AN UNQUIET MIND

Teaser by Steven P. Ross

40 years ago, G.C. Clarke discovers the body of Michael Kurz, a victim of what turned out to be potassium cyanide. G.C.’s best friend, Paul Kirk, was involved with Michael’s wife, Susan Kurz and has reason to believe he may be a prime suspect. Susan, livid after learning her husband cut her out of a fortune in trust funds, vows revenge against Paul, who Michael appointed to manage his considerable funds months prior to his death.

One week later, in the same village, seven people are poisoned from potassium cyanide in Chicago in a highly publicized case which changed the way American goods are manufactured to this day. Frightened by the resulting national publicity, Paul convinces G.C. to flee to a cabin owned by G.C. in the backwoods of Oregon. There they settle into a quiet, peaceful life for more than forty years.

Homesick, G.C. desires to return home to Chicago. Paul, who changed his name to Charlie Hamza, is finally convinced their pasts are behind them, agrees to move back. Within a year, G.C. invests in a neighborhood tavern and Charlie, a successful accounting firm.

Their worlds are turned upside down when a real estate developer expresses an interest in buying G.C.’s business in order to build a major retail/hotel/ high-end residence. A principal officer of the firm is Susan Riemer, who went by Kurz years earlier.

Fireworks erupt and the rest of the story becomes a cat-and-mouse game between Susan wanting the money she believes is rightfully hers, and G.C. and Charlie trying to avoid her and then trying to convince her they all could get caught up in the seven unsolved deaths from forty years earlier.