This page contains a description, reviews, and the first chapter
of my first novel.
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ENGINEERED FOR MURDER
by Aileen Schumacher
Tory Travers is a young, widowed, structural engineer, living with her son, on the
outskirts of a campus town in New Mexico. Her life changes forever when a scandal erupts
regarding the mishandling and structural problems of the new football stadium. From every
possible angle, Tory's business is financially threatened if she carries out her duties as
inspector. Then things start to escalate when the son-in-law of the stadium contractor
disappears, along with the building specs, and the quality control technician is found
murdered.
Enter Detective David Alvarez, who soon discovers Tory's connection to the mysterious
death. This confirmed bachelor soon finds that she is a handful that she is somehow
involved in all of this. He didn't count on her mysterious past, involving a state
senator, an underage pregnancy and an even bigger scandal ... which she won't discuss.
Once she starts receiving death threats to stay away from the stadium job, Alvarez and
Tory begin to work together to pull the various mysteries together. Suspense builds at the
construction site where death awaits and many hidden secrets are revealed.
"In many ways, I suppose, Aileen Schumacher, P.E., is a typical consulting firm
principal....On the other hand, Aileen is a remarkable example of a civil engineer with
the talent and tenacity to accomplish something that most of us only talk about....Aileen
is a writer. A mystery writer, no less. The best part is that she's good at it."--Jane
Gaboury, Editor, Civil Engineering News
"An intriguing mystery..." -- The Pilot, Southern Pines, NC
Aileen Schumacher is a civil/environmental engineer and
President/Co-owner of an engineering firm based in Florida, as well as owner of an export
firm dealing in technical materials and supplies. Engineered for Murder is her
debut novel.
PAPERBACK: ISBN: 1-885173-43-1; $5.95; 4½ x 7; 328 pages (May 1997)
ENGINEERED FOR
MURDER
A Mystery by
Aileen Schumacher
Prologue
It was a cool, dry, clear night, characteristic of summer in El Paso.
The night brought only temporary relief from the summer heat, when not even the barest
hint of clouds sheltered the parched earth from the sun, shining relentlessly down on this
far western part of Texas. The most recent memory of rain might be two, or even three
weeks past.
People died on nights like this.
Modern desert dwellers tried to escape the heat inside buildings where the whisper of
cool air was continuous and seductive with its empty promise of soothing frustrations
exacerbated by rising temperatures. But the heat continued to take its toll, and the
effect was cumulative, exceeding some secret threshold when least expected.
People killed on nights like this.
Every ambulance driver and police officer in the city knew only too well that summer
tempers flared and split-second decisions were made that could alter lives forever. Years
of emotion could boil over in one mercurial flash of anger. Feelings normally suppressed
could erupt hot and intense, and all the winters to follow would never eradicate the
results.
People hid their actions from the light of day on nights like this.
A person acting under the influence of the summer heat might spend years subsequently
wondering how he had come to such a juncture. While he wondered, incarcerated by the
results of his actions and the unchangeability of the past, the Texas summer would come
again, uncaring, seducing still others to actions that were uncharacteristic, even
unthinkable, at any other time.
People made irrevocable decisions on nights like this.
Sitting in the late night air-conditioned solitude of a deserted city library, the lone
individual left in the Periodical Reference Section compared the image on the computer
screen in front of him to a letter sitting on the table next to him. He was a person who
measured his frustration not in the hours he spent in the sun, but in years spent pursuing
activities he had come to hate. Looking again from screen to letter and back again, he
reassured himself that there was no mistake in his conclusions.
He let out a low whistle. This in itself was uncharacteristic for someone so accustomed
to fading inconspicuously into any setting in which he was placed, but tonight called for
a new expressiveness on his part. Tonight, he had stumbled across a discovery that might
provide a way out. Like those heat-crazed individuals committing violent acts in a moment
of passion, he did not stop to consider how his discovery might affect anyone else. He
craved the belief that he could change his life in the same way early pioneers had craved
clear, cool water, crossing through the arid mountain pass that had given El Paso its
name.
"Victoria Wheatley and Tory Travers are the same person," he repeated to
himself like a mantra. Somehow saying it out loud made it more real, more totally his
discovery and no one else's. Still, as satisfying as it was to voice his discovery, he
couldn't prevent a knee-jerk reaction, immediately glancing around to make sure there was
no authority figure nearby to censure the forbidden act of speaking out loud.
Reassured, he stared off into space for a while, allowing himself to ignore the copious
notes and documents that surrounded him. "This could be my big break," he told
himself. "If ever anyone had a story drop right into his lap, this is it." For a
few minutes he allowed himself to indulge in his fantasy of what life would be like as a
"real writer," i.e., someone who didn't have to pursue another line of work to
keep the bills paid.
If only he hadn't gotten married right out of college. If only his disabled
mother-in-law wasn't such a drain on his financial resources. Going back even further, if
only he had better withstood the pressure exerted by his blue-collar family on the first
child to be sent to college. "Don't major in journalism or English, major in
something reliable, something where you can get a good job," he had been told again
and again. But fulfilling his family's expectations, and then his wife's, had done nothing
to quench the desire that burned like a summer sun in his soul, through all the seasons of
the year.
He snapped back to the present, aware of the late hour and that he was expected at
work, as usual, in the morning. He would have to figure out how to use this new-found
knowledge to the maximum advantage. The story he could milk out of this connection
certainly wouldn't be a panacea to his quest for journalistic renown, but it could provide
a start. "My days as an engineering technician are numbered," he assured
himself, as he started to gather his papers together.
He left the library, striding out into the inky night. He forced himself to whistle as
he walked to his car. It still felt really strange, but he decided that making more noise
was a habit he was going to get used to.
In other parts of the city, the summer sun continued to work its ancient spell of
madness, unimpeded by the brief promise of relief held in the fleeting night. Acts covered
by darkness would soon be visible for all to see. Discoveries made in the might would be
illuminated by the relentless light of day, and there would be no turning back.
CHAPTER ONE:
PRELIMINARY DESIGNS
Tory Travers critically regarded all five feet ten inches of her
reflection in the steamy dressing room mirror of the Las Cruces Women's Fitness Club. This
was one of the few places with some humidity in the air during the relentlessly arid New
Mexican summer. Sometimes, after working up a sweat and stepping outside into the blinding
southwestern sun, Tory thought she could feel the moisture being sucked right off her
skin. Water was at a premium out here, and Mother Nature had a way of scavenging whatever
was in short supply. Moisture would be atmospherically stockpiled until the August
rainstorms would drench the parched land, and what appeared to the neophyte desert dweller
to be a wasteland would overnight be painted green to the horizon.
But it was appearances, rather than humidity or the lack thereof, that held Tory's
attention now. The body was okay. Somewhere around thirty, she had actually become
comfortable with her height. The fact that she could eat like a horse and not pay for it
on the scales hadn't hurt her coming to terms with the fact that petite would never be an
adjective that she would experience.
And the face was okay. Without a doubt, her best feature was her startling blue eyes.
They contrasted with her pale skin, which was dusted with freckles across the bridge of
her nose and cheekbones. Her heritage was from the Black Irish, not of the ruddy kind. Her
hair, a sleek dark brown verging on black, was blunt cut in bangs across her forehead and
curved under a few inches below her chin, hanging a little longer in the back.
No curls, no frills, no concessions to current style. It sometimes seemed that she had
looked this way forever, but at thirty-five she realized the advantage of the fact that
she would likely look the same in fifteen more years.
So the problem that currently held Tory's attention was wardrobe-related. The moss
green silk blouse would have passed muster anywhere as part of a dress-for-success outfit.
It coordinated beautifully with her black and green skirt, which, unfortunately, was at
home hanging in her closet. It didn't coordinate so well with her beige slip, which
currently comprised the rest of her outfit.
"Damn damn damn damn," Tory admonished her reflection, which didn't come up
with any snappy answers about why her skirt was at home rather than folded neatly in the
bottom of her workout bag. "You get up early and go to work out before a big
confrontational meeting so you can be nice and healthy and laid back, instead of nervous
and stressed out, and where does it get you? Trying to figure out how to decently get from
the dressing room to the parking lot, that's where."
She briefly considered putting her leotard and tights back on, but because of their
sweaty state, it wasn't a very alluring alternative. With a flash of inspiration, she
turned to the locker labeled Lost and Found and began to sort through its contents.
Luckily there was no one else in the dressing room to witness her foray. "If only I
needed deodorant, I'd be in luck," she muttered to herself, as she sorted through the
items that had been left in he locker room and never claimed.
It pushed the limits of probability that someone would have left behind a skirt to
match her blouse. A pair of shiny black nylon work-out shorts appeared to be the only
functional possibility. And they weren't even Umbros, a fact her son would have
immediately pointed out to her if he had been present. She cautiously gave them the sniff
test. She was in luck. Either they hadn't been worn before they'd been left behind, or
they'd been abandoned so long that they'd had a chance to air out.
Tory pulled off her slip, pulled on the shorts, and took another critical look in the
mirror. Combined with her panty hose, black high-heeled shoes, and her silk blouse, the
effect was somewhere between that of a highly paid cocktail waitress and a hooker who
charged by the hour, she decided. But it should do for a trip through the waiting room to
the parking lot. It wasn't like she was going to get cold or anything like that. Murmuring
a private apology to the unknown person who would not be finding her shorts in the Lost
and Found that day, she packed up the rest of her stuff and walked out.
It was unusual for someone to be in the lobby of the Las Cruces Women's Fitness Club so
early on a Friday morning, and it was even more unusual for the person to be male. It was
really unusual for that person to rise and address Tory by name on the one day she was
minus fifty percent of her intended outfit. If she was going to be beating the laws of
probability this morning, she would a lot rather have found a green and black skirt in the
Lost and Found locker.
"Uh, Tory Travers?" the slight young man standing in front of her repeated
his question. He started to drop his eyes, as people usually do after initiating a
conversation, but obviously thought better of it. The fact that she was a good bit taller
than he was didn't give him a lot of places to look without dropping his eyes. It
certainly made for an intense eye-to-eye encounter.
Against mounting evidence to the contrary, Tory decided to act as if this was an
everyday encounter. "Yes, I'm Tory Travers," she replied. "Do I know
you?"
"No," he said nervously. "We've never met, but I've talked with some of
your employees. I'm Billy--Bill Hartman. I'm with Quality Control tech for the El Paso
Precast Concrete Company."
Tory knew that she was unconsciously gearing up for the approaching morning meeting
when the first response that came to mind was "Oh, yeah, those assholes." The
booming international metropolis of El Paso, the western-most Texas city, lay to the south
of the small New Mexican town of Las Cruces. Only forty-five minutes away by car, it was
another city, another state, another world. But for all its size and industrial character,
it was not necessarily a better place for getting precast concrete. Of all the
construction-related industries in the two states, Tory had decided that El Paso Precast
Concrete was the lowest of the low, but she had thought she would be postponing
confronting this issue until her ten o'clock meeting. Until after she retrieved her skirt.
She censured her initial response and changed it to a mild, "Oh, yes, El Paso
Precast. You all are doing the precast for the University stadium project. Well, what can
I do for you?"
"I want to talk to you."
That much was obvious. That question was, did she need to talk to him? She gravely
consulted her watch. "The project status meeting is at ten o'clock over at the
University Facilities Planning Division. I'll be there and I'm sure we'll all be talking
about the project at great lengths then." Hopefully in a more complete outfit, she
thought to herself.
Hartman cleared his throat. "Uh, I'm involved with the stadium project, but I'm
not here for the ten o'clock meeting. I really need to talk to you about something
else." He glanced furtively around. "Privately," he added.
Tory stifled an impulse to blurt out "Give me a break." A private
conversation, and her in panty hose, work-out shorts, and high heels? Who ever said that
clothes didn't make the man, or woman, or person? The situation was getting more ludicrous
by the moment.
Then she thought, maybe this guy was looking to change jobs. In that case, experience
had taught her that she could talk to him now or spend a lot of time later trying to avoid
him. Besides, it would be a new experience. She had never talked to a prospective employee
before while wearing panty hose, and workout shorts. It made her grateful her company
didn't have a dress code that she'd have to explain.
"Okay," she said. "But I'm curious. How did you find me?"
"Your secretary told me where you were.
Ah ha, Tory thought to herself, Sylvia must have thought this guy was up here about the
stadium project, the same as I did. The office nickname for her
in-step-with-the-latest-fashion secretary was Chicana Madonna, but Tory mentally referred
to her as the Dragon Lady when Sylvia was on her high horse. Neither love nor money could
pry information out of Sylvia when she made her mind not to release it. Everyone in the
office was aware of the problems with the stadium project, and everyone, including Tory,
fully expected the lid to blow in the project status meeting scheduled for later that
morning. Sylvia must have sent Hartman over here because she thought he had some technical
information to impart before that happened. Too bad she hadn't dug a little deeper.
"So how did you figure out who I was out of all the people coming in and out of
here?" Tory asked curiously.
Hartman cleared his throat again. "Well, your secretary told me that you were
tall, had dark brown hair, and would be dressed for the meeting later this morning."
He heard what he was saying, but there was no choice between looking down or keeping his
gaze focused on her face, so he continued to look directly at her. God, that must be hard
to say with a straight face, thought Tory. "She said that most of the women working
out this time of day were people that didn't work, who wouldn't be dressed to go into the
office," he concluded miserably, unable to restrain himself from completing is
ill-timed explanation.
Tory cleared her throat, and realized that she was beginning to adopt his mannerisms.
This prompted her to action. "Let's go next door," she said decisively.
"There's a coffee shop there, and I'll be able to sit down with you for few
minutes." She gestured to the door, and refused to budge until he preceded her out.
She was damned if she was going to give this guy an opportunity to evaluate her
professional attire from behind.
Once seated, they went through the preliminaries of getting coffee. Now that she was
actually sitting down with this guy, Tory was more than a little curious about what he
might have to say. It was hard to believe that his presence really had nothing to do with
the stadium project. That would be entirely too coincidental.
Hartman engrossed himself with preparing his coffee after they were served, and she
refused to help out by asking any conversational questions. She figured she had up to an
hour to waste. Retrieving her skirt before the project meeting had become a big goal for
her this morning. After all, one had to maintain some kind of standards.
"I never really wanted to be an engineering technician," Hartman blurted
suddenly. This was not exactly the kind of opening statement that Tory has anticipated,
and it rapidly got even stranger. "I always wanted to be writer," he continued.
"Okay," said Tory. She waited for more explanation, but none was forthcoming.
"What does that have to do with me?" she asked after a while. Was this guy a
conversationalist or what? There was no point in wasting a whole hour if this wasn't,
after all, job-related. She was already beginning to regret agreeing to this conversation.
"I've been doing freelance writing," Hartman started speaking again slowly,
and then began to pick up speed. "Political and legal stories are my specialty. I've
been doing a series for the El Paso Times on the abortion issue. You know, it's a
really hot subject now, in light of the recent Supreme Court decisions."
Tory nodded, to indicate that just because she was an engineer didn't mean that she
wasn't aware of national political developments. She even read books totally unrelated to
engineering once in a while, but she didn't feel compelled to expound upon the fact. She
was beginning to feel distinctly uneasy about this whole conversation, and it had nothing
to do with what she was (or what she wasn't) wearing.
"The theme I've been using is that different political factions have been drawn
together by this issue. One of the most conservative and fanatical is the Christians in
Government group that's headed by Mason Barkley out of Florida. They're having a rally in
El Paso in three weeks. I'll be you're surprised to hear that El Paso was selected as the
site."
Tory wasn't surprised, she was dumbfounded. It had been a long time since she'd heard
the name Mason Barkley in any conversation she was a part of, although forever wouldn't
have been long enough for her. She felt her stomach automatically clench in anxiety. With
an effort she resisted an urge to grip the table. She supposed she was now going to have
the chance to discover why this person was talking about Jameson Barkley to her. She felt
very sure that whatever the reason was, she wasn't going to like it.
"They chose El Paso for their rally to try to emphasize the international nature
of their efforts to eliminate abortion." Hartman continued. "Even if it's
restricted or outlawed in the US, they're concerned about border communities where women
will still have access to abortions. Barley is the leader of this group, which has strong
stands on a lot of other issues. He seems to inspire fanatical loyalty from his followers.
And that's how I found out about you."
"Exactly how did you find out about me?" Tory's voice sounded flat and
unemotional to her own ears.
"I found out that you were Vicky Wheatley, the teenage girl who had an affair with
Barkley and ruined his political career years ago."
"No, Mr. Hartman. I am the person who enabled Jim Barkley to rise from the ashes,
phoenix-like, transformed into a new and powerful entity; a repentant, well-publicized,
born-again Christian politician. But you didn't listen to my question. I didn't ask you
what you found out, I asked you how you found this out."
"Oh," he swallowed audibly, nervous again. "That was pure coincidence.
There have been all those problems with our part in the stadium project, and Mr. Lester,
the owner of our precast plant, figures that you're probably going to come down pretty
hard on us. Anyhow, he had heard that you'd published a couple of articles in some
professional journals about quality control programs for structural integrity. He figured
that if we researched the articles and adopted some of your recommended procedures, it
might help out."
"You mean, he thought that if you made a few cosmetic changes to your operation,
especially after what happened during the last pour, I might be so flattered that you had
considered me an expert that I would let bygones be bygones."
"Well, I wouldn't put it exactly that way."
I'm sure you wouldn't. I still don't see the connection between quality control of
precast concrete structures and Jim Barkley."
"You really are Vicky Wheatley, aren't you?" Hartman started to look animated
again. "Up to this point I've had a hard time believing it myself. But I just
realized that you called Barkley "Jim." Not many people remember that Barkley's
real name is Jameson, and that he used to be called Jim. He's known as Mason now, not Jim.
Probably part of him putting his past behind him, don't you think?"
"Mr. Hartman, I am trying very hard to understand the point of this conversation.
It might help if you would finish answering my question. How did you find out about this
connection between Barkley and me?"
"Well, when I went to dig up the articles you had written, I went to the
University library. The one in El Paso, that is. They have a computer system for
literature searches. You enter a name, and the system pulls up all the articles or books
written under that name. For women, it cross-references and searches for publications
under a maiden name, which is displayed on the screen. So I got a screen which displayed
your maiden name, which stuck in my mind for some reason. Later I was doing some of my own
research for my newspaper series, specifically on Mason Barkley, the man. I started
scanning some old news clippings, and you were in all the headlines, seventeen, eighteen
years ago, as Vicky Wheatley."
"The wonders of modern technology," said Tory dryly. "So what do you
want?"
"An interview, of course. Preferably an exclusive one. How you felt about Barkley
then, and how you feel about him now. Whether or not you agree with the political
principles that he endorses. Whether, after all this time, you think he's really
changed." Hartman's voice rose with the last statement.
This was probably as close to exhibiting excitement as this guy ever got, thought Tory.
"Absolutely not."
"Why not?" He actually looked dumbfounded at her refusal.
"Because I have no desire to have anything to do with resurrecting that part of my
past."
"But how have you managed to keep it quiet for so long?"
"Keep what quiet? The events that you're talking about happened over eighteen
years ago, to a very young girl and a very minor politician, in another state half a
continent away. When I came here to college, some people were aware of the connection, of
course. But two years after I came here, I gave everyone something else to talk about. I
married one of my professors. I was nineteen and he was forty. How's that for a
human-interest angle? But since then, I've proceeded to live a rather ordinary, mundane
life. I doubt that there are more than three or four people around here who still connect
me with the man you say is coming to El Paso."
"What can I do to change your mind?"
"Mr. Hartman, I've negotiated a lot tougher situations than this. What part of no
is it that you don't understand?" Tory doubted if Hartman would realize that this was
one of the main negotiating phrases she used in dealing with her fifteen-year-old son.
"You can't expect me to keep quiet about this." Hartman's face had gone all
splotchy, and he was looking really upset. Tory briefly wondered what she would do if he
broke into tears. This simply couldn't be happening, at least not on a morning that she
was supposed to be obsessed with her ten o'clock meeting. Surely things would be going
differently if only she had all her clothes on.
Tory gave Hartman a long, considering look. "No, Mr. Hartman, I don't expect you
will keep quiet about this. But I will never, with you or anyone else, consent to talk
about Jameson Barkley and the person I was eighteen years ago. You'll have to excuse me
now, I have real work to do."
"You'll be sorry if I have to write this without your input. You have to talk to
me. I'm the one that found out about this first ..." Hartman actually started to
rise, but sat back down quickly when Tory got to her feet. She looked down at him and
shook her head for emphasis.
Later, the she was asked if she had been threatened by Bill Hartman, she would only
remember feeling upset, and disgusted, and saddened that his need was so great, and so
base. And later she would remember her last glimpse of Hartman's pale, disappointed face
and sloping shoulders. But at least one thing had been accomplished. She didn't think once
about what she was wearing all the way back to her car.
End of Chapter One
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© 2001 Aileen Schumacher. All Rights Reserved.
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