Good Friday - Chapters I-IV

Abstract

On a chilly Saturday morning, a man was shot to death in his parents’ dining room, on their family farm, in a small Iowa town. His mother and father had been bound and held captive throughout the previous night by an armed intruder who entered their home the evening of Good Friday. The gunman waited there for their son knowing he was to arrive at the family home on Saturday morning. This thesis is the first fifty pages of a greater book in process. The general overview of the story is a conspiracy for murder which appears to be a greed-motivated, life insurance cash grab. It is compounded, slightly, when the plan becomes a murder for hire. His wife’s friend knows a guy who can have the husband killed for fifty dollars. What seems like a joke to laugh off soon turns into a forged life insurance policy and a contract to kill. The first two murder attempts were unsuccessful, and an already naturally suspicious and distrustful man became nearly consumed by paranoia. The third attempt killed him; two gunshots were fired from the small, wash-glove covered hands of a masked intruder. In the process of investigation multiple layers of deceit, adultery, sexual exploration, manipulation, and abusive relationships begin to surface. This creates an ambiguity of guilt, and that uncertainty will continue to the trial as facts are exposed through testimony and plea deals. The reader will see that culpability was shared, but the punishments were not equal. Small town politics and country values left space for justice to occur—however it needed to happen.