“Old Man Peterson” is a story of revenge and retribution inside one African American family. The Peterson-Kennedy clan had everything. They were wealthy and powerful. The clan was untouchable until a plumber discovered 60-year-old bones buried in Miss Ina’s bathroom wall and all hell broke loose.
The family’s nice little world turned upside down when Lieutenant Abigaile Truman reported the bones belonged Miss Ina’s murdered husband, Hiram’s half-brother Bernard Peterson.
Old Man Peterson is a story of revenge and retribution inside one African American family. Lieutenant Abigaile Truman’s latest case involves a skeleton in the closet, literally; and it has been there sixty years. Ina Peterson’s husband has been missing for just that long, so odds are the skeleton is his. Thing is, Ina has what appears to be a serious case of dementia, and her fiery granddaughter Jannita has her claws out in her defense. She and Truman clash in every way—or do they? As the case progresses, increasingly sabotaged by outside forces, it becomes obvious that there is more than one skeleton in the Kennedy-Peterson closet, and someone is resorting to murder to keep them there.
In this surprising, sassy romance, sparks of contention turn to passion as Ina’s story of struggle during the Depression in the South and betrayal and lust when she marries above her station slowly changes the lives of three very different women.
Excerpt
“He musta been the thing stinking up my closet all them years. Smell like old Mr. Rat crawl off an’ die. I use me some ammonia up in there. It cut smell right down. I thinking the old coot went out for a quart of milk an’ got lost or find hisself another woman. Guess that’s why he never come back, huh?” The elderly Black woman looked up at the female officer from her seat on the living room couch when she asked the question.
Lieutenant Abigaile Truman wanted to laugh when she heard the old woman statement. She might have chuckled to herself if the old woman’s granddaughter… a Miss Jannita Davis hadn’t begun to wail and then tried unsuccessfully to silence her grandmother. This was going to make an interesting story to tell her captain when she returned to the precinct. Unfortunately, for her going back to the station wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. She mused as she eyed the two women huddled to together on the outdated gray couch. She wondered if the old woman, Mrs. Ina Peterson was telling the truth. That’s why she and her detectives were here to find out what happened to the skeleton buried in the old woman’s closet behind her winter coats. It was one helluva way to start a Monday morning.
“Mrs. Peterson, do you know why we’re here?”
The granddaughter’s head jerked up suddenly. She glared at the lieutenant as she rubbed her grandmother’s bony hand. “Don’t answer that, Nana. They’re just trying to blame you for something.” Angry dark eyes stared hard into the lieutenant’s face until she sighed uncomfortably and looked down at the narrow, black notebook in her hand.
Abigaile shrugged. She needed to get the granddaughter away from the charmingly frank old woman. She ignored the nasty eye roll from the granddaughter to smile at the old woman. She motioned for Detective Vaughn Mercer to follow her into the apartment’s hallway where they could speak privately. “Excuse me a minute, Ma’am. I need to see how my officers are doing.”
Mercer reluctantly followed her into the hallway, muttering softly under his breath. “What did Lieutenant Bitch want now?” He sighed. She was disturbing his viewing time. The Davis woman was a hot-looking babe. She was available too.
He’d noticed there wasn’t a ring on her finger as soon as he met her. Her figure was just the way he liked his women to look, too. She wasn’t too tall. She was maybe about five foot, five inches tall. She had big tits, a heart-shaped ass, a small waist and shapely legs that could wrap easily around him in bed during a passionate encounter. He bet her coffee-light complexion turned bronze in the hot sun of summer. She’d fit underneath him just right unlike the overrated Amazon the department thought would make a better lieutenant than he would.
As far as he was concerned, the lieutenant was a series of twos. She was too tall for him. At five foot ten, she stood nearly eye-to-eye with him when she issued her dumbass commands. Her figure was too broad. She had a shape but he didn’t give a shit about solid and wide. Her cinnamon complexion was too dark for his tastes. Her manner was too bossy. She lacked a sense of humor and she was too clever for her own good.
“Detective Mercer, are you with me?” Abigaile ignored his disrespectful utterances and snapped her fingers under his nose to gain his attention. Once she caught his eye, she pointed a thumb in the direction of the living room couch. “Keep an eye on those two for a minute. Don’t let them out of your sight. I’ll get Stevenson to finish the interview.”
Mercer rolled his eyes at her orders then folded arms across his chest. “When did I become a goddamned babysitter? I don’t see why I can’t interview them.”
Abigaile mentally counted to ten before she answered him. Mercer was acting exceptionally difficult today. She’d be glad to rid of him for the few hours she’d be able to spend back in her office. “You know Stevenson is the primary on this one, Mercer. Wait for him to do the interview. Okay?”
Mercer waved a dismissive hand at her. “Yeah, yeah, I heard ya…Truman.”
Abigaile considered confronting Mercer for not addressing her as a superior officer but she decided against it. Bringing Detective Ron Stevenson back into the picture was more important than her personal feelings about one of her detectives. She strode down the hallway where the crime scene technicians set up shop. She nodded at one of the technicians she knew from another case. She pulled on a pair of latex gloves before she touched anything.
Abigaile looked around the bathroom. She might have to expand the crime scene to include the bathroom too. The granddaughter wasn’t going to be happy about that. Ms. Davis didn’t impress her as being happy period.
For somebody who had great taste in expensive clothes, jewelry, makeup and perfume, Ms. Davis looked miserable today. Who knows, maybe her negative attitude was a result of discovering a human skeleton in her grandmother’s wall. She made some quick notes as a reminder to consider expanding the crime scene. She eyed the granddaughter from her position in the hallway outside one of the bedrooms. She wondered what the Davis woman’s story was.
The apartment belonged to Ina Peterson. The super told the detectives that much when he let them into the building. When Ron asked the super about Ina Peterson, he said that she lived alone except for the visits from her granddaughter every few days. He said Jannita Davis had been coming by to check on the old woman more often lately. When Ron asked why, the super signaled with a winding motion of his finger to his head that indicated the old woman was crazy.
He claimed that Ina Peterson heard voices in the middle of the night and constantly pestered him to check her place for signs of a break-in. He said he’d never found anything or anyone. When pressed further, the super said one of the local alley cats liked to visit Ina’s apartment. It would climb through her open window and take up residence under her bed or in her closet at night. According to the super, the cat’s purring and growling sounds were the only noises Ina Peterson heard at night.
Now, the discovery of the skeleton in the closet added a different dimension. The super said the plumber’s helper was repairing a leak in one of the basement lines and a pipe broke. He opened the floors and wall area directly above the leak to check the condition of the remaining pipes. The helper discovered about forty feet of corroded pipe that ran from the basement to the first floor tenant’s bathroom and ended in on the second floor in Ina Peterson’s closet.
When the helper opened Ina Peterson’s closet wall to replace the pipes, he discovered the skeleton. The super confided that the helper was shook up. He didn’t know what to do after he found the skeleton. He didn’t want trouble with the police since he was on parole. The super let the helper leave then he called the granddaughter. She rushed over to check on her grandmother. Once the granddaughter saw the skeleton, she called the police, which is how the crime scene crew came to the apartment.
Abigaile sighed as she eyed the Davis woman from her position in the hallway then she checked her notes for the helper’s name and address. She’d send Detectives Green and Lopez to check out his story.
She needed to find out why the Davis woman delayed calling the police. The timeframe the super gave for Davis woman’s arrival left at least sixty minutes between her arrival and her first call to the precinct. What did the Davis woman do in the apartment for over an hour?
The Reed’s faith, a mystery to some, will be tested like never before. Will it hold? Mark’s love for his wife and their intimate romance is shattered by Brandy, a barmaid.
