Gilt Trip Read Online Free Page A

nodded.
    â€œIf you line ’em up, I’m pretty sure I can point him out.” Carmela started to say something else, then hesitated.
    â€œWhat?” said Gallant. “Spit it out. This is no time to be coy.”
    â€œThere were also two people in the powder room.”
    Gallant cocked an inquisitive eye. “How do you know that?”
    â€œHey,” said Ava. “If Carmela says there were two people, then there were two people.”
    â€œI’m not questioning her honesty,” said Gallant. “I’m just trying to get the story straight.” He nodded at Carmela. “Go on.”
    â€œI heard voices anyway,” said Carmela. “They were sort of giggling and thumping up against the door. I think . . . well, I think they were doing drugs.”
    â€œYou know that for a fact?”
    â€œKind of. The woman was asking the man if she could do another line.”
    â€œAnd you think she was referring to a line of cocaine?” asked Gallant.
    â€œI don’t think it was a dance line,” said Carmela.
    Gallant nodded. “Okay. Where did you go from there?”
    Carmela crooked a finger, indicating the laundry room. “In there. But I’d rather not go back.”
    Gallant shook his head. “No, no. We can’t go in right now. The crime-scene guys are still at work.”
    As if on cue, there was a loud clunk, then a metal gurney poked its nose out of the door. It rammed into the opposite wall, then was pulled back inside again.
    â€œOh my,” said Ava.
    There was another clunk and this time the gurney burst through the doorway and halfway out into the hallway. On top of it lay a shiny black body bag that obviously contained the dead body of Jerry Earl Leland.
    â€œIs that him?” asked Ava. “Is that Jerry Earl?” Her tone was hushed but filled with curiosity.
    The young man who was pushing the gurney finally muscled it all the way out into the hallway.
    â€œCharlie,” said Gallant. “Are you guys about finished in there?”
    â€œI want to run a few more spatter pattern tests,” said the young man. He was nerdy looking in a pair of oversize blue scrubs with floppy blond hair and serious-looking horn-rimmed glasses that made him look like a young, learned owl.
    â€œCarmela, Ava,” said Gallant. “This is Charlie Preston. He’s kind of our crime-scene whiz kid.”
    â€œNice to meet you,” said Carmela. “Considering the circumstances.”
    But Ava was assessing him carefully. “You don’t look old enough to run a crime scene,” she told him.
    Charlie grinned happily. “That’s what everybody says.”
    â€œThat means you must be good,” said Ava.
    â€œWhat was your name again?” asked Charlie, his grin stretching even wider.
    â€œAva Gruiex,” said Ava.
    â€œIs that your married name?” said Charlie.
    â€œI’m not married,” said Ava, dimpling prettily.
    â€œGood to know,” said Charlie. If he’d been a puppy dog, he’d have wagged his little tail.
    â€œDo either of you know,” said Carmela, her eyes now riveted on the body bag, “how Jerry Earl was really killed? I mean, it wasn’t just death by clothes dryer, was it?”
    â€œFrom preliminary examination, it appears he was stabbed,” said Gallant.
    â€œYou mean with a knife?” said Carmela.
    â€œNooo,” said Charlie, jumping in. “It’s actually . . . a little strange. And rather interesting. It appears that the deceased may have been stabbed with a weapon that was long and possibly serrated.”
    â€œLike some kind of butcher knife?” said Carmela.
    â€œMore like a knife used to cut sugarcane or stick hogs,” said Charlie.
    â€œEeyuh!” said Ava. “That sounds awful.”
    â€œIt does,” said Charlie happily. “Of course, that’s just a guess on my part. Any final