I'll Protect You (Clueless Resolutions Book 1) (22 page)

Two months had passed since the East Wayford area serial killings had been brought to an end.  An investigation into the prostitution operation along the Connecticut southern shore revealed that it was not the direct cause of the killings, but the participants were either the victims of, or the un-witting enablers of the deaths.  Francine Stanley and Carl Jenson were arrested for masterminding the prostitution enterprise.

Also implicated was a Grandford Police Station Commander.  Several un-named prostitutes were detained and questioned.  They were cooperating witnesses and were released on probation by the State Attorney General’s Office.

Because of her past, Francine Stanley was held in custody. Carl Jenson was charged and released on surety bond.  Both were awaiting trial for their illicit acts.

The license for Stanley Realty and its principal broker were irreversibly revoked.  The Jenson & Associates Auction House was temporarily closed and under reorganization with different ownership.

Police Chief Louis Devaro, critically wounded in the operation to arrest Bruce Grover, the deceased serial killer, had remained in the intensive care unit of Yale-New Haven Hospital for seven days, in and out of a coma, and maintained there for weeks.  He finally had recovered to the point of release for continued rehabilitation.

He had submitted his resignation through Mayor Eugene VanDyke to the East Wayford Town Council.  At that time, with recommendations from Retired Chief Devaro and State Police Inspector Donald Chace, Mayor VanDyke appointed Acting-Chief Joseph Salvadore, recently promoted to Captain, to the position of East Wayford Police Chief.

On a rare day off from their new careers Margaret L. “Maggie” Marshall and her intimate friend C. Maximilian “Max” Hargrove were having a two-martini lunch at Jerry’s Pub on this first Saturday of September.

Jerry Pippin had taken their input and advice on his real estate properties and things had worked out well for him. The deed to the house on the hill had been legally separated from the deed to the pub.  Maggie, as Jerry’s agent, located a buyer for the house property. It was in escrow under deposit and was expected to close within a week. Maggie would receive the usual fee when the closing was completed.

“We’re wining-and-dining on the last of my tab today”, Max declared to Jerry.  The bar tab agreement with Jerry for their ‘adviser’s fee’ had been used up to the amount of approximately two hundred dollars over the last eight weeks.

“Right Mates”, Jerry responded. “The ‘Terrific Twosome’ proved to be one of the best investments I ever made.”  Max and Maggie raised their second martinis aloft as Jerry raised an opened bottle of beer.

“To the future” they all said in unison, as a toast.

As Maggie and Max were finishing their lunch, State Police Homicide Inspector Don Chace and East Wayford Police Chief Joe Salvadore stopped in for their noon meals.  Chace put his finger to his lips to signify silence to Salvadore as they approached the ‘Terrific Twosome, from behind. Chace tapped Maggie on her left shoulder and quickly stepped to her right.  Looking the wrong way, as expected, Maggie fell for the old trick.

“Oh, it’s you”, she said when she located Don Chace.

“Are you sure you’re here with the right guy?” asked the inspector.

“Yeah, I’m beginning to get you two straight”, Maggie returned chidingly, referring to the day months before when she mistook him for Max.

“Okay, we’re even”, said Chace as he sat on the stool next to her. Greetings were exchanged all around as Chief Salvadore took the stool next to Max.

“Although a bit late, we got some interesting information yesterday, from Mayor VanDyke”, said Chace.  He then went into a description of a profile the Mayor had received from a United States Senator, a friend and political contact, who sat on the Senate Armed Services Committee in Washington.  The Senator, one of twenty four committee members, had to remain anonymous, of course.

The Mayor, aware that Salvadore’s earlier quest for information about Bruce Grover’s military history had been denied, had requested help from his friend the Senator.

The profile had been buried in the archives by Grover’s military police commanding officer during Grover’s 1990’s tour of duty in South Korea.

It revealed that Grover, a U.S. Army Sergeant, was assigned with a Military Police Detachment to U.S. Army base near Seoul, South Korea. He had been involved, along with several members of his unit, in illicit on-base drug dealing, and prostitution using native Korean women and girls.

According to Adjutant General secret court martial confessions, the GIs would befriend the women in bars off base. Then they would blackmail the women with the threat of exposing them, bringing shame to their families.  This was regarded as an unforgivable disgrace according to local culture.

Grover had been living with one of the young women he met and keeping her free of involvement with the prostitution ring. At some point, when his girlfriend began disappearing from time to time, he followed her. To his disgust, he found that she had been recruited and blackmailed by another military member of the prostitution ring.

Grover had been accused of implications in the causing of several deaths of U.S servicemen who had purchased sex from a certain prostitute.  She was known as “Kai Rhee”, and she was Grover’s girlfriend.

The deaths, all due to karate chops to the neck, could not be proven and were attributed to local anti-American radicals who were protesting the existence of the Army base in their homeland.  The matter, very sensitive in the upper echelons at the time, was dropped.

The Commanding Officer of the MP Unit, to save his own career, transferred Grover out of the Military Police, demoted him to Private Specialist 3, and sent him to a supply support unit in Kuwait.  While stationed there Grover worked his way back up to the rank of Sergeant.

“That’s where I knew Grover from!” exclaimed a surprised Max Hargrove.

Grover had eventually been discharged as ‘mentally unfit to serve.’

Chace and Salvadore asked that the information, and its source, be kept confidential.  Max and Maggie agreed.

“There’s more”, Chief Salvadore said. “A friend of mine in the state medical examiner’s office finally got back to me about another puzzle which we all struggled with.”  He went on to describe the feedback he had recently received on the curiously strong perfume odor which was prevalent in the homicides.

Among Grover’s personal items, which were removed from his apartment, they had found a caked, dark-brown pigment contained in a cork-sealed vial.  A chemical analysis showed that it was a reduced and compressed compound of glandular matter from either an oriental musk ox, or musk deer.  When mixed in correct doses with alcohol it became a powerful, long-lasting perfume.  It was used along with incense in Orientals funerals.  It was known to spiritually prepare the souls of the deceased for entrance into the ‘life beyond.’  It also masked the odor of non-embalmed corpses.  Warriors often used it prior to battles to guarantee their entrance into the afterworld in case they were killed, or committed suicide.”

“Apparently, Grover got this from his girlfriend in Korea.  In his deranged mind he probably gave it to Carrie Slavonic to protect her when she ‘went out’ alone at night. Ever since that psycho met Carrie, the past must have come rushing back on him with a vengeance”, Salvadore said.

“That odd-ball was a ticking time bomb waiting to go off, but nobody caught it”, added Inspector Chace.  Maggie and Max were astounded. Maggie was uncharacteristically silent.  “Who knew!” was all that Max could say.

Max had secured a position as a real estate consultant.  The company,” Universal Security Associated Partners Inc., was owned and operated by his old friend from their college days.  The headquarters was located in upstate New York and most of the field operatives, along with the clerical workers, lived nearby in that area.  While he learned the method of operation, and developed a working procedures plan with the other specialists, Max had rented an apartment there.

When Stanley Realty closed its doors, Maggie had been approached by two successful real estate companies with local offices, to work as a private-contractor financial liaison, specializing in financially distressed properties.  This was essentially what she had successfully done working on salary with Stanley Realty.

Working with the two separate companies as a private contractor was non-conflicting, plus, she was free to contract with others.  Her lender contacts remained the same.  The former Jenson & Associates hadn’t re-opened yet so she made contact with a regional auction house centered in nearby New Haven.  Maggie also decided to contact other auction houses as well.

Maggie had agreed with Max to manage his apartment building, in his absence, and she had set up her private contractor’s office in rented space formally rented by Stanley Realty.  It was staffed by a secretary to handle her appointments and track earned fee payments. Her company was a sole-proprietorship known as “Marshall Realty Services”.

Although the ‘Terrific Twosome’ wouldn’t be working together on a day to day basis, they planned on spending as many week-ends together as mutually-available time allowed.  The drive to Max’s New York office was around two and one half hours, depending on traffic.

Max had taken flying lessons when he was younger and he was planning to up-grade them and apply for a private pilot license.  A small plane flight from Ithaca to East Wayford would be about fifty-five minutes of air time.

Included as one of the benefits with Max’s employment was access to several light aircraft types owned and maintained by Universal Security Associated Partners Inc.

Later on this evening they were planning to drive down to the little, weather-beaten fisherman’s bar on the Long Island Sound shoreline, for pre-made, refrigerated sandwiches and a couple of bottles of beer.