Page 50 of Never Flinch

“Bodyguard duty for a woman who was on the cover ofTime! A new page in your résumé. Very nice, big props to my homegirl, but why are you calling me?”

“It has to stay confidential. You can talk to your sister if you want to, but otherwise, keep it totally quiet. There may be a serial killer at work in the city.”

“Let me stop you right there,” Jerome says. “Might your serial killer be responsible for a woman killed on the Buckeye Trail and a couple ofhomeless dudes whacked behind a washateria? Names in their hands? Possibly the names of jurors in the Duffrey trial?”

Holly’s heart sinks. Not on her account, but on Izzy’s. “Where did you get it? Not the paper, I already looked.”

“Three guesses and the first two don’t count.”

“Buckeye Brandon.”

“Correctamundo,” Jerome says.

“Where didheget it?”

“No clue.”

“Izzy was afraid this might happen. What about a man found murdered in Tapperville?”

“That is in the paper, victim unnamed pending notification of next of kin, but if it’s related to the three others, no one has made the connection yet. Including Brandon. What’s your part in this, Holly?”

It’s been months, maybe even a year, since he called her Hollyberry, and she kind of misses it.

She tells Jerome about Izzy showing her the original note from the man calling himself Bill Wilson, and how she, Holly, spoke to John Ackerly. How it was John who found the body of Michael Rafferty, aka Big Book Mike.

“John found him and now you’re consulting with the police!” Jerome says gleefully. “Holly’s Sherlock Holmes and Izzy’s Inspector Lestrade! Totally cool!”

“I wouldn’t put it that way,” Holly says… although really, what other way is there to put it? “The night Rafferty was murdered, he was supposed to meet someone named Briggs. Izzy took a picture of Rafferty’s appointment book calendar. If I sent you the picture, would you show it to John? Ask him if he knows the name? He might; if it’s a first name, it’s a little on the odd side.”

“Happy to.”

“I’m sorry to interrupt your work—”

“No interruption about it. I have done hit a wall on the new book.”

“When you hit a wall, break through it. Old Chinese saying.”

“Bullshit. I know an old Holly Gibney saying when I hear one.”

“Good advice, either way,” she says, putting on her prim voice.

“No problem. I’ve been wanting a distraction. I think maybe I was cut out to be a one-book author.”

“Nowthat’sbullpoop,” Holly says.

“Maybe yes, maybe no. Either way, a break will do me good. Izzy’s Lestrade, you’re Sherlock, I’m just a lowly Baker Street Irregular.”

Still in her prim voice, Holly says, “I think you’reveryregular, Jerome.”

“Thanks. Hollyberry.” And he ends the call before she can make a token protest.

2

There’s no Wi-Fi on the plane (of course not), but her phone bings with a text while she’s going down the air-stairs to a hot spring Iowa morning. It’s from Izzy.

Our pal Bill W. got another one. Call me.

Once she’s inside the terminal, Holly calls Isabelle, who tells her the latest victim was a young man named Fred Sinclair, a native of New Haven, Connecticut, his reason for being in the rural town of Treemore, outside Treemore Village, on Route 29-B so far undetermined. Shot four times. A troop of Boy Scouts were camping a little way into John Glenn State Park. One of them walked down the trail just after dawn to use a Porta-John, and got an unpleasant surprise when he opened the door. One he’ll probably be telling a psychiatrist about in another fifteen or twenty years. “Primal scene, honeychild,” Izzy says. “I read about those in Intro to Psychology.”

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