Candidate for Murder

by Lauren Carr

  “The bartender in the lounge said there was a fat man sitting at the bar at the same time that Burr was meeting with Nancy Braxton. He had a feeling this customer was watching Burr, and he noticed that he left right after Burr left the lounge.”

  “Could’ve been a coincidence,” Dallas said. “Isn’t that sometimes the thing with witnesses? They’re so anxious to help that they start imaginin’ things. The bartender might have just thought he was watchin’ Burr because the idea was planted in his mind after he heard heard about the murder.”

  “That’s what makes information from tip lines so difficult,” Bogie said. “Thing is, we never identified the fat man. The bartender swore that he never saw the guy before, that the guy paid cash, and that he never saw him again. Plus he left a fresh drink behind when he followed Burr out. That’s what made the bartender suspicious.”

  “Can you see Nancy Braxton gettin’ her hands dirty and killin’ someone?” Dallas asked.

  “No,” Bogie said. “That’s why we were so interested in the fat man—who we never did locate.”

  “Maybe I’ll have better luck.”

  Garrett County Board of Elections

  “Good morning, Gnarly.” A man in farm overalls stopped on his way up to the counter to bend over and pet the German shepherd lying at David’s feet.

  Gnarly laid his ears back and wagged his tail. The toddler straddling the dog’s back giggled with joy.

  David glanced down to make sure that Gnarly wasn’t playing too rough with the child whose mother was busy completing paper work on the other side of the work counter. Seeing that both child and dog were safe and happy, he checked the registration number on the metal tag in his hand to ensure that he had written it correctly on the form.

  “Hey, Gnarly, how’s it going?” one of the office clerks said, patting him on the head. After scratching his ears, she continued on through the door and back to her work cubicle without acknowledging Gnarly’s human companion.

  After pocketing the tags, David signed the application.

  “Gnarly! What’s up?” a young man said as he hurried by and waved to the dog.

  The German shepherd replied with a bark.

  “Time to go, Austin!”

  “I want to stay with Gnarly,” the child said when his mother lifted him by the arm off of the German shepherd.

  “Austin,” his mother said in a low voice.

  With a pout, the toddler threw his arms around the dog. “Thanks for playing with me, Gnarly.”

  The shepherd sat up and licked the child’s face.

  “Thank you for watching Austin, Gnarly.” The mother gave him a scratch behind the ears. Then, taking her child by the hand, she hurried up to the counter to turn in her paper work.

  David led Gnarly up to the counter. Upon seeing the next available clerk, an older woman wearing turquoise reading glasses, his heart sank.

  It was Edna.

  Bracing for a fight, David clutched Gnarly’s leash and stepped up to the counter.

  “Chief O’Callaghan, what a pleasure to see you,” Edna said with a forced smile.

  “Hello, Edna.” David slid the paper work in her direction.

  Abruptly, Gnarly jumped up to plant his front paws on the counter. The sudden move prompted a shriek from Edna that was heard throughout the office.

  Gnarly’s mouth hung open in a grin.

  “This is—” David said.

  “I know Gnarly.” She reached over to pat the dog on the top of the head. Her usual sour tone turned agreeable. “What brings you here today?”

  “Filing to run as a candidate.” David gestured to the paper work in her hand.

  Tearing her attention away from the dog across from her, Edna read through the application. Upon reading the name on it, her eyebrows rose up on her forehead. She adjusted her eyeglasses and read the information again.

  “He’s been a resident in Spencer for the last four years,” David said. “He’s registered with the county—”

  “So I see.” The corners of her lips turned upward. “If he’s elected mayor of Spencer, will he do anything about that speed trap on Lake Shore Drive?”

  “That’s not a speed trap,” David said.

  Cocking his head at David, Gnarly uttered a low, guttural noise.

  Edna frowned.

  “Look,” David said. “I know the speed limit along that stretch of Lake Shore Drive used to be thirty-five, but then all those big houses went up, and the residents petitioned to have it lowered to twenty-five for a good reason: there are a lot of kids in that neighborhood. It would be unsafe to raise the speed limit back up to thirty-five.”

  Edna’s frown deepened.

  “But,” David said, “Gnarly would suggest that instead of taking Lake Shore Drive, you take Spring Road, which runs parallel to Lake Shore.”

  “That would be a longer route.”

  “Yes, it would be longer,” David said. “But only by about two miles. Since it’s more rural, the speed limit is forty-five. You can travel Spring Road in less time, and it comes out only a quarter of a mile from where you come out when you take Lake Shore.” He sucked in a deep breath. “That’s what Gnarly would suggest.”

  She regarded David for a long moment before saying, “Gnarly has a lot of sense.” With a flourish, she stamped the application with an “approved” stamp and handed it back to David. “He’s got my vote.”

  Well, that’s one vote! Trying hard not to dance out of the office, David led Gnarly out the door. Once they were out of sight, Edna took her cell phone out of her bag and searched her contacts for a phone number. The call was picked up on the second ring.

  “Got anything interesting, Edna?”

  “Oh yeah,” Edna said. “You’ll never believe who’s running for mayor of Spencer, Maryland.”

  Once Gnarly’s application to run for office had been officially approved, David felt that it was time for a celebratory breakfast—including a danish for the new mayoral candidate. Upon returning to Deep Creek Lake, David pulled his cruiser into Beagle Bailey’s Bagels for a hot cup of coffee. The summer weather was pleasant enough that he and Gnarly could sit out on the deck along the lakeshore.

  David and Gnarly had just bitten into their breakfasts when a familiar call made the hair on the back of David’s neck stand up on end. His ears perking up, Gnarly wagged his tail.

  “Hey, look, Hap! It’s Gnarly!” Two elderly men rushed over from the outdoor service counter where they had gotten their coffees and breakfasts.

  Bernie Stein and Hap Goldman had been best friends since childhood, and the pair was a fixture around Deep Creek Lake. The two men had run a fix-it business for as long as David could remember. They ran their business out of Hap’s garage. They spent most of their time in Hap’s man cave, drinking beer and watching sports on television. In spite of their less than polished appearance, Bernie and Hap were the local go-to guys for general repair work or small construction jobs. David suspected that that was because they were as entertaining to watch as they were skilled in repairs.

  Always grinning his wide, toothless grin, Hap let Bernie do all of the talking—which he did a lot of.

  “How’re you doing, Gnarly?” After giving the German shepherd a piece of crust from his egg sandwich, Bernie plopped down in a chair at their table. “Are you meeting a date for breakfast?”

  “Actually, he’s eating with me,” David said.

  Startled, Bernie looked up to see that David was sitting across from him. “Oh, sorry, Chief. I didn’t see you there.”

  Carrying a bear claw, Hap took a seat at the table. With a wide grin, he nodded a hello to David before giving a bit of his pastry to Gnarly.

  “So what’s happening, Chief?” Glancing around the outdoor café, which was nearly empty due to the lull between the breakfast crowd and the lunch crowd, Bernie asked in
a low voice, “Have you got someone under surveillance?”

  “No,” David replied. “Gnarly and I were just going back to the police station after taking care of some business at the board of elections.” Watching how Bernie and Hap were petting Gnarly, who was inching closer and closer to their food, he said with a sly grin, “Gnarly’s running for mayor.”

  Bernie’s and Hap’s eyes grew wide. Both of their jaws dropped open.

  “Really?” Bernie asked.

  “It’s official.” David nodded his head. “He’s running as an independent.”

  “Well, I’ll be.” Wagging a finger across the table at David, Bernie said, “You know, I think Gnarly would make a fine mayor—especially compared to those two knuckleheads already running. For one, Gnarly’s honest—”

  Seeing an opening, Gnarly snatched Bernie’s egg sandwich from the table and wolfed it down.

  Suppressing his laughter, David agreed with a nod of his head.

  “Hap and I would love to help. Who’ve you got running his campaign?”

  “Running his campaign?” David asked.

  “You have to have a campaign manager,” Bernie said.

  Hap was nodding his head vigorously.

  “But it’s only a small-town race,” David said.

  “Does Gnarly have a website?” Bernie asked. “Is he on Facebook and Twitter?”

  “Twitter?”

  Bernie jumped up in his seat. “Gnarly’s not on Twitter! How do you expect for him to win if he’s not on Twitter? Tell me that he’s at least on Instagram!”

  Hap’s toothless mouth hung open in what appeared to be disbelief.

  Bernie waved his hands. “Let’s not panic.” He looked down at Gnarly, who had finished the sandwich and was licking his chops. “We can fix this, Gnarly. Hap and I will take over as your campaign managers.” He turned his attention back to David. “What kind of budget does Mr. Faraday have for the campaign?”

  “Mac? Campaign budget?”

  “Well, as loaded as Mr. Faraday is, I’m sure he’ll have a big enough budget for Hap and me to get the job done right.” Seeing that his plate was then empty, Bernie stood up. “Man, this sure was an exciting breakfast. I don’t even remember eating my sandwich. Come on, Hap, we’ve got a lot of work to do. We got signs to make and to book some billboards. Plus we need to put the word out online.”

  Chattering away about the work that they had to do, Hap and Bernie trotted away—leaving Hap’s bearclaw for Gnarly to wolf down.

  The mention of Mac Faraday’s name made David swallow. He didn’t consider his registering Gnarly to run for mayor to be a big issue that he should tell Mac about. “Campaign budget? Signs? Billboards? It’s just a small-town mayoral race.” Looking down into Gnarly’s brown eyes, David cocked his head. “I mean, like, how big of a campaign could this become?”

  Spencer Manor

  Turning the SUV right onto Spencer Court, Archie Monday glanced over to her husband, Mac Faraday, who was asleep in the passenger seat. They had spent the last three weeks cruising up and down rivers in Europe, eating glorious gourmet food, drinking fabulous wine, and even spending some nights in romantic castle getaways.

  Thankfully, Mac hadn’t started to feel sick until the last day. It had started the usual way. He’d woken up with a sore throat and had been coughing. By the time they’d boarded the plane at Heathrow Airport, his voice had become raspy. He’d been flushed with fever and unable to stop coughing when they’d landed in Dulles. Two hours later, upon landing in a private jet at the airport in McHenry, Mac was full-fledged sick.

  Archie patted his knee to wake him up. “Honey, we’re home. We’ll just get you to bed and unpack tomorrow.”

  Clearing his throat, Mac rubbed his face and sat up in his seat. “Sounds good to me.”

  As she approached the stone pillars marking the entrance to Spencer Manor, which was located at the end of Spencer Point, Archie brought their SUV to a halt. Media vans were lined up on both sides of the road. Upon seeing the black SUV, journalists with camera operators hurried forward to escort the vehicle up the circular driveway and to the front of the stone-and-cedar mansion.

  “This does not look good,” Mac said when he saw the journalists jostling for the best position from which to ambush him when he climbed out of the SUV.

  A homicide detective who had had more than twenty-five years of investigative experience under his belt when a sudden inheritance from the birth mother he had never known had thrust him into high society, Mac was ready for everything—except for a media ambush while he was suffering from a high fever.

  Immediately, a pack of microphones was stuck in his face.

  “Mr. Faraday,” a middle-aged woman asked, “is Gnarly pro-choice or pro-life?”

  “Huh?” Mac covered his mouth and coughed.

  “Would you say Gnarly leans more to the left or to the right?”

  Thinking about the times when he’d walked the German shepherd, Mac replied, “Usually he keeps to the right.”

  “So he’s a conservative!” one of the journalists said.

  “Conservative?” Mac asked.

  “But he claims to be running as an independent,” another journalist said.

  “How does Gnarly feel about gun laws?” yet another asked. “Does he believe in protecting the Second Amendment? Is he going to support the Constitution?”

  “I think,” Mac said. “We never really talked about—you do realize Gnarly’s a dog.”

  Thrusting herself between Mac and the journalists, Archie asked, “What’s all this about?”

  “The voters have a right to know Gnarly’s platform so that they can make informed choices when it comes time to vote,” the first journalist said.

  Archie and Mac exchanged long looks during which a young female journalist asked, “As a dog, does Gnarly feel that cats and dogs have equal rights? Does he intend to propose that dogs who identify more with cats be exempt from leash laws?”

  “And cats who identify more with dogs will be required to wear leashes,” Mac said with a laugh that turned into a coughing fit.

  While patting her husband on the back, Archie asked, “What office is Gnarly running for?”

  “Mayor of Spencer,” the journalists replied almost in unison.

  “Mayor!” Mac’s voice sounded like a foghorn. “He’s never even voted!”

  Chapter Three

  “How long did you work for Robin Spencer?” Dallas asked Archie while they watched Gnarly and Storm chase each other in and around the floral gardens surrounding Spencer Manor.

  In the summer season, the gardens were in full bloom, creating a multicolored glory. Even with all of the foliage, they could see camera operators perched on top of the stone wall bordering the Spencer estate so that they could record the mayoral candidate frolicking about his home.

  Upon spotting Gnarly’s nemesis, an overweight squirrel that Archie had named Otis, the two dogs partnered up and began what resembled a tag-team competition to chase him high up into a tree. Displeased about being outnumbered, Otis cursed down at them in his squirrel tongue. Standing up on her hind legs with her front paws on the base of the tree, Storm seemed to be weighing how difficult it would be to climb up after him.

  Smiling at Gnarly’s delight over making a new friend, Archie said, “Ten years.”

  “And you were her research assistant—”

  “And editor.”

  “That was before—”

  “Before what?” Archie jerked her head to look in Dallas’ direction.

  Seeing that she then had Archie’s full attention, the corner of Dallas’ lips curled with pleasure. “Nancy Braxton was Patrick O’Callaghan’s prime murder suspect back ’bout twenty years ago.”

  Dallas sensed that eventually, if Archie let her guard down, she would be a fun person—maybe even a friend
to her. She thought that there had to be a fun and loyal friend behind that wall. Otherwise, David wouldn’t have valued Archie as though she were the sister he’d never had.

  Archie wasn’t David’s only friend who held a grudge against his new love.

  Things would have been different between Dallas and Archie if she had met David under different circumstances. As it were, fate had Dallas cross David’s path days before he was to marry Chelsea, Archie’s good friend. As a matter of fact, Archie was to be Chelsea’s matron of honor, which made it her job to deliver the shocking news to David that Chelsea had called off the wedding.

  A man of honor, David was planning to keep his commitment to Chelsea, even though he loved Dallas. So why, Dallas quietly fumed, did some of his friends blame her when it was Chelsea who ran away with another man?

  For some reason, in spite of the facts, Archie saw Dallas as the other woman who played an active role in breaking up the couple.

  “Robin never did like Nancy Braxton,” Archie said. “I assumed it was because Braxton is an arrogant bitch. Robin never had time for rude people. What was the victim’s name?”

  “Sandy Burr.”

  Dallas watched Archie’s emerald eyes narrow in thought. She brought her long, slender hand to her head to scratch her ultrashort blond hair with her finely manicured pale-pink nails. The hue on her fingernails matched the toenails of her bare feet, both adorned with toe rings. Every time she saw Archie Monday, Dallas was struck by her polished appearance—even when she had bare feet. Archie Monday might have been a rich man’s wife, but she was no shoe hound. The few times Dallas had been at Spencer Manor for dinner parties, she’d found Archie Monday dressed in the latest styles with rubies dripping from her ears—and with bare feet.

  Even though Dallas Walker was the daughter of a Texas billionaire, she had been born and raised in the outdoors, getting her hands dirty and learning how to hold her own against cattlemen and ornery quarter horses.

  Unlike Archie Monday, who never had a hair out of place and kept her nails clean and manicured, Dallas Walker wore her brunette mane long and loose down to the middle of her back and kept her fingernails unpolished and trimmed short. Women with long acrylic nails had no place on Buddy Walker’s Ranch.