Page 83 of Blow Down (The Plumber's Mate)
“So he sabotaged his own plumbing so his daughter would call you in to the very house where he doesn’t want stuff found?”
Oh, bugger it. I thought about throwing my notebook across the room, then had a change of heart and scribbled my final offer.
Toby=serial killer. Bish of Satan.
Phil laughed a bit grimly. “Maybe. Christ knows, I haven’t got anything better.”
Cherry dropped in on her way home from work. She looked upset to see me, but not particularly gobsmacked, so I could only assume Phil had ratted me out to her already.
In revenge, after several Oh, Toms, I let him tell her the story of how it all went down. She had a pinched look on her face all through, but when he got to the end, she looked thoughtful. “Do you think you had a premonition it was about to happen, and that’s why you raised your hand at just the right moment?”
What? “Nah. Spiderweb,” I whispered. I could talk by then, but it made my throat hurt and came out sounding like a chain-smoking jazz singer after a three-week bender, so it wasn’t really worth the bother.
“Spiderweb? Or spidey-senses?” The way she said those last two words, which by the way I’d never heard her utter ever, I half expected dramatic music to ring out from nowhere with a dum-dum-dum.
“Web,” I whispered as firmly as I could, which obviously wasn’t very.
“She might have a point there,” Phil put in, looking interested. “Maybe your subconscious knows more than you do.”
“Exactly.” Cherry looked pleased. “You know, you ought to experiment.”
Great idea, Sis. I’ll just hire someone to try to kill me every other day or so and we’ll soon have it all worked out.
I didn’t say it, obviously. Not to spare her feelings. It just would’ve hurt my throat.
Phil smirked in my direction like he knew what I was thinking.
“How are you getting on with that pendulum?”
I shrugged and gestured to my throat. Heh. At least it was good for getting me out of awkward questions.
“Oh—sorry. I shouldn’t make you talk.” The reprieve lasted all of thirty seconds before she was off again. “Have you had a chance to decide about the house yet?”
Great. I should have stuck with the pendulum after all. Phil frowned. “What house?”
“Oh, didn’t Tom say? My house in Pluck’s End. I thought you and Tom might like to live there after Gregory and I get married. I’ll be moving to St. Leonards, of course.”
Phil gave me a sharp look, which was well unfair given I wasn’t exactly in a position to defend myself right now. “We’ve not had a chance to talk about it yet,” he said, still giving me the evil eye.
“Well, no hurry, but obviously I need to sort out alternative tenants from March if you’re not going to be using it.”
He nodded.
Sis didn’t stay much longer. Might’ve been the chilly atmosphere.
“Was gonna tell you,” I whispered when she’d gone.
Phil huffed. It sounded exasperated but fond. Well, I hoped I wasn’t imagining the last bit. “You think I’m worried about that now?”
Uh. Maybe?
Gary came round after dinner (soup, in case you couldn’t guess). For someone who was supposed to be resting up and recovering, I was doing a hell of a lot of entertaining today. Not that I minded seeing Gary, though, particularly as he’d brought a large tub of ice cream with him, bless him. It was bloody nirvana on my poor throat.
He gave me a critical once-over as he sat down with his own bowl to keep me company. “Not loving the new look, Tommy dearest. Red eyes really don’t go with your complexion.”
No? I’d thought they toned in nicely with the purple bruising. Ah well.
He turned his narrowed eyes on Phil next. “What have you been leading our poor little Tommy into now?”
