Today’s excerpt is another SNEAK
PREVIEW from Monster’s Palace the new book found in the Other Books section of
the below web site. Jo Kelly is
introduced to the book and makes a decision that leads to much upheaval in her
life…and Clyde’s life. Enjoy and have a fantastic day.
m.j.
NOTE: This book in now available on Amazon’s Kindle
Book Store, but not yet posted on the below web site…be a couple of days.
NOTE: For those of you who may have visited the
below web site in the last few weeks, there was a problem with it. The matter has now been solved and it is good
to go.
While those two plotted, a lady by the name of Josephine
(Jo) Kelly, who owned a rather upscale art dealership in the Washington, D.C.
area, had just made a startling discovery.
While it didn’t surprise her, it was something she would just as soon
not know.
Several months earlier she had gone to a party, and there
had met Tino Pelosi and Basil Farhat—though those were not the names they
used…at least not the last names. The
first names were correct, and Tino asked her at the party if she was interested
in having well-made replicas of nice artifacts known to exist—clearly marked as
such, with no attempt to deceive and sell as the real item.
After looking at a few pieces he brought by, with a label on
the bottom stating they were replicas, she bought them on the spot, due to the
very reasonable price. When told there
were many other pieces available from the same South American artists making
replicas, she agreed to look at any they might have to offer.
Jo’s building was in a very nice area, with a very good
lease. In addition to her showroom,
there was an attached work area, where she often did a bit of restoration work
on original pieces needing little more than some cleanup work. The work area had a sliding door at the rear
of the building, with an adjacent loading ramp for deliveries. In time, she worked out an agreement with
Tino to have items delivered to her shop, but in his name. He suggested she could have first pick on any
items delivered, except those pre-sold elsewhere. The remainder of the shipment would be taken
away by Tino and Basil.
Jo always wondered about the arrangement, but this day she
walked into the work area before she opened her store for the day. Basil had just dropped a piece on the
concrete floor. It shattered, and white
powder spilled out. Jo swallowed as she
looked at the mess on the floor.
Thinking fast, she growled, “Tino, after you clean up this
mess—including the talcum powder—please try to be more careful in the future.”
Before he could respond, she turned abruptly away and went
back into the store. After she shut the
door behind her, Basil asked, “What should we do about her? She isn’t a stupid woman. She knows our product on the floor is not
talcum powder.”
“We do nothing…at least not now. Don’t forget who suggested we work with
her. Before we would ever consider doing
anything about her knowledge, we would have to get authorization to do so. We kill her, we might be next. For now, clean up the mess you made, while I
pull her portion of the shipment. After
we load up, I’ll ask her to look at the pieces for her and give her a price
below what I normally would.”
“What if she’s calling the police right now?”
“Then we have a problem.”
Jo did not call the police.
When shown the pieces for her and told the price, she paid for them, as
always, in cash, and the matter was never spoken of again.
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