Flipped Out

by Jennie Bentley

  The sound of a car coming up the street caused me to turn and look, and I felt my stomach drop when I recognized the cream-colored Mercedes. It pulled to the curb in front of Tony’s sports car, and after a second, Melissa got out and looked around.

  “Shit,” Adam said, which seemed to sum up the situation admirably. “She won’t be happy.”

  I shook my head. No, she wouldn’t be. She’d be shocked and distraught and miserable. Melissa had been just about as unlucky in love as I had; before I met Derek, that is. Her marriage hadn’t worked out, her relationship with Ray Stenham had gone down in flames, and now, just as she’d found Tony and gotten engaged again, her new fiancé was dead. It be enough to push anyone off the deep end. I didn’t like Melissa much, but I felt sorry for her at that moment.

  “Hello, everyone!” Melissa bathed us all in her brilliant smile. As usual, she looked fabulous in yet another designer skirt and wedge sandals, with sparkly stones—sapphires?—in her ears. “Hi, Avery. What’s going on? What are the police doing here?”

  The smile didn’t waver; I guess maybe she was just expecting me to say that Wayne or his deputy, Brandon Thomas, had stopped by to say hello and meet the television crew.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, feeling a little guilty about my dislike for her when I knew—and she didn’t—that her fiancé had just met an untimely end. “There’s been an accident.”

  “An accident?” She looked at us all standing there on the porch looking at her, and her smile slowly died. She turned back to me. “Derek?”

  As if I’d be standing here, as relatively composed as I was, if something had happened to Derek. I shook my head. “He’s fine. It’s not Derek. It’s Tony.”

  “Tony?” Her voice was strange. Not surprised at all, almost calm. It was probably denial. Or shock.

  “I’m sorry.” I moved to take her arm. “Here. Sit down on the steps.”

  But she shook me off. “I want to see him.”

  “I’m not sure that’s a good idea—”

  “I didn’t ask for your permission, Avery!” She pushed past me and into the house.

  “Melissa, wait!” I ran after her.

  Derek and Wayne were in the kitchen, Wayne crouched next to Tony’s body while Derek leaned against the kitchen cabinets, arms folded across his chest. When Melissa burst through the door, he made an abortive movement toward us, perhaps trying to forestall her, before he stopped.

  She came to a halt just inside the door, as if she’d run into an invisible wall, and let out a gasp of horror. She even lifted a hand—the one with the ring—to her throat, as if she couldn’t breathe. The diamond caught the sunlight coming through the kitchen window and cast it in prisms against the wall.

  Not that I could blame Melissa for her dramatic reaction. It was a pretty gruesome sight, even for someone who didn’t particularly like Tony. He was stretched out on the floor, with his head near the door to the utility room and his feet near the door to the dining room. His olive skin had taken on a grayish cast. It also looked like Derek and Wayne must have turned him over to get a better look at his injuries. There was a huge pool of dark blood on the floor next to him, and the entire front of his white shirt was red. It looked as if he’d been stabbed at least a half-dozen times.

  “Melissa.” When Derek touched her shoulder, she turned blindly into his arms and buried her head in his shoulder. After a second’s hesitation, he put an arm around her waist and used the other hand to pat her back and shoulder.

  I turned to Wayne. “Sorry. She pushed past me before I could stop her.”

  He shrugged. “She would have insisted on seeing him anyway, whether we’d been outside when she arrived or not.”

  Derek was already guiding Melissa out of the kitchen and toward the front door, and now Wayne nodded to me. “We need to go. I don’t want anyone else to wander in and contaminate the crime scene before Brandon gets here and starts doing the forensic dance.”

  “Have you called him?”

  “He’s on his way. So is the van from Portland.”

  The medical examiner’s van to carry Tony’s body to the morgue.

  “Any idea what he was stabbed with?” I hadn’t seen a knife anywhere in the kitchen. I hadn’t seen anything else, for that matter. None of the tools we’d used yesterday.

  Wayne shook his head. “We’ll know more when Dr. Lawrence has done her examination. For right now, we’re thinking it might be a screwdriver. Derek says there’s one missing.”

  Surely not the battery-powered one, the one I’d used all afternoon yesterday? My stomach twisted unpleasantly at the thought, and I fought back a wave of nausea. The smell in the house wasn’t helping: The fresh tang of paint stripper and the sweet smell of sanded wood were now mixed with the metallic scent of blood.

  “Let me ask you a question, Avery,” Wayne said, with a cautious look at Derek and Melissa, who were just passing through the front door onto the porch. He grabbed my arm and held me back. “Derek said you weren’t expecting Tony this morning. That the two of you were surprised to see his car parked out front.”

  I nodded.

  “What about Melissa? Did you know she was coming?”

  I glanced up at him, surprised. “You don’t think Melissa killed him, do you?”

  “I’m not thinking anything,” Wayne said, in blatant disregard of the truth. Of course he was thinking something, and it wasn’t difficult to guess what. “When someone dies an unnatural death, we always have to look at the significant other.”

  “Yes, but . . . they’ve only been dating a few months.” How significant could the relationship be in such a short amount of time? Although she had been wearing an engagement ring....

  “I noticed that,” Wayne nodded when I said so. “New development?”

  “The first time I saw it was Sunday night.” At the Tavern, with the champagne. It sounded like a game of Clue. “And I did see them both a few times last week, while we were getting everything ready for the flip. She wasn’t wearing it then.”

  “So fairly recent. Don’t know whether that’ll make the situation worse or easier for her.” He gestured for me to precede him out of the house. Outside on the porch, he raised his voice to address everyone. “If I could have your attention, please?”

  I moved away while everyone else turned to face Wayne. Wilson had put down the camera and was taking his turn to comfort Nina, who still looked distraught. Ted watched them, his jaw tight. Adam, meanwhile, had taken the opportunity to chat up Fae. She looked as if she really wanted him to leave her alone, but she was too polite, or perhaps just too young and afraid, to tell him to bug off. Once in a while, she’d shoot a glance at Wilson, as if looking for rescue, but he was busy and didn’t notice. All conversation stopped at the sound of Wayne’s voice; the only thing we could hear was Melissa snuffling into Derek’s shoulder.

  “I’m sorry to have to inform you that Tony Micelli is dead,” Wayne said formally. “Because of the circumstances, we’ll be treating the death as suspicious, and as a result, we’ll have to talk to everyone associated with the victim, as well as everyone associated with the crime scene. That means all of you.”

  He let his gaze run over the crowd, and by now, his eyes had lost all that brown softness and were cold and hard.

  “Surely you don’t think one of us . . .” Adam blustered.

  Wayne focused on him. “I’m not thinking anything, Mr. Ramsey. Not yet, anyway. But you were all here this morning, and you all met Tony Micelli yesterday, and you all knew where the key to the front door was hidden. . . .”

  Derek must have told him those things while the two of them were inside the house together.

  “But Ivory said there were tools missing. . . .” Adam protested, with a glance at me.

  “Avery”—Wayne glanced at me, too, with an amused twitch of his lip he couldn’t quite suppress—“is correct. However, the fact that the key was used suggests that someone who knew where it was hidden opened the door.”

/>   A babble of protest greeted this pronouncement, as everyone wanted to express their shock, outrage, and innocence, all at the same time. Wayne held up a hand. “Save it for later. You’ll have a chance to tell me your side of the story.”

  He thought for a second. “What might be best is if I take you back to the bed and breakfast. You can wait in your rooms while I talk to each of you individually. It’ll be more comfortable than cooling your heels at the police station. I’ll call Kate and let her know what’s going on.” He reached for his phone.

  “What about us?” Derek asked when Wayne had delivered the news and Kate was prepared to play prison matron for the next few hours. “Avery and me? And Melissa?” He had his arm around her still, and she looked pale and shocked, her eyes unfocused. Her makeup was still perfect, though, so I guess all the sobbing must have been dry. Either that, or she used the most amazingly waterproof makeup the world has ever seen.

  Wayne hesitated, looking at her. “I’ll have to talk to all of you, especially Melissa. In your professional opinion, is she up for an interview?”

  “My professional opinion isn’t worth squat,” Derek retorted, “since I haven’t practiced medicine for six years. But in my opinion, she’s in shock and probably won’t be coherent until she’s had some time to rest.”

  “Does she need to go to the hospital?”

  “It might not be a bad idea to take her to see dad. Get a second opinion from someone whose medical license is actually current.”

  “Why don’t you two do that,” Wayne said. “I’ll stay here until Brandon arrives, and then I’ll leave him to do the evidence gathering while I go back to the B and B with the crew.”

  “Sure.” I was a little unsure as to why he was sharing his plan as if we were working together, but maybe it was his way of telling the crew, without actually telling them, what would be going down.

  “C’mon, Melissa,” Derek said, helping her down the steps. “We’re gonna go see Dad.”

  “My car . . .” Melissa stumbled when her foot hit the ground. Lurching sideways, she probably would have fallen if Derek hadn’t had a good grip on her.

  “It’ll be safe here. The most important thing right now is to take care of you.”

  “Keep me updated,” Wayne told me. I nodded, running after them.

  6

  Dr. Ben Ellis and his wife, Cora, live in a pristine, greenpainted Folk Victorian on Chandler Street in the Village. Like a lot of houses in Waterfield, it’s been in Derek’s family since it was built.

  When we pulled up to the curb outside the house, Derek said, “Stay there.”

  It brought back memories. He’d done the same thing the first time he’d brought me here. I’d had an accident during the renovation of Aunt Inga’s house, had fallen down the sabotaged basement stairs, and when Derek came and found me all banged up and bruised the next morning, he had picked me up and carried me to the truck and driven me to Dr. Ben’s house. When we arrived, he’d told me to stay put until he could come around the car to carry me. I, being stubborn and embarrassed and not entirely sure that he hadn’t sabotaged the stairs—and liking being in his arms a little too much for comfort—had insisted on getting out on my own. He’d had to catch me before I fell flat on my face. This time, I did as I was told.

  Between us, we got Melissa out of the truck and up the garden path to the front door. Under her own steam, with Derek supporting her on one side and me on the other. When she wobbled and Derek asked if she needed to be carried, I’d come back with a firm, “She’ll be fine,” before Melissa even had time to open her mouth.

  On the top of the stairs, Derek tried the knob before ringing the bell, and then we waited. After a moment, there were footsteps inside, and then the door opened.

  “Derek.” Dr. Ben stood on the threshold knotting his tie. “And . . . Melissa?” His eyebrows shot up, and he looked around. I think he may have been just a little worried, which was nice of him. There was definite relief on his face when he spotted me. “Avery. There you are. What’s going on, Son?”

  “There’s been an accident,” Derek said, guiding Melissa through the door and into the front hall, and from there into the parlor on the left. He put her down on the same yellow brocade-upholstered sofa I’d sat on last summer when Dr. Ben had examined my leg. He had called Derek “Son” then, too, my first indication of the relationship between them.

  “What sort of accident?” Dr. Ben watched Melissa, who sat as docile as a child, staring straight ahead, violet eyes unfocused.

  “What looks like a break-in at the house on Cabot Street.”

  Dr. Ben knew all about the house on Cabot Street, of course; we hadn’t talked about much else for the past couple of weeks.

  “Looks like?” he repeated.

  Derek shrugged. “I left the key in a planter on the porch last night. One of the crew said he might get there early to start setting up for the shoot.”

  “And when you got there this morning?”

  “The key was gone, the door was open, and Tony Micelli was inside. Dead.”

  That was succinct and to the point. Maybe a little too succinct. I glanced at Melissa.

  Dr. Ben nodded. “Cora’s in the kitchen. Why don’t you two go say hi and get some breakfast while I talk to Melissa.” He turned to his former daughter-in-law. Derek looked like he might be thinking about protesting, but then he shrugged and went.

  Cora, of course, had not heard anything about what had happened, and we had to go through the story again for her, sitting around the kitchen table in the Ellises’ comfortable kitchen addition. “Tony Micelli?” she exclaimed when Derek had finished the sordid tale. “Who’d want to kill Tony Micelli?”

  “I can’t imagine it was premeditated,” Derek answered, hands wrapped around a mug of coffee. “He probably just drove by on his way home from dropping Nina at the B and B last night and saw the door standing open or something. Maybe he thought I was there and he wanted to talk to me.”

  “Why would he want to talk to you?”

  “Could be anything,” Derek said. “It was his house, and I was working on it. Or he was engaged to Melissa, and I used to be married to her, so he wanted the inside scoop.”

  “Either that, or your blessing.”

  “He had it,” Derek said and took a sip of coffee.

  Cora looked from one to the other of us. “So you think it was random? Someone broke in to steal your tools, and Tony happened to be there and walked in on them, and they killed him? That’s rather coincidental, isn’t it?”

  It was. Especially that it should happen on the same night that Derek had told the whole crew about houses under construction being magnets for thieves.

  He seemed to disagree, however. “What else could it be? I mean, who’d want to kill Tony Micelli?”

  “He was a reporter,” I said. “Maybe he’d discovered something about someone.”

  “And he arranged to meet them in our fixer-upper? Why?”

  “No idea. But it doesn’t make sense to kill someone over a few tools, either.”

  Cora nodded in agreement. “How much did the things cost that you left in the house?”

  Derek looked pensive. “Not much, now that you mention it. I hadn’t brought over the tile saw yet, or any of the other expensive stuff, so it was just some hammers and chisels, an electric screwdriver that Avery used to take the cabinet doors off—it didn’t cost more than twenty bucks brand-new—a crowbar, and the manual screwdriver, of course. . . .”

  Of course. “Doesn’t seem enough to murder someone over, does it?”

  “No,” Derek admitted, “but whoever broke in may not have realized that. Not until it was too late. Teenagers, maybe, trying to make a quick buck, never intending to hurt anyone. But when Tony walked in on them, they panicked. Maybe he grabbed hold of whoever had the screwdriver in his hand, and the kid lashed out, not even intending to stab him but just to buy enough time to get away.”

  “That would explain the first stab wou
nd,” I said, “but not the other half dozen.”

  “So maybe he accidentally got Tony in the chest, and Tony fell, and then they all freaked out and decided they’d better make sure he was really dead, and so they stabbed him a few more times for good measure.”

  “Maybe. But do you really think they’d be able to think clearly enough after something like that to take the murder weapon with them? Not to mention the other tools? Wouldn’t they just drop everything and run?”

  “Maybe they were afraid their fingerprints would be on the screwdriver,” Derek said.

  “If they broke in without wearing gloves, their fingerprints would be on everything else, too. Including the doorknobs and any other surfaces they touched.”

  Derek didn’t answer. I added, “They took the time to gather the rest of the tools and bring them along. And that doesn’t sound like panic. That sounds calculated to me.”

  “Do you think someone planned to kill Tony Micelli, then, Avery?” Cora asked in her soft voice. She looks deceptively sweet and simple, with her round face and fluffy brown hair and soft blue eyes, but she’s not stupid at all.

  I shook my head. “Not necessarily. It could still be like Derek said: Someone broke in to steal our tools, and Tony caught them in the act. But I don’t think they were panicked teenagers. They took the time to remove not only the murder weapon but all our tools afterward. So they weren’t too freaked out about stabbing Tony to lose sight of why they were there in the first place.”

  “Someone who really needed the fifty bucks those tools would fetch at a pawnshop, then?” Derek said, eyebrows raised in mingled disbelief and incredulity.

  I grimaced. “That doesn’t make much sense, either, does it?”

  “Not really, no. If they were old enough and coolheaded enough to stab Tony and remove the evidence, they’d be mature enough to realize that the profit wasn’t worth the crime.”