Sam Kincaid 01 - The Commission

Prologue
    He had been seeing the young prostitute for almost a year now. They had met at the Satin & Lace club in South Salt Lake City where she worked as a nude dancer. They’d hit it off right away. He found her youthful good looks, hard body, and sexual enthusiasm intoxicating from the very beginning. They got together as often as his professional schedule and family demands would allow.
    He got up and began to dress. She stirred briefly, rolled over, and went back to sleep. It was almost 11 p.m. He wanted to get home soon in case his wife tried to call him from her parents’ home in California where she was visiting. He deposited a crisp, new one-hundred-dollar bill on the night stand, kissed her gently on the back of the neck, and quietly left the room.
    A six-foot-high cedar fence separated the motel parking lot from a McDonald’s restaurant. The familiar smell of fast-food burgers and fries filled the still night air. He climbed into his new Lexus, turned north onto State Street, and headed home into the exclusive Avenues district. For a Saturday night, south State Street was relatively free of the usual transients and hookers who often plied their trade in this part of town. The amount of lust on south State Street would have made old Brigham Young turn over in his grave—clearly not what he intended when the streets of this dusty frontier town were neatly laid out one hundred and fifty years earlier.
    Levi Vogue paused to reflect on what a charmed life he was leading. At forty-four, he’d recently been appointed by Governor Nelson Strand to a second five-year term as Chairman of the prestigious and highly visible Utah Board of Pardons and Parole. Having established a statewide reputation for being tough on crime and criminals, his political ambition extended far beyond the Board. He was a member of a prominent and wealthy Republican family. He had two grown sons attending college. And he had a supportive, if boring wife, who was the epitome of what former Vice-President Dan Quayle meant when he stumped around the country preaching family values.
    ***
    This growing obsession he had for the young prostitute—he knew he needed to end it and end it soon. His occasional stops at the Satin & Lace club were also a problem. It would be just his luck to run into some former prison inmate he had paroled who might remember him. Or worse, what if he ran into some prominent member of the community dallying in the den of iniquity? It was just the type of potential scandal that could jeopardize his position on the Board of Pardons, not to mention ending any hope of a future political career. Besides, she sporadically dated a possessive, jealous boyfriend who had a reputation for dealing violently with strip-club customers who tried to become overly familiar with her. Who knows what he might do if he became aware of their occasional trysts at the Starlite Motel.
    He was living on the edge, and he knew it. But, he liked living on the edge.
    He glanced quickly at his watch, noting that it was almost 11:30 as he entered the circular driveway that led to the stately, older Victorian home he and Margaret had purchased five years earlier. As he frequently did during the warm spring and summer months, he parked in the driveway near the garage. As he climbed out, he failed to notice the approaching figure who emerged from the shadows next to the house. When he glanced up, he thought the figure looked vaguely familiar, but wondered why anyone would be wearing a long trench coat on a warm spring night.
    The advancing figure stopped less than twenty feet from him. For an instant, each looked at the other without speaking. Only when the sawed-off shotgun emerged from under the coat did he realize what was about to happen. He wanted to scream, “No,” but before he could say anything, he saw a bright flash of light and heard an explosion as the shotgun discharged. The deafening blast caught him high in the chest and propelled him onto his back. He felt the warm dampness of his own blood as it puddled under him on the cobblestone drive. A strange numbness followed. He looked up at the stars in a hazy state of disbelief as the dark figure crouched over him. The last thing he felt was the cold touch of the shotgun barrel as it was placed under his chin. The second blast nearly decapitated him.

Chapter One
    The telephone woke me from a restless sleep. I glanced at the clock across the room with its small red numbers and strained