The Providence of Death

Joe McKibben a retired chief of detectives in Hampton Virginia refuses to accept the reality that his wife of thirty years Carol Anne was killed in a vehicle crash. Joe attempts to bury and ignore his emotions of grief tries to live as though his marriage continues with all promises and commitments still valid. However the buried and ignored feelings explode into anger and thoughts of revenge after McKibben discovers the brutally slain body of Whitey Wheeler another retired detective and close friend since their days together at the police academy. When it’s learned that Wheeler was still digging into the murder of one of Hampton’s prominent citizens? a crime that has remained unsolved for more than three decades?McKibben believes this older crime may be the reason for his friend’s death. He begins his own investigation into the decades-old murder. McKibben the owner of a historical research company since his retirement from the police force uses computerized data that did not exist in the 1970s as a guide for old-fashioned pavement pounding and knocking on doors. His search for answers takes him across three states from Maryland’s Eastern Shore through the countryside of eastern Pennsylvania and into the city of Philadelphia. He unearths a trail of crime and tragedy that includes a hit-and-run death a kidnapping an illegal adoption and blackmail. The trail leads back a half-century into Hampton’s history. It also leads forward to the wife of the man who will be the city’s next police chief.McKibben’s travels also include a serendipitous encounter with Marsha Fielding a high school secretary and the widow of a Maryland State Trooper. This meeting leads him to learn the universal truth that life has only one true beginning and one true ending. They are separated by the middle a place where he cannot go back and start over but a place where he can accept his wife’s death start anew and move forward.