Flipping Out

by Marshall Karp

  'Sure,' Marilyn said. 'Fire away.'

  'These houses that you renovate, they sell for a lot more than the market value, because Nora makes them famous. Am I right?' 'Right.'

  'And how does she make them famous? She makes them the scene of some fictional murder, right?'

  'That's the concept.'

  'OK, here's the dumb question,' Diana said. 'Do you think the price of the house would go up even higher if there were a real murder connected to it?'

  'Wow,' Marilyn said.

  'That's pretty interesting,' I said. 'I can't wait till you come up with a smart question.'

  'You're saying that somebody might have wanted to drive the price of the house up, so they killed someone connected to it,' Terry said.

  'I don't know,' Diana said. 'It's just a weird thought I had.'

  'So maybe this has nothing to do with Jo,' he said. 'They just picked her at random. They could've killed any one of the...'

  I couldn't stop him, and by the time Terry stopped himself it was too late. The idea that the victim could have been any of the partners hit Marilyn hard. She bolted from the table. 'I'm going to be sick,' she said, and ran toward the ladies room. Diana ran after her.

  Terry put his hand to his forehead. 'I must be an idiot.'

  'It was like watching a train wreck,' I said. 'I saw where you were going, but I couldn't stop you.'

  'She'll be OK,' he said. 'In the meantime, if Diana is right about the motive, that would narrow down the list of suspects. There's not too many people who would benefit if the house sold for more.'

  'Nora's loaded,' I said. 'I can't imagine she'd kill anyone for money. So that leaves Julia and Marisol.'

  'Don't forget about that redhead who's puking her guts out in the bathroom,' Terry said. 'Never did trust her.'

  Chapter Eleven

  Traffic on the 101 is cake if you leave for work at five thirty in the morning. We had to wait till a civilised hour before we could make house calls, so we spent the first chunk of our day going over Reggie Drabyak's recent cases. At 9:00 a.m. we headed for Nora Bannister's house.

  Nora is a cop groupie. She used to drop by the station under the pretence of visiting her son-in-law, Charlie Knoll, then spend the next few hours chatting it up with any homicide detective she could corner. Terry and I were her favourite targets.

  Eventually, she stopped pretending and would call in advance to schedule a lunch or a drink after work, then bombard us with whatever murderous thoughts she had in her head.

  If we figured out who the killer was, she'd go back and rethink the plot. Her biggest joy was getting one past us.

  'I've stumped the experts,' she would say. 'This book is going to be a bestseller.'

  And, of course, it always was. Nora was short, smart, tough, funny, and immensely popular in fifty countries. She was also a bit of a loon. A lot of people check their horoscopes, but Nora based every one of her life decisions on how the planets aligned with the stars. She refused to let her publisher launch a book if Mercury was in retrograde. As for her partners in the house-flipping business, any one of the wives at our station would have been thrilled to get in on the action, but Nora only invited the astrologically blessed. The sad exception was her daughter Julia, the biggest disappointment of Nora's life. Who knows if Julia would ever have been anything besides a failed poet living in her mother's shadow, but when Mom keeps telling you that you were three weeks premature, so, despite all her calculations, it's your fault that you popped out under a bad sign, your whole life is basically fucked. It doesn't matter if it was mystical or self-fulfilling, either way it was a prophecy Nostradamus would be proud to call his own.

  I'd never been to her home till now. It was three stories high, pure white, and screamed art deco.

  'It's like somebody broke off a piece of the Chrysler Building and dipped it in powdered sugar,' Terry said.

  'Does that mean you hate it?' I said.

  'Are you kidding? I'd kill to own that house. Oh, wait, that's what she does.'

  Nora's assistant, Martin Sorensen, greeted us at the front door. We'd met him several times before at her book signings. Five years ago he had been a low-paid assistant editor at Nora's publisher. She was so impressed, she hired him to become her high-paid flunky.

  Clean-cut, good-looking, well organised, and totally buttoned up, Martin is the perfect assistant. Even more perfect than one might imagine. At last year's book launch, after several trips to the punch bowl, Charlie let us know he was pretty sure that old Martin was banging his mother-in-law.

  Of course, old Martin wasn't exactly old. He was thirty-seven. And while Nora's website doesn't give her age, the consensus from the media sites put her at sixty- four.

  'Julia thinks it's adorable that her mother is screwing a guy young enough to be her son,' Charlie had said. 'I think it's creepy. I asked around. He's got a reputation for chasing cougars, and Nora is one hell of a rich cougar.'

  'Terrible tragedy about Jo,' Martin said as he walked us through the house to the pool. Nothing more. Just the basic pap you mumble as you shake hands with the bereaved at a funeral service and move on.

  Nora and her daughter, Julia, were having coffee on the patio. Nora sprang up when we she saw us. 'I'm so glad you're working this case,' she said, giving each of us quick double-cheek Hollywood air kisses. 'You got anything yet?'

  'We're still putting it together,' I said. 'Good morning, Julia.'

  Unlike her mother, who was small and blonde, Julia was big and bland. 'Hi,' she said.

  'This is sur-freaking-real,' Nora said. 'Do you have any idea who might have killed her?'

  'That's what we came to ask you,' I said.

  'The three of us have been racking our brains about it all morning,' Nora said. 'Nobody we know could possibly have done this. Maybe it has something to do with her past. Something none of us know about.'

  'Everybody loved her,' Martin added helpfully.

  'You all got along? No infighting? No problems?'

  A chorus of three yeses.

  'Would Marisol Dominguez agree with that?' I asked.

  Nora laughed. She sat back in her chair and downed what was left in her coffee cup. Without a word, Martin picked up the empty cup and refilled it from a large chrome carafe. 'Well, there was no love lost between Marisol and Jo,' Nora said. 'They were total opposites. Sometimes Jo would bring the workers a box of pastries left over from one of her parties, and Marisol's attitude would be we're not paying them to sit around and eat fucking donuts. Jo was a people person. Marisol is a Marisol person. She's not there to make the workers happy. She's there to make them work. That's why she's so effective as a project manager.' Nora glanced over at her daughter, the failed project manager. Julia pursed her lips but said nothing.

  'So Marisol is in charge of the crew,' I said. 'What about the rest of the partners?'

  'Well, I write the books, so I have the biggest stake,'

  Nora said, picking up her fresh cup of coffee. 'I used to own sixty percent. Julia and Marisol are twenty-percent investors, and Marisol gets a salary for overseeing all the subcontractors. On this latest house, I dropped back to fifty percent, so we could make room for Jo and Marilyn. They each have five percent. I didn't need their money as investors. It was more because it's a successful business, and I wanted to bring in a few friends, who have the talent and the karma that I thought could make it even more successful. Marilyn has an innate sense of feng shui, and she's a water sign, so she's perfect in the garden, and Jo was the quintessential Virgo, so of course I put her in charge of publicity and coming up with creative ways to showcase the house.'

  'The book launch was scheduled for tonight,' Martin said. 'Jo planned a brilliant party. We used to have the predictable champagne open house. This year, Jo has transformed it into a veritable movie set. She totally brought the murder to life.'

  Nora slammed her open palm down on the table. Silver, china, and Julia all jumped. 'Martin, did you hear what you just said?' She turned
to us. 'Jo planned a stellar event. We've postponed it till after her funeral.'

  'Who would benefit financially with Jo gone?' I said.

  'Nobody,' Nora said. 'She's done so much of the work already. When we sell the house, her share will go to her estate. I guess that means Reggie.'

  We fished for ten more minutes, but the more questions we asked, the more clear it became that no one in the group benefited from Jo Drabyak's death.

  Finally, we wrapped it up. 'One last question,' I said. 'Where were you all on Sunday night at about eleven?'

  'I was in bed with a cop,' Julia said. 'Charlie got home from the poker game just around eleven.'

  'I was blogging,' Nora said. 'In fact, I bet you can track the fact that I posted a blog on my site around eleven thirty. It's not much of an alibi, but quite frankly, I can't imagine I actually need one.'

  'And I was home,' Martin said.

  'Alone?' I asked.

  'Absolutely,' he said, looking directly at Nora.

  He didn't seem to care if Terry and I believed him. He was more worried about the cougar.

  Chapter Twelve

  Martin and Julia waited on the patio, while Nora walked us to the front door. 'I realise you didn't want to say anything in front of the others, but if you've got anything, feel free to share it with me. I can help.'

  'Nora, you've been a big help already,' I said. 'Thanks.'

  'No, Mike. I mean help. In case you forgot, I solve homicides for a living.'

  I had been in a pissy mood before I got to Nora's. I only had five hours sleep, I was tired of living out of a suitcase, and the prospect of my contractor ever calling to say my house is ready looked dim. And now this woman who invented every homicide she ever solved was telling me she could do my job. My patience was worn thin, and I tore into her. 'Nora, you make this shit up,' I said. 'You come up with ways to kill imaginary people, and then three hundred pages later you have some other imaginary person figure out who the killer was. In case you forgot, this is what Terry and I do for a living. Jo Drabyak is not one of your characters. This is the real deal.'

  'For God's sake, Lomax, I know the difference between reality and fiction. You know what Tom Clancy said?'

  'No, and quite honestly, if it's not going to help me turn this case around, I don't give a shit.'

  'The difference between fiction and reality is that fiction has to make sense. Killing Jo Drabyak makes no sense. I can't make heads or tails of it. I was up at four this morning. By the time you showed up I was on my third pot of coffee. I have a theory. Are you willing to listen to it?'

  Terry hadn't said a word for ten minutes. He stepped in. 'Yes, we'd like to hear whatever you came up with.'

  She smiled. 'Thanks. Is it your turn to be Good Cop?'

  'Yeah, but I suck at it,' Terry said, 'so cough up your theory fast because I can get twice as cranky as Mike.'

  I doubted if Nora had anything of value to offer up. The only thing on her agenda was to get involved, but she was Charlie's mother-in-law and Marilyn's partner. It was probably a good call on Terry's part to let her blather on.

  'I'm sure you're looking into the Reggie connection,' she said. 'Cop's wife gets killed, maybe somebody's got a hard-on for the cop.'

  'We got it covered,' Terry said.

  'So I focused on Jo. Why kill her? Sure, there may be an old grudge that you dig up, but I doubt it. So I thought, what if this is not really about Jo? What if it's about someone else?'

  Terry was patient. 'Like who?'

  'Like me,' she said. 'What if someone is trying to destroy my career?'

  'Correct me if I'm wrong,' Terry said, 'but wouldn't it be easier to destroy your career by just shooting you in the head?'

  'Not if the killer is a sicko who wants to toy with me. First he kills Jo, then Marisol, or Julia, or even Marilyn. Little by little he would sabotage my books, my real estate venture, everything I do. 'Why shoot me, if he can watch me suffer?'

  I've met a lot of self-centred people in Hollywood, but Nora was the first to suggest that someone else's murder was motivated by a desire to ruin her day.

  'And who do you think might want to do that?' Terry said.

  'I don't know. I haven't figured that part out yet. But even though I have millions of fans, there are always those few that don't wish me well. Maybe they're authors who are jealous, or people who were offended by something I wrote. I'm sure there are a lot more people who would rather kill me than kill Jo.'

  At this point I was one of them.

  'It's an interesting theory,' Terry said. 'Maybe you can come up with a list of people who you think might have killed Jo to get at you. Meantime, Mike and I have to go. We'll be in touch.'

  He opened the door, and we walked down the steps into the mid-morning humidity that claws at Los Angeles every September.

  'I'll fax a list to your office,' she called after us. 'Is there anything else I can do?'

  I looked back over my shoulder. 'Yeah. Switch to decaf.'

  Chapter Thirteen

  'I was a real asshole,' I said once we were back in the car. 'Do I owe her an apology?'

  'Hell, no,' Terry said. 'But you owe me one. You know I hate playing Good Cop.'

  'Most of the time I can deal with her,' I said. 'But sometimes... How come she never gets to you?'

  'I don't have your issues.'

  'What issues?'

  'Mike, she's smart, she's engaging, and deep down inside I'm sure she's a good person. But she's a world- class meddler. She can't keep her nose out of other people's business. Remind you of anyone?'

  'Narrow it down for me,' I said.

  'If you moved into her house, she'd be peeing under your window every night.'

  'Oh, that world-class meddler. You think she's like my father?'

  'Nora Bannister is the female version of everything that drives you crazy about Big Jim: nosy, bossy, manipulating, in your face - what did I leave out?'

  'I get it,' I said. 'What do you think about her theory that someone killed Jo to screw up her writing career?'

  'Oh yeah, I forgot egomaniac. On a scale of one to ten, I'd give her theory a zero. It pissed me off that she threw Marilyn into the mix of potential victims.'

  'Maybe she thinks if your wife is a target you'll work harder.'

  'She's playing us.'

  'Of course she's playing us. I don't think she shot Jo, but now that one of her partners is a homicide victim, she's going to milk it to help her sell more books. I'll bet the first thing she did when she woke up at 4:00 a.m. was call her publicist to see if she could get booked on Good Morning America.''

  We rehashed everything we had put together since we caught the case and decided that we hadn't made a hell of a lot of progress in the critical first twenty-four hours. Fifteen minutes later we were at 611 South Cherokee, the house Nora and her merry band were flipping.

  There was a squad car parked outside, its lights quietly flashing. The front yard was wrapped in yellow crime scene tape. It was all part of the show.

  'Murder at 611 South Cherokee,' I said.

  'Good title for a book,' Terry said.

  There was a jet black BMW 328i convertible sitting in the driveway. The vanity plates said Joaquin.

  'Looks like Joaquin is doing pretty well for himself,' Terry said.

  The front door was wide open. We went inside. Marisol Dominguez was standing in the living room with a heavyset Mexican man who was dressed in paint-spattered overalls. He had a half-painted kitchen cabinet door in his hands and a puzzled look on his face.

  Marisol was pissed. 'No, no, no,' she said, tapping on the door. 'Este es amarillo de la mostaza. Deseo amarillo del limón.'

  ‘Ah...limón,'' the painter said. 'Si.'

  She waved him off, and he left to fix whatever he had done wrong.

  She looked up at us. 'He says he's a painter, but he can't tell the difference between mustard and lemon. The book specifically says 'The kitchen cabinets were painted bright yellow. Miranda thou
ght the colour matched her sunny disposition, but Stephen said it was lemon - a perfect metaphor for their sour marriage.'' That's what I get for hiring a bunch of wetbacks.'

  It would be a racist comment coming from somebody else, but Marisol was Mexican, so she knew she could get away with it. I've heard her use the word before, strictly for shock value, but in this case it was just a subtle display of power. She gave us a challenging look that seemed to say, 'What are you two white cops going to do? Arrest me for a bias crime?'

  There were times when Terry and I wondered why Tony stayed married to her, but every time we saw her in person, we'd smack our heads and say, 'Oh, yeah.' Marisol might have been short-changed in the charm department, but God had packed what little she had into a kickass body. Today, it was on display in tight jeans and a man's shirt tied in a knot at her midriff, leaving a three-inch band of smooth, dark skin.

  She had a clipboard in one hand and a cigarette in the other. 'I knew you two would get here sooner or later,' she said.

  'Good to see you too, Marisol,' Terry said.

  'Don't take it personally. It's just like I have a zillion things on this punch list that I still have to get done.' She took an unladylike drag on the cigarette. 'I feel bad about Jo's death, but if I told you I was grateful for the extra couple of days to get the house ready, would that make me a suspect?'

  'You're not a suspect,' Terry lied. 'We just want to know what you know about her.'

  'I hated her. She treated me like I was the fucking help. Well, maybe I am, but without my help, this house would never get done. She comes in as a five-percenter on the fifth house in the series, and she thinks her shit smells like strawberries. And she was always sucking up to Nora.'

  'Did you two argue?' Terry said. 'Ever fight?'

  'I fight with my husband. I fight with these dumb Mexican labourers. Her, I basically ignored. I just hated her from a distance. I'm in this for the money, not the sisterhood.'

  'Just for the record,' Terry said, 'where were you Sunday night?'