. "Trish was explaining why she didn't want to invest in Apple stock. She had a couple of good points, so I let her think she'd won the debate." "How long did you talk with her?" "Maybe five minutes." Carol said. "I came back inside here and got some dessert." "Did you see anyone else talking to Trish?" I asked." "No, not after I left her and Cat talking together." "And it was Cat who went to look for Trish after the break?" "Yes." said Carol. "Cat was still standing, putting her handbag aside when Mrs. James asked where Trish was. Cat said she'd go look for her and went back into the break room. Then we all heard her scream." "I see." I said. "Thank you, Mrs. Carlington. Here's my card if you think of something else that might be helpful." "Mmm, can I call you even if I don't think of anything helpful?" Carol said, openly seductive in her speech and look at me. "I wouldn't want either of our spouses coming after us with shotguns." I said, grinning. "Okay, I need to let you all know you can leave." I stood up on a chair and spoke loudly. "Ladies, I appreciate your patience." I called out. "Unless you're being interviewed, you can go ahead and leave, but you cannot leave in your cars until they are searched. We are getting a search warrant to do that. In the meantime, please leave a number where we can reach you with one of our officers. Thank you, ladies." The women made their way out, and within moments only police remained in the room. Just then, J.R. Barnes came rushing up to me. "Commander, we have something you should see." We went to the bathroom area. Trish Donolan's body had been moved and was being prepared for its journey to the morgue. J.R. had me stand at the bathroom door while he tip-toed inside. "Look here, sir," J.R. said, pointing to the toilet's water tank. He shined a blacklight onto the top. All I saw were faint horizontal streaks glowing purple. "Sir, someone wiped down this toilet top." J.R. said. "This is a fresh wipedown, some of the chemicals have not yet evaporated. It's the only place in the bathroom that was so recently cleaned. What it means is that someone stood up here, then wiped it off to destroy any evidence." "You absolutely must search above that hanging ceiling, J.R." I said. "And the sooner the better." "Yes sir." said Barnes. ---- Almost two hours later, all of the women's cars had been searched, as had the space above the hanging ceiling above the bathroom and kitchenette. No murder weapon had been found. "Okay, guys." I said. "Wrap it up. I'd appreciate it if you get your reports into the computers before you go home, so that I can spend the night reading them." Just then Diana Torres came into the room. "Commander, a man is outside wanting to come in. He says he's Mr. Donolan, Mrs. Donolan's husband." "Thank you, Detective." I said. I accompanied her outside, seeing Sr. Patrolman Morton accompanying a handsome man in his early 50s up the driveway of the Country Club. The man had black hair just showing gray, and a body that was fit but beginning to show the advance of age, and perhaps a bit of good living. "Mr. Donolan," I said, "I'm Commander Donald Troy of the TCPD." "I..." said Donolan, "I heard... I got a phone call that my wife had been killed." "Yes sir, Mr. Donolan." I said, knowing the only way to do this was be direct. "I'm sorry for your loss, sir." "Oh my God!" Donolan said, his eyes looking towards the building. "Trish!" He was about to run to the building, but I got in his way. "I'm sorry, sir, there's nothing you can do for her." I said. "Can I see her?" Donolan asked, his voice beginning to show the edges of raggedness. "No sir, not at this moment." I said. "And I wouldn't want you to have what's in there as a last memory of her. What I would like is for you to go with Patrolman Morton here to the Police Station, and I'll be there to talk with you as soon as I can. If you'd like us to call one of our Chaplains or your own minister, we'll be glad to." "Thank you." said Donolan, his voice drifting. "Oh my God..." He allowed Morton to accompany him to a police cruiser, which would transport him to Headquarters. "Ross, Torres," I said, "I'm heading back to the Station. "Let me know if you find anything of interest, such as the murder weapon." I knew that they wouldn't find the weapon in the meeting room or breakroom area; it had evaded my own quick but thorough search. Perhaps it'd be found elsewhere in the Clubhouse or on the grounds. As I left, I noticed the Press vans being kept outside. Both KXTC and KSTD had representation at the scene. I thought about giving just one of them an interview to piss off the other, but decided I needed to get serious about the case and leave the games to later. I drove on. Part 5 - The Long Night On the way back to Headquarters, I called Chief Griswold and informed him of what had happened. This was mainly in case the Press tried to call him at home for a statement, and he wouldn't be ambushed. I take care of my people, and I make damn sure not to let my boss get bushwhacked by the Media. However, it was me who was surprised when I got to Headquarters... and found that the Chief was already in Interrogation-A with Mr. Donolan and his lawyer. "Come on in here, Crowbar." said Chief Griswold when I peeked my head in the door. "I haven't asked Mr. Donolan any questions of consequence yet." "Yes sir, Chief." I said, coming in and sitting down at the table next to the Chief. When he made no move to get up, I began to understand why he was sitting in on this one: we were dealing with possibly the most powerful man in the County except for Henry R. Wargrave, and the Chief wanted to make sure he would be the one to take any 'bullets' in the event of any fallout, instead of subjecting me to a 'trial by fire'. I realized that I had a long way to go to equal the leadership of this man as I prepared to take over for him upon his retirement. "Okay," I started, "first, Mr. Donolan, I'm going to have to absolutely keep this one colored between the lines. I am going to read you your rights." I did so from the card I kept in my wallet. Donolan's lawyer whispered something to him after I asked Donolan if he understood the rights he was being read. "Why are you reading me my rights?" Donolan asked. "Am I a suspect here?" "Mr. Donolan," I said, "I'm sorry for your loss this evening, but as you are the husband of the deceased, you automatically become a person of interest to us." "It's entirely routine, Mr. Donolan," said Chief Griswold, "as bad as it sounds. We're trying to get at the truth, but we have an obligation to protect your rights... as well as those of Mrs. Donolan to receive Justice for the crime committed against her." "I'd like to talk to my lawyer for a minute." Donolan said. At that, the Chief and I got up and went into the anteroom. "So, Chief," I added in a teasing way, "getting in some last minute interrogations before you interrogate the fish in Reservoir Lake during your retirement?" "Might as well." said the Chief affably, then turning somber: "Seriously, Crowbar, this is a big one, politically. Those women in that Club are the wives of the Power Players in this Town, or else they're power players themselves, like Myrtle L. James. No offense to you, but I'm not retired yet so it's my place to make sure nobody tries to dump shit on you or your Detectives as you solve this thing." "I appreciate it, Chief." I said. Just then, Donolan's lawyer knocked on the one-way glass. We re-entered the Interrogation Room. "I am advising my client," said the lawyer, "to cooperate with your investigation and your questions. However, he reserves his right to invoke his Fifth Amendment right to silence at any time he chooses." "Fair enough." I said. "Mr. Donolan, I must first ask where you were from 8:30 to 8:45 tonight." Donolan replied "I was being driven home right about then. I'd just left the Board meeting at BigPharmaCorp." "You have a company car?" I asked. "Yes, the Company officers have Cadillac Escalades that have some enhanced security protections." said Donolan. "We took that precaution after the Crown Chemical riots some years ago... we never knew if what happened to them might happen to us one day, and we'd be attacked by Environmentalist Terrorists. Say, you don't think..." "What?" I asked. "That environmentalists murdered my wife?" Donolan asked. "Sir," I said, "I have absolutely no data or leads yet on who might have killed your wife. I'll keep your idea in mind. Meanwhile, is your vehicle the one that is in the Police Headquarters parking lot right now?" "Yes." "Would you object to me having a couple of my technicians download your GPS information from that car?" The lawyer quickly leaned over and whispered to Donolan, but he shook his head. "No, it's okay, they can do that." Donolan said. "I have nothing to hide." I immediately called the Duty Desk and told them to have two techs execute that operation. "Thank you, Mr. Donolan." I said. "Now I have to ask some rather personal and painful questions, but there's no getting around it. How were your relations with your wife?" "Good." Donolan said. "We have- I mean had a very strong marriage. I know that you, Commander, are aware of the open nature of our relationship. I hope we won't have to go into any details on that for the public record.." "I can't promise anything, but I'll be as discreet as I can." I said. "So you and your wife were not having problems, nor fighting?" I looked into Donolan's eyes as I asked. Was that the merest hint of fear I saw in them? "No, nothing serious." Donolan said. "I mean... we'd have arguments from time to time, usually over small stuff, like every couple has, I'm sure. But as I was saying, and as you know, Commander: marriages such as ours have to be strong and trusting. We get past any problems, and quickly." Out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of the Chief's look: he and his wife had probably never had a fight in at least 40 years of marriage; he never liked it when someone said that marital arguments were the 'norm'. "Anything recent?" I asked. Donolan definitely looked a bit uncomfortable. "I... we had some argument recently... I don't even remember what it was about... something about which party to attend on some night..." Donolan said, speaking as if he were trying to think. "Oh yes, now I remember... Trish did not attend the social function this evening before our Board meeting, as most wives do. She was going to that Investment Club meeting instead, and I thought her choice was the wrong one." "Does she usually attend company events with you when she's expected to?" "Oh yes," said Donolan. "She was very good about that. Not like Sean Bailey's drug addict wife, before she-" Donolan went silent. "Does Sean Bailey still work for BigPharmaCorp?" I asked. "No." said Donolan. "He left shortly after his wife died." "On good terms?" I asked. "Business-wise, yes." said Donolan. "He simply resigned. But there were some personal animosities when he left. Before you ask, I don't remember exactly what those problems were about, it was some time ago." "All right, but if you remember, please contact me immediately." I said. "Mr. Donolan, do you know of anyone else who might wish to harm your wife, and why? Anyone in your company have a problem with her, or you? A past anger or anything like that?" "Not that I know of." said Donolan. "We kept a fairly decent level of security, considering my position with my company, and we never got wind of any problems at all." "No break-ins into your house, or surveillance of it?" I asked. "Any house staff get fired or leave suddenly?" "No sir." Donolan said. "Okay, Mr. Donolan," I said. "I don't have any more questions at this time. I know you have your company to run, but this is not a request: do not leave the County. In addition, it's standard procedure that Mrs. Donolan's residence will be searched. We're getting the warrant now, you do not have a choice in the matter, and you may not return to your home until that warrant is executed. If you'd like to stay at the University Hotel or the Hyatt, the County will pay for your hotel room for tonight." Donolan was gaping at me, then turned to his lawyer, who immediately whispered something into his ear. The lawyer then spoke up. "We object to the search being made without both of us being present." "Certainly you can be there if you wish." I said. At that moment, Sergeant Thompson came into the room from the lobby side. "Sir, we have the warrant for the Donolan residence." the large, athletic Sergeant said. "Assemble a team and report to Lieutenant Ross at the location." I said. "Wake up Sergeants that are good at these searches and have them report. And as you go, carry Mr. Donolan and his lawyer in the back of your squad car, so that they can be present during the search. But don't let them go inside until the warrant arrives." Sergeant Thompson escorted the two men out of the room. Once we were alone in the room, the Chief said "You really do a good job of questioning people. I'm sure you're reading clues in their faces, too. Even my old eyes could tell that Donolan was hiding something." "Yes sir," I said. "He got uncomfortable when I asked about recent problems with his wife. He was trying hard to think of a reason for an argument, a recent one, and he came up with that attendance story on the spot. Ergo, there was a recent argument that we're going to find out about, and needs explaining away. I also noticed that he made sure to bring up Environmentalists, and he made a totally gratuitous point to mention Sean Bailey. He's really trying to plant seeds of distraction, n'est pas?" "Think there's anything in that?" the Chief asked. "Oh, no doubt about it, sir." I said. "There is definitely some bad blood between Sean Bailey and Donovan Donolan, and I think I know why. We definitely need to add Bailey to our list of people to be questioned." "Who else is on that list?" asked the Chief. "The entire Board of BigPharmaCorp, all of Trish Donolan's friends and associates, their neighbors, all of the Investment Club women again... a lot of ground to cover. And if you'll excuse me, Chief, I need to observe my Detectives searching the Donolan home." "You're not excused." said the Chief. I gaped at him. He grinned and said "I'm going with you to the scene, Crowbar. You drive." ---- Sergeant Thompson did not know that in just a few days he was going to receive a massive promotion in preparation for an even more massive promotion. As I watched him help in the search of the Donolan residence, I knew I'd made the correct choice in nominating him for Precinct Captain. Not only was he expertly searching, he was skillfully teaching everything to Detective Diana Torres that he could pour into her head in the time they had. Detective Nash, Lt. Ross, two other Sergeants, six Crime Lab persons and, to my surprise, Lt. Teresa Croyle, were all searching for anything and everything. We found virtually nothing, until we got to the bedroom. There were a number of DVDs in the room, and it was obvious that the Donolan's would watch these DVDs while in bed. When we bagged them as evidence, Donolan's lawyer practically ran over people to get to me and ask me to personally take charge of those videos and exercise discretion. I realized what was on them... swing club film footage. "Technician Cho," I said to Christina Cho, "put those DVDs under a seal in my name. My eyes only for first examination." I turned to the lawyer and said that I could not promise anything more than that I'd be the first person to look at them, and the only person if there was nothing of evidentiary value to them. The Chief nodded and the lawyer's face showed visible relief. We then ran into some trouble when Sergeant Thompson discovered the wall safe in Mr. Donolan's study behind his desk. "Mr. Donolan," I asked, "would you please open that safe?" "No, I will not." said Donolan. "And I'm invoking fully at this time." Everyone looked at me to see if I'd use my crowbar on Donolan or have a verbal explosion. I did realize that the crowbar would not physically open that safe... but I did not need it, nor to get upset. I just smiled a strange smile. "Okay, Mr. Donolan, as you wish. You've invoked, and you can't take it back" I said. "Everyone stay here." I went out to my Police SUV and got a bag out of the back. It was a kit of items that I had not used in years. Taking the bag inside, I went back into the study, feeling the many pairs of eyes watching me. Out of the bag I took safecracking devices from my days selling security equipment. Sometimes I'd sell something, including safes, only to have the client forget how to operate it, and I'd have to go help them out. I took out a device that even Federal Government agents would want to have: a device that read electronic safe combinations. It took all of 30 seconds to get into Donolan's safe. I told everyone to stand to the sides and not in front of the safe, just in case it was booby-trapped. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 02 "I am not going to ask where you got that device." said the Chief as I slowly opened the door to the safe. "Just stay on the side of Law and Order, would you?" "No worries, Chief." I said as I began bringing out the contents of the safe. Inside were a number of papers pertaining to his company, some CD certificates, some cash and jewelry... and more DVDs. I had the DVDs bagged as evidence under an 'Eyes Only' seal... ... and then I found a manila envelope. Pulling out the contents, I saw the photographs of Trish Donolan being deeply fucked by 'Black Magic'. They were some of the pictures Teresa and Grubby Paul had taken. I called over Lt. Croyle, who came forward and said simply "What?" "Lieutenant," I said quietly, showing her the pics, "it looks like we have a huge leak in our computer systems." Teresa's eyes widened as I called out "Ross!" Cindy came up. "Ross, contact Myron Milton and Mary Mahoney. Right now. Get their asses into Headquarters. We're searching for a breach of our computer systems. Croyle will give you the details of the file and the photographs that have been breached." I went up to Donolan. "Sure you don't want to tell me where you got these?" I asked, showing him the pics. "He's invoked, Commander." said his lawyer. "Like you said, he can't talk anymore, even if he wants to." "Too bad." I said. "These pictures in his possession are damning, and perhaps if he'd not invoked until he gave a reasonable explanation for them, there'd be no problem... but now I'm required to arrest Mr. Donolan. Sergeant Thompson, arrest Donolan, book him and process him-" "Wait a minute, wait a minute, just a darn minute!" the lawyer said. Chief Griswold was walking up, also. "What's going on, Crowbar?" asked the Chief. "Sir, Mr. Donolan is in possession of photographs taken by our Vice Squad during a drug surveillance operation." I said. "Photographs that involve his wife in flagrante delicto with one of the drug suspects from that operation." I showed the Chief the photographs. He confirmed with Lt. Croyle that they were indeed the same photographs. "The Commander is right, counselor." Griswold said. "Your client is in a world of shit right now." "Look, guys," the lawyer was saying, "you're talking about the CEO of a big company, here. He gets arrested, and the Media are going to have a field day. You know how they are. They'll lie, they'll tell stories that have no basis in fact, they'll drag Mr. Donolan's name through the mud just because they enjoy it. There's got to be something we can do, something we can work out." The Chief pulled me into the hallway outside the study. "He has a point, Crowbar." he said. "This isn't some pimp from the Tenderloin District. If he's guilty, then I'd be the first to bury him, but if he's not, he's the kind whose reputation the Media will leave in shreds with no apology, no retractions, no follow-ups to tell the truth when we get it." "I agree. What do you want to do, Chief?" I asked. "It's your decision. Welcome to Command." said the Chief. "And so you know, I'm not just passing the buck to you, here. This'll be going on for months, and the fallout will come onto you. I'll back you up, whatever you decide. Also, for all we know he may be innocent and these pictures have another explanation-" "Oh! Of course!" I gasped out at the Chief's last sentence. "Oh, sorry, sir, didn't mean to interrupt. I just realized something." "What?" asked the Chief as I tried to think. "Give me five minutes, please." I said. The Chief left me alone and went to talk to Croyle and Ross. Five minutes later, I returned to the study and went to the Chief. "We should process him, just to get fresh fingerprints on file and get DNA." I said. "But he won't get bail: any judge would release a public figure like him to his lawyer's custody and on his on recognizance. So we don't have to formally charge him just yet. But what I can't see is how to stop him from fleeing, should he choose to do so." "Leave that to me." said the Chief. "And it looks like I get to teach Kid Crowbar something, after all." I had no problems learning from the Chief's wealth of experience as I followed him to talk to the troubled widower and his exhausted legal beagle. --- Moments later, I was asked by Lt. Ross to come back to the master bedroom. When I got there, she led me into the little sitting room that was next to the bedroom. It was Trish's little office study, as Melina had used her sitting room as her study when we lived in Midtown, in the house that Cindy's sister Molly now lived in. "It's right behind this air vent." said Cindy. What looked like an A/C or heating vent in the back wall was actually a little door on a hinge. Behind it, embedded in the wall, was a small safe. Donovan Donolan, who had come up with his lawyer, gasped at the sight of it. "Didn't know your wife had a safe here, Mr. Donolan?" I asked as I prepared my equipment to open the safe. Donovan only shook his head as I took the next 30 seconds opening the safe. Inside were more papers and DVDs. "Let's bag these separately from the others, Ross." I said. "DVDs under my personal seal." Part 6 - Suspects and Clues "This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" blared the lovely reporterette into the television sets of the region at 7:00am on October 31st. "We're bringing you live coverage of the murder of Trish Donolan, wife of wealthy BigPharmaCorp CEO Donovan Donolan. Police have not released details of the murder, but Channel Two News has confirmed that she was murdered at the River Valley Country Club during a meeting of the County Wives Investment Club." Bettina went on to describe the course of events that night, just a bit too accurately for my liking. Bettina continued: "Wealthy CEO Donovan Donolan is at Police Headquarters now, cooperating with Police in the investigation of his wife's death. Channel Two News has confirmed that the Donolan home was searched last night. Police Chief Griswold issued a statement saying that their investigation is routine procedure, and that he expects Mr. Donolan to be able to return home soon." ---- Having gulped down my coffee, I went with Detectives Nash and Torres to Lightsource Industries, where Trish Donolan worked. I need not say that the company CEO, Mr. Turner Rogers, was devastated to see us for the second time in under a month. "I can't believe it." he said to me and Nash, as Torres led a team of police officers in interviewing Trish's co-workers. "Lang and Blair, and now Trish Donolan. I feel like a curse has descended upon me." "I am sorry for your losses, sir," I said, "and I appreciate your cooperation. Can you tell me what Trish Donolan did with your company?" "Yes, but I need to be very careful in my wording, and I'm sure you'll understand why." said Mr. Rogers. "Mrs. Donolan was officially the Associate Director of Marketing. But what she really was... was the unofficial Social Director. She was the one that arranged social events for our clients, parties around here for the employees, birthday parties and such. She arranged for our clients to be kept happy- oh, I don't mean that the way it sounded. I meant..." Rogers did not finish the sentence, his face red from blushing. "I understand, Mr. Rogers." I said. "So she was the Social coordinator of sorts. Do you know, sir, of anyone that might have reason to harm her?" "No, not at all." replied Rogers. "She was popular with her co-workers, to the best of my knowledge. I know she was upset about Diane Lang and Larry and Blair, but so was everyone else." "Martin," I said, "Why don't you go help Detective Torres finish up the interviews with the employees. I'll finish up with Mr. Rogers, here." "Uhh..." Nash said, then caught himself, getting the hint. "Yes sir." He got up and left. "Mr. Rogers," I said, once we were alone, "I want to ask you about the industrial espionage situation. Just you and me, badges off, no record of this conversation being written down." "I do want to thank you for alerting me to that." said Rogers. "I hired the team of private investigators you suggested, instead of those from Acme Private Investigations. The guys I hired found that there was not only one but two leaks. One was Blair, who didn't have proper authority but managed to access our research data; and the other, we haven't conclusively determined yet. It could've been Larry Lang, but my investigators' I.T. technicians said that sophisticated programs were used to avoid detection and corrupt the IP addresses and metadata of whoever did access that information." "I see." I said, using that phrase all too frequently. "Mr. Rogers, I am not expecting you to show me the schematics or the technical papers, but it would help if I knew what cutting edge research you're doing that has industrial spies so interested in your work. Please, tell me what you can." Mr. Rogers grimaced, then said "I'll just tell you this much, but no more. We accidentally discovered a laser process that, if harnessed, could speed up computer processing to a trillion instructions per second... yes..." He had seen the look of shock on my face. "We're secretly working with Mr. Oliver of BOW Enterprises." Rogers continued. "He secured patents on a nano-etching procedure before we were able to move on it... no, he didn't steal it, he applied for the patent before we even found a similar process ourselves. Anyway, between his work and our own, we're trying to flesh out what we can make work and then be practical. I need not say what this would do to the super-computing industry, nor the billions of dollars it would be worth." "No sir, I totally get that picture." I said. "And I think you understand that these may be secrets worth dying... and killing for. I'll keep quiet about that, of course, but if I come across anything leading to the killer of Trish Donolan, I'm going to have to pursue it." "I understand, son." said Mr. Rogers. "And I'm in your debt already for your brilliant work in solving the Lang murder, as well as alerting me to the espionage attempts." I took my leave of Mr. Rogers and went to find my Detectives. I was not totally surprised to learn that nothing of consequence came of the interviews of Trish Donolan's co-workers. ---- At 11:00am, Oct. 31st, Teresa Croyle and I were shown into the office of Sean Bailey at Crown Chemicals. He was in charge of their sales and marketing department. He was a handsome man in his late 30s, with brown, almost blondish hair. He looked at me a bit warily as he asked me to sit down. "Mr. Bailey," I said, "We're investigating the death of Trish Donolan last night." "I heard about that on the radio." said Bailey. "I don't know how I can help you, though." "You can help tremendously by telling me where you were between 8:30 and 8:45 last night." I replied, keeping my face emotionless and even as I looked at him. "Oh... I see." Bailey said. "At this point, I'd like to ask the company lawyer to attend this conversation." "By all means." I said. "Do you have a conference room where we can talk? Maybe give us a bit more room?" Once the lawyer arrived in the conference room with us, Bailey opened up the conversation. "To answer your previous question, Commander, I was at a dinner with clients last night at The Steakhouse. We were there until 9:00pm." The Steakhouse was not very close to the River Valley Clubhouse, I thought as I asked Bailey for the names of people we could contact to verify his alibi. He gave them readily, one of them being the CEO of Crown Chemicals. "Commander," said the lawyer, "may I ask why you're interviewing Mr. Bailey about this unfortunate tragedy?" "Certainly, Counselor." I said. "I am well aware that a year and a half ago, give or take, Mr. Bailey's wife Margo died of a drug overdose. I also am aware that two women left Mrs. Bailey in the hands of the drug pushers: Trish Donolan and Catherine Clausen. Mrs. Donolan was brutally murdered last night." Bailey visibly started, his face a mask of shock, as I continued: "I need to know the full story of what happened after Mrs. Bailey's death. I need to know why you, Mr. Bailey, left the employment of BigPharmaCorp so soon after your wife's passing, and what your relations with both Mr. and Mrs. Donolan were at that time." Bailey looked at his lawyer, who whispered something to him. Bailey finally said "Okay, here's the story: after Margo died, I knew that Donolan's wife had taken my wife down to the clubs where their friends the drug pushers were. I did some investigating, and found that Trish Donolan and some of the black drug people were tight, that she'd often bring other women to their clubs so that they, the pimps, could get the women hooked. Margo had really struggled to get clean..." he paused. "I understand how you feel, Mr. Bailey." Teresa piped up. "I was the Detective investigating your wife's death, and I know what she went through. If you can tell us everything, maybe we'll get some more Justice for your wife." "Well," said Sean Bailey, "this won't sound good for me, but after I got the full picture of what happened, I confronted Donovan Donolan about his wife's involvement in my wife's death. He literally laughed in my face and said that my wife was just a cheap whore and a drug addict, and that his wife had nothing to do with it. Of course I resigned from BigPharmaCorp on the spot, and I came here to Crown pretty quickly afterwards." "Did you ever have contact with either of the Donolans after that?" I asked. "Yes, sir." Bailey said. "I had to sue him. I've looked for jobs out of the State, off and on, but I haven't been offered anything I want to take. I found out that Donolan was working to smear my name with them, and with others. I hired a law firm, and they got that stopped." "Okay, Mr. Bailey, thank you for your cooperation." I said. "I do need you to stay inside the County for the next few days. Also, counselor, I need to interview your CEO." "Before you go," said Sean Bailey. "Did you police ever figure out who raped my wife before she died?" "Yes sir." I said. "There were multiple men, but I know who one of them, the ringleader, was. Do you remember the guy last summer who kidnapped that baby, then was shot dead at Ward Harvester and the baby recovered?" "Yes sir... it was him?" "Yes." I said as I went through the doorway. "And that son of a bitch will not be raping any woman, ever again." "Thank you." said Bailey. "I'm glad to hear it." "Not as much as I am." I whispered to Teresa as we started down the hall. She nodded in strong agreement. "And I totally agree with your evaluation of your nephew as a 'son of a bitch'." Teresa said. I nodded in strong agreement. ---- The lawyer took us to the office of the CEO, Mr. Knightley. He was a model of a CEO, in his late 50s or early 60s, head full of salt-and-pepper hair, looking vigorous and healthy. I noticed that his administrative assistant was a hot blonde with 'decidedly' large breasts (i.e. she 'decided' to make them that way). "What can I do for you?" asked Knightley. "Sir, your wife Joan is a member of the Investment Club and was present when Mrs. Trish Donolan was killed." I said. "So while I'm here, I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone and ask you the necessary but routine questions." "By all means." Knightley said, only the faintest inflection of a British or Australian accent in his voice. "I understand that your wife works for Dr. Bonnie Karpathian, who is an associate of my wife at the University, is that not correct?" "That is true... oh, by the way, has your wife recovered from her surgery? Joan was talking about Dr. Fredricson just the other day." "She's doing quite well, thank you." I said. "So, how well did you and your wife know the Donolans?" I asked. "Not well at all." Knightley said. "My wife knew Mrs. Donolan through the Investment Club, and that was their only connection. Joan didn't particularly like Trish Donolan and Cat Clausen. She said they were a couple of mean bitches." "So I've heard." I said. "So where were you while your wife was at the Investment Club meeting?" "I was at the same dinner with clients that Mr. Bailey was." said Knightley. "He'd done the groundwork, and had me come in for the coup de grace at the dinner." "Successfully?" I asked. "I think we're going to get an order from them, yes." Knightley said. "Thank you for your time, Mr. Knightley." I said. Teresa and I took our leave. "So, Croyle," I said, "what did you think of that?" "The first thing that struck me was why Mr. Bailey was and maybe still is looking for jobs, when he has a pretty good one at Crown Chemicals." Teresa said. "To get away from the Donolans, to get away from where his wife died, would be my guess." I said. "In any case, Mr. Bailey still holds grudges." Teresa said. "However, I don't know if he's capable of killing, and he's certainly had ample time to murder either of the Donolans if he was going to do so. It'd be strange for him to wait this amount of time, then kill Trish Donolan this way. Unless again, he finds a new job out of town, comes back and kills one or both of the Donolans, then scoots out of town." "Good points." I said. "He sure has waited a long time... unless something new came up that tore open the old wound, and caused Bailey to act. I can also see that Mr. Donolan is as mean-spirited as his wife. Whatta couple, eh wot?" Teresa did not reply. Her face was set in stone, and I could not deduce her feelings at the moment. "How about I take you to lunch, Teresa." I said. "I'm starving." "If you're buying, it's a date." she replied. Part 7 - Loose Ends At 1:00pm I went into the Main Conference room to attend a very happy meeting. The six people I'd 'invited' (meaning ordered) to attend were already there: Sergeant Damien Thompson, Patrolman Ronald 'Ronnie' Kirkpatrick, Sr. Patrolman Micah Rudistan, Detective Claire Michaels, Lieutenant Susan Weston, and Deputy Sheriff (Lt.) Holsom 'Hal' Briggs. Chief Griswold also attended, a smile under his mustaches as he 'invited' me to run the meeting. "Okay guys," I said. "I'll start with you, Rudistan. On November 1st, you will report to duty with your uniform looking sharp and setting the example, as is expected of the Town & County Police Sergeant you will be on that day." "Oh man!" said Rudistan as the others clapped for him. "Kirkpatrick," I said, "that goes for you, too. You're going to be the first Corporal in this Department since Pete Feeley died, and I expect you to continue this very rare honor and legacy with distinction." "Yes sir, I will." said Kirkpatrick. I could see my words had the desired effect. Kirkpatrick was an outstanding young officer, and would make a great leader. We'd talked to him about the Detective track, but he wanted to carry on family traditions of Uniformed Officer service. And to be the first to follow Feeley as a Corporal was significant in this Police Force. "Detective Michaels," I said, "We were going to wait until February, but it's a Commander's privilege to change his mind: you will be promoted to Lieutenant on November 1st, and you'll take command of our SWAT Teams at that time." "Sergeant Thompson," I said, "you also will be promoted to Lieutenant, but for a different reason, which I'm about to explain. Deputy Briggs, you'll be trading in that gold Lieutenant bar for a silver one when you report back to the Town & County Police on Friday. We talked earlier, so I know you have your new uniform ready to go." "Yes sir, I do." Briggs said laconically, typical of his easygoing, laid back nature. "Lieutenant Weston," I said, "I'm sorry, but you're not getting jack for a promotion tomorrow." Everyone groaned sympathetically, then I said "Of course, that Police Commendation Medal is going to look good on your uniform. I brought you here to discuss something else. Okaaaay... Kirkpatrick, Rudistan, and Michaels, you have the rest of the day off to get your uniforms ready. I'll have your badges and ranks Friday. The rest of you, please stay here." Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 02 Once the other three were gone, I said "Okay, guys, as you probably have figured out, I am pleased to say that the Town & County Council has approved your upcoming appointments. On February 1st, you're all going to be promoted to Precinct Captains. Weston, you're Precinct 3; Thompson, you're Precinct 2; Briggs, you're Precinct 1." The three appointees nodded their heads. "On Friday," I continued, "you're all going to be reassigned to Reassignment Duty... and also the Department of Redundancy Department." Tepid laughter. "You might as well laugh, the jokes don't get any better." More tepid laughter. Tough audience today. "Okay, seriously, you'll be working together and taking the leads on getting Precincts going." I said. "You'll be meeting with each other, meeting with Captain Charles, myself and the Chief, meeting with Personnel. You'll be in charge of getting your respective Precinct Headquarters in shape. Damien, some of that is going to be done for you, as the Old Mill building is being reconditioned." I continued: "All of you also need to think about who you want in your precincts, especially in Sergeant roles. If two of you want the same person, then I suggest the old fashioned method of 'horse trading' to resolve it. If that doesn't work, don't start fighting; come to me and I'll flip a very unfair coin and then decide for you anyway." More tepid laughter. "Last, but not least, you'll be meeting with the Town & County Council on several occasions, but first you'll be meeting with the Chief on how to deal with the Council... and the Chief will give you very thorough training on how to handle them properly. That's all, unless Chief Griswold wants to say something." "Just one thing." said the Chief. "First of all, I congratulate you on your promotions. They're well deserved, and the Commander showed some astuteness and strong vision in nominating you to the posts. Second, make the Commander's job easier, as you've worked to make my job easier these past years. I know he'll appreciate it as much as I have appreciated your hard work." "Amen." I said. "You're all dismissed." said the Chief. "Okay Crowbar, let's mosey on over to our next meeting..." To be continued. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 03 The chronological order of my stories is as follows: Todd & Melina series, Interludes 1-5, Sperm Wars series, Russian Roulette series, Case of the Murdered Lovers series, Case of the Murdered Chessplayer series, The Swap series, Interludes 6-10, The Murdered Football Player Series, Case of the Black Widow series, Teresa's Christmas Story, The Case of the Black Badge series, A Case of Revenge series, Trilogy Series, Dark Side Of The Force series, Caught In The Act series, Case of the Murdered Bride series, The Credit Card Caper series. The Hot Wives Investment Club, Ch. 1-3. Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas. This story contains graphic scenes, extreme language, and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial or racist language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above. Part 8 - Whiteboards The meeting that the Chief wanted himself and myself to 'mosey' to was at 2:00pm on Oct. 31st. It was a meeting convened in Classroom 'E' behind the MCD room, and was meant to be something of an experiment for us, but 'normal' for most Police Departments: we were going to start the 'whiteboards' on the case. At the Chief's request, the meeting was led by Lt. Cindy Ross. Present were Martin Nash, Diana Torres, Theo Washington, Teddy Parker, Lorena Rose, Claire Michaels, Myron Milton, "Goth Girl Mary" Mahoney, J.R. Barnes from the Crime Lab, and Chief Griswold. Also attending were Detective Julie Newton and Lt. Teresa Croyle from Vice, and Sergeant Damien Thompson. In Classrooms 'E' and 'C', which was Vice's meeting room, there are whiteboards on the side walls. They open like double doors, and can be closed and locked when Detectives are not using them. They are also detachable from the walls, and we have been known to do just that and carry them to the Courthouse and A.D.A.s offices to present our case why a Grand Jury should hear our case. On these whiteboards, we'd be putting pictures and information about the suspects and various other things about this case. I deliberately arrived a couple of minutes late, per the Chief's instructions, then took a chair to the back corner and sat down, telling the Detectives to not mind my presence, to pretend that I was not there at all. I was trying hard to let Cindy lead the Detectives and for them to follow without me, though of course I had no intentions of disassociating from working the case. I wouldn't let them fail just to have them do a case without me. "Okay, what did we get done this morning?" Cindy asked, as I perused officer reports of the Investment Club members' statements the night before. "Teddy? Theo?" "We canvassed the neighborhood around the Donolan's home." said Theo Washington. "Neighbors said the Donolans seemed like a happy couple, but a couple of them said that yesterday morning Mr. Donolan left his home in an angry mood, squealing his tires as he drove off in his car. Another neighbor, in the house behind the Donolan's, said that she heard yelling, as if the Donolan's were having a fight. We did get formal statements from them." "Good." Cindy said. "J.R.?" J.R. Barnes, the young but promising Crime Lab liaison to the Detectives, said "The D.M.E. (Deputy Medical Examiner) says that death was from the stab wound to the throat, but she said it was not very deep, barely getting the job done. In fact, the carotid artery was not severed but nicked, and the bleed-out was slower than a full severing of the artery, which is why Mrs. Donolan lived long enough to get to the door of the bathroom. The D.M.E. thinks the killer was not particularly strong, and also the killer was either taller than Trish, or else was standing on the toilet seat when making the fatal cut." "No murder weapon, though?" Cindy asked. "Not yet." said J.R. "The Crime Lab went through all of the trash and through every room in the building, just to be sure. No blood anywhere else, no weapon at all. The Country Club's kitchen staff have fully accounted for their knives. None missing. "Sergeant Thompson?" Cindy said. Sergeant Thompson said "Ma'am, we collected all of Mrs. Donolan's correspondence at her home and Sr. Patrolman Rudistan and I are going through it all right now. Commander Troy has the DVDs, and will be looking at those with Master Technician Milton, who also has the videotapes of the Country Club that evening. Right now, we have nothing that stands out relative to the murder." "Nash?" Cindy said. "We didn't get anything from Trish's co-workers at Lightsource." said Nash. "But the one thing Torres and I noticed was that all of her co-workers liked her. No one thought she was mean or a bad person, which is a contrast to what we heard from her fellow Investment Club members and other women who know her socially. Her co-workers don't know her except through work, though." "Interesting... Myron, Mary?" asked Cindy. "The Donolan's finances are in absolutely perfect shape." said 'Goth Girl' Mary, dressed in leather, probably to tweak the Chief. "The only strangeness is that their finances are completely separate, and I mean completely. They own absolutely nothing jointly, that we know of, anyway. The house is in her name and it's paid for; no mortgages or liens. The cars are in BigPharmaCorp's name, leased at one dollar per year by the Donolans, and have some light armor and radios, justifying the cars as security needs." Mary continued: "All of Trish's earned money went into her own back account. Her credit cards are in her name only, and mostly were used at Nordstrom's and other places, shopping places. For his part, Mr. Donolan mostly uses company credit cards to buy his suits, his meals, anything he can expense to the company. He does have one personal credit card, it's not used very much, and mostly for stuff at home that he can't find a way to expense. Neither of them have debt, and both are in good standing with the IRS." Myron took up the story: "Looking into their past, Trish Donolan's family had money, which she inherited. Several tens of millions of dollars, some of it in trusts, some of it used to buy the house outright. It was her money and social influence that got Mr. Donolan started on his career to the CEO chair." "So nothing there that suggests a motive?" the Chief asked suggestively. "No sir." Myron said. "Not that we've found to this point. We haven't seen a will yet, so we don't know what he gets of her estate, but we did not find a life insurance policy on her when we searched the house, and they don't have any safety deposit boxes with any of the banks in Town. Now there were two life insurance policies on him, one of them by the company, a very typical thing; and the other was a variable whole-life policy." "Julie, explain the importance of that." I said. "Yes sir." Julie said. "Rich people like the Donolans don't invest for retirement through limited products like IRAs. Instead, they take out a whole-life insurance policy, and contribute far more than the base amount. The overage is invested in the markets, and the policy can grow to millions. Then when they retire or when they need the money, they can borrow against the life insurance policy, never paying it back. By borrowing, the money is tax-free, as well." "Thank you, Detective Newton." said Cindy Ross. "While you're at it, what have you found from the Investment Club's records?" Julie said: "First of all, the amount of their worth is, and to the penny: $2,404,684.36, and 80% of it is invested in high quality dividend stocks such as Microsoft, Proctor & Gamble, Kellogg, etc. They occasionally write covered calls, which is an income producing option strategy, as well. But for the most part they're conservative, and tight with their cash." "What about who's next to join the club." Cindy asked. "Ah, there we ran into an issue." said Julie. "Jeanine Burke of the Women's Law Firm of Dewey, Cheatham & Howe has invoked lawyer-client privilege. She refused to respond to the subpoena and provide us with the information. Myrtle L. James said that she was willing to tell Mrs. Burke that it would be okay to release the information, but Mrs. Burke gave Mrs. James reasons why that should not happen, so they're both keeping silent now. The judge said Mrs. Burke is fully entitled to claim the privilege and not waive it, so we're stuck there." "Commander," Cindy Ross said to me, a bit of a gleam in her eye, "are you going to work your niece over and get that for us?" "Nicht mich." I replied. "In the arena of the Law, Mrs. Burke can run rings around me. She knows what she is doing, and I suspect her reasons for invoking lawyer-client privilege are very good. So I'm not going to have any part of messing with that." "That's a wise man talking, there." said the Chief. "Anything else, anyone?" "Just a couple more things, sir." said Mary. "We've been checking out every member of the 'Hot Wives' Investment Club." I knew she said that on purpose to tweak the Chief, but he pretended not to take notice. "There are sixteen members, but only two of them have any financial issues that we could find. One is Catherine Clausen, Trish's best friend. She has some serious debt issues, and she and her husband are estranged." "Miss Mahoney," said the Chief, "what data is backing that up?" "Me, sir." I said. "As 'Crowbar 2' so astutely pointed out, Mrs. Burke is my niece, and hers is primarily a divorce law firm. No further comment will be given." Everyone broke out laughing. "Go ahead, Mary." I said as the laughter died down. "The other is a woman named Susan Wexler. She's from the City." Mary said. At that, Teresa and I exchanged glances. "She's been a member since the founding of the Club, but she has some debt issues, as well. She's never been married, though." "What's her occupation in the City?" Teresa asked pointedly. "I don't know, ma'am." Mary said. "I can't find anything on her, except her personal bank account and credit cards." At that, Teresa gave me another look, and Cindy caught it. "Share it, 'Crowbar 1'." Cindy said. "She's a City Police Officer, a Captain in their Police Force." I said. "And she has a history of undercover work; hence, you'll likely not find much on her. And for that matter, don't try anymore. I'll have to handle that one myself." "Absolutely, Crowbar." said the Chief. "People, let me reinforce how important it is to keep quiet and not get caught up when an undercover police officer is involved. I don't want anyone outed and murdered because somebody talked too much. Is that clear, everyone?" "Yes sir!" came a loud chorus. "Okay, if nothing else--" said the Chief "Sir," said Myron Milton, "I do need to report one thing about the videotapes of the Club. The equipment is pretty old. The timestamps are not in good shape, sequence-wise, but I can't tell if it's just bad equipment or manipulation." "Meaning the videotape footage is not really worth anything." said the Chief. "Okay, Ross, let's talk suspects." "Yes sir." Cindy said. "We're going to start putting suspects on the whiteboard. Obviously, the first is her husband, Donovan Donolan." Cindy put up a picture of Donolan, his formal portrait issued by BigPharmaCorp. "So what are possible motives?" "He had a fight with his wife that morning." said Torres. "Their swinger issues, might be something there." said Lorena Rose. "I'm thinking that there might be something left over from the Diane Lang murder... the Donolans knew the Langs pretty well." "Good points, Miss Rose." I said. Lorena was pleased at the compliment. "Anything else?" Cindy said. "Money?" No one was really buying that, and I couldn't blame them. "Okay, who is next?" said Ross. Julie Newton said "Whoever is next on the list to join the club. Of course, we don't know who that is." "True." I said, forced to break silence. "But let me point this out: no one, not even the Members nor the people on the wait list, know the names on the list, nor would they know the exact order of the names on the list. I verified that much with Mrs. Burke and Mrs. Myrtle L. James myself. What that means, folks, is that the person on top of the list is known only to the lawyers at the Women's Law Firm, and their own names are not on that list at all; a consequence of them getting the firm's legal business. So the next woman on the list doesn't even know she's next; ergo, no reason to go on a killing spree." "Ah, so you did work your niece over, Crowbar 1." Cindy said, teasing me. I gave Cindy a cutting glance with my eyes. Retaliation would be soon coming, swift and devastating. "I'd have to say every woman that was at the Club meeting that night is a suspect." said Martin Nash. "Especially Cat Clausen, who discovered the body, and was Trish's friend. For that matter, I guess the Country Club staff should be considered, as well." Cindy wrote it down, making a special notation for Cat Clausen, complete with her picture. "Whatever you do, Ross, do not put Myrtle L. James's picture on that whiteboard." I said. "I don't want my wife getting fired by a pissed off University Trustee." Everyone laughed. "Taking you seriously, Commander," replied Cindy, "if memory serves me correctly, she was in sight of multiple persons the entire time, including the break time. She's not a suspect. Anyone else?" "Although it's thin," said Teddy Parker, "there was another murder involving Lightsource Industries, where Mrs. Donolan worked. We have to consider something or someone from there as a tie-in." I complimented Teddy for his thought process as Cindy wrote it down. "Sean Bailey." said Teresa, to my great happiness. "His wife Margo died a year and half ago, and he blamed the Donolans. Although I checked his alibi and it checked out, he could've hired someone." "I'll start looking into his finances." said Myron. Cindy wrote his name down on the whiteboard. "Anyone else?" Cindy asked. No one spoke. "Okay, everyone." the Chief said. "The Commander told me he was going to keep quiet to this point, as he wants you Detectives to think without him. That is not an insult, of course, and it won't be an insult or a put-down if he starts teaching you guys some good stuff right now. Crowbar?" "Thank you, Chief." I said as I stood up and went to stand in front of the whiteboard. "You all did a fabulous job, and I was thinking about taking a nap in the corner there. There are a couple of points I want to bring out, though." "First," I said, "I need to add a suspect or two, here. Trish Donolan has long been associated with black drug pushers, usually having sex with them but not known to be a drug user herself. But she might have learned something she shouldn't have. In addition, I haven't had a chance to look over the DVDs we got at the Donolans' home, and beyond that are those evidence photographs that Donovan Donolan somehow had in his possession. There may be something there, and something in these swing clubs that some of you have astutely mentioned." "We're putting the DVD evidence onto the servers for you to look at, Commander." said Myron helpfully. "Good. Thank you." I said as I put a piece of paper on the whiteboard. Printed upon it was a computer graphic makeup of the floor plan of River Valley Country Club, the parts around the meeting room. "Guys, let's look at this chart and try to understand what happened." I said, in the form of a professorial lecture. "There were sixteen Investment Club members and six River Valley employees in the building at the time. No one else that we know of. None of the employees were in the kitchenette area or those bathrooms during the time of the Investment Club's break. There is a door to the kitchenette that is a service entrance, but it was locked. Also, the hall's surveillance camera covers it, for what little that's worth." I then said "One employee was seen going in taking the desserts, and that employee came back out well before 8:30pm. The only other way into that kitchenette is through the meeting room, and none of the sixteen members noticed anyone except the employee who put the desserts on the side table then left through the main back doors, again well before 8:30. Those employees are fully accounted for." I went on: "So here is what was accomplished: during a very short fifteen minute interval, someone had to get into that bathroom with Trish Donolan, someone she knew as she never screamed out. The killer had to not be noticed by others, and then had to kill Trish, partially clean up, get rid of or hide the murder weapon, then get out without being observed or arousing anyone's suspicions. To do this, the killer was either extraordinarily lucky not to have had blood spattered on him or her, as no one was reported as being seen with blood on their clothing, save Myrtle L. James's sleeve when she felt for a pulse. And as Lt. Ross has said, Mrs. James had eyes on her literally the entire break time, not to mention her age and lack of physical strength to commit this sort of crime." I continued: "I again commend your attention to the missing murder weapon. The Country Club kitchen is on that side of the building, but at the end of the hallway, and the cameras showed no one going down that hallway, assuming we can trust the cameras. So I rule out kitchen knives, and J.R. has confirmed that, as well. There were no knives on the dessert table in the meeting room, and no knives in the kitchenette area, either. The murderer either had a damn good hiding place for that weapon, or else somehow whisked it out of the building undetected." "For all of that to have happened, a lot of skill as well as some luck had to go into this murder." I said. "Either it was so spur-of-the-moment that the killer got lucky, or it was exceptionally and extensively planned and orchestrated well before the night of the murder, and it was carried out with practiced precision." The Detectives were all silent, the enormity of the issues involved just beginning to hit them. The Chief broke the silence, saying "So, Crowbar, have you figured it out yet?" "Oh, of course, sir." I said, grinning. "I've known all along." "What?!" cried out Cindy Ross, still standing next to the left side of the whiteboard, losing her restraint. "You sat there and let us go through this and you knew all along?" "Hell no! I don't have a clue, either!... but you thought I did, didn't you?" I said teasingly to Cindy. I did say to myself that retaliation for her earlier teasing would be devastating. "Why you!" she said, picking up the blue crowbar from where she'd leaned it against the wall under the sideboard, and swinging it at me. I covered my head with my hands, not knowing if she were pretending or for real. All the other people in the room were laughing uncontrollably, even the Chief was gasping with merriment, his mustaches twitching mightily. Cindy didn't really hit me, but her face was red. And then it hit me... no, not the blue crowbar, but an idea that came out of the blue. I went into a reverie. Everyone noticed as the laughter died down. "Don? what is it?" the Chief asked. I looked up. "I did just think of something." I said. "J.R., call Christina Cho and have her and a small Crime Lab team meet us at River Valley Country Club. Ross, Croyle, Nash, Torres and Thompson, all of you meet me at the Club. Ross, ride in my car with me. Everyone else, keep gathering that data." I scooted out, and everyone scrambled, not worrying about an explanation that they weren't going to get yet. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 03 Part 9 - The Magic Evidence Recovery Trick "I'm sorry about embarrassing you like that, Cindy." I said as we sped down the roads to the Country Club, not really sorry at all. "I meant it as a joke." "Jerk." Cindy said, slapping me on the forearm with the back of her hand, still angry. Then she sighed and said, "Naah, I had that one coming, and you got me really good." Teresa was sitting in the backseat, trying not to laugh out loud as Cindy asked "So what are we doing now?" "It just struck me where the murder weapon might be hidden." I said. We all arrived at the Country Club. I told the team to wait in the lobby as I went to the manager's office to let him know we were checking on some things in the crime scene. The man's name was Trey Lundquist, and he was a very large (meaning fat) man with a bald head. "By the way," I said, "do you have a master key to all the closet doors behind the meeting room?" "Yeah, there's a master key in the box here." Lundquist said. As he went to the keybox, I looked around the room, noticing with disdain a fake palm tree in a flowerpot in the back corner of the room. I also noted a couple of plaques on the wall behind the manager's desk and a nice fountain pen set on the desk with a small plaque and inscription at their base. The manager unlocked and opened the keybox that was mounted on the wall. "Holy smokes!" he gasped as the door opened. "What?" I asked. "The... the master key." the man said. "It's not in here!" I called out the door for Christina Cho to come in, then asked the manager "When was the last time you saw it?" "Last night." Lundquist said. "One of your officers borrowed it, then returned it to me when you all left." "Hmm." I said. "Who else has access to this lockbox?" "Nobody." said Lundquist. "I have the only key on a chain. The Fire Chief has a key to the lockbox at Fire Department Headquarters. Here's my master key to the building's doors off my chain, just please give it back when you're done." "I will. Christina," I said as the Asian woman walked into the room, "take fingerprints of the lockbox. You'll have to take the manager's prints, as I expect his will be all over the place. See if any others come up." "Yes sir." Christina said. She got out a small rectangular box with a clear glass top. She then took a glass plate and cleaned it thoroughly, then asked Lundquist to press his fingers on the glass lightly, then remove them. After he did, she blew some dust onto the plate, then put it on the box and turned on the light inside the box. The man's prints glowed in an eerie green-blue light. "Well I'll be damned." said the manager as Christina photographed the prints, then cleaned off the glass and had the manager give his other hand's prints. "I've never seen anything like that." "Ain't technology wonderful?" I asked. "Okay, Christina, I'll leave you to this." I went into the hall, and led my team into the meeting room. "Okay guys," I said. "Let's look at this. The back doors to the meeting rooms lead down corridors to a hallway that leads to the covered parking lot." We went through the passage on the right, coming out into that hallway, seeing the door that exited to the outside. "Okay, so what's behind the bathrooms?" I asked. "Hmmm, electrical closet in the middle, behind the left restroom, and a janitor closet behind the murder scene bathroom. J.R., did the Crime Lab search in these rooms?" "Yes sir." J.R. said as I opened the door to the electrical room. "I know we opened the doors and looked in, anyway." The electrical room also had the telephone wires, a fusebox, and connections to the generator that was outside. "Nothing on the floor but some dust, which is not disturbed." I said. I looked up and saw that there was no false ceiling; this room was sealed against tornadoes, theoretically. "Okay, now the janitor closet." I said, opening that door. The room was deeper than the electrical closet, and filled with cleaning supplied and two big mops and buckets against the back wall and a three foot aluminum ladder against the right wall. Dust and particles littered the floor in the back half of the room. "See that dust and material, J.R.?" I asked. "I think it's from the ceiling tile above. Sample it." One of J.R.'s technicians did so. "Okay, here's a ladder, and I'm a tall guy, so I'm going to look and see what's up there." I said. I put on blue latex crime lab gloves. "But sir..." said J.R. as I set up the ladder. "I know, you looked last night." I said. "But bear with me." I got up onto the ladder, pushed back the ceiling tile, which created more dust and particulates in the air, then shined my flashlight into the dark space above. "Oh, what do we have here?" I asked. The red crowbar came into action, as I used it to drag the object to the gap in the ceiling where I could grab it. A plastic trash bag emerged, which I handed down to J.R. It was tightly wrapped around something, and was about a foot long and three inches wide and three inches deep. "Sir... I swear to God, that was not there last night!" exclaimed J.R., whose face was red with embarrassment. "And I believe you." I said. "I'll explain in a minute, but what's inside the bag?" J.R. unwrapped and opened the bag. Compressed tightly inside was a Tyvex suit with blood splattered all over it; blue cloth overshoes that were worn to protect one's shoes the way the Tyvex suit protected clothes, also spattered in blood; blue latex gloves like the ones I was wearing now; and... joy of joys... a large sendoku knife, heavy and extremely sharp, coated in blood. "Yes! Murder weapon!" I exclaimed happily. "J.R., do I even need to tell you to get this processed pronto, and keep a good chain of custody?' "No sir." said J.R. "Christina, check for prints before we touch anything further." As Christina went to work, I put the ladder back where it was after putting the ceiling tile back in place. Then I went into the hallway and started lecturing my stunned audience. "Okay, guys," I said, "here is what I think happened. The murderer copied a master key some time before last night, used it to come into this room and set back the ceiling tile to leave a hole, then set the mop up at an angle to the bucket. We know that the murderer wiped down the top of the commode in the bathroom, and that was because he or she stood on it, passed the bag containing these extremely incriminating items over the tiles and through that hole. The bag dropped down, hit the mop, landed in the bucket with the mop on top of it, 'Rube Goldberg'-style." I noted that J.R. Barnes was looking confused and skeptical as Cindy asked "So how did the bag get back up there?" "I think that last night the killer returned after everyone had left, coming in through this door to the covered parking lot." I said. "The killer got into the storeroom, put the bag back up in the space above the hanging ceiling, then closed the tile. We'd looked there already; what's the chance we'd look there again?" "100%, with the Iron Crowbar on the case." Cindy said. "But why didn't the burglar alarm go off?" "I'm betting it wasn't set, what with all the police activity into the morning hours." I said. "Or else the criminal knew the code to deactivate it. Either is a real possibility. Nash, go see if we can get any video of the hallways or the covered parking lot from the hours after the police left the crime scene." But our luck ended: "Sorry, Commander," said the manager as I returned his key to him. "Your police took the tapes, and we didn't install new ones and re-activate the system until late this morning. And no, we didn't set the burglar alarm; your officers stayed on duty in the parking lot, and we left the doors open for them to get in and out if they needed to." "Tell me this." I asked. "Do you remember how many of the Investment Club members left their cars overnight?" "About half of them." said the manager. "I didn't count, but some of them came back and got them this morning, after your police searched the cars." "J.R.," I said, "anything else you need from the crime scene? Otherwise I'm going to release it and let them clean it up." "Sir, after what you just did, I'm not sure of anything, anymore." said J.R., still in a state of shock over the turn of events. I couldn't help but chuckle at that as I told the manager the crime scene was released. "Sir, may I ask one question before you go?" asked Christina Cho. I nodded and she said "Why do you believe the missing key was duplicated... and if it was, why steal it now?" "Yes, that's a good question." I said. "The reason I think it was a duplicate key is because the original was there last night: the Crime Lab was using it, then turned it back in. As to why it was stolen last night, that's a damned good question, and I'm not sure of the answer yet." ---------------------------------- "Damn, Crowbar," muttered Chief Griswold as he, Cindy Ross, Paulina Patterson, and myself sat in the Chief's small conference room at 5:00pm. "That is just frickin' unbelievable. How in the hell did you figure it out?" Paulina was giving me a look that suggested she wanted to fuck my brains out right there on the table, in front of everyone. I made a mental note to take advantage of that when we were alone in her office, or mine. "There was this blue crowbar swinging at me, and my life flashed before my eyes, and it just came to me." I said, not really kidding as much as I sounded. "Let me swing it at you a few more times, and see what else you can solve." Cindy said, her voice deadpan flat. I had to work hard not to break out laughing. "Seriously," I said, "it did just come to me. I'd been looking at those ceiling tiles since I got to the crime scene. The evidence hadn't been found. I was going to call for sonar equipment to look between the walls, but when I saw the janitor closet and the dust on the floor, I knew." "So does finding this evidence help you decide who the killer is?" the Chief asked. "Not yet, sir." I said. "Myron and Mary are burning up bandwidth looking for anyone who purchased that knife, but good luck on that. And we might be waiting days for DNA to come out, and it'll be huge luck if anyone but Trish's DNA comes up." "Okay guys," the Chief said, "it's Hallowe'en and I know you guys have parties to go to. Get out of here. See you Monday." ---------------------------------- As I exited the Chief's office, Myron Milton intercepted me in the hallway and asked me to come downstairs. I headed down to the 'dungeons' right behind him. When we got there, Goth Girl Mary was working in the common area in front of all the cubicles. I sat down next to Myron and his computer as he handed me a box with several jump drives in it. "That's all the DVDs transferred to jump drive, for your personal collection." said Myron. "And you have your own set?" I asked. "You bet we do, sir." Mary said. "It's been heaven the last couple of nights. Those scenes really get Myron worked up, and he takes it out on me with that big tool of his." Myron was a geeky nerd, but he was blessed with an eleven inch cock that put John Holmes to shame, and Goth Girl Mary enjoyed first claim to Myron's Weapon of Lust. "I'll be sure my wife is around when I look at them." I said. "So, anything of interest on them?" "Most of the people on them, we already investigated during the Diane Lang murder case." said Myron. "And so far, there's not much else there. These are people with open marriages and in swap groups, I doubt they'd kill Trish over that knowledge." "No, they wouldn't." I said. "And they would respond to blackmail by using the Duke of Wellington's response to a blackmail attempt: 'Publish, and be damned!'." I then said "Just one question: do any of these tapes show Trish Donolan having sex with any blacks?" "No sir, not that I remember seeing." said Mary. "All white guys. Some group parties in there, but no blacks. Is that important?" "Just a bit." I said. "I'm beginning to wonder if, for all those years, Donovan Donolan never knew his wife was banging black men." "It's a real possibility, sir." said Myron. "We also checked further into Sean Bailey's finances and situation. Nothing in particular, but someone kept trying to put liens on his house and have his car repossessed. He hired P.I.s to investigate, and found out Donovan Donolan was behind it. The harassment stopped after he hired a lawyer to sue Donolan." "He's also taken a number of trips out of State." said Mary Mahoney. "Usually overnight, sometimes two nights. All kinds of cities: Atlanta, Houston, Los Angeles, Orlando, Nashville, Buffalo." "He was interviewing for jobs in those cities." I surmised. "Okay, let me give you guys an avenue to go down..." Part 10 - Hallowe'en Parties The first Hallowe'en party that Laura and I attended was at University President Wellman's home. Laura and I dressed as Hyppolita and Hercules, Laura looking like a Grecian goddess in her nearly see-thru negligee, and I like a man in a toga and gold leaf 'crown' that very much wanted to fuck his wife right there in front of everyone. We all were wearing masks of some kind, as well, but it was fairly easy to tell who was there. Sally Wellman was dressed as Jezebel and her husband, University President Sidney Wellman, was dressed as Samson, and many were surprised (the ladies pleasantly so) at Dr. Wellman's still considerable physique despite his advanced age. Tanya Perlman and Barry Oliver were there. She was dressed like a 1980s Madonna-wannabee, and he was dressed as a punk kid from that era. It did not surprise me that a number of people employed by the University and their spouses dressed up in some variation of the 1960s... they were either still living those times, or desperately wished they had lived in that era. And then, somewhat to my surprise, there was my nephew Todd and his wife Jeanine. Todd was dressed as Julius Caesar, wearing a red robe and a skimpy toga and very short pants that showed off his muscular body and all but revealed his massive cock and balls. He got a lot of looks from the women. Jeanine got looks from the men, as under her red robe was a toga as flimsy as my wife's very revealing outfit, and almost as scandalous as Todd's (lack of) clothing. Tom and Janet Riordan were there, dressed in clothes from the Roaring Twenties, with Janet looking like a cabaret singer, her legs looking hot in the fishnet stockings she was wearing. I did not see Henry R. Wargrave, then later overheard Dr. Wellman tell someone that the billionaire was in Washington, D.C. ------------------------ "I'm hearing you invoked privilege on the subpoena for the Hot Wives Investment Club's information." I said to Jeanine. We had snuck off into Dr. Wellman's private study, where I had a very pleasant memory of what I had done to Vicki Oldeeds on that very desk. I would not have minded fucking Jeanine right there on that desk, and perhaps she read my mind, as she sat herself on the edge of the desk. "I'm not trying to force you to reveal anything, but if there's anything you can tell me privately that'll help me catch a murderer, I'd be grateful if you could help me out." I continued, standing between Jeanine's legs as she spread and raised them, her high heels on the edge of the desk next to her now-exposed pussy. "I've been wanting to talk to you about that privately," said Jeanine, as she reached under the hem of my toga and slid my cock out of the flimsy pants holding my male equipment, "and tell you privately why I invoked the privilege, even though Myrtle James said I could turn over the information. Fortunately, I'm the only one that knows this. It's the names on the wait list to join their club." "Okay." I said, waiting for Jeanine to go on... both verbally and physically. She pulled me by my cock up to her, easing my throbbing cockhead into her labes. I pushed forward, sheathing my throbbing, iron hard 'crowbar' balls-deep inside my niece's steaming hot, sopping wet twat. "The first person on the list is Diane Lang." said Jeanine, her voice getting ragged as I began fucking her slowly. "Obviously, she won't be joining this or any other earthly clubs. It's the next name that I'm protecting... the next woman up for membership is your wife, Dr. Laura Fredricson." "Ahhhh, I see." I said, keeping up our fuck rhythm, sliding my arms under her knees so that she could take her feet off the desk, letting them hang suspended as I pumped her. "If that comes out public, I can't work on the case anymore. My wife would be a suspect, albeit a poor one." "Yes." said Jeanine. "And I mean no disrespect to your Police Force, but without you on this case... I don't think it gets solved." "Hell, it may not get solved even with me on it." I replied. "But I appreciate you doing that, Jeanine. So... how are things with Todd?" I kept stroking in and out of her as I asked her about her husband. 
"Okay." Jeanine said, peering at me with a funny look on her beautiful face. "But I know he's fucking someone. I know he fucks other women, and we're talking about swinging with you and Laura and some others, but there's something strange about it. Women's intuition on that." "Hmmm, did you ask him about it?" I asked, feeling my nut rise as I began getting closer to the crest. "Oh, of course." Jeanine said. "Unnnh, oh that's good... Todd just says he's having an affair with his new company... unnh... working long hours and there's nothing else going on. I know that's bullshit-- well, he is working a lot-- but I don't know why he's lying and being evasive. He usually tells me when and who he's been fucking... speaking of fucking, you can give it to me harder than that... oh yeah..." "I'll see what I can find out about Todd." I said. "So how are the babies?" My mind was more filled with making a baby than an already-born one as I asked the question... "They're great." said Jeanine. "They're going to be like twins, growing up together like they are... ohhhhhh....." We said nothing further, getting more seriously into our fucking... ----------------------- About 20 minutes later, Jeanine and I went to find our spouses. We found them together in the bathroom of the guest bedroom just down the hall from us. Laura was sitting on the edge of the sink counter while Todd was pumping his huge meat into her, just as I'd been doing to his wife. "Oh God, it's going so deep!" Todd gasped. "You're burying every inch of me." "Like being balls-deep in your aunty's nasty cunt?" Laura whispered to him. He responded by driving his huge meat into her with a hard thrust, causing her to say "Ohhh... easy, Todd, go easy... you're very big and I'm still not used to being... stretched like this..." "Yeah," Todd said, "I've never gotten this much into you like this before, Aunt Laura... is that because of your operation?" "Some." Laura said. "There's a bit more room in there, though the operation didn't make my cunt longer... mmmm... Jesus, I love feeling your size inside me like this..." Jeanine and I just watched through the cracked door as Todd pumped my wife, taking it easy and not fucking her too hard, but still pistoning in and out of her with that deceptively easygoing, languid motion of fucking that was his almost trademark style. Even at that pace, I could tell that my wife was being intensely stimulated, and she was really enjoying being fucked by the young stud's enormous cock... ---------------------------- "Todd blew a huge fucking load into me." Laura said to me as we drove towards our next party destination in her Mercedes. "If I didn't know better, I'd think he hadn't gotten any pussy for days, maybe weeks." "Jeanine was very wet and aroused, too." I said, then recounted what she had said to me about Todd fucking around. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 03 We pulled up at our destination: Lashes & Lace. Our friend Rita, the lovely, statuesque blonde that ran the place, had invited us to the 'late' party, which was basically going to be an orgy in the downstairs room. "Mmmm," said Rita as she greeted us in the private bar area. "Laura, you are dressed correctly; you are indeed a goddess, and you can be my goddess any time you like, if I can steal you away from this handsome hunk husband of yours." She then kissed my wife warmly and fully on the mouth. Then it was my turn to share a kiss with Rita. "Mmm, I have a labor for you to perform, Hercules." said Rita. "I want you to spend all night trying to untie the knot deep in my pussy. It'll take many orgasms, I'm sure. Cop." "I'll do what I can." I said... ------------------------------ It was nearly 3:00am and the orgy was in full swing. Everyone wore masks and some kind of costume. They were to remain in their costumes during the party, so there were a lot of cocks hanging out of unzipped pants or protruding from underneath togas (like mine), and many of the women had torn open their crotches to give easy access to their wet snatches inside. As was almost always the case when I was there, Rita had corralled me as her official consort, and we were indeed slowly and languidly fucking. Laura had given me half a 'gray viagra', and along with the large load I'd shot into Jeanine's pussy earlier, I was able to hold off from climaxing as I steadily pumped Rita in a 'spoon' position as we watched the many couples fucking hotly on the main ballroom floor. Laura had been eaten out by a masked woman dressed as Tinker Belle, who had enjoyed the sperm feast left by Todd in Laura's depths, then my wife had selected a very well hung young man that I suspected she knew as a University student, and he was now deeply fucking my wife in the missionary position not far from Rita's 'bedchamber' where Rita and I were. The sight of Laura's long, luscious legs in the gold lamè high heels with straps criss-crossing up her calves to her knees, as those legs wrapped around her muscular young stud, was extremely intense and erotic for me. "Mmm, your wife does have the hottest legs in Town." Rita said, knowing what I was watching. "She has the hottest husband, too. Cop." "I'm the lucky one." I said. "And lucky to be fucking the hottest hostess in the County right now." I slid my cock hard and very deep into Rita's cunt to emphasize the point. "Oh geez..." Rita moaned, reaching her arm back and pulling my head down for a deep, hard kiss, which she broke after a long minute. "I love it when you fuck me deep like that. Cop. Your cock is so fucking hard; I don't know any other guy whose cock is as hard and taut as yours... does it hurt?" "No, baby, it feels great while I'm fucking you." I said. "So," Rita said, "you want information on this Donolan murder you're investigating?" "If you have anything for me." I said, continuing to thrust into the blonde's tight cunt. Of course this was an unspoken but major reason for Rita inviting us to this party, and for us accepting. "Just this." said Rita. "On the morning of the day Trish Donolan was murdered, her husband Donovan hired a private detective to look into his wife's dealings with the black drug pushers in Town. He hired Acme Private Investigations, and even after she was murdered, he told them to keep digging into her past. It looks like he didn't know that she was devouring black snake as often as she could. Also, Margo Bailey is not the only woman who Trish Donolan delivered unto death at the hands of those pushers, but you probably didn't get wind of them; they didn't take those bodies to the hospital." "Acme Private Investigations, eh?" I said, almost idly. "You catch on fast. Cop." Rita said, knowing I was unerringly honing in on what was important. "Funny how your rich buddy is out of town right now... and with the big football game tomorrow." "I'm sure he'll fly in to catch that." I said. "Though his team is going to take an ass-whipping from the Wildcats." "I'm sure he'll be seeing 'red'. Cop." Rita said, grinning. "Now why don't you shoot a big load into me, so I can let your wife eat your sperm out of my juicy, cream-filled cunt..." Just the nastiness of her words made me hotter and more aroused as I drove my meat deep into her scalding snatch... -------------------------------- I did not go to bed when we got home. Maybe it was the 'gray viagra', but I was wired, even though I was physically drained from the sex I'd had in the hours before. As Laura slept soundly, exhausted by the deep fucking and pussy-eating she'd done at Rita's, I began watching the evidence videos on the jump drives. One was a tape of Cat and Trish fucking that looked familiar to me, and I realized it was the same tape Laura had been playing on my birthday night. I idly wondered where my wife got that footage as I continued to watch. Then I put on one of the DVDs that Trish had hidden in her safe behind the air vent. This one had not been put on the jump drive; Myron and Mary had not yet seen it. "Gold mine." I said to myself as images of Trish and various other women came on. They were fucking black men. I recognized T-Mac, Gloria Cagle's lover, as he deeply fucked Trish and came inside her. I was shocked to see 'Clete', the black guy who had been my nephew Ned's helper before we arrested him at the Olivet factory. He was fucking Cat Clausen with hard, deep, animal thrusts... this tape was some years old, I noticed, as Cat looked younger. I remembered that Clete was helpful to Ned's drug operations, and had been the one to bring Margo Bailey to Ned on her last night alive... Then I noticed that the sun was rising. I went out onto the deck to watch the Town greet the new day. It was Saturday, November 1st. Game day. The Wildcats vs. the Bulldogs. I couldn't wait... Part 11 - Football Wins and Birthday Celebrations Later that morning of November 1st, Melina and I drove in my Police SUV into the reserved parking area near the University football stadium. Such were the perks of being in the Police Force. But instead of going towards the North stands, where the University's president box was, we headed to the box on the South side, which was the visiting School's Presidents box. Melina and I had passes to enter. "Ah, good to see you, Commander." said my University's president, introducing several friends. Dr. Woodrow of my Crime Lab and Dr. Yates of the University Hospital staff, both graduates of my school, were also here. I introduced Melina to everyone. "An honor to meet you Colonel." I said to the Commandant of my School's ROTC program. He'd been a highly decorated soldier with over 20 years of continuous Airborne jump status and on his way to being a general, until an injury essentially ended his career. He was doing the ROTC assignment to run out the string before retiring. "And you also, Commander." said the Colonel. "Coach Marshall has told me of the outstanding job you're doing with the police here. I wish we still had you in the Army." "Thank you, sir." I said. I then noticed Melina had taken a red Wildcats jersey out of her large handbag and was putting it on. I was already wearing one. We were but a few specks of Red, Black and Gold in a human sea of Blue and Silver, which was the local University's Bulldogs colors. As the game started and progressed, it took a while to explain to everyone that Melina was not my wife any longer, that we'd both remarried (and me to her sister and a celebrated professor at this University), and that her husband was running for Sheriff... which is why Melina didn't wear the red jersey until we got to the box. And one reason it took so much time was because we were cheering a lot. The Wildcats were running rampant over the Bulldog defense, and our own defense was killing poor Nick Eastwood as he desperately tried to run plays with virtually no supporting cast. In the end, my Wildcats ran to a 56-0 win over the local Bulldogs, the local School's worst defeat since the 1930s. I was very happy. "Well, Melina," I said as we headed back to my vehicle. "As you know, today is Laura's birthday, but it's not going to be a happy one after that beatdown. What do you suggest we do?" "I've already got it planned." said Melina. "Your mother called me and we worked it out that we'll have dinner at our house, and your mom has already made a cake. What you do after that to make her happier, is your call. I would suggest... 'sex'. Lots and lots of... 'sex'." "Thanks for that idea, Captain Obvious." I said. It was an old joke from our married days. Melina tried to smirk, but could not help laughing. "So," I said, "are you ready to be a Sheriff's wife?" "Yep." Melina said. "I'll take a less public role after the election, though I'll have to show up at the Ladies Auxiliary meetings and attend all the public activities with Daniel. I think he's the more excited one, now that he realizes he's going to win the job. How did you know he'd like it so much?" "Observation and deduction, my dear, observation and deduction." I said. "Just as I'm deducing how excited you are about the new baby on the way." "Yeah." Melina said happily. "I can't wait." She paused, as if reading my mind. "I don't know what it is. I love little Doug, but I'm fine with leaving him with his father and stepmother. But I want Daniel's baby more than anything in the world." "I think my wife would make the psychological deduction that you're in love with your husband." I said. "Just a wild guess, though." I didn't say more, realizing that Melina's psychological makeup should be left to people with much more professional experience than I had. Fortunately, just the right person for that was on the case... To be continued. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 04 The chronological order of my stories is as follows: Todd & Melina series, Interludes 1-5, Sperm Wars series, Russian Roulette series, Case of the Murdered Lovers series, Case of the Murdered Chessplayer series, The Swap series, Interludes 6-10, The Murdered Football Player Series, Case of the Black Widow series, Teresa's Christmas Story, The Case of the Black Badge series, A Case of Revenge series, Teresa's Summer Race, The Trilogy series, Dark Side Of The Force series, Caught In The Act series, Case of the Murdered Bride series, The Credit Card Caper series. The Hot Wives Investment Club, Ch. 1-4. Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas. This story contains graphic scenes, extreme language, and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial or racist language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above. ***** Part 12 - Good and Evil Monday, November 3d. The alarm woke me up at 5:00am. My wife was lying by my side in our 'exclusively marital' bed. Molly was asleep in the guest room, having come over the evening before for dinner. Groggily, I headed to the shower. After my shower and shave, I went downstairs and to the den to pick up my police notebook. I tripped and almost fell over Laura's large 'maternity bag', which was full of diapers, and would also have formula and blankets and extra clothes for both babies. Fortunately, no damage was done to bag or Police Commander. This morning is not starting off right, I thought to myself as I headed out to the door and got into my Police SUV. I'm tripping all over things- hmm, maybe that's a sign, I realized as I thought about the case... maybe there's a silver lining in this morning's cloud... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * At 6:00am I walked into the empty MCD room to find that the coffee was made already and the TVs were on. Someone was eager to get back to work, and I knew who it was. I found Tanya in the back hallway, looking into the darkened space that was the office next to ADA Jenna Stiles's. "Welcome back, Lieutenant Perlman." I said. "Ready to take charge of MCD?" "Yes sir!" said Tanya, her face bright with happiness. "But I want to know why Cindy can't have this office, and me her current office. This office is not meant for Jenna's assistant Gor-don." Tanya had a point: Jenna's punk assistant had been working in that second office more and more, to the point he was practically making it his. I intended to stop that, and soon. "Cindy's staying where she is, in the Captain's office." I said. "And the office next to hers is going to be the next Captain of Uniformed Officers's office after Captain Charles retires." "Oh, he's leaving?" Tanya asked, surprised. "He hasn't said so yet." I said. "But once Chief Griswold is gone, I predict he's going to desire to retire, also. I'll be surprised if he's here after February 1st." "What about me and Teresa?" Tanya asked. "Our offices are so small, Teresa doesn't even use hers; she just sits in Vice. I'm thinking of doing the same thing." "We'll see what happens with that." I said, not letting on that I had plans to take care of my Lieutenants, extracted from the Town & County Council in exchange for supporting precincts. Tanya peered at me, possibly observing the gleam in my eye, but she said nothing further about it. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "This is Priya Ajmani, KSTD Channel Five-Alive Morning News!" said the beautiful Indian reporterette at 8:00am, November 3d. Bettina's broadcast the hour before had had no new news, and concentrated on the Elections... still a dead heat in the State Senate race, which depressed me. But the sight of gorgeous Priya wasn't too bad, I thought as I drank coffee in the MCD room and watched with everyone else. Cindy and Jenna were watching Priya with rapt attention... and it wasn't because of her news content, if you know what I mean. "Five-Alive News has learned that one Sean Bailey is being investigated by the Town & County Police in connection with the murder of Trish Donolan." said Priya. "Bailey is the husband of Margo Bailey, who was a chronic drug abuser and who died of an overdose eighteen months ago. Sources tell Five-Alive News that Sean Bailey believed Trish Donolan was at least partially responsible for his wife Margo's death, and that he may have acted in revenge. Calls to the Police Department for comment have not been returned." "What the fucking hell?" I asked, absolutely shocked. "Who the fuck did she call?" "Not me." said Lt. Scott Peterson, coming into the room. "I just checked. She called the Duty Desk at 4:00am and asked for me, then asked them to leave me a message to call her back. Of course I'm not here at that hour, and I only just now got the message to call her." "That's dirty pool." I said. "Don't call her, Scott... call her boss and chew his ass out. Let them know there's a competing network that just might start getting our exclusive interviews and have exclusive access to our Headquarters Press Room if she doesn't watch her step." Peterson nodded and left the room just as the Chief came in the other door. "What the hell was that story about, Crowbar?" Chief Griswold growled. "Some bullshit games being played, sir." I said. "And two can play that particular game. Can we go to your office?" The Chief led the way. Once in his office, I told him what I thought was up, and what I wanted to do about it. "I agree with your analysis, and you have my fucking permission to do it." the Chief said. "Move out." I went to my office. Just as I sat down, my cellphone rang. I answered it: "Why, hellooooooooo Bettina!" I said enthusiastically. "You're not recording this, are you?" "Hi yourself, handsome." said Bettina. "No, I'm not. I sure don't want this recorded: I just heard about Priya's broadcast on the other station. I just wanted you to know that we were approached with that same story, but we didn't run it." "Why not?" I asked. "We hadn't confirmed it with the Police yet, and we think it's not kosher." said Bettina. "Want to know who called us with the story?" "Of course." I said. "It was the press relations officer of BigPharmaCorp, speaking on the grounds of anonymity." Bettina said. "I see." I said. "Bettina, I was just about to call you when you called me. Obviously our minds are well connected." "I'd rather our bodies be connected." Bettina said in a flat out invitation. "Me too, and we'll make that happen soon. Very soon." I promised. "But for now, here's a huge scoop for you, if you'd like KXTC to exclusively film a perp walk." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News, bringing you exclusive coverage of the arrest of Donovan Donolan by the Town & County Police Department!" The image showed Donolan being led out of his home by Sergeant Thompson and now-Sergeant Rudistan, Donolan's hands cuffed behind his back, the officers holding his arms in a way that made it hard for him to duck his head. Bettina's voice could be heard as the television showed the world the 'perp walk' by Donolan: "The Police have arrested Donolan, wealthy CEO of BigPharmaCorp, for suspicion of murder, and also for having police evidence in his personal possession without authorization. A statement from the Police says that Donolan and his wife had a fight the morning of the day she died, and that he is formally a 'person of interest' in their ongoing murder investigation. We have no further details at this time, but will bring you more news as soon as we get it..." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "What the fuck is this about?" said Donolan's lawyer in Interrogation-1. Donolan had been dragged through booking, his mug shot released to the Media for widespread distribution. BigPharmaCorp had offered no statement to the Press so far, stunned by the events. "That Sean Bailey story." said the Chief, who was sitting next to me. Teresa Croyle was sitting in a chair behind us, and Patrolman Morton was keeping watch. I had no clue how many people were behind the one way glass, but I suspected it was a standing-room-only audience. "What?" said the lawyer. "That wasn't us." "Bull shit." I said quietly, my even voice belying my underlying anger. "What?" "I said 'bull shit'." I replied a bit more loudly and with emphatic clarity, looking Donolan hard in the eyes, ignoring his legal beagle. "Your press department gave that story to the Media." "You'll never prove that." said Donolan. "I don't need to prove it, dipshit." I said witheringly. "It's enough that I know. And all this is an eye for an eye. You had your people smear Bailey's reputation out of sheer, mean-spirited spite, asshole. You're as mean as your dead wife; you two were perfect for each other." "All right, Crowbar," said the Chief just as the lawyer was about to explode on me. "I think we get the point. But the Police Commander is right, gentlemen. And the charges are real. I suggest you think about explaining those photos." "You know damn well he can't do that." said the lawyer. "He's invoked. He can't say anything, and you know it. You're trampling on his Constitutional rights with these threats." "We're not trampling on anything." I said. "Your client may continue to take the Fifth, and I don't need his protestations of innocence to convince a jury of his peers, such as they are, to convict him of not only the smaller charge... but also the murder charge." "Oh Jesus Christ, you don't have shit." said the lawyer, his voice barely restraining his anger. "I've explained the photos on my client's behalf. And he let you check the GPS on his vehicle." "That just shows where his limousine went, not where he went." I said. "No proof he was in the limo at the time." "For crying out loud," said the lawyer, "his limo driver will testify." "How well do you pay your limo drivers, Mr. Donolan?" I asked, the insinuation clear. "Pretty damn well, last I checked." "Can I have a moment to talk with my lawyer, please?" Donolan asked. He was smart enough to have understood where all this was going. "Sure." said the Chief. "Come on Crowbar, Croyle. Morton, just outside the other door, if you will." "Yes, Chief." said Morton. He waited until we went into the anteroom, then went out the other door, guarding it. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "Donovan, if you talk now, you can't re-invoke." said the lawyer. "If I don't tell them about those photos, I might as well be dead." said Donolan. "Donovan, what happened with that Sean Bailey story? Did you do that?" the lawyer asked, his voice barely above a whisper. "I think my people took some of my words a little too literally." said Donolan, not admitting the real truth. He'd been the one to plan the attack on Bailey and have his company's media relations department give it to the Press. "Okay," said the lawyer. "My advice is to keep silent and let us fight them all the way, tooth and nail, to the last ditch. There is no way in hell they can make this stick. Any of it." "I hear you." Donolan said. "But I'm going to waive and talk. That Crowbar bastard made it clear they're going to lynch me if I don't. I was warned by some people... some really big People... that if he got pissed off enough, things would go badly. Well, he's pissed, and things are going badly." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "Just you, Commander." said the legal beagle. They'd asked for me to come back into the room alone, which was an affront to Chief Griswold, but he'd acquiesced. Regardless, Senior Patrolman Morton was in the room with me. "Sorry, gentlemen," I said, explaining Morton, "it's Department policy to have at least two of us in the room. That's for your protection, by the way, since one of our former officers, now an SBI agent, liked to beat the shit out of lawyers." I was remembering Ikea's assault on Jeanine Olivet. "Whatever." said Donolan. "Listen, I'm waiving my Fifth Amendment rights. I am telling you that those photos had been slipped under the front door the morning of the day Trish died. I confronted her about them, which was the argument we had, and then I put them in the safe and went to work. We had a huge Board meeting that day, so I didn't have time to work it out further with Trish. And I never got a chance to, I never saw her again." I threw up my hands in mock helplessness. "Donolan, you're not giving me a thing, here." "What can I give you?" Donolan said, nearly shouting. "I can't prove a negative. Look, let me put it this way: this is embarrassing to you that your photos leaked. And how in the hell could I get them? Aren't they secure?" "You're a wealthy man, Mr. Donolan." I said, not pointing out Donolan's contradiction in his last two attempts to make points. "One of the most powerful men in the State. You can easily buy things you want, things like those photos." "And how am I supposed to have known your Police Force even had those photos?" asked Donolan. "Money talks." I said. "My client is bring up reasonable doubts, Commander." said the lawyer, groping for something upon which to base a bluff. "Your story is not solid, and won't be in a jury's eyes." "Harrumph!" I grunted. "Counselor, I know all about 'beyond a reasonable doubt', but juries aren't stupid either. We found the pics in his possession. That's a hardcore fact, it's rock solid, and the Chief of Police was there, for cryin' out loud. You know you have to come up with something strong to counter that solid fact." I leaned forward a bit for emphasis as I said "And let me be sure you understand: the photos show your wife banging a black stud. You fought with her about it. That's not only probable cause... juries have convicted for murder on less than that. Jealousy... oldest motive in the world." "Come on, Commander," said Donolan. "You of all people should know that my wife and I loved each other, and that our marriage was strong enough that we had an open relationship, and you know such strong relationships don't change on a dime. Think of your own marriage." "Oh, if my marriage changed on a dime, I'd be the one that would come over all dead." I replied, very sure but not worried about it. "But that's beside the point. Yes, Mr. Donolan, I personally might understand... but district attorneys and juries more than likely won't." "Look, I was in my limo." Donolan said. "People saw me get in, I'm sure there's cameras everywhere that showed my route. I didn't kill my wife, Commander. And the photos: I swear to God they just showed up under the door. Obviously someone wanted me to see them, maybe someone is trying to frame me. Sean Bailey wouldn't be above that, Commander." "Funny how you keep bringing up Mr. Bailey, Donovan." I said. "Now why is that?" After a pause pregnant with tension, I said "It's time to come correct with that story, Donolan." "What can I say?" said Donolan. "After the man's wife died, he blamed my wife for her death. His wife was a fucking crack whore, she really was. She went and had sex with other men, died of an overdose, and he wants to blame my wife. He made some ugly accusations, then resigned before I could have him fired. I couldn't stop him from being hired by Crown, but I sure have stopped him from being hired by anyone else that's of any quality, including Lightsource Industries." "Why?" I asked, just curious. "The man's wife is dead, he's distraught and grieving. And here you are, absolutely hell-bent on destroying him, to the point of playing dirty tricks in the Media to attack him. Why?" "It's how you get to my position, Commander." Donolan said. "When someone fucks with you, you don't just take an eye for an eye; you take out both his eyes and cut off his arms and legs, too. Look at what you've just done to me in retaliation for what you think is my press report about Sean Bailey. You know the deal, Commander, that's why you are where you are." I tried hard to keep hold of my temper as I replied. "No, I don't beat a man down when his wife is dead and he's near-mad from grief, just for the perverse pleasure of doing it." I said. "And I'll tell you something else, Donolan: your wife did deliver Margo Bailey to those pimps when Margo was desperately trying to stay clean. Your wife took her to the clubs where the black drug dealers were, your wife's buddies, maybe your wife's black lovers..." I saw Donolan's eyes grow jet with anger... "and they got Margo jacked up on drugs, then raped before she died of the overdose." I continued, whipped to anger, my eyes boring into the furious CEO's eyes: "Sean Bailey was right about you and your wife, Donolan. He didn't fuck with you, just the opposite. You keep going after him because you know he was right when he called you out for being the mean, hateful, dirty little man that you are, Donovan. What you're really trying to destroy... is the exposure of your own evil." I stood up. "I'll tell you this, Donolan... no, I'm not like you... and you're damned fortunate that I'm not like you. If I was, I'd let you stand trial for your wife's murder, not worrying about your guilt or innocence. But, lucky for you, I'm more interested in Justice than in destroying someone for the sake of pure menace." I walked out of the room and into the anteroom, almost unable to get through the crush of people. I felt pats on my back and whispered 'way to tell him!' comments as the crowd moved like a living organism before finally dispersing down the various hallways. It took some time for the cold feeling in my soul, a feeling of being dead to all but Justice, to die down and for me to relax... Part 13 - The Pursuit of Evidence Though delayed by the arrest of Donovan Donolan, the Promotions and Medal Ceremonies were conducted in the large auditorium. I had more fun pinning ranks on the promoted individuals than having to stand there as the Chief pinned the Police Star of Gallantry upon my own uniform. Then, in a surprise, the Mayor walked into the proceedings and presented the Chief with the Police Department Distinguished Service Award, which was only superseded by the Medal of Valor and Police and Fire Crosses. The Chief's award was something of a lifetime achievement award, and I knew that upon his actual retirement he would also be getting the Public Safety Department's Distinguished Service Award. That was like the Defense Department's DSM vs. the Army's DSM. The Council does indeed like to give awards out like candy, I thought to myself, though happy for the Chief's well-deserved accolades. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * As the ceremony was ending and people chatting and dispersing, J.R. Barnes came up to me with one of his young technicians. "Commander, can we talk to you for a moment?" "Sure." I said. "Let's go to my office." In my office, J.R. introduced his technician, who was a rookie Police Academy graduate named Bobby Patrick. Patrick's best quality is that he had a degree in Chemistry from the local University. "Commander," said Patrick, "Technician Barnes and I were talking about our search of the facility the night of the murder. I examined that janitor closet, and I did take the mop out of the bucket and looked in there. There was no bag in the bucket, sir." "I know." I said. "And I apologize for having to say that you'd missed it. I needed that wrong information poured into the right ears, so that culprits would not try to flee the jurisdiction." I told them what had likely really happened, and they understood my subterfuge. I swore them to secrecy on it, also. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 04 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * At 2:00pm, November 3d, I went searching for Cindy Ross and was told she was in Classroom 'E'. Indeed she was, and she was looking at the whiteboards and a slew of papers on the table in front of her. And she was not alone: my mother Phyllis was sitting to her left, wearing her Police Auxiliary uniform. "Hi Don," said Cindy, "I'm just trying to earn that blue crowbar and figure this stuff out." "You've long since earned the crowbar, my friend." I said, passing behind her back. "Hi, Mom." I said, kissing her on the cheek. "You look gorgeous today." "Why thank you, Son." Phyllis said. "Lieutenant Ross and I are just looking over all the evidence. It's a very interesting case. I only regret that I did not see the crime scene that night." "I agree, it would've been good if you were there, Mom." I said. "So, what have you ladies discovered?" "Myron has found nothing on Sean Bailey, except that Bailey travels a lot." said Cindy. "I'd ascribe that to looking for a job. Otherwise, we have no motive for Sean, and really for no one else except the husband." "That is true, though I think we have some motives for other people." I said. "I'll point out one thing, though. This was absolutely premeditated. A master key was reproduced, a hiding place for the weapon created. The killer thought ahead of time about having a Tyvex suit for the blood. The killer planned, and planned well, to go back in and re-hide the evidence bag. I see real planning and execution here, and that means that Trish was the target long in advance. What does that suggest to you, ladies?" "Someone knew her schedule," Cindy replied, "someone knew where she'd be and when, and lay in wait for her. I'd say it was the husband after their fight after he saw the pictures, but this obviously took more time in planning for him to do it in less than a day, pretty much on the spur of the moment." "Very good, Cindy." said Phyllis. "But I just can't help wondering... if those pictures aren't distracting us. Mr. Donolan could've been planning to kill his wife long before those pictures arrived." "Nice point." I said. I looked amongst the mess of papers and began collecting the photographs. There were a number from the crime scene, as well as some of the main meeting room, with Investment Club members and police officers milling about. Just then, Teresa Croyle came in. "Commander, can I borrow Lieutenant Ross for a moment?" Teresa asked. I nodded and Cindy got up and went out. "Okay, Mom." I said. "Take a look at these two pictures..." My mother looked at them for a long moment... then she got it. "Oh, of course, I see it." she said. "Yes, I see what you're getting at, Son." "Yes." I said. "Now we just have to find motive, and some proof. Oh, that reminds me, I need to talk to Myron. I want him to check on the finances of someone who was at the River Valley Country Club the night of Trish Donolan's murder..." Part 14 - Evidence Pursuits, Sexual Pursuits Tuesday, November 4th. Election Day. At 6:10am I went into the Chief's office. As I entered, he said "Go get some coffee for both of us, and get back in here." I hustled to MCD, filling my large mug and then the Chief's, then hurried back. Yes, I'm the Police Commander... and I still jump when the Chief says to get him coffee. "So, where are we on the Donolan murder?" the Chief asked when I got back with the mugs of the Elixir of Life, that being coffee. "Close, sir." I said. "I'm waiting for DNA to get back on the evidence we found, and I hope we hear something today. I'm also waiting for Myron and Mary to research some data. What they find may be the key to solving the riddle." "So what else are you going to do, besides wait?" the Chief asked. "I was thinking of going over to the City and interviewing Susan Wexler." I said. "About the Donolan murder, of course. I'm still trying to decide how to approach her showing up in our Vice sting as part of that sex party. I'm thinking I might talk to Britt Maxwell while I'm over there, see what she has to say. Maybe she can look into the Wexler undercover situation, and would know who to get in touch with if there's an issue." "Not a bad idea, but of course the real reason you're going to see Miss Maxwell is because she's so easy on your eyes." said the Chief, teasing me. "Oh yes," I said, unperturbed, "and a lot of other men's... and women's." I replied. The Chief peered at me as I drank some coffee, then began drinking his own. "Well, it's Election Day." said the Chief. "Captain Charles has assigned Patrol Officers to every one of our 30 voting districts, so there should be no trouble." "No sir." I said, very sure. "But I can't say that about what's going to happen in the Courts tonight if Katherine Woodburn isn't ahead." The Chief peered at me, then drank more coffee. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 7:00am. Another wonderful cup of coffee, and a television visit from Bettina! "This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" blared the lovely redheaded reporter. "Today is the day! The Polls are opening right now, and the State Senate race for the 1st District is too close to call. Katherine Woodburn has a one point lead over John Cummings, but that is well within the margin of error. Experts say it's going to go down to the wire. Meanwhile, there are no other races expected to be so close, as Miriam Walters is solidly ahead the County's first election for Solicitor, and Dr. John Quincy Kelly has pulled significantly ahead of incumbent Steven Lester Haines in the Coroner's race." "Meanwhile, there is no new information on the murder case of Trish Donolan. Her husband, wealthy BigPharmaCorp CEO Donovan Donolan, has been released on his own recognizance after being arraigned for being in custody of police evidence without authorization. The BigPharmaCorp Board of Directors issued a statement expressing their vote of confidence in Donolan, and that no action will be taken until his legal situation is resolved. Meanwhile, as Channel Two News exclusively reported yesterday, Sean Bailey has been cleared by Police of any wrongdoing in the murder of Trish Donolan, and Police Chief Griswold emphasized that Bailey is not a suspect in their investigation. Stay with KXTC Channel Two News for the latest and most accurate news information!" "You know," Cindy said to me, "we really haven't cleared Bailey as far as hiring someone to do it for him." "True," I replied, "but if you can find where he paid someone a hundred grand to commit that fantastic crime, you're doing much better than Myron and Mary have been able to do." Martin Nash said "KSTD has walked back their story about Bailey, but won't formally apologize nor correct the record." "Withhold my surprise-" I started. I then went into a reverie. A long one. "Don?" Cindy finally said, gently shaking my shoulder. "Yeah, yeah..." I said to myself. "Solving the murder over morning coffee, are we?" Cindy said. "If so, allow me to pour you a fresh cup." "Please do." I said, holding out my cup. As Cindy filled it, I said "Solving murders is good. Coffee is better." After sipping from my mug, I said "No, I haven't solved it yet, but what I was thinking about may tie in. I just realized why KSTD went off on Bailey like they did before confirming the story." I stood up. "Excuse me, folks. I've got to go talk to Myron... and call Jack Muscone." "I love my job, I love my job, I love my job, I love my job..." Cindy chanted after I'd left. Martin Nash grinned at Cindy's eternal complaint, giving about as big a grin as anyone in MCD had seen from him in some time. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * At 10:45am I entered the FBI office of Jack Muscone in the City. "How the heck are you, Don?" Jack said. "Glad to see you over in our neck of the woods." "Thanks, Jack." I said, sitting down in the chair to which he pointed. "So how have you been doing?" "Not too bad, personally and professionally." he said. "My team's been working on finishing up the rogue CIA cell. They had a lot more tentacles than we realized, and your discovery of Alicia Foster and her husband Spence tore open new holes for us to look into, with some positive results. And something along those lines is why you're here now, isn't it?" "Of course." I said. "Did you look into the industrial espionage angle I suggested?" "Yes and no." said Muscone. "We started to, and then my boss suggested that was something our FBI Consultant could research in his spare time and get paid for doing it." "I'm already doing it, and keeping track of the hours." I said. "Both the Alicia Foster case and the one before it, the Diane Lang murder case, have something behind them." "What's that? CIA associates?" Jack asked, intentionally getting in a dig at the other Federal service. "No, I'm the one sleeping with one of those." I said. "No, it's even worse than the Company... it's the lawyers. Those weren't just local legal beagles defending those ladies, but real legal firepower, 'expensive-as-all-get-out' kind of firepower. Atkins had a high power attorney behind him, also, and Spence Foster's wasn't shabby." I continued: "As to the murder of Trish Donolan that I'm working on now, there's pre-planning and bold execution behind the killer's actions. And in that, I'm sensing that same presence lurking in the background." "We heard about the Donolan case." said Muscone. "The boys in Washington have been getting an earful about it, wanting us to get involved in it, or get the SBI into it. Of course it's your case all the way, and I don't know why they're interested." "It's because the dead woman's husband is the CEO of BigPharmaCorp, not one of the really big 'Big Boyz', but on the second tier. And the Big Boyz are scared shitless about the whole thing, especially after I had Donolan arrested after he pulled a dirty trick. Also, our Vice squad had a drug sting going, and we got some pictures of Trish Donolan and our drug suspects from the City fucking their brains out... and the pictures ended up in Donolan's hands." "Fancy that." said Muscone. "You didn't do that, did you? Send the prick those pics?" I smiled. Muscone was not the dumbest rock in the box by any means. "You're pretty sharp, no matter what everyone else says about you." I needled Jack. "No, it wasn't me. But what was interesting, and the reason I'm in the City: another woman, who is a member of the Investment Club that was meeting when Trish Donolan was killed, was caught in our Vice sting getting her brains fucked out. Her name is City Police Captain Susan Wexler. Know her?" "Vaguely." said Jack. "We might've been introduced, but I don't really know her. I've heard about her, though. She's one of the City Police Department's highest people. She'd be a lot higher, Inspector or Assistant Commissioner, but she resisted being promoted into paper-pusher jobs." "I'm going to meet her today." I said. "Interview her about the Donolan case, and maybe see if I can glean a glimpse into why she was featured in my Vice Squad's dirty pictures. Anyway, what I wanted to tell you was that there is a significant brain behind the Donolan case. I'll send you our collected data, and maybe you guys can find a connection to something bigger." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * I was escorted through City Police Headquarters by Detectives Robin Ventura and Thomas "Sapper" Warren. It took a bit of time, as many officers had heard my name and wanted to be introduced. I bore these necessities; who knows when I might need any or all of these people on my side and working with or for me in the future... Finally I made it to the branch in Vice that I was seeking, and to the office of Captain Susan Wexler. A lovely sight greeted me as I went into the office. Susan Wexler was in her forties. Her hair was a frazzle of black curls with a touch of gray around the ears. Her body was firm and toned, and very shapely with larger-than-average breasts and an hourglass shape that led to hips that flared out just a bit. She was wearing pants over her high heel matte black pumps, but I'd seen the photos and knew her legs were smoking hot. "Commander, please, have a seat." she said after Robin Ventura introduced me and then withdrew. "Tell you what." I said. "I'll drop the ranks if you will. Deal?" "Sure... Don." Susan said, smiling brightly as she sized me up with her roving eyes. "Thank you... Susan." I said. "Now I'm wondering if our conversation would be more pleasant over a cup of coffee at the coffee shop across the street. "You're reading my mind." said Captain Wexler. "However, I have a better idea in mind, and a more private location to talk..." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Susan drove me to the Marriott Grande Hotel. "We have room 609 reserved at all times for undercover operations." she said. "I like the sound of that..." I said suggestively. "Under covers." Susan smiled. Once inside the room, we sat at the table by the window, which afforded a nice view of the western part of the City and its suburbs. "I'm here about the Trish Donolan murder." I said. "I know you are a member of the County Ladies Investment Club, and I wanted to get your perspective on what happened there when Mrs. Donolan was killed." "To be honest, I had no idea what was going on, and still don't." said Susan. "Since I was out of jurisdiction I just held back and let you and your guys do the work. Your officers found my gun very quickly. I showed them my carry permit instead of my badge so that I would stay incognito as a police officer. I never know when I might go undercover, nor where, so its best they don't know who I am. I'm assuming that's why you're here doing this interview one-on-one?" "That's one reason." I said, not really masking my intentions toward this hot older woman. "But it's a wise precaution. By the way, if you do any undercover operations in my County, please at least let me or my Vice Lieutenant know, so that there won't be any problems. I'm not asking for more than need-to-know, but we do need to know if you're there. And you're not doing anything in our part of the State right now, are you?" "No, we have no operations going on in your County right now." said Susan. "Neither does the State, as much as Jack Lewis wants to do something and fuck you guys over." "I'm sure he does." I said, noting not only the distraction of mentioning the SBI Director, but also noting Susan's denial of conducting any operations in our County. "So your only visit to our County recently has been for the Investment Club meeting?" "That's right." said Susan. "Though I came over the night before and spent the night at your University Hotel. Better than this place, for sure." "So how well did you know Trish Donolan?" I asked. "Not particularly well." Susan said. "Mostly as a member of the Club. She and her husband came to the City for receptions and such stuff which I also attended." Now I knew she was withholding the truth from me, but was the reason legitimate, I wondered to myself. I said "Would you mind recounting how the body was found?" Susan replied "We were back from our break, and I'd been talking to Carol Carlington, who also lives here in the City now, when someone asked where Trish was. Cat Clausen said she'd go look for Trish and put down her handbag and went into the breakroom area. Then we heard a scream and we all rushed in. Cat had found Trish's body in the bathroom." "I'm sure that with your police experience and training, you took a lightning inventory of the crime scene." I said. "Anything unusual pop out at you?" "Only that Trish had been leaned against the door, and when Cat opened the door Trish fell out of it and so she was halfway in the bathroom and halfway in the breakroom. I remember thinking at the time that 'that was some trick by the murderer to lean her body against the door like that'. Other than that, I saw nothing unusual. No one had tracked any blood anywhere on the floor or anything like that." "You're right." I said. "We didn't find anything like that." "I don't envy you, by the way." said Susan, getting up out of her chair. "This is going to be a really tough case to solve. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go powder my nose. Make yourself more comfortable, Don." I watched as Susan strutted to the bathroom, her words giving me... and my loins... a surge of hope that something good was about to happen. While she was in the bathroom, I took out my little bug-detecting device and used it. The room was bugged to the hilt, which was no surprise if City Vice was keeping the room on retainer, but fortunately none of the devices were being used right now. "So, Don..." I heard Susan's voice say. "How's this for a police uniform?" I turned and almost gasped in shock. Susan was wearing her high heel pumps and what looked like sheer black stockings until I realized they were finely woven fishnet stockings. The stockings were connected and held up by a garter belt, and a nice patch of thick black pubic bush was gloriously exposed. Above that, Susan was wearing a button-down shirt, opened, exposing her luscious breasts. I could see blue veins criss-crossing along her breasts, and that somehow turned me on as much as the large dark nipples standing proudly on her tits. "I definitely approve." I said going up to her. I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her to me as she wrapped her arms around my neck. Our lips met in a warm kiss, then a second kiss that turned into a deep, tongue-twining kiss. "I heard you were a party animal." Susan said breathlessly as she felt my crotch, not missing my hardening cock. "Why don't you get out of your clothes and let's do some real under-cover work, yes?" * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * We were lying on top of the bed in a sweaty heap, cuddling and kissing. Our sexual liaison had been intensely hot. After eating her pussy and feeling her warm mouth suck me to iron-hardness, I had deeply fucked Susan in the missionary position, enjoying the feeling of her legs wrapped around me, the fishnet stocking sliding against my thighs, hips and sides. Susan had been a very active participant, moving her hips to match my thrusts, giving as good as she was getting it. It was not long before I was climaxing, emptying my balls into her snug snatch. We then enjoyed a long, slow, deep fuck. I had taken a 'gray viagra', and felt that my stamina was good as I pumped the older woman beneath me. I have a thing for older women, and Susan Wexler was one incredible mature hottie. She expertly and deeply kissed me as we lustily mated, and I could tell she was extremely experienced in the sex department. "I'll have to invite you to some of our parties here." Susan said as we cuddled. "My friends would love getting fucked by you... if you're into that sort of thing. Are you into the swinging and orgy scene in that rockin'-hot University town?" "I'm sure I could be persuaded to be." I said, realizing what information Susan was probing for, but not giving it to her. She was trying in roundabout fashion to determine how much I knew about her sexual exploits, which I had deliberately concealed from her while interviewing her about Trish. Susan was a strong adversary, I could tell. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Before leaving the City, I stopped in to chat with Inspector Britt Maxwell of the SBI, making sure that I was not followed. I told Britt everything about Susan Wexler being in Town and fucking the black guys with Trish, and wondering if Susan was on an undercover mission, a dirty cop, or just having some good sexual fun. Britt said she'd look into it very discreetly, and would give me any information she found out... after she and I had some good sexual fun, of course. Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 04 I couldn't stay and take Britt to dinner though, and she understood: I had to go back to Town for the Election results... Part 15 - Election Night "This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" shouted the lovely redhead reporterette into her microphone from outside City Hall. She was dressed up, showing just a bit more cleavage, wearing just a bit of extra jewelry, her hair made up just a bit more, as if the news she was reporting was a really big deal... oh yeah, it really was a really big deal. "It's 7:01pm and the polls are just closing in the County." Bettina reported. "At this time we can announce that Channel Two News projects the winner of the Sheriff's election will be Lieutenant Daniel Allgood of the Town & County Police Force!" A cheer erupted in our room. We were in Daniel's hotel suite near the top of the University Hotel, and one of the ballrooms on the first floor had been rented for the victory party. John Cummings had rented rooms on the other end of the Hotel. Katherine Woodburn was at the Hyatt Hotel north of Town. In our room was Daniel and Melina, myself and Laura, Chief Griswold and his wife, and Martin Nash and Sandra Speer. Others would be coming in within the hour. "Congratulations, Boss." I said, shaking Daniel's hand. "Hey, this was all your doing, buddy." he replied. "Yeah," I said in mock fear, "I dragged you into this, and now you'll be taking it out on me." Daniel and the Chief laughed heartily. "Hmmm," said Melina, who was sitting next to Laura on the sofa next to ours. "So my husband is now my ex-hubby's boss." She rubbed her hands together as she cackled "Moohahahahaha!" The gleam in her eye was one I knew well from eight years of marriage to her, and I knew it required a retaliatory response. "Yes, my dear," I replied, "but my wife is your boss, not to mention big sister, and I might can't kick your ass, but she can." "I'm staying out of this one." said Laura, getting up to hug Daniel. "Congratulations, Daniel." Suddenly, there was a loud knock on the door. Mrs. Griswold opened it and was almost knocked down as John 'Jack' Colby burst into the room. "You got the news on?" Colby said breathlessly. We all turned to the TV as Colby said "Nance is holding the polls open, but only in the black districts!" "This is KXTC Channel Two News with a breaking story!" cried out Bettina. "Let's go straight to Brian Jennings. Brian, whaddya got?" Brian Jennings, who was in reality within sight of Bettina on the other end of Courthouse Square, came onto the screen. His hair was brown-black, slightly graying at the edges. He tried to look distinguished in his suit, but came across as if he was looking down his long nose at you. His voice was condescending, and he talked as if he were better than you, knew more than you did, and wanted to make sure you knew that his word was your gospel. Jennings began his report. "Bettina, I'm here at the Courthouse, where Superior Court Judge Harry 'Spud' Nance has just granted a motion to keep the polls in the Town's 2nd and 3d Districts, and only those districts, open for at least one more hour. The NAACP had filed a request with the Court, saying technical glitches had caused voting problems in the primarily Black districts, and that Black voters were being disenfranchised of their voting rights." "That's a load of horse shit!" exclaimed the very red-faced Jack Colby as the rest of us watched. Jennings continued, "Lawyers for John Cummings' State Senate Campaign have appealed to both the State Appellate Court and the Federal Court. The State Appellate Court has flatly denied the Cummings Campaign appeal, stating that this election is about more than just his race, and the County Republicans have not yet joined the Cummings Campaign appeal. The Federal Court has not yet ruled either way, waiting to hear what the County Republican Party wants to do about it. Meanwhile, both parties are complaining of harassment of their poll watchers at several polling stations, and lawyers for both parties are gearing up for legal challenges. Back to you, Bettina!" "Don," said Jack Colby, his baritone voice quivering with anger, but also fear, "you gotta do something. They're flat out trying to steal the election from John Cummings. It's neck-and-neck, and I mean it literally when I say that a dozen votes might decide that thing." "Mr. Colby," I said quietly, "what would you have me do? I'm a police officer, not a poll watcher." "You can go down to City Hall, where they're counting the ballots." said Colby. "Watch and make sure they're not cheating." I sighed. "Mr. Colby," I said, "not even Chief Griswold or the Mayor can go into there without a warrant. I'm serious. It's sealed off. If I were to go in there without a warrant, I'd be arrested myself. You're the one who has to lead this fight; my hands are tied, and all the more so because I'm a cop." "And you predicted this would happen, too." said Colby, remembering. "Did you talk to the Elections people?" "I sure did." I said. "But there's nothing more I can do, but wait and watch like everyone else. You might want to talk to D.A. Krasney." "Well, I guess I better go see what I can do." said Colby. "Oh, congratulations, Daniel!" he said, striding up to Daniel and quickly shaking his hand. "And you,too, Councilman Colby." said Daniel, but it was practically to Colby's back as he hurried out. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Thirty minutes later, I was admitted to the suite of John Cummings by his cousin Joanne Cummings, who happened to be one of my Detectives. I found a room alive with a low hum of chatter, anxious but not yet frantic. "Hi, John." I said, stepping up to Cummings and shaking his hand. He looked depressed. "Hi Don." he said. "I was going to try to pop over and congratulate your brother on his Sheriff win, then this came up." "How's it looking?" I asked. "Bad." said a voice behind me. Then Cummings' campaign manager came into my sight. "It's going to be at least midnight, but it looked like we'd win by about 200 votes out of 70,000 or so cast in the County. But this corrupt judge is going to steal the election for Woodburn!" His face was red with anger. "Don, anything you can do? Oh... here, sit down by me." John Cummings said, his voice an open plea. Joanne Cummings was watching, almost forgetting to breathe. "I'm afraid not." I said, sitting down to Cummings's left side. "It's in the hands of the lawyers and the Courts now, no matter who wins." I then sat down next to Cummings and said in a voice only he could hear. "John, even if you win the vote count, they'll find a way for Woodburn to win in the recount, or they'll find away to disallow some of your votes. The Democrats' lawyers are already laying the groundwork for it." "Why? Why can't they just let the People decide by the vote?" Cummings asked, his voice exasperated. "ANDREW!" he called out. A handsome man in an expensive suit strode up. "Oh, Andrew, this is Police Commander Donald Troy. Don, this is Andrew Cardigan, who is heading my legal team." "Good to meet you, Commander." Cardigan said. "Can I have a moment with Mr. Cummings?" "You can speak in front of Don." said Cummings. The lawyer did not look happy about it, but acquiesced, sitting down on Cummings' other side. "We're trying to get in touch with the County Republican office." Cardigan said. "They're saying they're busy, running around like chickens with their heads cut off and will get back to us. To be honest, John, I don't think they're going to call us back." "I can understand the Democrats, but why are the Republicans not helping me?" said Cummings. Cardigan looked at me. "Because you're a Conservative, Mr. Cummings." I replied. "The Republicans hate Conservatives like you more than anything else. They'd rather the Democrat win than a true Conservative win." The look of shock on not only the two men's faces, but of everyone else who had heard my words, would've been priceless if it weren't for the open pain on their faces as they realized the truth of my words. I also knew I wasn't too popular in that room at the moment. My cell phone saved me by ringing loudly. I took the call, which was from Laura, ordering me back to Daniel's rooms. "Gentlemen, if you'll excuse me," I said, "I'll see what I can do on my end, and let you guys get back to work." "If you go down to Republican Headquarters with your crowbar, it might help." said Cardigan. "If I do that, Mr. Cardigan," I said, "I'll be indicted for murder tomorrow morning. I'm as mad as you about this. Good luck to you." I exited the room. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * When I got back to Daniel's suite, I found the room chock-full of people, and it was loud and noisy... until I walked through the door, whereupon silence was instantaneous. "What?" I asked. "I'm not wearing a Wildcats jersey." The joke fell flat. "What's the word over in Cummings's room?" asked T&C Councilwoman Dagmar Schoen, breaking the tension and silence. "They're anxious." I said. "The County Republicans aren't joining their lawsuits, nor returning their calls." "Don," Daniel Allgood said, taking charge. "The Media's pushing us for me to give my victory speech as soon as possible. I can understand; they really want to concentrate on the State Senate story. So I've given them 8:15. I'd like for you and Laura to be on the stage with us." "Sure." I said. Just then my mother Phyllis appeared next to me. "Hi, Mom." I said, then remembered. "Mom- who's keeping the kids?" "Oh, Lieutenants Croyle and Ross, Son." my mom replied. "It seems they have discovered that volunteering to babysit the Commander's children gets them out of mundane police tasks like guarding Election stations and patrol duties." I laughed. "Good on them." I said. "They're definitely as smart as they are beautiful." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Daniel had his crowd whipped up with cheers as he thanked them for their hard work on his behalf, Melina standing beside him looking lovely in her black and white dress. He then brought Chief Griswold up to the podium and said "Although we've won this race, I'm sorry that I'm losing this great police officer to retirement. Everyone give Chief Griswold a huge, well-deserved round of applause!" The room shook with thunderous applause, which caused the Chief to blush under his mustaches. It was a very nice gesture on Daniel's part, I thought. As I stood with several other campaign people on the stage behind Daniel, I scanned the room. Near the very back, I noticed the head of ash-blonde hair at the back of the room. It was the tall figure of Henry R. Wargrave, watching the proceedings. I could make out his wife standing beside him. "Okay everyone, enjoy the rest of the evening, and let's get ready for four years serving our County!" Daniel said, concluding his remarks. The cameras followed the Allgoods as they left the stage and mingled with the guests, the men in suits and the women in dresses, all having a good time. As soon as it was possible, I broke away from my group and went searching for the Wargraves. But they had left already. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Judge Harry 'Spud' Nance allowed the polls in the primarily Black districts to close around 8:30pm, an hour and a half after every other district's voting booths had closed. The crowd in Daniel's rooms had thinned out. The well-wishers making their rounds, such as the Mayor and his wife, had visited, congratulated, and moved on. At 12:45am, early on November 5th, Bettina came on the air, sitting behind the KXTC News Desk. "This is Bettina Wurtzburg with the latest updates. With 98% of precincts reporting, we can project that Miriam Walters has won the Solicitor's post, and Dr. John Quincy Kelly will be the County's next Coroner. District Attorney Krasney will continue to represent The People in the County's courtrooms, and the entire Town & County Council was re-elected comfortably. Mayor Larry Vaughan is the People's Choice to continue in that post. And of course, Daniel Allgood was declared the winner of the important Sheriff's race before the evening had hardly gotten started." "The only race left undecided is for State Senate from the 1st District. Wait!- Ladies and Gentlemen, we have breaking news! Brian Jennings is reporting from our election headquarters. Brian!" "Yes, Bettina," said Jennings, smiling broadly as his face came onto the screen. "Channel Two News can now project that Katherine Woodburn will be the next State Senator from the 1st District! With 100% of all precincts reporting in the Senate District, Ms. Woodburn has a 700 vote lead over radical TEA Party Extremist John Cummings. It appears the People have rejected the extremism of John Cummings and elected Ms. Katherine Woodburn, who was a late entrant into the race after the death of Senator Nathan Allen!" "Brian, do you have any breakdown of the numbers, especially of those districts that remained open?" "Yes, Bettina, we do!" Jennings said, smiling even more broadly. "Ms. Woodburn won by around 700 votes, and reports are that about 950 votes were cast in the extra time in those precincts that were ordered to stay open by Court decree. Nearly all of those votes were cast for Ms. Woodburn, once again a total rejection of John Cummings and his extremist TEA Party views. Back to you, Bettina!" "Thank you, Brian!" Bettina said. "Let's go to Amber Harris at County Republican Headquarters." "This is Amber Harris, KXTC Channel Two Evening News!" said the attractive blonde. She was smiling very happily as she said "I've just gotten word from the County Republican Party that they will not join the appeals nor any recount requests of TEA Party Extremist John Cummings, and it is the official position of the County Republican Party to accept the results that are being announced at this hour. Back to you, Bettina!" I didn't get to hear what Bettina had to say next, as the Chief got up and turned off the television set, his face inscrutable but seemingly aged. Just then my cellphone rang, and Laura's began chiming a split-second later. After hearing what was said, I hung up. I looked at Laura, who just nodded. "Guys, Laura and I have to go." I said. "My phone call was from Cindy Ross. Her sister Molly has gone into labor, and they're going to the hospital now." To be continued. You now have all the clues. Who murdered Trish Donolan? And why? The solution, and the happy results of Molly's labor, are coming up in the next chapter... Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 05 The chronological order of my stories is as follows: Todd & Melina series, Interludes 1-5, Sperm Wars series, Russian Roulette series, Case of the Murdered Lovers series, Case of the Murdered Chessplayer series, The Swap series, Interludes 6-10, The Murdered Football Player Series, Case of the Black Widow series, Teresa's Christmas Story, The Case of the Black Badge series, A Case of Revenge series, Teresa's Summer Race, The Trilogy series, Dark Side Of The Force series, Caught In The Act series, Case of the Murdered Bride series, The Credit Card Caper series. The Hot Wives Investment Club, Ch. 1-5. Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas. This story contains graphic scenes, extreme language, and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial or racist language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above. Part 16 - Please To Remember... "Remember, remember the Fifth of November, The Gunpowder Treason and Plot, I know of no reason Why Gunpowder Treason Should ever be forgot. Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, t'was his intent To blow up King and Parli'ment. Three-score barrels of powder below To prove old England's overthrow; By God's providence he was catch'd With a dark lantern and burning match. Holloa boys, holloa boys, let the bells ring. Holloa boys, holloa boys, God save the King!" I would have great reason to remember Guy Fawkes Day, but due to a much happier occasion. I got to the hospital to find Cindy in the waiting room. Laura was changing into scrubs, exercising her privileges of being on Staff at the hospital to help with what was about to happen. "They took her into the delivery room." Cindy said. "They wouldn't let me go in with her since I'm not the father. I called our parents. They're still in Canada; we weren't expecting this for another week or two." "I hear you. I'll stay here with you, then, being the father notwithstanding." I said. We waited, watching the late night coverage of the election on the TV, talking about what had happened in the State Senate race. At 2:45 am, Laura came out to see us. "Congratulations, it's a boy!" she said. "He came out about 15 minutes ago. Mother and son are doing very well. Let them finish their initial work and put Molly in a room, and you both can go in and see them." It was another hour, but once we got into the room we saw a very happy Molly holding her newborn baby, who was wrapped in a light blue swaddling cloth and wearing a blue toboggan cap on his little head. Molly was going to hand my new son to me, but I suggested she let Cindy hold her new nephew first. Cindy was near tears herself as she held the baby. I kissed Molly as I congratulated her and she congratulated me back. "So, what is his name?" I asked. "I was thinking about that." Molly said. "He sure as hell is not going to be named 'Evans'." Molly was referring to her married name, and though she hadn't dropped it, she still didn't think enough of her ex-husband to grant that name to her child. "So I was thinking his last name would be 'Troy', if you're okay with that, Don." "Okay?" I said, "It's more than 'okay'; I'd be honored!" "Good!" said Molly, grinning, "since I already put it on the birth certificate. His first name is Ross, and our mother's maiden name is McAlister. How does 'Ross McAlister Troy' sound?" "Sounds very Irish to me. He'll fit right in at the Cop Bar." I said as Cindy handed little Ross to me. He was a good-looking, blue-eyed redhead like his daddy, and I felt the same emotion of holding him as I'd felt when holding baby Jim after he'd been born. "What, can't name a male child 'Cindy'?" Cindy Ross said, teasing. "Seriously, it sounds good. I called Mom and Dad, they're probably preparing to come down now." "I called them, too, as soon as I was put into the room." Molly said. "They're going to meet me in Midtown after I'm released from the hospital here." "Whaaa---" Cindy said, obviously shocked by the news. "I told them to come here." Molly said, her face a look of resignation. "But they insisted on going there, saying I had a guest room for them there, and they can see the new house as well as the new baby." "Like The Cabin is too small for them?" I asked. The look in Molly's eyes as she glanced at me told me everything. "Well!" Cindy said. "Congratulations, Molly, he's a beautiful boy. I'll step outside and leave you two alone with him." Before either of us could stop her, Cindy fled the room. "Hoo boy." I said. "Yep, you understand." Molly said. Just then the beautiful black woman Nurse Jones came into the room with other hospital staff. 
"Okay, Commander," Nurse Jones said, "you know the drill by now. Tests to run, mother and son need sleep, you probably need some, too." "Yes, I do know the drill, happily enough." I said. I handed the baby to the other nurse, who took him over to take more body measurements. I kissed Molly and told her I'd visit later that day, after solving the Donolan murder once and for all, then left the room. I found Cindy in the waiting room, with Laura comforting her. I sat down on my partner's other side. "You okay?" I asked. "I guess." Cindy said said, as Laura excused herself. "They're not coming here because they don't want to meet Jenna, aren't they? And I thought... after they came down after I got shot, that everything was better." "Well," I said, "I'm not going to try to speak to their intent. I think they don't really want to see me either. They're devout, practicing Catholics, aren't they?" Cindy nodded, and I said "Well, I'm sure they're going to love their grandson, but their daughter having a bastard child by a married man probably isn't going over too well with them, either." "Nice try." Cindy said, refusing to be mollified (pun not intended). "But we all know they don't want me introducing my new girlfriend to them. Why can't they just accept me as I am?" "They do, and they showed it when they came down here while you were in the hospital last summer. They love you, and they love you for who you are as an individual and as their daughter. But they're not ready for your girlfriend. I replied, knowing that I was probably the only person in the world who could tell Cindy this truth without being ripped apart, and it was my duty to do so. "You want them to accept you as you are, but you have to meet them halfway and accept them for what they are... as not ready to handle you being a lesbian. You want them to change, they want you to change, and neither of you are going to change." "You're right." Cindy said. "It still hurts, though." Just then Teresa Croyle bounded into the room. "Hey, congratulations!" she said, about as happy as I'd seen Teresa possibly be. I took the opportunity to excuse myself, letting Cindy explain to, and be comforted by, her friend. Part 17 - An Interdicted Arrest "This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" blared the lovely but tired-looking reporterette. "After a hotly contested election, Katherine Woodburn has been declared the winner of the State Senate race. TEA Party candidate John Cummings not only is refusing to concede, he is demanding a recount and his campaign is already preparing lawsuits over the results." "However, their appeal of Judge Harry Nance's decision to let heavily Democrat districts, and those districts only, be left open has been flatly denied by the Appellate Court, and the Federal Court refuses to accept the case because the County and State Republican Parties refuse to join the lawsuits. The Republicans have brutally betrayed Mr. Cummings, leaving the Republican candidate as well as many citizens deeply angry at the seeming collusion between the Republican and Democrat Parties in installing Katherine Woodburn as the 1st District State Senator." As a ranking Police Officer, I thought to myself, I had an obligation to outwardly be a political atheist... but right now I was disgusted with both political parties and the whole election process, especially seeing that it was the Republicans doing all they could to defeat Conservatives. With 'friends' like the Republicans, who needs enemies? I thought to myself. Sheesh. Oh well, enough on politics. Time to get my ass in gear and bring Justice on behalf of the late Trish Donolan... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * At 10:00am, I arrived at River Valley Country Club, with FBI Special Agent in Charge Jack Muscone, FBI Special Agent Eduardo Escobar, Sergeant Rudistan, Senior Patrolman Morton, and Patrol Officers Johnson and Inga Gunddottar. "We've got the Federal warrant." Jack Muscone had said at Headquarters earlier that morning. "After you had us check Trey Lundquist's fingerprints, we found that he has some outstanding warrants for his arrest in Florida. He's accused of wire fraud, mail fraud and money laundering across State lines. He previously was arrested and is on probation for impersonating a police officer in Florida." "He's got an even more serious charge now, for which I have a local warrant." I said. "Aiding and abetting first degree murder. Think the U.S. Attorney will let us cut a deal if he hands us the murderer of Trish Donolan?" "Maybe." said Muscone. "Lundquist is pretty small potatoes as far as the FBI is concerned. Unless, of course, we find new connections to whatever you think is going on in your County here." "That could well be." I said. "Let's get him into custody now, and we'll worry about all that shit later." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "Mr. Lundquist," said the Club staffer at the door to the Manager's office, "the Police are pulling into the parking lot. Several cars." "Thank you, Carlotta." said Lundquist. He quickly opened the fountain pen on it's little commemorative plaque and took out a little glass capsule. He then put that glass capsule deep inside his mouth, between his cheek and back teeth. I entered the Country Club, brushing by the staffer as she attempted to run interference by coming up to us asking how she could be of service. I barged straight into the Manager's office. "Trey Lundquist, please keep your hands where I can see them." I said to the manager, who was sitting behind his desk. I had a red crowbar in my hands, ready for use. My officers and the FBI agents were prepared to draw their guns, if needed. Lundquist put his empty hands on the desk where I could see them. I could see nothing else amiss in the room, though the fountain pen at front looked to be at an odd angle to its holder. "What can I do for you, Officers?" Lundquist asked. "You are under arrest," I said. "For aiding and abetting the murderer of Trish Donolan, and helping hide the murder weapon." "You've gotta be kidding." said Lundquist. "The Commander has forgotten to mention my outstanding Federal warrants." Special Agent Muscone said. "Seems you've had an active career in Florida." "But aiding and abetting murder? Are you out of your tree?" said Lundquist, pretending uncomprehending shock. I could tell in his eyes that he was busted and he knew it, though. "Not at all." I said. "Pretending the master key was stolen was my first clue in your direction. You were the only one who could've manipulated the camera and the tapes so that you weren't seen going to the janitor closet and securing the plastic bag full of Tyvex suit and the murder weapon. Then you threw it back above the ceiling tiles later that night." "Hell, you can't prove a word of that." Lundquist bluffed. "Yet I was able to get a warrant, which is 80% of the battle." I said. "And when we arrest the murderer herself, she's going to throw you under the bus. You've only got one chance, Trey... tell me, who hired you to assist the murderer?" "If I told you that, I'd die anyway." said Lundquist. I failed to catch the meaning of his words. "Maybe, but I'll just turn you over to the FBI." I said, bluffing. "They'll interrogate you much more... thoroughly than I'd be permitted to. They'll get the truth out of you." "Sounds like I'm a dead man, all the way around." said Lundquist. "Congratulations, Commander. You're every bit as dangerous as my employer said you'd be." "Stop him!" I shouted I saw Lundquist's tongue moving inside his cheek... but it was too late. He bit down and a heavy, pungent smell of almonds permeated the room as foam began spewing from his mouth. The fat man gurgled and fell back. Within seconds he would be dead. "Cyanide!" said Jack Muscone, who had rushed forward to try to stop him, but was too late. "God damn it!" I screamed. I grabbed the fountain pen, which separated from itself, having only been loosely put back together, then threw the parts onto the floor in utter disgust with myself. "Fuck me! I saw this when I came in, I should have known!" "It was in his mouth already, Commander." said Sergeant Rudistan perceptively. "No way you could've stopped it." There was general agreement, and I pretended to allow myself to be mollified. I was still pissed at myself. "All right." I said. "Call the fucking morgue to come get this shit eater." "What now?" asked Muscone. "Does this hurt your case against the murderer?" "I was hoping to get him to talk." I said. "But I think we have a case, anyway. Let's move, just in case someone around here knows what's up and is calling the bitch to warn her." Part 18 - A Murderer Captured "Catherine, I don't get this." Cat Clausen's husband was saying. "Trish's funeral is coming up, you need to be here to help with that. You were her best friend." "The funeral home will handle it." said Cat dismissively, quickly packing her large suitcase. "I've got to go, my dad called and said Mom is sick. He can't take care of her." "When did he call?" Clausen asked, totally stunned by his wife's frantic actions. They had been trying to get back together, and had done very well in bed together the night before... but now his wife was acting strangely yet again. "A while ago, while you were in the bathroom--" Cat said, but was interrupted by the doorbell ringing. "Don't answer that!" Cat yelled as her husband went towards the door. "What the hell?" he answered as shouts of "POLICE! OPEN UP!" were shouted from the other side of the door. He went to the door and opened it. I barged past him, as did Sergeant Rudistan and Patrol Officer Gunddottar. We were too quick for Cat Clausen, whom we prevented from running into the kitchen towards the back door. "Cat Clausen," I said as Inga Gunddottar deftly turned her around and affixed handcuffs to her wrists before she hardly knew what was happening, "you are under arrest for the murder of Trish Donolan." "What the hell is going on, here?" asked Cat's stunned husband. "Cat? What's going on?" "Your wife is under arrest for murder, Mr. Clausen." I said. "Here's the warrant for her arrest, and here's the warrant to search this house for a large black handbag, the clothes she was wearing the night of the murder, and whatever else we find pertaining to the case..." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "We've got the bag, and we've found Tyvex fibers inside it." reported Dr. Woodrow later that day. "Nothing on her clothes yet, but we're still working to see if any blood got into cracks in her shoes before she wiped off the soles." "Good work, Doctor." I said. "Thank God she didn't get rid of the stuff." I hung up. "Okay, Croyle, let's go talk to Cat Clausen. Where's Ross?" "In her office." said Teresa. "But to be honest, I don't think she's fully into the game right now. She told me about her parents not coming here. It's hit her really hard." "Okay, we'll leave her alone for the time being." I said. "That means you and Tanya get to watch the fun." I grabbed Paulina Patterson, Tanya Perlman, Martin Nash and Diana Torres from MCD, and they followed me to Interrogation-1. Only myself and ADA Patterson went inside, while the others watched through the one-way glass. "Okay, Cat." I said to the woman, sitting next to her lawyer, another expensive legal eagle from Gresham & Mason, P.C. "I am going to re-read you your rights, particularly for the benefit of your lawyer from Gresham & Mason, whom I'm seeing a lot of, lately." The lawyer's eyes widened slightly; he might have realized that I was onto far more than he had previously been aware. I read Cat her considerable legal rights. "Okay, Cat." I said. "We're processing the evidence now. I know you're not going to insult my intelligence by pretending I don't have you down ice cold for Trish's murder. I only want to know two things: your reason why, and who hired you to do it and for what reason." "In exchange for what?" said the lawyer, who was astute enough to know that the next words out of Paulina's mouth would be 'death penalty' if his client did not come correct. "Death penalty off the table." said Paulina. "Life without parole." "Not good enough." said the lawyer, whose eyes could not hide that he was essentially bluffing. "I don't think you have enough for a conviction, much less malice murder for the death penalty." "Then you have another 'think' coming." I said to the lawyer derisively. "This woman viciously slit her supposedly best friend's throat with no more compunction than if she were swatting a fly. That alone is going to make a jury wonder just what capacity for evil Cat Clausen has inside her. And I'll give the D.A. the case for conviction that she'll spoon-feed to the jury like a hungry baby." "Yeah, right." sneered the lawyer. "I'll not only have her out of here by the end of the day, I'll have the judge demanding you apologize for inconveniencing her with these fantasies of yours." I couldn't help but laugh out loud at that. "I do apologize for laughing, Mrs. Clausen, but your legal representation here is really pathetic trying to bluff with the hand he's holding. Let me show you just some of what I have. In fact, I'll tell you just what you did, and you please correct me if I stray from the path, okay?" I began. "Trish Donolan went into the bathroom and you followed her, with your large handbag in tow. I know this because several witnesses observed you with your handbag during the break. Inside the bathroom, you suggested that you dress up in a Tyvex suit as an early Hallowe'en trick, saying that after the break you'd come out saying the room was quarantined, or something along those lines. Trish actually helped you put on the suit, then you got up onto the toilet seat. Before she could react, you had the sendoku knife out, grabbed Trish, and slit her throat. I don't know if it was your friendship with her or just your lack of strength, but you barely got the job done." Cat's eyes were wide with shock; I knew I was on track. "You then took off the protective suit and booties, put them and the weapon in the plastic bag, all while standing on the toilet seat, then threw the bag and contents through the ceiling tiles into the janitor closet, where your associate Trey Lundquist took the items and hid them in his office. Since he was being helpful to the police, and due to a lack of skepticism on my Crime Lab's part that I will assuredly be correcting in the near future, he was able to hide the package for the duration of our initial investigation. He later threw the package back up into the false ceiling and closed off the tiles." "Meanwhile, you wiped down the top of the toilet and your shoes, then managed to get out of the room without tracking Trish's blood. What you didn't know is that she was still alive, moved enough to get to the door and to allow more blood to flow all over the floor, so when you 'found' her again she fell out the door." Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 05 "So you went back to the main room, then went to 'find' your friend, screamed when you 'found' her, and everyone came rushing in. Later, your associate threw the package back up above the ceiling tiles after we'd searched for them, and you intended to come back and get them and dispose of them later, when the investigation began dying down. Will it do, Mrs. Clausen?" Cat said nothing. The lawyer thundered "Why in the hell would she kill her friend? What motive could she possibly have?" "Money." I said. "Cat's been hooked on drugs for years. She'd been getting off light by bringing other women to the pushers, and also by having sex with them. But her debts became a bit too large, and her suppliers began demanding green dollar bills in payment for their drugs. Cat was offered the chance to wipe out her debt, get some money to start fresh somewhere else, if only she'd take care of her benefactor's problem and kill Trish, who was not as much a friend to her as people believed. "In fact, I suspect Trish had denied Cat the money Cat needed and asked to borrow in order to pay for her drug debts. For that matter, Trish was not too far behind Cat in being hooked on drugs and needing money herself. So Cat... who was your benefactor? I suspect that if you don't tell us and let us protect you in custody, that you're going to end up with the same fatal throat injuries you applied to Trish." "Watch your threats, buddy." said the lawyer, menace in his voice and eyes. I matched his look. "That's not a threat, Counselor. It's a prediction, and Mrs. Clausen knows it." I said. "Why don't you tell your client what happened to her associate, Mr. Lundquist." "Lundquist is dead." the lawyer said. I noted Catherine's look of shock as the lawyer continued "I got the call about that almost immediately after the police went into the Club to arrest him." "Ahhh, so you have been anticipating me catching up to your clients." I said, glomming onto the lawyer's admission. He said nothing, but his face gave himself away as surely as if he'd stated a confession out loud. "Trey is dead?" Cat asked, her voice shaking. "Hush, don't say another word!" the lawyer demanded. "Yes, Catherine," I said, quickly seeing the path I needed to walk upon. "Trey committed suicide rather than give up whoever hired him. He knew he was going to die. And I think you know what this means for you." As neither Cat nor her lawyer said anything, I said "Ms. Patterson, I think we should give Cat and her lawyer a few moments to discuss her rather dire situation." We got up and went into the anteroom, which was full of stunned Detectives. "So much for those high-priced lawyers." I said to the group in the hallway outside the anteroom. "He really fucked up, there." "I thought you'd trapped him into saying that." said Cindy, who'd joined her fellow Detectives after I'd gone into the Interrogation room. "I could pretend to take credit for that," I said, "but in reality he screwed up on his own." Five minutes later, Cat Clausen was banging on the anteroom door. Her lawyer's face was red-faced, furious with anger, and he was shouting at her. "Twenty-five to life with possibility of parole if I confess and cooperate?" asked Cat. To my total astonishment, the lawyer got up and left the room. "Yeah, give it to her." I suggested to Paulina. Paulina nodded. "Do you want new legal counsel?" I asked. "No. I'll take the deal and confess." Cat most wisely said. "What do you want to know?" "Who hired you, Cat?" I asked. "Honest to God, I'm not sure." said Cat. "The manager at the Club, Trey, was my contact. He gave me the cash to pay my drug debts, which I did." "Did he say why he wanted you to kill Trish?" I asked. "He just said that Trish had betrayed his employer, and she had to die. He also said that I'd end up dead if I didn't kill her. I didn't really have a choice, so I took the money to get out of debt and get free. I was planning to move away, leave my husband if I had to." "You murdered her, even though she was your friend?" Cat peered at me. "You were more correct a minute ago. I thought Trish was my friend, but I realized that she'd delivered me to drug hell just as she'd delivered Margo Bailey and Carol Carlington, who is lucky not to be dead herself. Then when Trish wouldn't loan me the money I needed, and was a real bitch telling me that it was my own fault I got hooked, I realized she was no friend of mine. I didn't want to kill her, I don't want to hurt anyone... but I did what I had to do, and I haven't cried about it yet." "Cat," I asked, "are you aware of Trish being involved in other criminal activities? Industrial espionage, for example?" "No sir." said Cat, looking genuinely surprised. "She never said anything about anything like that. Of course, most of our time together we were on our backs, getting fucked..." Part 19 - The Solution I managed to spend over an hour with Molly and my new son late that afternoon. We talked extensively about our lives, about baby Ross and my desire to be involved in his life, about Cindy and their parents and the issues there. "Okay," I said, "I've got to go tell everyone how I solved this case. I'll come by in the morning. When are they letting you out of here?" "They're releasing me tomorrow afternoon if all continues to go well." Molly said. "I'll spend the night at The Cabin if Cindy wants to spend time with us. I hope she will, but like you said, she's hurt and I don't know what to do about it. I'm between a rock and a hard place." * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The back room of the Cop Bar contained myself, Chief Griswold, my Lieutenants Three a.k.a. 'Crowbar's Angels', those being Tanya Perlman, Teresa Croyle and Cindy Ross, Martin Nash and Sandra Speer, Diana Torres, J.R. Barnes, Bobby Patrick, Christina Cho, my mother Phyllis, Sheriff-Elect Daniel Allgood and his wife Melina, and Jack Muscone, whom I'd invited to join us. "Handbags, ladies!" I said loudly. "Handbags! I've got 'Crowbar's Angels', I've got other female Detectives and Technicians," I looked pointedly at Torres and Cho, "and none of you saw it! Even Mycroft Holmes here missed it at first." I pointed my thumb at my mother. "Rub it in, why dontcha." said Cindy acerbically. My mother put a reassuring hand on Cindy's shoulder. "He's right, my dear." Mom said. "We did miss it, and it's something to learn from. We won't miss it next time, ladies, will we?" Cindy nodded acquiescence. "So what about the handbags?" asked the Chief, understanding the importance of the lesson. "There were sixteen women at the meeting." I said. "Of those, thirteen had handbags no longer than six inches at the most, too small to carry very much. Two women had no handbags at all. But Cat Clausen had a massively large handbag." "So that's what got you on her track?" asked Martin Nash. "Yes." I said. "I realized when I kicked her handbag while questioning her that not only was it very large, it was virtually empty. So why was she carrying a handbag of that size? Now my wife carries a big bag like that, full of diapers, changes of baby clothes and the like, and when I tripped over that bag at home, it only confirmed what I'd been thinking: the Tyvex suit and footies and gloves used by the murderer, as well as the murder weapon, had to be imported, and a large handbag would do the trick." "In addition," I continued, "several other ladies noted that Cat was putting down her bag when she said she'd go look for Trish. That infers that she had been carrying that bag into the bathroom/kitchenette area. So I let my imagination wander as to what story might fit Cat going into the bathroom with Trish, being able to put on the Tyvex suit without Trish being alarmed, and the story I presented during Cat's interrogation was pretty much what actually happened." "What about Lundquist?" asked Daniel Allgood. "One reason I have J.R., Bobby, and Christina here is to buy them dinner, because I had to do them the dishonor of making things look like they'd missed the evidence, when in reality they had not... and for that I apologize. I did need to do it though, because I very much suspected a mole or helper within the ranks of the employees, and telling that story kept the helper off guard and calm until I was ready to strike with an arrest warrant." "I realized that Cat must have had help." I continued. "She was barely tall enough in high heels to reach the ceiling tiles from the top of the toilet, and thus to throw the evidence package through the gap in the ceiling tiles into the janitor closet. Of course, it would've been too extraordinarily lucky for her to make a blind shot that would've gone into the mop bucket, but fortunately you all were so amazed at me finding the evidence that you did not consider the magnitude of the luck that would've had to be involved. I felt the ice-cold blue eyes on me. "Yes, Cindy," I said, looking at my partner, returning her stare, "I deceived you all on that one, and you can beat me up later about it." "See you in the gym tomorrow morning." Cindy replied. She was not kidding. "Ouch, I am soooo looking forward to that." I joked, getting a few laughs. "Meanwhile, let's talk Trey. When Trey Lundquist came up missing a key from the locker, I realized that he was likely the one that had made it disappear in order to make it look like it had been stolen, thus giving credence to someone coming in to put the evidence up in the ceiling tiles again. But it was a horrible mistake on his part: in saying the key was missing, it necessitated us getting his fingerprints... and when I had the FBI run those, they came up with all sorts of good stuff on him from his days in Florida. In addition, Myron found that he had some serious money issues, being in debt to the wrong people, so he was easy to hire by the person who really wanted Trish Donolan dead. More on that in a minute." "Lundquist substituted a recorded tape of a blank hallway, as the equipment could be manipulated to have a false timestamp. He went down the hallway and into the janitor closet, got the wrapped evidence package, and hid it in his office, likely inside the flowerpot holding the small tree in the corner of the office. No one, including myself, thought to search his office that night other than a cursory look at the trash cans, and that is a reproach to my management of the case, and also to all of us." "Anyway, Lundquist later threw the package back up into the ceiling tiles, and I'm sure he was shocked when we came back to the location and found it. As I said earlier, he had taken the precaution of making the master key in the keybox disappear, so he thought he was covered." "Why did he commit suicide?" asked Martin Nash. "He knew the game was up when we came for him. He had vowed to himself to never return to prison, and I would imagine that his 'employer' promised to take care of his family if he killed himself rather than be taken alive. That's an old mob tradition, but we've seen the cyanide poisoning before when that bozo snuck into our Evidence rooms wearing a replica of my Lieutenant badge. The capsule was analyzed by the Crime Lab, and was of the same type in both cases. Ergo, the cases are connected to that extent." "So why was Trish killed, then?" asked Teresa Croyle. "She doesn't have any connection to all that crap that went on then, does she?" "Well..." I said, considering what to say, then decided my team deserved to know. "I'll be talking to Jack and his FBI team more about that, but I'll just say this to all of you: in the last few weeks, we've had the Diane Lang murder case, the Barry Blair suicide, and the exposure of the disavowed CIA agent Alicia Foster and her husband Spence. All of these have had a common thread weaving through them, that of industrial espionage, either at DynaCorp or at Lightsource Industries." "And ultimately, that was why Trish Donolan was murdered: someone is cleaning up the remnants of the mess we created when we whacked Jody Corrigan and his rogue agents at the County Airport, and Trish might have been involved in that. Blair was not the only one being paid to steal secrets from Lightsource; I suspect Trish was involved in that, as well. As to who is behind all this, I don't know yet, and it'll likely be the FBI's case instead of ours. Anything else?" "Mr. Donolan." said Tanya Perlman. "He wasn't involved?" "No, not in his wife's murder." I said. "What about the photos he had in his possession?" Tanya asked, persisting. "I noticed you dropped the charges against him yesterday. What's going on with that?" "Coincidence." I said. "As an aside, I have told Mr. Donolan to be on his guard, that whoever wanted his wife dead and wanted his fellow swingers Diane Lang and Barry Blair dead might also want him, Donolan, dead; and one reason I took him into custody was to prevent him from being murdered. "Beyond that, certainly someone wanted him and his wife being hostile to each other, and those pictures may have been the way that was being done. I think we'll say no more on that for now, though. I just hope we won't be investigating Mr. Donolan's murder anytime soon..." "Another brilliant piece of work, Crowbar." said the Chief, which was followed by loud acclaim until the Chief continued: "Daniel, you're a lucky man to have this guy on your Police Force, and I'm sorry to be retiring and not be able to watch him work. Give him every bit of support you can, even when it seems like he's bat-shit crazy about something... I've learned many times that he's not the crazy one, and there's method to his seeming madness." "I hear ya, Chief." replied Allgood. "Melina, is Don bat-shit crazy?" "I'm taking the Fifth on that one." Melina replied, her eyes wickedly cutting to me. "And I'm going to change the subject by offering a toast to Molly's new baby arriving in the world." And so we drank a toast to Molly's new baby, then someone burned a doll of Judge Nance in effigy for Guy Fawkes Day, which set off the fire alarm and generally got us into some trouble... Part 20 - Solution to the Purloined Photographs "Before you whip my ass," I said to Cindy the next morning as we donned the light armor for our black crowbar battle in the boxing ring of the gym, "I do want to ask you something. Molly is being released from the hospital today, and she wants to spend the night at The Cabin before going home to Midtown tomorrow. She wants you to stay there with her. And I'd like for you to do that, also. I want you to get to know your nephew, really be a part of his life." Cindy exhaled. "I dunno." she said. "I'm still pissed that she's not making our parents come here. She could help by telling them to come here and accept me, rather than letting them dodge me and Jenna." "I think you're being unfair to Molly." I replied. "She's worked really hard to forge a good relationship with you. She wants you in her life and her baby's life. She's walking a tightrope between you and your parents. If she does as you suggest, her parents will simply walk away from her, also. Give her a chance, my friend. She's trying to bridge the gaps without getting herself crushed in the process." Cindy thought about it. "Okay, I'll hang out with her. And it's a good thing her son takes after her instead of his father." Cindy said, the underlying challenge intended to rile me up. "Oh really?" I said, taking the bit, glad to see Cindy into the spirit of things. "We'll see about that." And we did. Let's just say that I got a lot of practice being on the very defensive, on the downside fighting for my life. It was a solid beatdown, and I knew what the local University's Bulldogs felt like at the end of that game against the Wildcats. All of Cindy's frustrations came out in the clanging of iron and the whacks of her crowbar on my body armor, which was barely adequate to the task. But I took it, every bit of it, for my own improvement in weaponless defense, but more for the sake of my teammate... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Vice Lieutenant Teresa Croyle walked into my office, wearing her uniform of blue pants with light blue piping, a light blue shirt with Lieutenant ranks on the shoulder epaulettes, "TCPD" insignia on the collars, her badge above her let pocket and the Purple Order insignia over her nametag on the right pocket. In addition, she wore the thin belt sash denoting a heightened level of formality. Something was up as she came to attention in front of my desk and began speaking. "Commander, I hereby submit myself for disciplinary action--" "STOP!" I yelled. "Not another word!" Teresa looked at me in total shock as I stood up, my finger over my lips in a 'hush' sign. Silently, I got out my bug-catching device. It lit up bright green when I scanned the frame around my window to the outside, and around the overhead fluorescent light. Internal Affairs' bugs were not only there, but they were actively listening in, and I pointed to the glowing green light with yet another silent signal to not speak. "Walk with me, Lieutenant." I said, walking out of my office. Teresa followed me down the hall and out the side door to the parking lot. We got into my SUV, where I again cautioned her to be silent, and we drove down the road, past the Old Mill where the 2nd Precinct would be headquartered, and down County Road 2. "Here's where Jefferson Jackson was found dead. You can leave your radio in the car." I admonished, getting out of the car near the spot where his body had been found. I proceeded to walk another 50 feet away from the vehicle, Teresa again following. "Don't say anything about this, ever." I said. "Not a word to me, not a word to Cindy, not a word to a priest in confession, not a word to anyone at all, ever. If you have to talk about it, do like the old Japanese proverb and whisper it down an empty well at noon, making sure no one else is around." I continued: "I know it was you, Teresa, that put those pictures of Trish fucking those black guys under Donovan Donolan's door for him to find. I know you've been watching both Donovans as well as Cat Clausen since the night Margo Bailey died, waiting and watching for a chance at revenge. I know you took your shot when you got those pics, hoping to cause them to fight, maybe to divorce, maybe to get physical and then you could step in and take them down." Teresa's eyes glowed with understanding as I continued: "I understand why you did it, and it was just sheer bad luck and pure coincidence that she was murdered later that day. You've been worried that giving him those pics is what caused her to be murdered, but of course that wasn't the case. As for what you did, I've figured it was you from the time we found the pics, and I've said nothing for a reason. I'm trying hard to forget the whole thing, I hope you will also, and while I understand and respect you for submitting yourself for disciplinary action, I do not want to be placed in a position of needing to take that action." I looked around, then said "That's why I brought you out here: Internal Affairs was listening in and would've heard you if I had let you say anything more. I don't want I.A. knowing about this matter. I worked my ass off getting you back into my Police Force, I want you continuing to lead the Vice Squad, and that's that. Am I making myself abundantly clear, Lieutenant?" "Yes, sir." Teresa said. "Thank you, sir. I'm sorry I let you down. It won't happen again." "Unless you take up a career as a porn photographer, of course." I said, grinning. "You didn't let me down. You made a mistake, and we'll move forward from it. Now if anyone asks, I brought you out here to see the Jefferson Jackson crime spot and to talk about the finer points of the lessons learned from that case. Okay... let's go home and solve some crimes." Hot Wives Investment Club Ch. 05 As we walked back to the car, Teresa noticed my slight limp. "I observe and deduce that Cindy beat the shit out of you this morning." she said. "Does she feel better now?" "I hope so." I said. "But having a sister like you that she totally trusts makes a lot of difference..." Teresa just nodded in vigorous agreement. Part 21 - Epilogue "Dr. Fredricson, Mrs. Myrtle James and two others are here to see you." said Gayle Roberts into the intercom, at the same time that Teresa and I were examining the Jackson crime scene. "Show them right in." said Laura Fredricson. As the door opened, she stood up to greet the University Regent/Trustee and the other two ladies: Barbara Langram, treasurer of the Hot Wives Investment Club; and Investment Club Senior Board Member Helena French. After having the ladies sit on the sofas facing each other, and sitting with them, Mrs. Myrtle L. James got to the point: "Dr. Fredricson, we are pleased to offer you the next membership in the County Ladies Investment Club." Of course Laura accepted, and she immediately arranged for a cashier's check for $25,000 to be made out to the Investment Club for her pro-rated membership. After the ladies left, Laura called me to tell me the good news. After taking Laura to lunch, I thought about a conversation I'd had with Jeanine Olivet Burke. "I'm the only person in the world who knows the exact order of the wait-list," Jeanine had said, "and if I re-arranged it slightly, who else is ever going to know?" "I take back every bad thing I've ever said about lawyers." I replied to my niece... * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * At 11:00am on the morning of Friday, November 7th, I was in the FBI conference room in the Federal Building off Courthouse Square. With me were Lt. Cindy Ross and Chief Griswold, as well as Jack Muscone, Sandra Speer, Eduardo Escobar and Lindy Linares. "So you think there's industrial espionage behind all this?" asked Jack Muscone. "Yes." I said. "Blair and Trish Donolan were trying to get at Lightsource's research, Alicia Foster and Spence Foster were trying to infiltrate Dynacorp, as were others who were traitors for foreign powers. Corrigan's cell tried to kidnap Barry Oliver, now of BOW Enterprises, over the nanoetching process he's now patented. And now we have Donovan Donolan, whose company spending millions in chemical and drug research. Before that, we had Tom Burleson at Ward Harvester before the Black Widow waxed him, and his brother is at Crown Chemicals now, along with Sean Bailey. But this recent stuff is especially interesting. There's definitely a thread connecting them." "And you think there's a single entity behind it?" asked Sandra Speer. "Yes." I said. "And that entity had the brains to put together a really interesting and brilliant scheme to murder Trish Donolan, though in my opinion it was a bit overdone. Ditto that for the Diane Lang case: elegant, but needlessly dramatic and complicated." "And it would've been successful if not for you seeing small things like a large handbag, velcro on a wedding dress and a guy talking about his victim in the past tense, and a prostitute's disappearance at the same time Alicia Foster tries to buy a gun with a bad credit card." said Jack Muscone, shaking his head. "Salem is calling, they want you for trial." "They'll have to wait." I said. "Too many people right around these parts want to light my fire, and in a bad way." "So who is behind it all?" asked Eduardo. "Oh, I suspect the person who sent me that lovely oil painting depicting the Fall of Troy." I said. "And who made the huge mistake of scaring my wife in her nursery behind her office." "Wargrave." said Muscone. He then looked up at the ceiling. "Hmmm, lightning didn't strike me down mentioning his name." Suddenly, someone burst into the room. "I'm sorry to interrupt, Mr. Muscone," said the young man, "but there's been an explosion at BigPharmaCorp! We have reports of fatalities at the scene!" "See Jack, lightning DID strike." I said as my cell phone began going off. It was Tanya Perlman, informing me of the BigPharmaCorp explosion. She told me that several people were hurt and possibly dead. The Chief rode with me as we hustled over to BigPharmaCorp across the River. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * "Three people dead, including the CEO." said the Fire Chief to myself and Police Chief Griswold as we stood 100 feet from the scene of the explosion. Two tanks full of propane gas had exploded just as CEO Donovan Donolan, his Media Relations officer, and a plant foreman had walked by. All three had been immediately killed by the blast, which I could tell was seemingly directed right at where they had been walking. Two Town & County fire trucks and two EMS ambulances were on the scene, as well as three BigPharmaCorp fire trucks. The fire had been quickly contained, as it had not spread after the initial blast. "My arson team is looking into it." said the Fire Chief. "I suspect it was an intentionally set explosion." I turned to the BigPharmaCorp security man who had escorted us to the scene. "Did Mr. Donolan normally walk down that path?" I asked. "Yes, Commander." said the security man, his face ashen and looking like he wanted to get sick. "He often took that route to his second office, which is located inside Plant Number Two. He'd go to that office to get away from the office people in the front offices, so he could talk to the plant managers and find out from them what was really going on. He'd been doing that for years." After watching the investigation and aftermath, including the removal of the bodies, the Chief and I walked back to my Police SUV. "Whaddya think, Crowbar?" the Chief asked as he rode with me back to Headquarters. "Donolan was murdered, wiped out." I said. "Whoever did it knew he'd be walking along that street, and rigged the explosion to kill him. Maybe someone was watching and triggered it, maybe it was done by some sophisticated remote control that recognized his cell phone signature." I continued, thinking more to myself than addressing the Chief: "I don't know why, but he was silenced. Maybe he knew of his wife's espionage, maybe he was stealing secrets from his own company. Remember, sir, that the Feds in Washington, D.C. were interested in the case when I had him arrested. Something's up about this one." "Think it's Wargrave, or someone else?" Griswold asked. "I dunno." I said. "We've suspected there are still three assassins out there from the Corrigan Cell. Maybe they're behind it; they'd have the Special Forces training to do something like that. Whatever it is, Chief, they're not letting you retire quietly. They're going to usher you out in a blaze of glory. Things are definitely heating up, and I'm not talking about football season." Little did I know that things were not only going to heat up... they were going to catch fire... Finis... for now.