Free Flipping Out by Marshall Karp Page A

better. I know,
baby. It's gonna be OK. Put Tony on. I promise. I love you too.'
    As soon as she
handed the phone to Tony, Terry's voice went from comforting husband to cop in
charge.
    'Nora and Julia are
dead. Shot. Same as Jo Drabyak. Three partners in this house-flipping business
have been murdered, and I don't want my wife and yours to be numbers four and
five. Get the two of them and Diana out of the building.'
    There was a
short pause while Tony did the talking, then Terry jumped back in. 'What I
would do,' he said, 'is pull the plug on the party and lock up the house. Just
tell everyone that Nora took sick, and shut it down without going public with
the truth. Good. We're on the same page. Mike and I are at Nora's house. We'll
send a couple of units to back you up. You're welcome, bro. See you soon.'
    He hung up.
There was a roll of paper towels on the counter. He pointed to it. I tore some
off and began to wrap it around his bloody left hand, while he called for
Tony's backup. When he finished, he gave me my cell back.
    'Sorry,' he
said. 'I got blood all over your phone.'
    'What happened?'
I said.
    'I'm no Sherlock
Holmes,' he said, looking down at Julia, 'but I'm gonna go out on a limb and
guess that someone put a bullet through her head.'
    'What happened
to you , asshole?'
    'Oh, that. I
sliced my hand on this Pellegrino bottle.'
    There was a
shattered green bottle on the floor. It must have been full when it broke,
because the pool of red around Julia was a lot more liquid than could possibly
have come from the single dot in the middle of her skull.
    'It looks like
Julia tried to fend off her killer with a litre of imported sparkling water,'
Terry said. 'Never the best choice against a gun. All she managed to do was get
the floor sopping wet, so the first cop on the scene would slip on it, cut open
his hand and wet his pants.'
    'There's a medic
out there,' I said.
    'What I really
need is a dry cleaner. These are my good pants.'
    One of the cops
walked in. 'Nothing upstairs, Detectives,' he said. 'And no sign of forced
entry.'
    'Keep everyone
out till CSU gets here.' I said.
    'No problem,' he
said. 'Detective Lomax, I know you're busy in here, but you know that big guy
out there - the one who found the bodies?'
    'What about
him?'
    'He's a major
pain in the ass. Says he wants to talk to you. I told him to wait till you're
good and ready.'
    'What'd he say
to that?' I asked. The cop laughed. 'He says he's your father.' I laughed along
with him. 'He's full of shit,' I said. 'Tell him to wait.'

Chapter
Twenty-One
     
     
    Terry and I took
stock of the kitchen. There was a phone cradle on the counter, but no handset.
I pressed the locator button and heard it beep back from another room.
    'Well, even if Julia
heard Nora get shot, that solves the mystery of why she didn't dial 911,' Terry
said.
    He knelt down at
the edge of the puddle of blood and Pellegrino. Julia was dressed for the
evening. Black skirt, a silky blue blouse, heels. The hair near her left temple
had been cut, and some of the little clippings were floating in the bloody
soup.
    'She's having a
really bad hair day,' he said.
    We walked back
through the living room and took another look at Nora. Her hair too had been
chopped.
    'She's wearing
sweats,' I said. 'I know the two of them were supposed to go shopping this
afternoon. They must have come back here together, and Nora probably put on
something comfortable and was planning on changing her clothes at the last
minute. What time do you think she would have gotten dressed for the party if
she was expecting Big Jim to pick her up at six fifteen?'
    Terry gave me a
blank stare. 'Mike, I'm the last guy you should be asking for fashion tips. I
would have figured she was just gonna wear her gym clothes to the book
signing.'
    I looked at his
hand. The blood had already soaked through the paper towels. 'You really should
have EMS bandage that.'
    He stood up.
'I'd rather try to solve this shit first before this maniac