Honor Thy Father

The moving finger writes and, having writ, moves on.

Nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back

to cancel half a line

nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.

Omar Khayyam

Now

June 2018

Chapter One

Cassandra Warren felt nothing but exhilaration as she stepped out of the shower and dried herself with a plush towel. She tousled her stylishly-trimmed, freshly highlighted locks with her fingers. Even damp, her hair looked perfect. She took her time applying lotion to every reachable part of her body. It was her most prized possession, tanned and toned in a way that belonged only to the extremely disciplined or the extremely wealthy. Cassandra was both.

She donned his favorite nightgown, then dabbed her favorite scent on the pulse at the side of her throat, a jasmine that she ordered custom-made. She wandered into the spacious master bedroom and draped herself over the chaise. The candle was lit, the wine already chilling in the ice bucket. Sliding glass doors along the opposite wall offered a moonlit panoramic view of Lake Barkley. Through the open windows she could hear the lake’s waters gently lapping against the shore below.

She was taking a sip of the wine when she heard him come in. She had never felt this sort of anticipation for anything or anyone, but it was this way every time they met. She heard his steps as he walked across the hardwood floor toward her. Her breath hitched in her throat as she waited for him to touch her. The first touch from him was always her favorite—a harbinger of things to come. No man could do for her what he did. She sensed him—no, she felt him—standing silently just inches behind her, and sighed.

He was everything she wanted.

His fingers grazed her bare shoulder and eased up her neck. Cassandra turned her head to press her lips to his hand. She couldn’t see his other hand, nor the silver instrument it held, gleaming in the moonlight.

In that moment of anticipation, Cassandra Warren did not realize she had only seconds to live.

He felt her skin prickle beneath his touch. Cassandra Warren was so aroused by who and what she thought he was. It would be her final mistake.

Still, he played along.

His hand moved up the side of her neck and cupped her jaw. Mmm… she purred, closing her eyes and nuzzling her face against his hand. I’ve been waiting for you.

No, he replied in a hoarse whisper, you haven’t.

Before she could react, he seized her jaw in his left hand. She didn’t have time to react or resist. The straight razor gleamed in his other hand. He planted the blade a few inches below her left ear. Feeling it catch in her tender flesh, he pulled the razor back to his right in a surprisingly smooth and easy motion.

He watched as she spewed and choked on her own blood until the considerable fight within her was gone. He picked her up from the chair, carried her to the king-sized bed and gently laid her down so that her head dangled over the edge. Blood pulsed through the canal gashed across her throat and dripped to the floor, where it began to pool. It was the very spot where the house’s last mistress had died. It gave Cassandra a view of the lake, albeit upside down. He wondered if in these, her final seconds, she would still admire that view. After all, she had worked so hard to get it.

He knew he should run, but he lingered to watch the light fade from her eyes for the last time. He unconsciously fidgeted with the blade, twirling it between his fingers, flicking it in the air, and then catching it safely by the handle. A groundswell of emotions began to stir inside of him. He felt a sob catch in his throat, but he choked it back, remembering why he had come here.

Why he had come here the last time.

It had begun. Again.

He snapped the knife shut and pocketed it. With the look of resignation that comes with mourning the very life you just took, Cassandra Warren’s killer simply turned and walked away.

Chapter Two

Hunter Cameron’s long, rangy frame rose easily from the solid oak table traditionally used by the defense. He doffed his jacket and ambled toward the twelve jurors seated in the middle of the courtroom.

During this trial, now in its third—and God willing—final day, more than one juror had been struck by the strong resemblance between Hunter and the subject of one of the judicial portraits hanging to the right of the judge’s bench. The portrait was of Hunter’s late father James, whose humility had prevented him from allowing anyone to call him Judge anywhere except inside this courtroom during his distinguished twenty-two years on the bench. Just like his father, Hunter’s once-dark hair was frosted with a silver that only served to highlight his green eyes. High cheekbones and a straight nose complimented his striking face and made him look a decade younger than his fifty-seven years.

Hunter had grown up within these walls. And when he began his closing argument, speaking in a rich, southern baritone hued with whiskey and honey, there was no doubt among the jurors as to whom the courtroom belonged. The room’s acoustics seemed to greet his words with a warmth not reserved for other voices, as though it was welcoming an old friend.

Sheriff Thomas Dooley was familiar with the allure of Hunter’s words. In his thirteen years with the department, he had heard them countless times. Until now, however, his seat had not been behind the defense table.

Late last summer Sheriff Dooley had developed an interest in his neighbor’s bosomy daughter, Dorothea. To his surprise and as a profound testament to the theory that some women couldn’t resist a man in uniform, any uniform, Dorothea had welcomed his advances. Unfortunately for Dooley, he was so busy shaking off his resulting disbelief that he failed to note an important fact about Dorothea before they began their two-week affair—her age.

In Kentucky the age of consent was sixteen. Although Dorothea had been a willing participant in their acts—including sex atop the hood of his squad car, which she affectionately termed as doing it Dooley-style—she was six months shy of sixteen and thus, not of consenting age.

When the indictment was returned by the Christian County Grand Jury, the disgraced sheriff turned to the man he knew to be the best criminal defense lawyer in western Kentucky. Hell, the best defense lawyer in the Commonwealth, some said.

Robert Galusha, the Commonwealth’s Attorney from Todd County, had been appointed as special prosecutor in the case. Galusha had brawled his way through the trial, lacing the Sheriff with layer upon layer of salty and lurid accusations, leaving little to the imagination. No matter how minute the detail, Galusha jack-hammered it into the jurors’ minds. However lacking in subtlety his approach may have been, Galusha had nonetheless been effective. During the Commonwealth’s case, some onlookers in the courthouse swore that they could actually feel the weight of the jurors’ disgusted scowls aimed at Dooley. Others in the County Clerk’s office were positive they had heard hissing from the jury box.

And then it was Hunter’s turn.

His approach was, as it always had been, one of understated grace. He wasn’t interested in brawling with Galusha, or in dazzling the jury with his intelligence. He simply wanted to connect with them. And connect with them he did.

From the beginning of the trial, Hunter had followed the same routine when he came into the courtroom. He’d make the obligatory handshakes, go to his table, and unload his battered briefcase. He would display the contents prominently on the defense table—the binders of notes, a law book or two, and his trusty pouch of Red Man tobacco. Not dip. Chewing tobacco. Never mind the fact that he’d never had a chaw in his life and had been bringing the very same pouch of the very same tobacco to trials for years. Silly though it may have seemed to an outsider, that bag resonated with a jury in this rural community with traditionally strong tobacco ties. I’m not like that prosecutor over there, it said. I’m one of you.

But props weren’t the only way Hunter connected with the jury. Careful not to attack Dorothea while she was on the stand and risk offending the jury, Hunter gently prodded her to acknowledge that she routinely drove a car to her rendezvous with Dooley. She also admitted, without a trace of embarrassment, that due largely to her indisputably mature appearance, she was regularly able to purchase alcohol for her friends. Finally, she admitted—over Galusha’s vehement objection that the testimony asked for speculation by Dorothea—that under those circumstances, ol’ Dooley probably did think she was over sixteen.

This evidence, he argued, was consistent with Dooley’s claim from the outset that he had believed Dorothea to be of consenting age. If that was the case—and he reminded them, Dorothea testified under oath that it was—then it was their sworn duty, under Kentucky law, to find Dooley not guilty. Of course, Hunter was far too seasoned to put Dooley on the stand to ask him whether or not he had known about her age. Frankly, he had no desire to learn the answer to that question himself.

Now, during his closing argument, Hunter subtly, but repeatedly, reminded the jury of this evidence. The look on their faces would later be described by onlookers—the very same onlookers who had predicted imminent conviction and perhaps a hanging at the court square—as that of a church body, anxiously receiving and accepting the words of their preacher. Hunter knew that the only real question to be answered by the jury was which one of them would be elected as foreperson, not what their verdict would be.

Shortly after the jury acquitted Sheriff Dooley and before the starved western Kentucky media could grab him for a much-needed shot of adrenaline for their otherwise sleepy headlines, Hunter Cameron breezed down Highway 68 toward the lake home he shared with his wife Katherine. The convertible top of the burgundy BMW was down and the warm summer air rippled the waves in his hair. Instinctively, he felt the pocket of his shirt, checking as he had just seconds before and would do again, that the folded piece of paper was still there. He left it in his shirt pocket, breathing a sigh of relief. The directions, written in his own hand, were there.

Thank God.

The directions weren’t another prop to impress a jury. On the contrary, he’d gone to great lengths to prevent anyone from knowing that he needed them and that he had needed them for several months now. He didn’t need them every day, he assured himself. But when he did, his shame was palpable, even though no one knew his secret. After all, these were the directions to the home in which he had lived for the last twenty-six years.

Chapter Three

The smells of country breakfast awoke Hunter from his deep sleep. He yawned, rose from his bed and, donning his robe, wearily wandered down the hall, following his nose each step of the way.

He paused in the doorway of the kitchen to revel in the view of his wife of thirty years. Covered with one of Hunter’s oversized oxford shirts, her long, lean figure was more the by-product of good genes than of strict diet and exercise. Her once-porcelain facial features had developed more character with the age lines, producing a lived-in, comfortable beauty, much like the antiques she sold from her parlor in town. Her still-dark auburn hair was tied back and her hazel eyes made him think of leaves descending from trees, cooler weather, and all things autumn.

Snapping out of his spell, he approached her from behind, wrapped his arms around her waist, and nudged the morning stubble of his chin down the nape of her neck.

Mornin’ love, she said in a wispy voice indicative of the early morning hour.

No more low-fat diet? Who do I owe for the reprieve?

Katherine flipped the eggs and gently broke from his embrace to check the biscuits in the hearth-style oven. A reprieve is all it is. Enjoy the sunset of your freedom while it lasts, she said, grinning.

Shit.

Hunter sat at the kitchen table and gazed through the large glass door that opened onto the deck, affording a spectacular view of the lake. The sun glistened sharply off the water, blazing a broad streak of light across the bay and the main channel.

Lake Barkley and its adjoining sister, Kentucky Lake, comprised one of the world’s largest man-made bodies of water. The land mass located between the lakes, creatively titled The Land Between the Lakes, was a haven for campers and anglers alike. Each summer both locals and tourists would pour in to enjoy the tranquility and hospitality of the area. Although it was only seven-thirty, the lake was already well populated by fishermen trolling Barkley for the bountiful catfish, bass, and crappie for which it was nationally known. Within a couple of hours, the fishermen would retreat to their campsites and be replaced by weekenders and tourists, cutting across the waters in houseboats, pontoons, and runabouts. Hunter and Katherine enjoyed watching the droves arrive each spring, but were happy to wave goodbye when they left in August. Though they both worked in Hopkinsville, the twenty-minute morning drive was a sacrifice worth making. Neither of them could imagine not living on the lake.

The table, typically set for four, held only two place settings. Their daughters, Payton and Alexandria, were away at college. Payton, the eldest at twenty years of age, was a junior accounting major at her father’s alma mater, Centre College, some three hours away. Alexandria, the more outgoing, creative one, had just enrolled at Northwestern University in its acclaimed drama department. Not yet eighteen, she had left for college a month early to become acclimated to life at the university’s home in Evanston, Illinois. The quiet from the girls’ absence had been unsettling at first. However, the appeal of not having to sneak around after some twenty years of being careful not to be caught in a compromising position by one of the girls, was welcomed by the Camerons.

The morning newspaper lay on the table, still bound snugly in its blue cellophane wrapping. Hunter was typically unimpressed both by his courtroom victories and by the press’s consistent inability to correctly detail what had occurred, so there was a great likelihood that the morning’s headlines regarding Sheriff Dooley’s acquittal would not be read.

He poured his first cup of coffee as Katherine placed breakfast on the table. Plates full of fried eggs, bacon, sausage, grits, and gravy flanked a pyramid of homemade biscuits. Several condiments, including three flavors of preserves, rounded out a feast that Hunter and Katherine, and four other couples, could never consume in one sitting. However, Katherine knew that during the week Hunter was often in a hurry and would eat anything in the refrigerator. So she wasn’t concerned about wasting leftovers.

I take it Sheriff Dooley is happy, Katherine said as she sipped her coffee.

"Relieved maybe, Hunter replied, but I don’t know about happy. He took a bite of his bacon before continuing. He’s resigned from his position, with little or no benefits. Been publicly humiliated. Now that the need for the public illusion of a united family front is gone, Janey told him that he’ll be served with divorce papers on Monday. When she gets sole custody of their kids, which she will in light of his admission that he indeed had sex with a girl not much older than they are, he’ll be reduced to getting them every other weekend. All in all, I don’t expect he’s out kicking up his heels."

"You know what they say, Hunter. Maybe the good Sheriff should’ve thought about that before he decided to use his squad car to go parking with high-schoolers. I mean, really, Hunter. Dooley-style?" Her face contorted with disgust.

He didn’t know she was underage, he mumbled.

Didn’t know, my ass, she replied, sitting up a little straighter in her chair. He’s in the high school all the time. He doesn’t miss a ball game. You’re going to tell me he didn’t have any idea how old that girl was?

The jury didn’t think so. Hunter blinked innocently at her.

Katherine offered him a curt smile, then leaned over and patted him on the shoulder. "And he has a brilliant lawyer to thank for that. And I’ll remind his brilliant lawyer that this Dorothea isn’t that much younger than the brilliant lawyer’s own two girls." She leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs, silently daring him to rebut her.

Wisely, he refrained.

Hunter sensed it was time to move on to a different, potentially more rewarding topic. So, I was wondering, he said, feigning the voice of a nervous teenager, do you have any plans for tonight —y’know, with your folks or something?

Catching her cue, Katherine slowly laid down her coffee cup, adjusted her posture and rested her chin on her clasped fingers. She arched an eyebrow and with an exaggerated drawl said, I don’t know. Why do you ask?

This was one of the routines that made their relationship not just a marriage, but a living, breathing romance. Mindful of marriages that had collapsed once the glue of rearing children was gone, Hunter and Katherine went out of their way to not take any aspect of their marriage for granted. In that vein, dates were not to be assumed. Hunter would always ask if she would join him for dinner, picnics, movies—whatever the plans were. Katherine, not wanting to place the entire burden on Hunter, would occasionally do likewise. The result was a marriage that remained unusually fresh.

Well, I thought—if you were interested—I might commandeer the grill tonight for those pork chops you like so well. Dinner on the deck, overlooking the water, without the girls…

Katherine rose from her seat and positioned herself in Hunter’s lap. She wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him a mischievous look. I think it was dinner on the deck overlooking the water that brought us the girls in the first place.

Hunter cocked his head, still savoring his role. I see. What will it take then?

With a gentle pull, she brought his face within inches of hers. Her hands moved to the sides of his face. She closed her eyes and, with the most seductive voice she could muster, whispered You’ll have to get me drunk first.

Hunter rolled his eyes. Damn. The wine. He had forgotten to pick it up. This just cannot be happening. He had traditionally brought a bottle of their favorite Chardonnay home on the last day of every trial. What is it with me lately, he wondered. It wasn’t just the getting lost while driving home, either. His episodes of confusion were becoming more frequent. Although his mind had always tended to wander, he could not get over how he was having difficulty remembering even the most mundane things. He found himself using landmarks to drive to places where he had traveled his whole life. He constantly struggled to remember someone’s name. Or left something at the office that he needed in court. His secretary had started double-checking before he left to make sure he had everything and to spare herself an emergency trip to court.

Perhaps he was just getting older and more susceptible to the rigors of the practice of law, particularly a solo practice. Maybe Katherine was right. She had been encouraging him to slow down, perhaps even retire. His lucrative practice had long ago made them wealthy, so there was no financial need to continue. He could scale back and begin to enjoy the comforts of the life he and Katherine had made. This was probably his body’s way of telling him he needed to set course in another direction.

…so if you’ll make certain we have gas in the grill, I have fresh corn and can make the baked potatoes and the salad. Katherine’s voice broke his train of thought.

Sure, honey, he said, patting her leg. He had to go back into town to get the wine and didn’t want to alarm her the way he had himself with the knowledge that he had, for the first time, forgotten to pick up the post-trial wine.

I’ve got to run back to the office, I forgot to sign some orders that need to go out.

Her grin turned southward. Why do you need to go back in today? It’s Saturday. The office is closed and so’s the courthouse. What could you possibly hope to accomplish today that can’t wait until Monday?

Katherine knew him, she knew his schedule. She was largely cooperative with the demands of his career, but when it was her time, then, by God, it was her time. However, Hunter had anticipated this objection from her and had a response fashioned and ready.

Well, I need to sign the orders and I wasn’t planning on going in to the office on Monday.

Her disapproval immediately changed to surprise. You’re not?

Hunter managed to keep a straight face. Nope, he said, or Tuesday, either. He could feel her hope, the sense of anticipation rising from within her. In fact, he added, I think we need to take some time and just run off together.

This type of talk was just plain heresy coming from her husband. She looked as if she was expecting some belated April Fool’s joke.

Where?

I don’t know. How about we decide when we get to the airport? Let’s just wing it. They had often talked of doing such a thing many years ago, before careers and children had drained their sense of adventure, leaving them with only the mundane and the practical.

What about your clients? she asked. He could tell he had her hooked now, but she was going to make certain the water was safe before she dove in.

They’ll be here when I get back. And if they’re not, the hell with ’em.

What about the girls… She cut herself off, realizing the silliness of the question.

Hunter laughed out loud. "Oh, please. They’re in college. I refilled their bank accounts last week. So long as we let them both know where we are once we get there, they won’t give a shit what we do."

He was face to face with her now, his hands on her hips. He gazed down at her, giving her his warmest smile. No excuses. We’ll pack tomorrow and head for destinations unknown.

Finally accepting that one of her dreams was about to come true, Katherine nuzzled her face against his chest. His hands slowly raised the oxford shirt from above her thighs. With little effort, he picked her up and felt her legs quickly wrap around his waist. Careful not to knock over any of the plates still on the table, he placed her on top of it. Her head fell back as the buttons of the oxford, one by one, slowly came undone.

Three hours later, Hunter was on his way back from Hopkinsville. He had stopped by his office on Main Street, the one opened by his father fifty years earlier, signed the orders, and managed this time, to remember the wine. At the subdivision’s security gate, he looked at the card he never used to carry and carefully entered his code. The iron gates swung open with the speed of a drawbridge. He was navigating the winding roads that came part and parcel with lakefront development, when he first spotted the police blockade. As he approached, the deputy sheriff held Hunter’s car at bay with his outstretched hand. Hunter leaned out the window of the BMW to peer at the scene. The Warren house was the largest, most majestic home on the lake. The police cars and equipment vans parked in front of it looked like peasants’ wagons hunkered down in the shadow of their lord’s castle.

He knew the home well.

The tragedy that had occurred there forty-five years earlier had affected many lives, few more so than his own. But he had eventually taken those memories, boxed them up, and stashed them neatly away in the back of his mind. Now released, they came crashing down upon him like a tidal wave on an unsuspecting shore, leaving only debris in its wake. Sharp, bladed debris that must be sorted through before it can be cleaned up and thrown away.

The problem with waves is that they eventually come back to shore.

As if on cue, a stretcher flanked by a pair of hefty paramedics was pushed through the house’s massive solid oak double-doors. Although the body was draped in the standard-issue white sheet, strands of the corpse’s dark hair were visible at the head of the stretcher. Hunter instantly recognized the victim and felt the tide rising again, preparing to crash against the shore. Lost in those memories, he never heard the tremble in his own voice.

Not again, he whispered. Dear God…not again.

Then

Part One

Commonwealth of Kentucky

v. Javier Vazquez

July, 1972

Chapter Four

Twelve-year-old Hunter Cameron slouched in one of the leather chairs adorning the lobby of his father’s law office. The late afternoon sun peeked through the partially pulled blinds, casting streaks of light across the dark hardwood floors. The bill of the St. Louis Cardinals baseball cap pulled low over his forehead did little to mask his impatience or frustration.

Thwap. Thwap. Thwap. Time after time, he smacked the scuffed baseball into the weathered baseball glove. His clear green eyes focused on the wood-framed clock on the paneled wall to his left. As the minutes ticked by, the ball hit Hunter’s glove more frequently and a little bit harder. Thwap! Thwap! Thwap!

James Cameron’s secretary, Pauline Story, occasionally looked up from the legal brief she was typing to cast a quick glance at her employer’s only child. The boy was normally very friendly. Downright charming, in fact. Without children of her own, she knew that she had quickly become easy prey for the boy’s wiles. He seemed to instinctively know, as beautiful children often did, precisely how to use his blessings to his advantage.

He had his father’s dark hair and lanky build. His gait seemed to exude an air of quiet confidence. He might have been mistaken as aloof were it not for his warm personality. And that smile. Oh, that smile. With a simple grin, it was as though the young man could open any door. Pauline was relatively certain that, even at his age, no girl to whom the smile was directed would ever fail to return it.

Virtually none of these characteristics were present now, however. Pauline, or Ms. Polly as he called her, could have looked at the calendar months ago when the trip was planned and known what Hunter’s mood would be on the day he and his father were to depart. This was an annual event, the same as a holiday or a parade.

Each year James and Hunter made a late season trip to Busch Stadium in St. Louis to watch their beloved Cardinals play a weekend series. For Hunter, the annual trek to St. Louis was much more than simply a father-son trip. It was an opportunity to see his idol, Ted Simmons.

Unfortunately for Hunter, the battle to get his father to leave his busy law office on time was as much a ritual as the trip itself. It wasn’t that James wasn’t an attentive and loving father. On the contrary, he doted on his son. Hunter’s mother, Elizabeth, had died when Hunter was two, leaving James to raise their only child. Although he knew he could never completely make up for the loss of Hunter’s mother, James did everything in his power to make certain his son knew how much he was loved. Still, the practice of law was a jealous mistress and far too often Hunter found himself competing with the profession for his father’s time.

Hunter had declared long ago that he would never, ever, be a lawyer.

Shaking her head, Pauline went back to her work. Another hour passed. Then another. It was nearly two o’clock, just five hours from the first pitch, and James was still in his office with his door closed. Hunter continued to simmer. The ball hit the glove again and again. Thwap! Thwap! His father was, no doubt, sitting behind the scratched oak desk with his feet propped up and the phone stuck to his ear, idly trading words for the pitches they could be watching in St. Louis.

Thwap! Finally, Hunter heard the heavy door to his father’s office creak open and saw James step out into the hallway. Hunter stood up anxiously as his father approached, waiting to hear the words, OK, let’s go. However, as James walked into the lobby, the stunned expression on his ashen face made it clear that they would not be on time for the game. In fact, they would not be going to the game at all.

Chapter Five

His son had not taken the news well.

James Cameron sat in the small concrete-walled lobby of the Christian County Jail, waiting to introduce himself to the client who had already changed his life. The jail was old and, by necessity, had one of the more peculiar methods for prisoners to meet with their attorneys. The jail cells were located in the basement, creating, as intended, a dungeon-type feel. The building was barren of private meeting areas, so when a lawyer came to meet with an imprisoned client, the prisoner would be summoned to the top of the narrow stairs, where he would be separated from his counsel by a door of thick iron bars. As James waited for what was sure to be a lengthy and difficult meeting with Sgt. First Class Javier Vazquez, his thoughts strayed to the disappointed young boy he had left an hour before in his office.

James often felt like the rope in a never-ending game of tug-of-war—one end in the hand of his demanding career and the other end in the hand of his precocious young son. Most of the time he believed he held his own as a single father. Many days after long hours at work, James would loosen his tie, roll up his shirtsleeves, and don a catcher’s mitt so he could be peppered by Hunter’s wild pitches. He carefully walked the line between helping Hunter with his homework and doing the work for him. He answered every question the boy asked about his mother and encouraged him to ask more.

He knew how much Hunter looked forward to their annual trip to St. Louis. Although they invariably left James’s office later than Hunter liked, Hunter’s irritation would vanish once they left behind the Hopkinsville city limits. However, this was the first time James had been forced to cancel the trip altogether. The tears that had rolled down his son’s face were streaked with bitterness, making James feel like the tug-of-war rope had become a noose around his neck. Oh, he had promised that there would be another weekend. But he had been careful to avoid promise of a trip for the rest of this season. He didn’t want to completely lose his son’s faith in him. And by all appearances, Javier Vazquez would be occupying a large portion of his time for the foreseeable future.

Javier’s company commander had contacted James. James maintained a very good relationship with the Judge Advocate General’s office at Ft. Campbell, the U.S. Army base located fifteen miles away. Consequently, he often received referrals for soldiers who faced criminal charges off-post. The captain had little information to give James, only that the military police had come during a drill and had taken Javier to the MP station. Apparently, a Christian County judge had issued a warrant for Javier’s arrest.

The charge was first-degree murder.

James sat back in the cheaply-upholstered chair. The news that Eleanor Warren, wife of the tobacco magnate Charles Warren, had been found murdered in the Warren family’s lakefront estate had already began to filter through western Kentucky like a stream of water through the rock of a gravel road. After all, the Warren name was synonymous in the Commonwealth with money and power.

Kentucky had, along with Virginia and North Carolina, taken the early lead in the growing and processing of tobacco in the mid-to-late 1800’s. In 1864, a revolutionary strain of tobacco was discovered. This strain was strange looking—its leaves were finely textured, with a light, golden color. Its sweet taste was preferred for smoking, but it soon became extremely marketable for both plug and twist tobacco. It was also easier for farmers to grow and process. The sweet tobacco leaf exploded upon the already expanding tobacco market, and by the 1870’s, the leaf was one of Kentucky’s economic mainstays.

In the decade following the Civil War, Copeland Warren, a widowed father of two small children, had returned to his small family farm and saw a wasteland, barren of crops and depleted of food and livestock. All the Yankee soldiers had left behind was a barn full of the previous year’s tobacco. Desperate to feed his family, Copeland hauled the tobacco into his wagon pulled by mules, gathered his children, blankets, and food, and traveled from town to town, attempting to peddle the tobacco. He could never have imagined that he was on the brink of creating an empire.

Although Copeland had recognized the bright future of the new strain of tobacco, he also recognized the fickle nature of growing tobacco. The process was long and any profit depended on quality. Quality, unfortunately, required an element beyond skill and expertise—it required a good share of luck as well. A bad drought, a heavy rain—any of it could ruin a tobacco crop. Copeland wanted to limit the element of luck as much as possible. As he sold more and more of his tobacco, driving his mule-drawn cart across the rural landscape, his plan for the future materialized—let someone else grow the tobacco; he would sell it.

With his initial earnings, Copeland sought out other tobacco farmers, going to their homes and offering to purchase their crops. The farmers, amazed at their good fortune in not having to find a buyer, quickly agreed. Copeland, who had always had personality to spare, soon realized that he had an aptitude for sales. His fortune rapidly grew, as did his ambitions. He began to process the tobacco before selling it. When his barn became too small for his enterprise, he purchased an old log factory in Christian County, where the tobacco could be granulated and packed. The Warren family business was flourishing, and Copeland’s young son, Kirkland, watched with eyes brimming with anticipation, looking to the day when he would run the business.

Kirkland inherited his father’s ability to look ahead and to recognize future trends. When he realized the potential popularity of cigarettes, he struck quickly. He began to hire expert cigarette rollers to manufacture cigarettes on a large scale. The Warrens expanded their market west—first to St. Louis, then to Kansas City, and even further west. By the close of the nineteenth century, the Warren Tobacco Company was an industry empire, surpassed only by the Dukes of North Carolina. However, while the Dukes globalized, the Warrens were content to maintain their North American niche.

Kirkland and his young wife would sire only one child, a son named Charles. Before he had taken his first step, Kirkland had his son in the office, intent on giving him a lifelong education in the family business. Young Charles became consumed with the family business, even more so than his father and grandfather before him. While he shared their ambition, his seemed unbridled. Perhaps because he was born into wealth rather than growing into it, Charles, unlike his ancestors, lacked any sensitivity toward others. He seemed to enjoy buying out bankrupt farms and capitalizing on the economic climate after the Depression.

Charles Warren wielded his power broadly throughout the Commonwealth. Governors were known to spend weekends lounging at the Warren’s lakefront estate, enjoying lavish parties hosted by his young trophy wife. A new building constructed by Warren dollars at the University of Kentucky bore their name. He kept seats, seldom used, next to the University president for UK basketball games, and had Coach Adolph Rupp’s home phone number, though it was usually the legendary coach who called him. He and his beautiful wife were regulars in the luxury boxes at the Kentucky Derby. The Warren power and influence was unparalleled in the Commonwealth.

James’s thoughts were interrupted by the coarse voice of the guard. It’s your turn, Counselor.

James forced a smile, grabbed his briefcase, and rose, offering a polite, Thanks, as he passed the guard. As he headed toward the jail’s stairway, James was unsure whether his gratitude was for his wait coming to an end or for the guard interrupting him before he could change his mind about taking the case.

The light shining behind James provided little illumination for the cellblock located at the bottom of the stairs. He blinked down into the blackness as he waited patiently at the iron-barred door to meet with his client. When the face of SFC Javier Vazquez appeared at the bottom of the stairs and began a slow ascent up the stairs toward James, it was as though the man was emerging from the dark waters of a deep sea.

Vazquez’s physical appearance confirmed his Hispanic heritage.