“Hi, Father. It's William Miler.”
“Oh hi, William. What's on your mind?”
William was not sure why he was letting Father Michael know that he had agreed to help
Nick Johnson. After all, he didn't think Father Michael cared to get involved any further than he
currently had been.
William could hear a whirring noise in the background, kind of like the sound of a cake
mixer. Betsy was a wonderful baker and probably had her kitchen aide mixer whirring once a
week. He knew that sound, but he had a hard time envisioning Father Michael mixing cake or
brownie ingredients.
“Well, Father, I just wanted to let you know that I have talked with Nick Johnson and
have agreed to help him,” William revealed. “It's quite a problem he has facing him and his
family.”
“You're not kidding. I have a hard time believing this kind of thing happens to people,”
Father Michael stated. “You know, I spent a good part of last night thinking how these thugs
found Nick in the first place.”
That was the sixty thousand dollar question as William asked Nick this question twice
and he just didn't have an answer. These thugs must have had an insider working for them,
somebody who had internal knowledge of these pharmaceutical drug trials.
“You have a question that none of us have an answer for…Nick has no idea, Father.”
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Father Michael sighed loudly into the phone and William realized that he really didn't
want him losing sleep over this. But his job was to be a totally caring person. He was such a good
priest, so much so that William didn't know how he did it. William couldn't remember the last
time Father Michael took a vacation.
“Do I want to know how you two plan to prevent these thugs from killing dear Nick?”
“Well, he is going to have to leave town for a while and make everyone believe that he is
dead. That is the tricky part. But, you don't need to know any more details than that. ”
Father Michael didn't say anything right away causing William to think that maybe he
had spooked the priest or something like that.
Betsy and William had dinner plans with the Feinsteins who lived up the street from
them. They all were going to Benihana's.
“Well, I will be sure to be there for Susan, his wife, when the whole thing goes down.
There will be a lot of grief, you know.”
“Father, that's why I am keeping you in the loop.”
William heard him laughing.
“I'll do my best, but this whole thing is a doozy!”
“You got that right, Father.”
They wished each other a good rest of their Saturday and William told his priest friend
that he would see him at Mass Sunday morning.
Betsy was out shopping. Who knew how long that would take? This was as good a time
as any to started drawing up a list for Nick. William had told Nick to do the same and they could
compare notes.
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William saw on their Caller ID that Andy called at 11:37 this morning and he wondered
if Andy and Betsy talked. Those two could talk for an hour without thinking anything of it.
William thought that was awesome.
Sitting down on his family room couch, William started thinking of ways to fake one's
death. He tried to think of how many cases he saw over his career where there was no body but
signs of a struggle that could lead to a murder. There usually was a lot of blood and maybe some
tissue found by forensics. They always waited a few weeks to make any determinations because
the body always turned up somehow, in restaurant freezers or car trunks. There was that one case
in the early eighties where they found blood and part of a thumb on a warehouse floor. William
never found the body in that case, yet it sure looked like a mob hit gone ugly. A death was
eventually declared for that guy – what was his name? Man he was getting old!
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