The Blood of Ivy

by Jessica King

  “You think you’re still in danger?” Ivy asked. She rolled her shoulders, feeling the target on her own back.

  Loraine shrugged, one shoulder of her too-large sweater slipping down her shoulder. “They’ll find me again, right?” she asked. “If I’m lucky again, I do what? Shave my head and move to New York? Save up money and move to Europe before they can try again?” She shook her head. “That’s not really a life, is it?”

  “It’s more than some of the Prophetess’ followers got,” Ivy said.

  “I didn’t follow her. I didn’t follow anything even related to magic,” Loraine said. Her eyes shifted to a stack of fantasy books at the edge of the counter, which looked to be filled with stories about magic. “Unless you count that,” she said, waving off the stack. “And if I’m hiding because I like magical novels…” she trailed off, annoyance deepening her voice.

  Ivy restrained herself from telling Loraine how truly lucky she was to just be hiding in an apartment, not bleeding in a log cabin, but decided it wasn’t in the girl’s best interest to let her know the alternative between life and death. Loraine bounced on the balls of her feet, the hostility in her face momentarily replaced with anxiety.

  “Well, thank you for letting me check on you,” Ivy said.

  “I’ll hopefully move soon,” she said, her eyes growing dark as she escorted Ivy out of her apartment. “Loraine Glen is dead. There’s no point in this.” The heavy look she gave to Ivy left her feeling strange.

  She nearly knocked on the girl’s door again, but she dropped her hand away. She’d obviously wanted Ivy to leave, but at least she was alive. Maybe Loraine didn’t appreciate the gift of life she still had. It wasn’t up to Ivy to make her grateful by telling her how many dead bodies she’d found, how many times she’d almost been killed in the past few weeks. It’d made her feel guilty, not gracious.

  She made her way down the stairs carefully. The dead glow of the girl’s eyes in the shadow of her threshold haunted Ivy. Loraine Glen is dead. She’d asked for solitude to mourn her life. Maybe she truly believed she was dead because her old life was gone. Maybe a new one simply wasn’t going to be good enough to ever really heal Loraine.

  She drove back to the station, wanting to write down the details of her conversation with Loraine while it was still fresh in her mind. When she came in, the camera crew was a silent presence at her side, the light of the camera now a blink in the corner of her vision she’d come to ignore. She tugged at her sleeve, needing to hide the still-healing scars.

  “Ivy!” Chief Marks called her over to his office. She walked back, camera crew in tow, and she pretended to rub her eye to cover the makeup-covered scar on her face as she passed. She dropped into the empty seat in front of Chief Marks’ desk. He had a CD player on his desk.

  “Need some new music selections?” she asked. She heard Marks’ grandson, Mikey, stifle a noise somewhere between a snort and a laugh from his place behind a lighting reflector.

  Chief Marks pointed to the wall behind him. An extensive record collection covered the wall like wallpaper. He often boasted about his taste in music. Looking at the titles, Ivy felt he could still use some new music selections, and she raised her brows to let him know. He shook his head before returning his attention to the CD player.

  “This,” he said, popping open the top of the CD player, “is the CD we took from the Kingsmen gathering—the one of King’s voice.”

  “Right,” Ivy said. “I was hoping someone could work with it so we could hear the original before all the modulations. I don’t know if that’s something they can do, but—”

  Chief Marks shook his head and pressed the CD back into the player. He pressed play, and the time stamp chugged forward. Silence.

  “Two hours of silence,” Chief Marks said. “The King was there.”

  Ivy shook her head. “He must have been streaming in. We couldn’t find him anywhere.”

  “I think you might want to check in on an alibi for that suspect of yours,” he said. He hadn’t liked the idea of Ivy trying to figure out if Wilkins was the King while off-duty but conceded that he’d be far more comfortable and likely to make a mistake if he was in his professional element if he felt in control of the conversation between himself and Ivy.

  Ivy called Wilkins’ office.

  “Hi,” Ivy said. “This is Ivy Hart with the LAPD. Could I talk to Dr. Wilkins? I need to know where he was on Sunday.”

  “He actually stepped out for a second,” the sugar-sweet voice of his secretary said. “I have his calendar right here. He’s been making weekly special Sunday lectures at the UCLA campus as a supplementary instructor or something like that.”

  “How long has that been going on?” Ivy asked.

  “Nearly two months. They’ll continue until the end of April.”

  Ivy nodded. “All right, thank you.” She hung up and shook her head at Chief Marks. “Could it have been a different recording?”

  Chief Marks had set the center of the CD around his pointer finger and was spinning it around on his hand. “Maybe,” he said. “Whoever he is, he’s slippery.” He stopped the spinning CD. “I don’t know what to say about it.” He put the CD back in the evidence bag. “Just keep looking.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Published: Monday, March 27, 2017, 8:03 a.m.

  Gang Activity is on the Rise in Los Angeles, Recruiting Outside Normal Territory

  It is no secret L.A. has been the hub of several long-lived gangs that have been the torment of police officers for decades. From dealing narcotics to homicide to petty theft, the rise in crimes is often linked back to these groups, which mostly populate West Los Angeles and the downtown areas.

  However, as the gangs of Los Angeles find themselves breaking into smaller factions that also war against each other, their reach is extending as these new, smaller gangs are recruiting more members and are willing to stick their necks out into new territory in order to do so. While individual criminals are generally a likely target for their recruiting process, the more likely method is through high schools, as educators have noted a rise in the violence of their students across the board in downtown and western Los Angeles, as well as a rise in students that identify as gang members themselves, or their peers have identified as “likely members” or “known members” of local street gangs (often one of these aforementioned “faction gangs”).

  It’s this interest in spreading into new territories and the interest in recruiting from schools and areas that previously had been left mostly untouched by gang activity in comparison that has local authorities concerned.

  “Some of them will use suburbs as bases,” says Levi Wilson of the National Gang Center. “And that’s how the reach just keeps getting bigger because it’s not just the members who get caught up in things like this. It’s the families who then want to shelter their loved ones who they know are involved in illegal activity. It’s the siblings and cousins who get pulled in when they’re old enough. It’s the extended families who become accustomed to this lifestyle, and the little ones become used to it—it becomes their normal, their comfort zone. So, where do you think they go when they face going into debt to go to college and university or going back to what they grew up around where they can make quick money, where they already know the tricks of the trade?”

  While some organizations have devoted time and energy to creating housing away from these suburbs, creating affordable housing in areas of L.A. with less violent crime per capita for the low-income members of suburbs housing gang members is a balancing game most seem to be losing. Families that move out usually can’t maintain the payment to stay out of neighborhoods with gang influence, and families that can stay out of the neighborhoods still find their student-age children being approached in schools or still deal with their children who grew up around gang violence not shying away from it as they head into adolescent life.

  With this combination of familiarity and the seemingly ever-extending reach of the further-fra
ctioning gangs, Los Angeles families find themselves facing a difficult choice: risk living in an area with gang-related activity or use all of their financial resources in order to stay in the always-shrinking areas where gang activity is relatively low or nonexistent.

  +++

  Monday, March 27, 2017, 10:15 a.m.

  With all the Long Beach and Venice Beach shooters behind bars, Ivy and Vince were up to their necks in testimonies, case files, and discharged weapons reports. Not to mention all the files regarding their many victims and the requests for interviews and phone calls. Vince and Ivy had decided to change the documentary to be an exclusive interview, which had made Lindsey ecstatically happy, even though she knew the only reason the other media outlets had been denied was that Vince and Ivy were too busy to deal with the media.

  “I might die beneath this mountain,” Vince said from behind his wall of folders.

  Ivy stood and stretched, her neck cracking. “Why would you hang those up?” Ivy asked, pointing to the results of there ARE YOU A WITCH? kits, in the lime green and black of the Prophetess products. Their results said Ivy was a witch, and Vince wasn’t.

  Vince grinned. “I like the reminder.” He clapped his hands together beneath a smile with glee. Ivy stared at him. Her intimidating looks never worked on Vince; they just amused him. He waved hello to her before turning his attention back to their results.

  “It’s not sanitary,” Ivy said. “There are four drops of blood on each.” The blood was little reddish-brown stains now, but it was her strongest point for him taking the tests down.

  Vince crinkled his nose. “I’ll throw them away later,” he said.

  “I’ll be checking.” They’d be there for a few more days until he finally caved, she knew, but it was progress.

  Ivy slumped into her seat, swiveling herself back and forth, wishing her eyes would uncross from all the screen time. As she read through the files, she tried to do so from the perspective of trying to form a web that stemmed out from the King. But with the anonymous recruiting feature of the Kingsmen website and hierarchy, the leader of the organization had all but erased their name from the history books of their own cult.

  Lunch had come and gone, Vince and Ivy passing back and forth boxes of crackers and downing cups of coffee, spitting out theories about the King as they came to them.

  “If it’s not Justice Wilkins, it could be another Justice my mother knew,” Ivy said. She’d landed on the floor at this point, her body tired of her worn chair. Papers bloomed away from her like petals of a flower. Vince hummed in agreement of the possibility.

  “Regional kings?” Vince thought aloud an hour later. He’d abandoned sitting altogether and stood at his desk. “Like how gangs all do sort of the same thing, but they have their own organizations and leaders?”

  “But wouldn’t they have fought, then?” Ivy asked. She pulled a pen from the pincushion of her frizzing bun, marking the idea on a scrap paper. “For territory?”

  “Maybe they aren’t, like, that organized,” Vince said.

  “What about that Archer guy Mason mentioned?” Ivy asked. “We hadn’t had time to look into it before, but I think that’s a route to go down.”

  Vince scribbled the idea on a sticky note and attached it to his computer, the sticky side down to avoid cluttering his view of the monitor. The assortment of sticky notes made the computer look like it needed a haircut, blond and red strands sticking up in chunks and at odd angles. Another hour passed, the sounds of their keyboards chattering back and forth to one another.

  “Remember when we thought maybe the FBI was a contact? Because of the information Jeremiah Ethan had?” Vince said. “Maybe that’s something to follow?” Vince had returned to his signature feet-on-desk posture, his keyboard pulled onto his lap.

  Ivy groaned, pressing her forehead into the coolness of her desk. She had entirely forgotten about that strand of an idea. It seemed so long ago when they feared an FBI agent was going to kill Aline Rousseau at the Oscars.

  “Maybe it could be anyone. Or maybe it could be Aline,” he said, catching onto the hopelessness of their ideas. He stared up at the ceiling.

  Ivy snorted against her desk. “I hate to say it, but I’m just hoping someone will call with a tip. I’ve never seen anything with so many loose ends with nothing actually leading anywhere.”

  Vince had taken to rubbing his temples, the afternoon sunlight catching the white paper across his desk, the entirety of it looking too bright and entirely headache-inducing.

  Ivy’s computer made the noise that promised yet another email was waiting. Vince’s computer had apparently grabbed his attention as well. He muttered, “Chief Marks,” as Ivy opened the e-mail they’d both been sent by the chief.

  “I decided to just come over here and tell you,” Chief Marks said, walking up to him. He held out a box of half-gone donuts to the camera crew, which had hardly anything at all to film as Ivy and Vince had worked at their computers. Ivy wished they would record more of this to show the general public that cops didn’t just run around after witches and witch-hunters, but that likely didn’t make exciting television. “They found a Kingsmen victim in Italy.”

  “Italy?” Had she been that disconnected from the world news? She’d hardly paid attention to any news that wasn’t given to her specifically, but when she pulled up the email, she saw the story had been circulating for at least twenty-four hours: a woman stabbed in St. Peter’s Basilica, appearing to be in prayer.

  “I think you two need to go. If this thing is spreading, you might still have some sort of lead to grasp before it gets so big like it has here,” Chief Marks said. “The police there said they’re comfortable handing the investigation to you if you can get there quickly.”

  Ivy nodded. “It’s small enough we be able to trace something if we can find the Kingsmen there.”

  “Have there been any other Kingsmen killings in Europe?” Vince asked aloud, searching his web browser. He muttered keywords as he typed. Nothing.

  “Looks like we’ve got a shot at finding the King, or at least a high up contact,” Ivy said.

  “You mean, we’ve got a stab at it,” Vince said. “Eh?” he poked Chief Marks, who shook his head and walked away.

  +++

  Monday, March 27, 2017, 4:49 p.m.

  Robbie offered Cameron the blunt in his hand, its sour smell curling in the air. Cameron waved him off, and Robbie tilted his head. “Aw, Cammie, c’mon now.”

  “I’ve tried it,” Cameron said. He resisted the urge to bat away the smoke. “Don’t like the way the taste sticks in my nose.” The only time he’d smoked weed was right before his family had moved out of West L.A. when Robbie had first gotten into it and smuggled some into his bedroom. They’d hung out of his window, giggling and laughing. They were still little, and they’d woken with aching stomachs from laughing so hard. It didn’t seem to be the same stuff Robbie had now. He looked relaxed, not hysterical, his eyes red-rimmed and sleepily.

  “Here,” Robbie said, offering him a cigarette.

  Cameron took it and held it out for Robbie to light. The thing tasted awful, but he preferred to at least keep his wits about him. “Good, man.” Cameron blew out the smoke, his throat itching against the cigarette’s air. “You’re gonna have to act like us if you wanna be in. After, you can say you don’t like it or whatever, but ‘til then go with it, yeah?”

  Cameron nodded. “All right. All right, yeah.” He stretched out his legs. They were sitting on the two cement steps that comprised Robbie’s back porch, a place where the two of them fit much better when they were twelve. The tiny concrete alleyway between Robbie’s house and the next was filled with weeds, which popped through the pavement and crisscrossed with laundry lines. Cameron played with a stray clothespin, clipping it lightly onto each of his fingertips.

  “Can make some good college money if you want with this,” Robbie said, waving the putrid smoke beneath his nose. “You pay for the gang’s stuff, but like, you can k
eep some. Make some good money.”

  “College money?” Cameron asked, raising an eyebrow at Robbie.

  Robbie grinned and ran one of his hands across the top of Cameron’s head. “We both know I ain’t goin’ to no college, Cammie.” He laughed. “But we all know you’re gonna, ah? I mean, your dad’s a smart guy an’ all, but where you guys are living, I guess it’s hard to save money and stuff?”

  Cameron didn’t know. His parents didn’t talk to him about money much. He didn’t know if they had a college fund for him, or how much was in it if such a thing existed. He’d always just assumed he’d be going to college, whether his parents paid for it all or if he ended up in a mountain of debt. Everyone at his school was going to college.

  He remembered where Robbie was still going to school. Only the kids with scholarships ever left town, and those were few and far between. His sister was going to be one of those kids, though. He pushed the thought away. The school counselors even made everyone apply.

  “You know, money’s always tight for everyone, I guess,” Cameron said, hoping that keeping everything vague would stave off Robbie’s questions.

  “You’re tellin’ me,” Robbie said. He coughed, pulling the blunt from his lips. He squinted down the small alleyway between his house and the next. “Aye, Broadway!”

  “Broadway?”

  Robbie grinned, his eyes fixed on the shadows of a skinny figure. “His name’s Clark or somethin’, but Marco caught him singing show tunes one night. His name’s Broadway.”

  “Caught singing show tunes?” Cameron asked.

  Robbie laughed as Broadway approached them. “Aren’t you listening, Cammie? That’s what I said. He got the livin’ daylights beaten out of him for it, though, so don’t you go singing anything, or you’ll get it too.”

  Broadway was smiling as he approached, even though he’d clearly heard the conversation about him. He pushed his way through the clothesline between Robbie’s house and their neighbors. He held his hand out for the blunt, and Robbie passed it to him.