Excerpt from Chapter Seven: "Time to Go"

The lunch crowd was adding to the volume and noise at the Athena where the two Georgetown professors were reviewing their research finds.

“How does a large and powerful family just disappear?”

“Well, from this researcher’s point of view, there just simply is no mention of any of them after a certain point. Except, here is the family crest stitched onto a doctor’s satchel. There is not any von Kremmin family before the good doctor, as far as I can tell. There is a region of Prussia called the Kremmin. That may be where your family comes from, originally. I say that because “von” means “from”, if course, so Dr. Von Kremmin was probably someone from Kremmin. My theory is that he is really the last of the Gottlegiesser. He and his son ran away from whatever fate befell the rest of their family. Maybe there was some vendetta out on the entire family, and it is now catching up to you?”

“Ever since my mind started going down this road, and ever since I ruled out any crime or drug connections that Andrew’s family may have had, that theory has bothered me. It has bothered me from the day I decided to look up Carl August’s son in the military journals at the National Archives. Why would someone act on a century’s old grudge? Why would it be worth that much to go through all this trouble, and to risk getting caught? What could that person possibly get out of all this? What would this killer want from us?”

“Well, I would think it would have to be more than a mere grudge. No, I think Carl Augustus had some sort of family treasure, or something valuable he stole.” Daniel winced as he saw Albert grin from ear to ear.

“What are you thinking Albert?”

“Maybe it is a lost treasure from the Teutonic Knights? Who knows?”

 AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is part of the first draft of the novel I intend to submit as part of the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo).  Feedback and ideas are most welcome.  Oh, and I hit the 10k mark yesterday for the word count.  Boo ya!