To Kill a Sorcerer (2 page)

“You,” she said.

“What?”

“I want you. Not money. Tonight. I’m off at one.”

“You want . . .”

“Don’t look so surprised. You’re hot.”

Nonplussed to have a vixen version of my little sister giving me the once-over, I concentrated.

“How about a thousand?”

“You’re saying no to me?”

For a moment, I could not speak.
Of course I’m saying no, Margie—you’re my little sister!
“You’re gorgeous,” I managed, “but I have a sweetheart.”

Gliding up close, bringing with her the clean scent of peach shampoo, she fiddled with my bow tie. “You didn’t get this quite right,” she said, undoing a perfect knot. “What’s your name?”

“Sebastian.”

“Laura. You’re not wearing a ring, Sebastian.”

While she twisted my neckwear, I studied her face. High cheekbones, graceful lashes, Margie’s nose and chin. Although I had seen doubles of friends and acquaintances, I had never seen a replica of anyone from my families. The losses of the centuries washed through me. How I missed them! I longed to take this lovely woman in my arms, kiss her cheek, and welcome my sister back to life.

But her name was Laura, and Marguerite lived only in my memories, sepia-tinted by the lens of time.

“A man like you could have more than one girl,” Laura said. Deftly, she tugged the tie into shape and looked up. “You could have as many—what’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Liar. You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“It’s an odd coincidence, but you look like my baby sister.”

“Oh.” She hesitated. “The way you say it—she’s dead?”

I nodded.

“I’m sorry.”

“Please don’t be. It was a long time ago.”

“I’m not your sister, Sebastian. You know that. We could have fun.”

“I really couldn’t.”

She pouted, pink lips puckered, an expression that had surely driven other men to their knees. “No one’s ever turned me down before.”

“I’ve no doubt of that.”

“Your girlfriend must be very special.”

“She is.”

“I am so not liking that,” Laura said.

Her hand slid down the sleeve of my jacket and took the bills I held, her fingers warm along my skin. She gave me a ticket.

“I’ll park your car,” she whispered in my ear.

I strolled across the hard-packed dirt to the low wall fronting the property, pulling a pack of Dunhills and a lighter out of my jacket pocket. Looking up at the mansion silhouetted against the night sky, I lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply, careful of my embers in the hot wind.

The house wasn’t really the Houdini Mansion, at least not in the sense that Harry Houdini had ever lived in or owned it. Houdini died in 1926, and the original estate on this property burned down in 1959. This house was recently built on the same land.

The great magician did not own the mansion that went up in flames, either. Although he knew the owner of the original estate, and his wife lived in the guesthouse across the street after his death, there is no proof Houdini ever spent a single night in the original main building.

Welcome to Hollywood, where investors fashion titanium connections from the thinnest of gossamer strands.

In spite of so tenuous a correlation to the famous illusionist, the house served as a focal point for the most notable spirits of Laurel Canyon’s residents. Interestingly enough, Bess Houdini, in an effort to contact her dead husband, held séances on top of the only building in the city more haunted than this one. There is a story she succeeded once.

I loitered next to a meter-high sand-filled vase with flowers painted on it. Two couples in formal clothes stood to my right, waiting to have their invitations examined by a uniformed police officer. When they started up the steps, I buried my cigarette in the sand and strolled over.

“Evening, Officer Chen,” I said. “Gonzales and Hamilton here yet?”

“Evening, sir. Just arrived.” Her navy uniform shirt stood open at the collar, and she had a Colt automatic nestled in her heavy leather holster. She glanced at my invitation. “Wait until you see Gonzales’s tuxedo.”

“Powder blue?”

“That actually wouldn’t be bad.”

“Hm. What about Hamilton? Did he look happy to be here?”

“As happy as ever, sir.”

“Seen any ghosts?”

“No ghosts. But I did see a birthday girl and her friends.”

Chen’s dark eyes sparkled. Tonight’s party also celebrated the twenty-first birthday of the mayor’s daughter Sofia. I had a terrible premonition.

“Has everybody seen it?”

“You mean the
Popwire
picture from a local club of a guy who looks a little like you kissing a girl who looks a lot like the mayor’s daughter? I heard a few people at the station mention it.”

Chief Reyes had also known then. “We hadn’t even been introduced,” I protested.

“Your animal magnetism probably overwhelmed her.” She handed my invitation back.

“It doesn’t seem to be overwhelming you, Officer.”

“I’m in better control of my actions.” She smiled.

“I see.”

“The boys were talking about you before they went up,” she said, tilting her head toward the estate.

I slid the invitation into my pocket. “And?”

“They wish you weren’t in on this one.”

Tuesday, December 21, 9:18 p.m.

The estate sat in the wooded foothills of Laurel Canyon, an area favored by rock stars and drug cults when Hollywood still made movies in black and white. The drug cults stayed.

I ascended the winding steps. Voices echoed over the faint chime of holiday music. The familiar burning odor of someone taking their medical prescription scented the air. Santa Claus and sativa. Happy holidays.

Four days before Christmas, hot, unseasonal Santa Ana winds had temperatures soaring all over the San Fernando Valley. Arid gusts ruffled the tops of the trees on both sides of the staircase, causing the tall palms to sway with stately grace and bringing the thick smells of sage and chaparral.

The front door stood open. It was cooler inside, the air conditioner in turbo drive. I cruised through the living room, scanning. The mayor talked with two men who were not Hamilton and Gonzales. A relief. I had no idea if the big man had seen the picture of his daughter and me, and I wasn’t in a hurry to find out.

I headed for an open door near the back, sure the detectives would not stay inside if they were done with their meeting.

As I passed the fireplace, I glanced up at a black-and-white framed poster. Houdini stared down at the assembly, his hands shoved into the pockets of a heavy double-breasted suit, his expression severe. He probably wasn’t happy about being forced to stand watch over a party in someone else’s house.

I stepped into the heat again, onto a flagstone patio lit with dozens of tiki torches, their flames bent sideways by the gusts. This courtyard, one of several around the estate, had two levels. Below, a pink brick wishing well covered in ivy stood at one end of the veranda, and at the other, a curving red stone bridge extended over a tiny lake and onto the dark lawn leading toward the back of the estate.

Several men leaned against a horseshoe-shaped bar, silhouetted by the bay laurel trees that were the canyon’s namesake. Detectives Hamilton and Gonzales stood among them, looking as happy as men waiting for rectal exams.

I took a place next to them downwind and lit a cigarette.

Steven Hamilton was the senior man. Caramel-skinned and lean, he cut an attractive figure in an inexpensive black single-breasted tuxedo.

A Sumo-size Samoan bartender wearing a white dinner jacket trundled over.

“Tequila,” I told him. He set down a shot glass and filled it with Don Julio Blanco. I hoisted the drink, saluted the two detectives. “Thanks for meeting me.”

Neither replied.

Alfred Gonzales resembled an NFL defensive end who had fattened up a bit after retiring. Shrek-like in a plaid coat with black silk lapels, black formal pants that were too tight at the ankles, and plain black shoes, he hurt the eye.

“So, Montero,” he said, “you’ve bought your way onto a homicide case again.” He gestured at the bartender, who poured him a shot.

“Detective Gonzales, I thought perhaps we could—”

“Must be nice to have that kind of cash.” Sweat glistened on the detective’s face and neck, darkening his collar. “Must be real nice.”

“It is. Must we do this like before?”

“Since we have to do it at all. Why don’t you leave jobs like this to professionals?” He tipped the tequila into his mouth and bit a lime wedge.

“I do.”

“Like hell you do.”

I didn’t bother to argue. While I had completed LAPD’s training for reserve officers, allowing me to legally work for the department, the program was designed for specialists and other volunteers. The instruction did not remotely prepare a graduate to participate in criminal investigations.

The mayor gave me special dispensation because my science and forensics company BioLaw offered free state-of-the-art analyses to the overloaded LA county coroner’s office. My lavish contributions to his campaign chest coupled with my private annual donations to the LAPD also influenced his decision.

Though most in the LAPD knew of my support—and knew it meant they had more modern equipment, access to better health care, and fully funded pensions after twenty-five years—the detectives hated working with me.

Money can’t buy me love.

“I’ve seen the pictures from the Barlow murder scene. Care to speculate as to why the killer spent so much time cutting her up?”

When I said Barlow, Gonzales’s brow furrowed briefly, and Hamilton’s gaze flickered.

“Well?” I prompted.

Neither answered.

The first two times we had worked together, they had shut me out this same way. And though my assistance in the last investigation had proved valuable, I knew they were unlikely to thaw toward me because of it.

Their reaction still hurt. Hope is not a reasonable emotion.

I took a sip of tequila and glanced around. From where we stood, we could see through the windows at the crowd inside. Hamilton noticed my visual surveillance.

“Looking for Sofia?” No gossip network could compare to that within a police station.

“It’s not like that.”

“Looked like something on
Popwire
. Nice picture. What did Aliena say?”

“I haven’t heard from her. She’s in Iraq. Coming home tonight, in fact.”

“You don’t sound worried,” Hamilton said.

“Why should I be?”

“A girl like Aliena usually gets pissed when she sees a picture on the Internet of her boyfriend kissing another girl.”

“I was not kissing Sofia. She was kissing me.”

“Yeah,” Gonzales said, “I’d like to see how that explanation goes over.”

“How did you find it?” I asked him.

“One of the girls in Metro spotted it and recognized you. She e-mailed it to her friends, they forwarded it to their friends, and the picture went viral on our network in two hours.”

Damn. “Sorry about that.”

“Shit, I’ll bet you love it,” Gonzales said. He motioned to the bartender, who refilled his glass. “Pissed off a couple of captains, but you didn’t have to deal with that, did you? Now half the women in LAPD are probably after you. That’s the problem with this city. Even in the department, there are too damn many gold diggers looking for sugar daddies.”

In earlier eras of my life, protocol would have permitted me to take Gonzales to task for such an insulting insinuation. Times being what they were, I let the comment pass, but the man had officially irritated me.

“You’re right,” I agreed. “Since you’re airing your opinions, Alfred, tell me: why do you think the killer strung Sherri Barlow up and gutted her as if she were a deer? He must have worked on her for a while, and we all know how dangerous that is for him. What do you make of that?”

Gonzales stiffened at my use of his Christian name, swallowed his drink, and tossed his shot glass on the bar where it tipped and rolled onto its side with a clatter. “Piss off.” He strode toward the house.

“He’s never going to warm up to you, Montero,” Hamilton said. “Never.”

“I lose sleep over it. What about you? Do you really hate working with me so much?”

He leaned on the bar, crossed his legs at the ankles. “It’s like the last two times. I’m ordered to give you all cooperation. I like it as much as I like paying income tax. Why do you care? As long as you’re in.” He gestured to the barman. “Two more here.”

“I prefer to be welcome,” I said.

“Go ahead and prefer it. You’re a civilian, and you always will be.”

“Everybody cares what happened to that young girl.”

“So? We’re handling it.”

“Good. I’m glad it’s you and Gonzales.” The bartender poured our drinks.

“Then leave us to it,” Hamilton said.

“I just want to help. Are you saying I don’t have the skills necessary to assist you?”

“Don’t even go there. If you think I’m going to tell you you’re good so you can walk around with your hand on your crotch like you’re Dick Tracy—I don’t think so. Homey don’t play dat.”

“I thought cops were superstitious.”

“So?”

“So maybe I’m your lucky charm,” I said. “We are two for two, after all.”

He took a snort of his tequila. “We caught the first guy in three hours, and we would have solved the last one without you.”

True. Of course, cracking the case and catching the bad guy are two separate parts of the investigative process. Hamilton and Gonzales would have eventually followed up on the same lead I had in the Richardson homicide. But time is a critical factor. Our killer had possessed an Irish passport with plans to use it soon. Identifying the murderer doesn’t give you a lot of satisfaction when he escapes your net and makes it to another country. Even if a foreign agency catches him and extradites him, there is always the feeling of having had someone clean up after you.

“Why do you think the murderer cut the girl up?”

“No idea.”

I lit a cigarette. “Watanabe’s examination confirmed the girl was a virgin. With the incense, this has all the earmarks of a ritual. Which might mean serial. After all, most ceremonies have more than one—”