ELECTING TO MURDER (McRyan Mystery Series - Excerpt)

Chapter 2: "What would be the fun in that?"

CHAPTER TWO

"What would be the fun in that?”

Thursday, October 31st

The Snelling Motor Lodge was a two-story L-shaped motel from a bygone era, both in its shape and function. It was L-shaped to fit snuggly into a tight lot on the east side of Snelling Avenue near the Minnesota State Fairgrounds. In years gone by, its function would have been to host out-of-state families in the cities either visiting or working at the Minnesota State Fair or in town visiting their children attending Hamline University which was located just to its north.

However, what travelers needed from a hotel, matched with years of neglectful ownership, had allowed The Snelling to fall into a dilapidated state. The red paint was peeling away from its cedar siding and the years of harsh Minnesota winters and heavy snow had wreaked havoc on the faded black shingled roof, causing it to look as wavy as Lake Minnetonka. The cement parking lot was strewn with small pot holes and the sidewalks were chipped and cracked. People looking for a good night’s rest and some peace and quiet usually did not stay at The Snelling. People looking to engage in activities they didn’t want others to see did. Time and neglect turned The Snelling over to a poorer clientele, one that frequently included drug dealers, junkies and prostitutes. So it was no surprise to Detective Mac McRyan that at 5:30 p.m. he was turning into the parking lot of The Snelling, pulling up to yellow crime scene tape and parking next to the coroner’s wagon.

This wouldn’t be his first rodeo at The Snelling.

Mac put his new Yukon in park and took one last long sip of his Depth Charge Coffee from the Grand Brew. Thirty-three years old, he had four years as a detective. He was a fourth generation cop, with cousins and uncles scattered throughout the St. Paul Police Department. When you retired from the first family business, you went to work for the second family business, McRyan’s Pub, sitting on the southwest corner of downtown St. Paul on West Seventh Street.

While policing and owning a bar were the family businesses, Mac’s route to being a cop was far more circuitous than for the rest of his family. He’d been a hockey player at the University of Minnesota, captain his senior year. He was also a scholastic All-American. As a result, Mac McRyan had other options available to him. So while other McRyans of his generation stayed true to family form and went into policing, Mac went to law school with his college sweetheart, got married and appeared set for a long, lucrative and successful legal career. He had been hired by the biggest firm in town with a six-figure salary waiting. Then lightning struck two weeks after he passed the bar exam. His two cousins and best friends were killed in the line of duty and suddenly he felt the pull and obligation of the family business. Mac made detective by age twenty-nine, was divorced by age thirty and now at age thirty-three was the best detective on the force.

He grabbed his worn brown leather folder, pen and cell phone and rolled his athletic six-foot-one frame out of the warmth of the truck. There was a definite chill in the air. The temperature was dropping quickly from a noontime high of forty-eight and was now dipping into the mid-thirties, with a stiff northwest breeze adding to the chill, cold even for Minnesota in late October. Winter was still a ways away, but days like today made you realize it wasn’t that far away. Mac threw his black wool overcoat on over his suit coat and pulled a navy blue scarf around his neck and walked under the crime scene tape.

His cousin Shawn, a uniform cop, greeted him with a smile and: “Hey cuz. I didn’t think the chief would send the A-squad to The Snelling.”

“Just my luck, I guess,” Mac answered. “Hold this,” Mac said as he handed his cousin his brown leather folder and reached inside his coat pocket and pulled out a pair of rubber gloves. He took the folder back, “Lich will be along any minute.”