The stench grew stronger as I approached the rusted utility cart filled with mangled bicycles. The wagon and its contents stood as a monument to the four members of the Crescent Valley Mountain Bike Club, my brother among them, who died ten years and three days ago when Clarence Bonnell drove his Jeep into a pack of riders.
The judge dismissed the DWI and murder charges on a technicality. Clarence left Harriston the next day. He returned last week to attend his mother's funeral.
Blinking away the memory, I followed the scent up to the shrine and looked into the mound of disfigured metal. Amongst the rusted spokes, chains, and crossbars, I saw the silver glint of a watchband. I reached down and lifted one of the frames. The bodies of Clarence and his brother-in-law/lawyer, Franklin Demming, III, were still recognizable, as were the single bullet holes in each forehead. I inhaled the aroma of their putrefied corpses and held my breath. I hadn't smelled anything as sweet in ten years and three days.
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