inTWINition of murder

By Michael Houbrick

Phil Brittenbeck, an identical twin from Portland, Oregon uses his inner twin tuition, or inTWINition to find the clues to help track down the killer of his beloved twin brother, Jerry. Jerry Brittenbeck was a well-established reality television producer and was found dead in his swanky Las Vegas casino hotel room. The police quickly ruled the death an accidental poisoning, but Phil wasn't convinced. In what started as a textbook death investigation was cracked wide open when Phil began communicating with his twin from beyond the grave. Phil was able to get clues the police either missed or tried to avoid seeing all along. The more Phil dug into the rushed investigation the more he realized his inTWINition said it was murder.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jan 31, 2014
• ISBN: 9780988252363

Book preview

Michael

Chapter 1

Lisa Grigoletti, a striking, petite, female account executive walked by the boss’ office and glanced in the open door. An old friend of the look-alikes, as she called her superior and his brother, she stopped dead in her tracks.

Lisa looked like a beautifully chiseled Italian marble statue.

Tall and thin with long, straight, black hair that framed a gorgeous face. She had perfect white teeth and brown eyes as big as olives. Normally she was glib and animated, but at that moment she was frozen in one spot, staring at Phil Brittenbeck in disbelief.

I don’t believe what I’m seeing, Lisa said. Her big brown eyes were staring intently above Phil’s head. Phil, there is a black cloud hanging above your head. She stepped closer. Sheepishly she walked uninvited into his office and said, Do you feel all right, Phil?

Phil assured her that he was fine and politely asked her to leave. Lisa continued with the questions. He secretly had a sudden urge to get up and run away from her ambush as he had done so many times in the past.

This feeling was all new to him. It was a sensation he didn’t understand. Normally he was the man with all of the answers. Shielding his clients from the endless questions from the local over-zealous reporters concerning a few of his more controversial Stars at his Public Relations firm. Why was he was feeling this way? How was he now expected to explain his feelings to his old friend and now an employee when he didn’t understand why he was feeling what he was feeling? Phil finally raised his voice and told Lisa to please leave and shut the door behind her.

Lisa refused. She persisted, asking specifically about the black cloud she was seeing -- or at least thought she was seeing above Phil’s head. She invited Phil outside for some fresh air and to smoke a cigarette. Phil didn’t smoke, but reluctantly agreed. He welcomed the chance at getting some fresh air. Perhaps stepping outside would shake the funk that had suddenly enveloped him.

Lisa took a long drag on her menthol cigarette. She again asked, Is anything bothering you Phil? Because dude, that black cloud … is the freakiest thing I have ever seen when I’ve looked at you.

Phil assured Lisa he was fine and reiterated to her that he didn’t know why, but he had a sudden overwhelming feeling of despair. Although she was a questionable hire because of her relationship with the twins, Phil brought her on because he could trust an old buddy.

After all, the three of them hung-out since junior high school. The guy in charge, to her though, was not his normal upbeat self. He certainly wasn’t the same man that walked into the office that morning with a dozen fresh hot bagels and cream cheese spread. Bagels were something Phil treated his employees to every Monday morning.

After five minutes of silence, Lisa gave up. She knew Phil wasn’t going to share any more with her. As a friend, she wasn’t going get squat from him about the mysterious, illuminating black cloud. Lisa finished her cigarette and left Phil standing outside in the brisk, November Portland breeze.

The sudden mood swing. The sudden chill. Lisa seeing a black cloud above his head.

These three events were stuck in Phil’s mind as he drove home later that day. He always tried to keep things professional between himself and his employees. Still, Lisa was a life-long confidant.

However, on that Monday he decided to break his own rule concerning workers under his supervision. Why not? Lisa had been there through thick-and-thin before. He wanted to let her know he was feeling better and that he appreciated her kindness earlier in the afternoon. Phil rang her up.

Thanks for being, you know, there, Lisa. Didn’t mean to be such a … stopping short of calling himself a douche. He assured her that he was back to his normal charming self. He asked if he could take her to lunch the next day to make up for being so, douchey. Lisa agreed.

That Tuesday lunch date would never happen.

Monday nights were a fun TV night for Phil because he loved watching the reality television series, Break the Casino’s Bank, which his twin brother Jerry produced. In a strange twist of fate, on this Monday, Phil and Jerry’s older brother Jason, had dropped off his son at a nearby gymnasium for basketball practice, so Jason stopped by Phil’s house to watch the show with him. In their entire life, Jason had never stopped by unannounced to watch television. They were close, but Jason knew his place and knew that Phil was much closer to his twin Jerry than Phil was to him. Phil was so glad of all possible times that Jason had stopped by to see him that particular night.

At about 8:20 p.m. there was a knock at Phil’s door. When he opened it, Phil saw the familiar faces of his mom, stepdad, sister, and brother-in-law, standing in an awkward somber silence. Phil invited them in. Despite their less than exuberant moods they did seem delighted to see Jason also there, but they were not smiling and said nothing else at first. A thickness of doom filled the room changing the brightly painted yellow living room into a dreary gray of depression.

Then Phil’s mom said they had very bad news. He didn’t know why, but instantly Phil thought that maybe something had happened to one of his beautiful nieces. Phil’s sister, Cheri, and husband had four grown daughters. He turned to Cheri and asked if something had happened to one of her girls.

No, Cheri’s husband spoke up, It’s your twin brother, Jerry. They found him dead in his hotel room in Las Vegas.

Phil crumbled to the floor screaming, She killed him. She killed him. She finally killed him.

Chapter 2

Imagine a couple of kids in elementary school who had their own business cards. It was 6th grade as they’d pass-out these sleek, glossy white cards with black and white clip art of a rabbit coming out of a top hat with the enticing tag line, If It’s Magic - Jerry & Phil. That’s how close they were. Jerry & Phil, The Brittenbeck Twins, as they were often called, were the youngest in a family of seven children raised by a single mother in a strict Christian home, in the Northwest city of Portland, Oregon.

There was no such thing as desktop publishing or a personal computer back when they were growing up, so to enhance their new business cards the twins purchased a steel die-cut printing plate of the logo. They used proceeds from their newspaper route, The Oregonian to make the purchase. It was evident to many that even at such a young age the twins were both blessed with the business savvy gene.

While in junior high, they had a newspaper route. In addition to earning spending money to buy squirting flowers, whoopee cushions, or real magic props at the local Novelty Nook, the twins also earned trips to theme parks in Orlando three consecutive years based on increased sales on their highly successful paper route.

One Saturday morning while they were going door-to-door to collect their weekly bounty from customers on their route they first met Lisa. She was the skinny daughter of one of their customers who answered the door as the twins assembled their weekly bounty. Phil later remarked, She’s such a twig. I wanted to give her back the money and tell her to get a double cheese burger or something. Jerry agreed.

However, as they say in the movies, it was the start of a beautiful relationship with the young girl.

Having salesmanship and being entrepreneurial were not the only traits the twins showed at an early age. Their desire to excel with their showmanship and to seek attention was also evident while they were still young. Prior to their paper peddling and prestidigitation, family members recall the twins crawling on the dining room table using sticks of butter as make shift microphones to create attention for their impromptu dinner shows.

Phil and Jerry’s very first magic show was for Boy Scout Troop 4343, and they received their comedy merit badge for the effort. Their first paid magic show was at a party for one of the four Merritt girls’ tenth birthday, for which Jerry & Phil were paid a total of $11.00.

The Merritt family was close friends of the Brittenbecks and over the years, Jerry & Phil became the standard fare of entertainment for all the Merritt parties. Eventually, the twins went on to perform at much bigger venues than the Merritt’s living room. They took their magic act on the road in their white dilapidated Ford van appropriately named The Vangician. As their magic act became popular, Jerry & Phil entertained audiences all over the United States, or wherever you could go in a Ford van and not miss any school.

David Copperfield’s career was never threatened by Jerry & Phil, but they didn’t realize that. The gimmick of seeing the Brittenbeck Twins interactions on stage was more impressive than their actual feats of misdirection. No matter where they performed, the audience always enjoyed them, and the twins certainly enjoyed the approval.

One magic performance in particular at a Presbyterian church in Portland, Jerry & Phil were doing a trick called magic rice bowls. The illusion was for the magician to take a single bowl of water and turn it into two heaping bowls of rice. It was a perfect trick to do at the church. The brothers Brittenbeck added a few biblical references, as well as their standard patter, to connect more to the audience and to reinforce the Christian values deeply instilled into them by their family. The tailored reference referred to the miracle of Jesus feeding 5,000 people with five loaves and two fish. It’s a simple beginner’s trick from Magic 101.

Somehow during the routine, the Vaseline seal used to hold back the water on one of the rice bowls failed. A few words of hocus-pocus and a wave of their sleek black magic wand didn’t give them two overflowing bowls of rice but one bowl and a dripping mess. Because the twins were doing a comedy magic act, they never really took their act very seriously. With their gift of gab and some very quick thinking, they were able to avert the disaster by looking at each other while Jerry added, Soggy Rice, not nice. The crowd roared with approval. Lame at best, but once again, the Brittenbeck Twin’s magic act was a huge success.

As with their magic act and everything they did together, there was never any need to discuss it. From the early days as womb mates, they always wanted exactly the same thing. Jerry & Phil had the same tastes in food, style of clothing, and yes, girlfriends -- well most girlfriends. When they were younger they always chose the same young ladies to crush on and luckily, most girls liked both of them equally. For example, Phil became sick on the night of their high school junior prom. Since Jerry didn’t have a date, he naturally stepped into Phil’s place, and his companion Lisa, was never the wiser.

So how do identical twins decide who gets the girl when attracted to the same one? Jerry & Phil always settled issues like this the old-fashioned way: they flipped a coin. It worked well until Phil caught Jerry using a two-headed quarter he had purchased from that local magic store.

The Brittenbeck Twins were so up right and squeaky clean that neither of them snuck off to drink alcohol at school football games like many of the other students. With their handsome good looks, straight white teeth, big blue eyes, and wholesome lifestyle, their friends often asked whether their last name wasn’t Osmond, as in Donnie & Marie.

Chapter 3

One day shortly after the now infamous prom date switcheroo, their sister Cheri came home from college and said that her dorm roommate, Tina, had gone to the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clown College. After hearing so many stories from Cheri about her twin brothers, Tina suggested that Jerry & Phil apply to be clowns. Luckily, the roommate passed the address and phone number along since this was pre-Internet days and locating the college address would have meant a trip to the school’s library for the twins.

The regular school library they attended was a place of no return for the twins. At least until the day they burned-up a borrowed edition of Highlights magazine. It happened while practicing a magic trick. Jerry & Phil were both a bit embarrassed about the failed stunt; it was supposed to light a magazine on fire and then reveal it fully restored. When they returned the charred periodical and presented their explanation to the school librarian, she informed them that they were welcome to come back to the library to study at any time, but their magical hi-jinx banned them from ever checking out any books or magazines. After the tongue-lashing by the librarian neither twin ever-stepped foot inside the school library again.

Not knowing much about it, but being intrigued, they called the Clown College saying they were twins from Oregon who did magic, and they both wanted to apply for admission.

A few days later, they received the application, which was more like a book. It was huge, and it asked in-depth questions like, When was the last time you cried and why? Do you like to travel? Which foreigners intrigue you? When you enter a crowded room what is the first thing you do? The twins eagerly filled out the applications separately, but to no one’s surprise when they compared their answers they were identical.

You two have always been a couple of clowns, Lisa said when they beamingly told her their plans. She grabbed Jerry’s nose, squeezed it and blurted Honk!

A couple of weeks after sending in the applications they were notified by the deans of the Ringling Bros. Barnum & Bailey Clown College that they were accepted into the next class of clowns. Jerry & Phil were very excited and could not wait to tell their mother. It was as if the years of doing magic shows were starting to pay off. The impressively colorful logo of the circus splashed across the top of the letterhead of the acceptance letters and made the twins excited to know they had received mail from The Ringling Bros. Barnum & Bailey Circus. They remember when they were younger their aunt and uncle took them to Big Top. It left an impressive memory in both of their minds: the colorful lights, the smell of the animals, a sense of danger of the high-wire act,