Read Dream House for Free Online Page A

Molly.”
    “Sorry.” I call it persistence, but others disagree.
    “The minute we hang up I'm leaving to interview two witnesses. After that I testify downtown. If that's okay with you?”
    I ignored his sarcasm. “It's fine.
Thank
you.”
    “If I come back to the station today, I'll try to get to it then. If not, tomorrow morning.”
    “If you
do
get back today, can you fax me the report?”
    Connors groaned. “God, you're relentless! Why the urgency, Molly?”
    “No urgency. W-I-P.”
    “What?”
    “Waiting Is the Pits.”
    “Cut the crap. Are you onto something the department should know about?” The banter had left his voice.
    “It's probably nothing.”
    “Then why are you pursuing it?”
    “Curiosity. And I have time to kill.”
    “A dangerous combination. Ask George.”
    “If I find out there's a pattern, I'll tell you.”
    “Damn right you will,” Connors said.

C HAPTER S IX
    F EDEX DELIVERED THE PAGE PROOFS OF
SINS
OF THE
Father
as I was loading the washing machine. I'd contemplated visiting the Hudson and Schumacher houses vandalized on Monday, but they would have to wait. I was eager to read the typeset pages—one small step away from a book.
    I was nervous, too. I suppose it's like seeing your dream house after the drywall has been covered and the exterior walls stuccoed. It's a real house, and you plan to love everything about it because it's your design, after all. But some things aren't exactly what you imagined from the blueprints and framing, and it's too late to change them without great expense.
    This was a real book. I wanted to love every word and hoped there weren't any “walls” that would have to come down or be moved, because, as the accompanying letter from the production department warned, “This isn't the time to make major changes.”
    With a cup of coffee on my nightstand next to a pad of the smallest yellow Post-its and two freshly sharpened pencils, I settled myself on my full-size bed with the page proofs and the manuscript. It's my ritual. I do all my writing and revisions on the computer in my office, but I always read completed manuscripts or large chunks of them in my bedroom. I can't explain why, but the energy is different here, quieter, and it's not just the absence of the computer's hum. (My mom, who has published one romance novel under the pseudonym Charlotte D'Anjou and is working on another, does her best writing with Beethoven playing in the background.) I also can't explain why words and sentences and paragraphs that had seemed so right three months ago when I reviewed the copyedited manuscript seemed so glaringly wrong now. I winced more than a few times, but at least there were no “walls” to relocate.
    By late afternoon I had finished the pages, many of them now flagged with Post-its. I would read the galleys at least once more before FedExing the pages with corrections to my editor, and I knew that, careful as I was, I'd overlook something. A typo. A missing word. I often see what's in my mind, not on the page. I hoped more objective eyes would catch the errors before the presses rolled.
    On the whole I was satisfied. I was saddened, too. It was a grim story. So was my first book, and the one I'd just finished.
    I often wonder why I'm drawn to write about true crime. I suppose with each book I'm hoping that if I understand the
why
of that act of violence, I'll be closer to understanding why someone would murder my best friend, Aggie. After five years and three books, I still have no answers—not to Aggie's murder, not to what makes people do the terrible things they do to one another. A part of me knows I never will.
    I phoned the Hollywood station and asked for Connors. He wasn't in, and I didn't leave a message.

C HAPTER S EVEN
    “W E ARE
SO
LATE,” I ANNOUNCED AS ZACK PARKED HIS Honda two blocks from the school where the HARP meeting was taking place. Judging by the number of cars, the attendance was high. “We probably missed the good