Hex on the Ex (24 page)

I straightened back, curious. “I know Gretchen. In fact, I saw her at the game Tuesday night. Did you give her the tickets?”

“Yeah. How did you guess?”

“Gretchen told everyone at the gym that her boyfriend got her tickets.”

He groaned. “Geez. Why would she say that? She knows I don’t have those kinds of feelings for her. I warned her not to talk about me around there. The tabloids bug me enough the way it is. What else is she telling people about me?”

“I don’t know. I’ve only seen her at Game On a few times and once at the ballpark. To be fair, she didn’t call you by name when she talked about the tickets. And she still didn’t admit to knowing you when I bumped into her at the game and introduced myself.”

“She didn’t recognize you? She saw your picture at the house. I told her all about you.”

“Big difference between seeing me in person and seeing me in a photo. Did Gretchen know you were with Laycee Monday and Tuesday night?”

He snorted. “What I do and who I see on a daily basis is none of Gretchen’s business. Kyle is the only one who knew I left with Laycee on Tuesday, and I didn’t tell him I saw her Monday. Why?”

I put my fork down and covered my half-eaten fish with my napkin. “I wonder if Gretchen is the jealous type. You might not have feelings for her, but she called you her boyfriend at least once. A small-town woman reconnecting with her first love, now a Major League Baseball player, sounds like the plot of a romance novel to me. Tell me you’re not having sex with her, Jarret.”

He shrugged, curling his mouth into a bad-boy grin. “Maybe once. For old times’ sake.”

Like I had to ask. Although I detested Laycee for sleeping with him in Atlanta, she had given me a tangible excuse to escape from his street-cat morals.

“Is Kressler a married or maiden name?”

“Her maiden name. She told me she never got married,” he said.

The waiter asked if we wanted coffee or dessert. I turned down both. As Jarret and I rode the escalator down to the
parking lot I wondered if Gretchen had an interest in the occult.
What if she knew Margaret Smith?

“Does Gretchen ever ask about your game-day superstitions?”

“Hell, no. My rituals are sacred ground. You’re the only person who knows what I do,” Jarret said. “Gretch and I talk about the old times, baseball, and my plans after I retire. She’s interested in my career. She thinks I’d make a good TV sports analyst.” He checked his reflection in a slim metal strip on the wall. “What do you think?”

T
o dodge the Friday-night restaurant and nightclub traffic on the boulevard, I took back-street shortcuts through Studio City to Nick’s bungalow in North Hollywood. All I wanted to do was take off my clothes and get into his bathtub, preferably surrounded by bubbles, ideally joined by Nick. My fantasy dissolved as soon as I pulled up at his house and saw Robin and Dave through the picture window, standing behind Nick at his desk.

I climbed the porch steps and opened the door to a screechy blast of haunted-house organ music. I cupped my hands to call out over the noise, “Hello? Anybody home?”

“Come here.” Robin waved me over to the desk. “You have to see this.”

“Hey, babe. How was dinner?” Nick said without turning around.

“Eventful. Forrest Huber attacked Jarret and nearly got
himself carted off to jail.” The comment failed to draw attention. I edged between Robin and Dave, and rested my hands on Nick’s shoulders. “What are you watching?”

“My friend at ATTAGIRL messengered me a DVD of the only TV special Billy Miles ever produced,” Robin said. “He blew almost a million dollars on the production, a Halloween special on nightmares. It never aired.”

“Why not?” I said.

She smiled. “Watch. You’ll see.”

Dave shushed us. “Here comes the good part.”

Six figures with heads and bodies covered in hooded black robes, stood in a half circle in a dark, forestlike clearing lit by torches. Each character held a tall staff with a shrunken head at the top. A procession of men shuffled onscreen—feet dragging, eyes straight ahead in a daze—carrying a woman tied to a plank by chains and wearing a collar of thorns. The camera zoomed in on her eyes, fixed in a trancelike stare. Cheesy organ music swelled from the speakers.

The procession halted center screen. The black-robed half-circle parted for a bald, horned, muscular actor in a loincloth with his body painted dark red. He raised his arms and wagged his long tongue at the camera. Proceeding with dramatic, overacted strides to the side of the plank, he said to the woman, “I take you for my bride to live forever in the bowels of Hades.”

She lifted her face toward him and waggled her tongue.

The four of us broke out in laughter.

“Seriously?” I said, wincing, “A million dollars? This is beyond bad.”

“I am everywhere, in every shape,” the onscreen devil
said to the faceless robed figures surrounding him in a circle. “I am your lover, your nightmare, your demon, your sins, and your savior.”

“Why is the devil always a man?” Robin said.

“Not always,” Nick said. “She-devils are scattered throughout history. The most famous is the legend of Lilith, Adam’s first wife, a character from Jewish mythology. Lilith appears in several forms with different names as a seductive spirit over many cultures dating back to late Antiquity. She—”

“Fascinating,” Dave said. “Save the rest for the classroom. Here comes the scene.”

The hooded figures onscreen circled the devil, chanting, “Hail, Satan.”

The devil figure turned, sweeping his curled tail and bare backside toward the camera. He reached for a lit torch, bent over the woman, and drew a flaming inverted pentagram on her stomach.

“The pentagram.” I squeezed Nick’s shoulder. “Billy used the inverted pentagram.”

“He copied most of the scenes from
Häxan,
a 1922 Swedish film about medieval sorcery. The original version used an eight-pointed star instead of a pentagram,” Nick said.

“Liz is right,” Robin said. “This proves Billy knew the pentagram—what if he killed Laycee?”

“Why?” Dave said. “For offending him at a party?”

“After seeing this film, I doubt if Billy has the ability to be offended,” Nick said.

“Maybe Laycee saw the video and gave him a review,” Dave said, laughing.

“Yuk it up, kids,” I said. “I’ll think of you while I’m at
the police station to—” The camera panned in close on the devil’s face. “Nick, pause the screen. Quick.”

The face froze on the monitor. The actor’s shaved head was painted red with pointed black eyebrows drawn in—but close up, the small eyes and thin mouth were unmistakable.

“That’s Kyle Stanger. I’m sure of it.”

Nick leaned forward and squinted. “You might be right.”

“I know I’m right. Can you fast-forward to the credits?” I said.

“There are no credits,” Robin said. “The project got canned before it went to post.”

“You didn’t recognize Stanger the first time we watched this?” Dave said to Nick.

“I only saw him once before, at the game. He had a full head of hair and wasn’t in red face paint,” Nick said. “And he didn’t have horns.”

“I’m sure it’s him,” I said. “Billy told me Kyle took acting classes.”

“After this was shot, I assume.” Robin laughed. “If I were Kyle, I wouldn’t put this disaster on an audition reel.”

Tidbits of information spun through my mind. Kyle’s veiled resentment of Jarret. Kyle’s relationship with Laycee. Kyle’s absence from the gym on the morning of the murder.

“Kyle has Jarret’s garage door code. He was familiar with the symbol. He left Laycee, his date, at Fifth Base with Jarret the night before the murder.” I turned to Dave. “What if Kyle was angrier at Laycee and Jarret for staying together that night than he let on? Would jealousy, coupled with his knowledge of the symbol, make him a suspect?”

“Depends on the story Stanger gave Carla about that
night,” Dave said. “Carla should see this clip. Stanger will be in the fingerprint database from his drug arrest. The forensics from the crime scene should be in by now. The killer could have worn gloves but, yeah, Stanger’s knowledge of even part of the symbol, especially the scene of him drawing the pentagram on the body, makes
me
suspicious.”

“What’s on the rest of this footage?” I said.

“We watched all of it before you got here. Nightmare sequences, ghosts, and witches stirring pots.” Nick ejected the DVD, gave it to me, and shut off his computer. “You saw the only scene that caught our attention—the devil drawing the pentagram on the woman’s body.”

I dropped the disc in my purse and then perched on a stool next to Robin and Dave at the kitchen counter. Nick pulled beers out of the refrigerator and gave us each a bottle.

“The fascination with the devil has gone on for centuries,” he said, settling next to me. “Religions and belief systems on every continent conjured a dark god or spirit who caused evil and catastrophic destruction.”

“Blame your troubles on the outside opposing and malevolent entity,” I said. “Before contemporary psychology and the concept of the subconscious, some scientists and philosophers ascribed undisciplined emotions like anger, greed, or jealousy to possession by the devil.”

“Believe me, some lawyers still do that. It’s called the insanity defense,” Dave said.

“Belief in the devil spread so widely that by the Middle Ages, the myth transformed into fact. He
or she
,” Nick said with a nod to Robin, “became real. Hell was positioned at the earth’s core, devils stuffed the damned into pots, and sinners were thrown in the fire.”

“And don’t forget the female healers they labeled witches,” Robin said.

“Very true,” Nick said. “Women were accused of signing pacts with the devil. Thousands were burned at the stake—young and pretty, old and haggard—their appearance didn’t matter. Often women were accused of witchcraft as an excuse to take away their property. Diseases were labeled curses. Stories spread about witches dancing naked with the devil and preparing food made from corpses in the gallows, marinated in wine casks. Women’s groups were labeled witches’ councils.”

I put down my beer. “What did you say?”

“Food was made from corpses in—”

“No, the women’s groups and witches’ councils.” I covered my face, shaking my head. “I can’t believe I forgot about this. Laycee and I had a hairdresser in Atlanta who called herself a witch. Laycee went to a witches’ council meeting with her and came home with a book of witchcraft spells.”

“And?” Dave said. “The hairdresser followed her to Jarret’s house in L.A. and killed her?”

“No. I get it,” Robin said. “If Laycee kept the book in their house, Forrest could have seen an inverted pentagram. When he caught her at Jarret’s, he smeared the sign on her back to curse her.”

“We’ve established that everyone on the planet except the three of you has seen a version of the inverted pentagram somewhere,” Nick said. “However, only Laycee’s killer understands the significance of the five. Schelz related it to vengeance.”

“What’s the standard interpretation?” Dave said.

“Give me a century, a religion, a sport, a science, a—”

“Are you sure you saw the number
5
and not the letter
S
—for Stanger?” Robin said.

Dave cocked his head, smiling. “Or Superman?”

“Five. The top edges were sharp.” Nick turned to me. “Liz, earlier you said something about Forrest Huber going to jail.”

“You heard me?”

“Always. Even when I’m not paying attention.”

Nick and Dave both listened, wide-eyed, to recount of Forrest’s outburst. When I told them about Jarret’s dinner comments about Gretchen, Robin sat straight up.

“His high school girlfriend tracked him down after all those years? That’s huge,” Robin said.

“It got my attention,” I said. “Jarret brushed her off as a casual friend with benefits, yet Gretchen referred to him as her boyfriend at the gym.”

“You know, a girl never forgets her first,” Robin said.

“Never?” Dave said, putting his arm around her. “Who was your first?”

Robin fluttered her lashes, poised and self-assured. “This year? You.”

“Liz, what did Jarret say about Margaret Smith?” Nick said.

“I didn’t ask.”

“Why not?”

“The timing didn’t feel right to me. I’ll wait for his mother to return my call. Marion will give me details and she won’t ask a lot of questions.”

“This Gretchen woman’s move to L.A. coincides with the Smiths losing their house in Bull Valley. Or close
enough,” Dave said. “Write down her last name and I’ll run her through the database at work on Monday.” He slid off his stool and gave Robin’s blonde ponytail a gentle tug. “It’s getting late.”

She took Dave’s hand, then gave me a knowing wink. Getting late—lover’s code for let’s go to your house and fool around.

“We’ll see you tomorrow night at your dad’s party.” Robin picked up her purse from the coffee table. Nick and I followed them outside.

“Good luck at the police station,” Robin said. “Don’t let Carla the bulldog intimidate you.”

“Oliver will be there to growl back,” I said.

Dave stopped at the sidewalk and called across the lawn, “Call if you need me.”

Nick and I waved from the porch as they drove off under the night sky, clear and black, punctuated by a scattering of bright stars. A forceful wind rustled through the trees, blowing dust and dried leaves across the lawn. I wrapped my arms around Nick’s waist and rested my head on his shoulder, taking in the scent of summer flowers and fresh-cut grass, happy for the quiet.

He moved his hand up my back, caressing my neck with his forefinger and thumb. His slow, gentle kneading shot tingles of release across my shoulders to my fingertips and down to my knees. My body relaxed into his touch. He slipped his free hand around my waist and moved around to face me. Running his hands down my body to my hips, he began to bunch my dress up.

I stopped him, mid-thigh. “What I want to do with you tonight requires a soft bed, a dark room, and a lot of time.”
Taking his hand to my lips, I slowly kissed his fingertips. “But first, I’m taking a bath.”