I have taken a writerly detour to work on a true-life unsolved murder that has always stuck with me. The tragic events inspired me to write a mystery from which I recently read this excerpt for the Bethlehem Library’s Literary Coffeehouse, which is put together by Gail Ouimet.

A Laire MacNair Mystery

The Farmington Murders by M.H. Ungar ©2026

‘Now the storm begins to lower, (Haste, the loom of Hell prepare.)

Iron-sleet of arrowy shower, Hurtles in the darken’d air.’[1]

Tina Marie Costello’s cat kept bumping and rubbing her slender calf. She should have left the homely tomcat, missing a front tooth and sporting an oozing bite in its right ear, in the alley where she first spotted it. The cat had purred like a race car’s engine when she patted his scruffy head. Sighing, she picked up the animal, who did not hiss or scratch, and carted it home.

 Blacky as she named him while dabbing hydrogen peroxide on that bad ear, lived with her these two months since her dad died and left Tina with no other family. The ear healed nicely and now, the cat butted her again. They were both hungry. She dug into her bell-bottom pocket and fished out the day’s tips.

Two quarters, a dime, a nickel and three pennies; sixty-eight cents—that was the trouble with working at a family burger joint. Cheap burgers equaled bad tips. She could get a ten-cent can of tomato soup and a splurge for the larger, quarter a can of tuna-flavored cat food. She pulled on the thick sweater she got from Good Will that made do as her winter coat.

Her real coat was lost with a lot of her things when the bank locked Tina out of her dad’s foreclosed home. Now, her waitressing job just covered the rent of a tiny fourth-floor apartment with little money left over for decent food or any of the other things she was doing without. Tina went to the plastic radio on the chipped tile counter.

 That new song was playing again, and she already knew most of its lyrics. She shut off the radio, softly singing as she went out and locked the apartment door.

“Ooh, Dream Weaver, I believe we can reach the morning light.” Her voice fell flat on the last word, which made her smile since there was no one to hear but herself.

She did not like using these dim back steps and hurried outside onto the triangular meeting of Winthrop and Whalley Avenue, which was where in New Haven, Connecticut she ended up living. Tina was not happy being stuck in a city; she missed the taste of sun-warmed tomatoes from their garden and watching the moon from a patio chair, but here was all she could afford. Dad had died owing more than the ranch house they occupied in Shelton was worth.

Beggers can’t be choosers, as Dad would say. On street level, her building housed Johnny’s Barber Shop and opposite it was Deletto’s Italian Grocers. She waited and crossed when the road was clear, went inside to shop, and came out with a paper bag holding two cans.

“Hey, ain’t you cute,” a man said from an open pickup truck window.

It was an older model with a dented front bumper and cracked back window. The man inside was all dark, hair, eyes, and shirt, but nice enough looking. His hair was mussed up but still. It was right then Tina noticed he had a folded twenty-dollar bill in between his fingers. He waved it at her.

“Not me, not that kind of girl,” Tina said.

“Aw, come on, I’m celebrating here,” he told her. “Just want to talk to a pretty face…it’s yours. All you gotta do is talk, help me celebrate.”

Tina glanced all around. It was dark early with spring still a month away. Her stomach rumbled. What she would give to sit down at the diner on Orchard Street and have a hot meatloaf and mashed potatoes dinner with lots of ketchup, her favorite. Just like she and Dad used to make together on Sundays.

She hesitated. Truck guy had a good face, a bit too tan from working outside construction, she guessed, but he was clean-shaven and had even white teeth. She walked closer to where the pickup sat in the store’s lot near its exit to the street.

He reached out a long arm with the twenty. “Take it, it’s yours.”

Now she was closer, Tina smelled a combination of beer and a spicy men’s cologne. She reached and touched the bill. He immediately let it go. It fell to the pavement. Feeling a little disbelieving, this was happening, Tina bent and clutched the folded twenty, then set down her paper bag. She straightened and used one hand to lift the thick wool sweater, the other to tuck the cash into her bellbottom’s front pocket. Tina dropped the sweater and smiled at truck guy.

“Thanks. What’re you celebrating?’

She owed him now. She would be nice, then as soon as it seemed right, would leave.

Grinning, he gestured at her to move closer as if he were going to share a secret. Tina took two steps nearer the old pickup, noting one long scratch along the driver’s side.

“I won!” he whispered, excited. “The lottery. Five hundred dollars. Can you believe it?”

“Really, wow, that’s great. I guess you do need to celebrate. What do you plan to do with it?’

“Better car,” the man said slapping the driver’s side door. “Got my eye on a Ford Fairlane, white with a blue stripe. Second-hand but mint condition.”

“That’s nice for you,” Tina said. “You must have family or friends to celebrate with you.”

The man lifted his dark gaze and gave her a little smile. “Nah…just you and me. Tell you what, I got two more twenties, just for you, if you’ll come celebrate with me.”

Tina was already shaking her head. The man glanced at the pickup’s console, and she saw it; an envelope stuffed with cash. Sixty dollars…she could get a warm coat, she really needed new shoes, a little black and white TV.

The man was not even looking at her now. He had an open can of Budweiser and was sipping it. He looked happy but not really drunk. He did not sound drunk. He put away the can, leaned to the passenger side of the pickup, and opened that door. Tina sucked in a breath; she knew what she was getting into here. She decided since he was cute, it would not be so terrible. She had boyfriends before and was no virgin. Tina went around the truck and got onto the passenger seat, shut its door.

“I’m Tina,” she said.

“Pretty name for a pretty girl, Tina.”

The pickup started and pulled out of the grocers’ lot. There were few cars on the road. The man put on the radio. Different station but it was playing that same song. She did not want to sing it now. They were blocks away when a breeze kicked up. It blew a dirty napkin across Dilletto’s parking lot. The napkin got stuck against Tina Marie Costello’s forgotten bag with its two cans.

 Hours later Blacky repeatedly scratched the apartment door high above Joe’s barber shop on that triangle of Winthrop and Whalley Avenue in New Haven, Connecticut. It suddenly gave up clawing the door and started loudly mewling for a way out.

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[1] The Fatal Sisters: An Ode by Thomas Gray