Read It Takes Two to Strangle for Free Online Page A

a greeting.
    “The one about the two silkworms?”
    Damon cut her off. “Be serious for a minute. Did you hear about what happened this morning at the fairgrounds?”
    “No,” she said in earnest. “What happened?”
    “Lirim Jovanovic went and got himself murdered.”
    “Murdered,” she repeated. “That guy we saw in the Fish Barrel two nights ago?”
    “One and the same.” He recounted his morning adventures.
    Rebecca took in the story with relative ease. “I bet it was that guy Victor,” she said plainly when Damon finished his account.
    “Really?” Damon said. “He seemed like the only person who could stand to be around Lirim.”
    “Maybe, but he still gave me the creeps. He didn’t say anything at the Fish Barrel. He just sat there grimacing.”
    “True, but he was talking yesterday when he announced the pig races.”
    “Yeah, like the grim reaper doing stand up.”
    Damon laughed. “I suppose the murderer could be Victor. But, then again, it could have been anyone.”
    “Clara must be on top of the list,” Rebecca said. “She’ll surely get the money from her mother’s estate now that her father is dead. She might get Lirim’s assets, too.”
    “They didn’t appear to have been on the best terms,” Damon said. “But if she doesn’t have siblings, anything Lirim had will probably go to her.”
    They debated whether Lirim was likely to have had sired any other offspring.
    “And he may have had a will,” Damon suggested. “From what we heard at the Fish Barrel, it sounds like his wife had one.”
    “Good point. So did you hear the one about the two silkworms who had a race?” Rebecca asked, bringing their conversation full circle.
    “No,” Damon said flatly.
    “It ended in a tie.”

    Damon called his mother and let her know how he had spent the morning. She engaged in uncharacteristic motherly cooing and demanded that he come over for a late lunch.
    Damon feasted at Lynne’s kitchen table on pastrami and Swiss and a mountain of homemade fennel slaw. During Lynne’s six years living in Hollydale, no one had been murdered there. She decided it wasn’t a local who had done the killing. Damon agreed. He sensed this murder was committed by someone who had a much longer history with Lirim Jovanovic.
    Needing a rest, Damon stretched his long legs over the end of the love seat in Lynne’s front sitting room. As soon as he laid down, his phone vibrated. He glanced at the caller identification. Bethany Krims.
    Damon sat up and hesitated before answering. She greeted him warmly, which calmed him. “I saw you were down at the fairgrounds this morning,” she said.
    “You were there? I looked for you with the reporters and didn’t see you.”
    “No. I saw you on film footage. I heard about the murder from one of my colleagues and came into the station early to see what was happening.”
    “And you saw me on tape?”
    “You were talking to a woman who was putting on ChapStick while a couple of guys in long coats loaded the body into the truck.”
    “That was Liz de la Cruz,” Damon said. “She’s my counterpart over in Oakwood. Did I make it into the segment?”
    “Sorry, you two were the first things cut. Did you know this Lirim person?”
    “We met a few times while he was setting up the carnival. So if you know it’s Lirim, the police must have released his name.”
    “I guess so, it was in the segment. The police must have already notified his next of kin.”
    “They did. I saw his daughter when I was leaving the fairgrounds this morning.”
    “Is that the gorgeous woman with the throaty voice? My colleague interviewed her for the segment.”
    “I’m sure that’s her, though I didn’t think her voice was that throaty.”
    “Maybe it sounded that way because she was competing with the rain crashing down during the interview.”
    “What did she say?” asked Damon.
    “Nothing earth-shattering. Just the usual devastated daughter routine with a huge golf umbrella as a