Harsens Island
Authors: T. K. Madrid
Harsens Island
by
T. K. Madrid
Copyright © 2014 T. K. Madrid
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed in any form by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical means, without the permission of the author and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
The characters, places, icons, businesses, and incidents are mostly the product of the author’s imagination. Physical locations, directions, and other landmarks have been purposely altered, omitted, added, or otherwise adapted for the demands of the story. It is not, in any legal or strict sense, factual, and its values, attitudes, and opinions are not necessarily shared by the author.
Karin.
"Sai, in quella luce, con quell'espressione sul viso,
si guarda circa 25 anni vecchio. "
Excerpt from the website “HarsensIsland.com”:
“They call Harsens Island ‘Paradise’, located at the top of Lake St. Clair and at the mouth of the St. Clair River. Less than an hour from Detroit and Port Huron, it is a short ferry ride from Algonac, the mainland. Visitors and residents are drawn to the Island to soak up the beauty of the freshwater deltas, wildlife, freighter watching, and a host of other sights. Sportsmen are attracted to the abundance of hunting and fishing offered on the Island. Generations of families have come to Harsens Island over the years, either as a summer visitor or a full time resident. Today this lovely Island has nearly 2000 full time residents, and from Memorial Day to Labor Day, that number swells considerably, as the ‘summer folk’ come back to their cottages.”
Excerpt from the website “TheOldClub.com”:
“The Old Club started as, and still remains, a Premiere Island Resort and Yacht Club. The lure of the open blue water is still one of the great assets of The Old Club, whether it is prowling the rivers and flats in search of the wily small mouth bass…or sitting on the boardwalk, watching the spectacular boats pass. And then there are the three brand new, clay tennis courts, the totally redone 9-hole golf course, the heated swimming pool, and the trap shooting range. Of course, The Old Club is a ‘family’ club…Children and grandchildren are always welcome and there is a very special room in the clubhouse set aside for their activities. But, beyond this, the members of The Old Club make up a very special ‘family’ There is always a sense of belonging to a very special group of people who are privileged to know and associate with one another…In the end, The Old Club is really nothing more or less than the generations of people who have come to treasure it over all the years of its existence…and continues to do so today.”
“…every island is full of graves…”
James Theodore Bent
Samantha Moretti’s beauty was natural and undeniable. Her facial features were elegant and simple: her eyes were dark, her skin a dusky hue, and her lips a vibrant pink. She used makeup sparingly. Her black hair was swept from her forehead, tucked behind her ears, and fell slightly above her shoulders. Both sexes were attracted to her for the usual reasons, and she’d grown up with the siren songs of love and lust.
Everyone called her Sam.
For more than a year, Sam had been in free-fall, enduring a series of trials that would have crushed a weaker woman.
It started when her godmother, Laurel Fisher Laragia, died of lymphoma. The disease appeared quickly, spread rapidly, and was embedded so deeply that all anyone could do was prepare for the inevitable. From diagnosis to the warm, living earth had been less than two months.
The deaths of her parents quickly followed. Leon and Juliet Moretti provided and coordinated security for a republican New York Senator, Henry Madison Smith. They were each slain as they defended Smith, who was assassinated at a Safeway meet and greet in Syracuse, New York.
The next blow came with the death of her godfather, Stephen Laragia. Distraught over his wife’s death, Laragia punched a bullet through his left temple on a brittle December morning.
The Laragia’s, who were childless, bequeathed Sam the entirety of their estate: profitable businesses, real estate investments, a technology-heavy stock portfolio, and a philanthropy known as
The Sisters
. The total value of the estate was slightly greater than thirty-million dollars.
Unbeknownst to Sam, her godfather also left behind a document he termed an “explanation” for murders he committed or had knowledge of. The murders were, in his self-portrait, justified. He gave the document, and an explanatory letter, to his lawyer, Thomas Wilcox, Junior.
“Before the age of nineteen I murdered two men. I attempted the murder of another man, a murderer in his own right. I was also involved with and take responsibility for an additional four deaths. Those deaths coincide with Foursquare’s public record, events that took place over nearly two decades, from 1971 through that horrific year in 1987...The first two deaths were personal vendettas I do not regret…There is also the matter of evidence. I’ve been haunted by the idea that someone else might be accused of these crimes. This document should ensure that doesn’t happen…”
He detailed a lifelong friendship with the future senator, revealing the senator knew of the murders and – without direct admission of the act – implied Smith had strangled a madman in their mutual defense.
The graphic and violent document revealed what she’d known her entire adult life: her father (and to a lesser degree her mother) had been employed as assassins for the FBI and a New York crime family.
**********
Stephen Laragia was born, lived, and died in the village of Foursquare, New York. It was in Foursquare that Sam agreed to meet the lawyer Wilcox, a man her godfather regarded as honest and trustworthy.
There was no way for her to have known Wilcox had already concluded a 25-year-old woman with her ancestry was incapable of managing such a complex and formidable estate.
There was no way for her to have known Wilcox had also determined she would be better off dead.
Wilcox’s conclusions were rooted from his desire to maintain his controlled embezzlement of
The Sisters
: he saw no reason to return what he had so artfully stolen.
Moreover, having read Laragia’s document, he decided it would be best for everyone if her murderous lineage were severed. To that end, he enlisted two locals to execute her kidnapping, murder, and ultimate physical disappearance.
At times, Wilcox needed a heavy hand. For those occasions he employed a creature named Whit Whitman. Whitman was a large man with a pockmarked face; he was wanted in Kentucky for rape, assault, and assorted felonies.
The second accomplice was a diminutive blond named Jeffery Debozy. Debozy was his inside man, a detective with the Foursquare Police Department. He was quick-witted and discrete, and after Sam’s disappearance, he could manipulate the investigation in their favor.
Wilcox dispatched Whitman to capture and incapacitate Sam. Debozy was tasked with finding Sam’s final resting place somewhere in rural New York’s abundance of wells, marshes, and lakes. Knowing where Sam was buried would ensure she would never be discovered.
It seemed foolproof.
Every murder plot seems foolproof.
Within minutes of finalizing the transfer of her inheritance, a half-block west of Wilcox’s office, Whitman assaulted Sam on Foursquare’s sleepy and picturesque Main Street. She didn’t know Whitman’s larger agenda, and assumed it was an inept rape or robbery attempt.
She used his weight and aggression to her advantage, crippling him, breaking three of his ribs, and leaving him with the blunt advice to never approach her again.
The second complication to Wilcox’s plans came when a private detective named Burleson discovered the murder plot and attempted to warn Sam. Debozy discovered Burleson’s intentions, and being impatient and greedy, murdered Burleson.
Within twenty-four hours of Sam’s arrival in Foursquare, Wilcox, Whitman, and Debozy, lay on the cool, stainless steel autopsy tables of the county’s bespectacled coroner. His findings along, with testimonies and other evidence, corroborated Samantha’s version of their deaths – they had each died because she had acted in self-defense. As a result, she was freed on bond while the investigations proceeded.
It was shortly after her release that Foursquare’s lone newspaper,
The Revolution
, brokered the opinion Sam was a psychopath leaving a “horrible and bloody path”. The editor declared she would go down in history as the most insane criminal to come from Madison County since “
The Craigslist Killer”.
The public outcry and demands for justice resulted in the revoking of her bond, and she was subsequently reincarnated.
**********
Seven months later, the owner of
The Revolution
received a package with no return address. Inside he found a copy of Laragia’s manuscript – referred to as
The Laragia Confession
– along with various redacted FBI memorandum, emails, and faxes.
He read the manuscript and its attachments, verified portions of it through private and public sources, and after a sleepless week wrote and published a front-page editorial, the title of which echoed a fictional romance published decades earlier:
The Political Prisoner of Madison County
“Over a nearly three decade span, Foursquare has been the stage for two evil and avaricious battles resulting in grotesque, multiple deaths. This editorial will not recount their history. However, while it is obvious avarice has lost both battles, the war against evil continues. The last, ongoing chapter in this battle is so sensational that it forces us to consider the ethics and moral compass of our collective will.
“We believe Samantha Moretti came to us wanting nothing more than to grieve the loss of her godparents, and to take ownership of a philanthropy known for its charitable works throughout the northeast United States. Indeed,
The Sisters Trust
has benefited many Madison County families, individuals, non-profits, schools and religious institutions.
“Based on anonymous sources and government documents obtained by
The Revolution,
this newspaper is convinced Ms. Moretti was the victim of a brazen plot which, if brought to fruition, would have led to her murder.
“Ms. Moretti now finds herself in the center of a battle between one and possibly two alleged crime families, as well as potentially renegade factions of our elected and appointed government officials, officials who allegedly condoned and orchestrated the murder of its own citizens.
“This newspaper does not approve of any illegal act of violence, and while we wait patiently for all the facts and issues to emerge, we believe Ms. Moretti must have her day in court.
“We further believe our legal system should and must determine her final culpability. It is the opinion of this newspaper that Ms. Moretti is being sculpted into a victim or sacrifice by corrupt men compelled by ravenous greed. We believe she had no knowledge of these forces until she came to our once idyllic village. Her ‘crime’ appears to be one of protecting her life from men wishing her death.
“This newspaper regrets and apologizes for its previous editorials, and believes it now has a moral and ethical obligation to support Ms. Moretti in her fight for freedom.
“Ms. Moretti, in this newspaper’s opinion, is no longer a free citizen, but is in fact a political prisoner.”
The New York Times
picked up the “political prisoner” phrase and subsequently one of their younger, more ambitious reporters traveled to Foursquare and began tilling the background of the Laragia’s, the Moretti’s, and the beloved Republican senator, H. M. Smith, searching for deeper connections to her parent’s profession, and their alleged ties to the FBI.
Politicians from both sides of the aisle became aware of the
Times
inquiry, and being as sensitive to national security as they were to the New York electorate, came to the pragmatic conclusion Samantha Moretti was of no further value.
Sam’s law firm,
Houle and Kelly
, agreed that ending further inquiries would be achieved only if Samantha Moretti ceased to exist.
It was also agreed that once all lawsuits related to the matter were settled, and all legal fees paid, the bulk of the Laragia Estate would be seized in accordance with the RICO Act.
**********
Lynn Hunter, the associate assigned to her case, lived in expensive suits and shoes, carried an impressive array of gadgets in an expensive, leather bag, and exuded an aura of wealth and power. She referred to herself as “Irish-light”: a blend of English, Irish, and French. She had thin, shoulder length black hair, sparkling gray eyes, and looked closer to thirty-five than her actual age of forty-three.
She presented the settlement agreements to Sam, highlighting portions of the seemingly endless documents in detail, emphasizing anything she signed would not be an admission of guilt to any crime her or her parents may or may not have committed.
Sam listened intently to Hunter’s presentation, voicing the work “Okay” many times, saying little else.
When Hunter concluded, she shifted the stack of papers toward her client. She removed an expensive pen from her jacket and placed it on the papers. The papers needed Sam’s signature and initials, all of which were tagged with yellow post-its.
“Is there anything you’d like to comment on or annotate?”
“Yes, but we’ll get to it. So you believe this is to my best advantage?”
“Yes,” Hunter said. “But the call’s yours.”
“Seems complete,” Sam said, idly ruffling the three-hundred-page document. “How much time do I have to read through it?”
Sam had a modest case of dyslexia. During her incarceration, thanks to the endless river of briefs, motions, writs, and lawsuits, her reading skills had improved to a point where the document was not a challenge.
Hunter said, “You could read the whole of it in, I’m guessing, three days? But is that what you want to do?”
“No,” Sam said.
“Sam, the beauty is in the details. It takes care of all parties to their satisfaction.”
“Okay,” Sam said.
She stopped her overall examination, brought her hands together, and read the final ten pages. When she was done, she wordlessly brought the pages together.
“Why do I need to change my name?”
“For your protection as well as the protection of others.”
“And this name? Jennifer Melillo?”
“Melillo is Italian, and neither rare nor common. There are two-hundred Jennifer Melillo’s in the United States and thousands more with the same last name.”
“The bottom line is I’m taking away close to ten-percent of my godparent’s estate…”
Hunter interjected.
“…Three million, tax free…”
“…my parent’s Harsens Island property, a full pardon, and a new identity.”
“Correct.”
“I don’t need a pardon for saving my own life.”
“Yes, but it allows our powerful friends to feel noble. And it absolves you of any crimes discovered from this point forward.”
“I doubt it. I want to see the pardon.”
Hunter brought her briefcase to the table, rolled the lock tumblers, popped its clasps, and handed her the document.
“Once you’ve signed the agreement, this copy is yours.”
“And I walk?”
“You walk.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow morning, early, before sunrise.”
Sam looked at Hunter.