Perfect Love

by A.M. Burns

22

  Dusty barely had time to shift to his wolf form before we heard the bell to the outer office jingle indicating we had visitors. Since Tiffany was not at her desk out front, I went out to see who it was. Lenny Pentelli and Katie Crackles stood in the office looking around. For some reason, I was surprised that they were early. Lenny wore a beat-up brown leather duster over a basic black t-shirt and black jeans. His black cowboy boots tapped lightly as he stepped across the oak flooring of the outer office. Katie looked bedraggled, her blonde crew cut hair was somehow a frizzy mess, her fluffy green sweater was only half tucked into her orange skirt that hung lopsided. She had a wild look in her mud-brown eyes. She all but screamed that something was very wrong in her world.

  “Hello, you must be my next appointment,” I offered my hand to Lenny first. “Ethan Peters.”

  “Lenny Pentelli.” His voice sounded as smooth as it had a couple of nights before at the get together. His handshake was firm and full of confidence.

  “Katie.” Her voice shook a bit and she tried to focus on me. I started to wonder if she may not have been strung out on something.

  “Sorry for not being able to do this at the house.” Lenny started as I motioned them into my office. “But the roach issue just got so bad that we had to call the exterminators this morning. I’ve no idea where they’re all coming from. It just has poor Katie beside herself.”

  “No problem, we could have waited until tomorrow.” I gestured to the chairs in front of my desk.

  “We are booked up for the next week,” Lenny explained as he took the chair on the left. “So tonight was the only time we had free.”

  “Well thanks for driving over.” I waited for Katie to take the other chair.

  She had a look of near horror on her face as she stared at Dusty where he sat at the end of the desk looking at her. It was almost like she could tell he was more than just a big dog sitting there. I wondered if she knew about werewolves? Most people who ever encountered them could tell them apart from domestic dogs, or even wild wolves fairly easily.

  “It’s okay. He won’t hurt you. I like keeping him close by, but I can put him out if you like.” I walked over and put my hand on Dusty’s head.

  “She smells weird, not exactly an elemental smell,” he said as we made contact. “Her fear smell spiked after she saw me, I think she knows I’m a wer.”

  Katie sat down shakily, barely hovering on the edge of the chair. Her eyes never left Dusty. “No, I’ll be fine. It’s just that dogs make me nervous. He looks nice enough.”

  “You be a good boy.” I said with a final pat on Dusty’s head then sat in my chair. “So, Tiffany explained why I needed to talk to you?”

  “Something about Magee’s suicide?” Lenny replied, a hint of doubt in his voice.

  “Well, Reynaldo doesn’t think it’s a suicide, or at least not intentional. He wanted us to ask around and see if we could find anyone who might have wanted Magee dead.”

  “Well I personally feel that her loss is going to be a major blow to the community. I can only hope that I can carry on her work for her.” Lenny said, a crease of concern deepening the lines on his forehead.

  “What work?” I wanted to see what he would say about perfect love.

  “Oh you don’t know about the project she started? She called it Perfect Love. Her goal was to unify the Wiccan community under one guiding hand. She was perfect for the job. Everyone loved her. She had so much charisma. Under her guidance the Wiccans would’ve stopped being these little single entities and been able to be a united force for the good of the Mother Goddess.” His voice held conviction, but not on the blind-faith level that several of the others had. He was planning something. “Magee let me see the first draft of her proposals. It was a little rough, but I was helping her work out the kinks. She was nearly ready to present her ideas to the CMC gathering in Austin next month.”

  “CMC?” I don’t keep in touch with all the new groups that are popping up all the time. I’m sure the Council has a file on them. I’d have Tiffany check into it.

  “Council of Magical Crafts,” Lenny explained. “They’re one of the largest regularly-meeting groups around right now. They recently managed to get their religious tax exemption. They had some trouble a while back but have bounced back nicely.”

  “He means that a large number of their people were turned into werewolves during one of their gatherings,” Dusty added, brushing my hand with his head. “I thought that ended the group.”

  Now I remembered. It’d been a nasty mess that really changed the balance of power in the wer community. Some people still swear that the Goddess Dianna appeared during the event. The wers weren’t telling one way or the other. But that was neither here nor there at the moment. We had other leads to chase.

  “So, other people knew about this Perfect Love Initiative? “

  “Only Magee’s close friends. She hadn’t told anyone at CMC what she was planning, only that she wanted to do a workshop and a ritual. They got it all scheduled for her. They just called me today asking if I’d do it in her place. I told them I would. I owe it to Mags to keep it going.”

  “We owe Magee a lot.” Katie finally found her voice.

  Lenny reached across to take Katie’s hand. “Katie and I met thanks to the get-together group. So if it hadn’t been for Magee, I wouldn’t have this wonderful woman in my life.” His smile went only as far as his lips. His eyes held anger, like he had warned her not to say anything before they came over. It was a cold calculating anger. I wondered if that was part of the reason she was so disheveled? Had she felt his anger before they arrived? I couldn’t see any physical signs of injury, but that bulky sweater could be hiding a lot. Had that been the true reason he had wanted to meet up here and not at their home? Most men who controlled their spouses through violence didn’t want people in their base of power. They were afraid of what others might find or see.

  “Well it seems that a lot of people owe their happy couple-hoods to Magee, Alexia and Barry met there if I’m not mistaken.” I opened the middle drawer to the desk to like I was going to pull out a file. I kept a small crystal there that I had ensorcelled to help detect magic when I didn’t want to risk using mage sight or anything more active. A light orange glow came from the crystal. There was something going on, but it’d be hard to tell without digging deeper and I wasn’t sure if either of them would detect it if I did. These two weren’t the same as most of the other people from the get-together group that we’d talked to so far. Real magic came from one or both of them.

  “It really is a shame about Barry,” said Lenny, his eyes losing some of their anger as he turned back to me. “He and Alexia seemed so happy. They’d both been through so much with Madeline tormenting Barry the way she did. Now, that woman had some issues. She had some illusions that she’d take over the group after Magee died. I think the group’s better off with her gone.”

  Katie looked worse than ever and seemed to shrink back into her chair.

  “I told Magee several times that Madeline was trouble and would bring her down, but she always said that they were close friends, almost like sisters and that Madeline would never do anything to hurt her,” Lenny continued, seeming not to notice Katie’s state. “I often got the feeling that they were more than friends, if you know what I mean. You know, maybe Madeline was dealing in black magic, and after she used it on Magee, it turned on her.” Lenny didn’t notice her brief nod as he mentioned black magic turning on the caster, either.

  “I hadn’t heard anyone mention Madeline using any kind of magic, other than fairy magic.” And from what I had sensed of the woman, that was all she was capable of, nothing more than a bit of glitter tossed into the air.

  “Like a lot of the newbies around, she thought that anything other than fairy magic was black,” Lenny continued. “But, I know from some of the things that she said, she either dabbled a bit herself or someone that held her in confidence did. She knew just enough about high magic to be dang
erous.”

  “So I take it you know a bit about high magic?” I made a few random scribbles on the mostly blank pad in front of me. I found that it tended to make people think I was taking them seriously and it made some of them very nervous.

  “Well I am a Gardenarian High Priest and have read everything that Crowley ever wrote, even managed to get my hands on a few of the things that never got published. He was a very interesting man.” Lenny was very much in his element now. With any luck I’d be able to keep him talking until it was time for us to go to the next interview and thus give Tiffany and Tech time to search his house, if the exterminators or the roaches weren’t too bad.

  I’ve never had much patience for either Gardener or Crowley. There were files on both of them in the Council. Neither of them was what they claimed. Gardener was just a horny goat that figured out that if he called it religion, he could get women to have sex with him whenever he wanted. Crowley was just odd. There was no other way to look at him. There’s some evidence that some of their ideas would yield results in the right hands, but most of them were backwards ways of doing things. Most high magicians who found good teachers found easier ways to get much better results. If Lenny was being truthful about himself he might be able to cause some trouble and he might even be the person calling things up and not signing his circles.

  Katie interrupted Lenny’s praise of Crowley and my musings. “Excuse me Mr. Peters?”

  Lenny glared at her for a second.

  “Yes Ms. Crackles?” I set my pencil down on top of the pad.

  “Could I bother you to use the bathroom? It was a long ride over here and the tea I had is going right through me.”

  “Sure. There is one on the left side of the lobby.” I gestured to the open door into the front office. “There is a picture of the Texas Star on it. You know the big ferris wheel over in Fair Park.”

  She nodded and got up. “Thank you.”

  “So anyone else other than Madeline that you think may have had issues with Magee? What about…” I glanced down at my pad for effect, “Bree and Byron Supunski?”

  “Bree is a wonderful lady. I think that the community will do well with her as one of its leaders. Byron, well let’s just say he is a bit of a blow hard, a bit more talk than he can back up, if you know what I mean. He has an opinion on everything and is ready to defend it, even if it’s totally wrong. Otherwise a really nice guy, particularly when Bree keeps him quiet.” He went on about various things that Byron had tried to argue with various people over various times, including whether or not George Washington was really the first president of the United States. I made a mental note to make sure to get him together with Carmine. If possible, I’d like to introduce them. It could be entertaining in a warped sort of way. Lenny’s comments also helped reinforce some of my previous observations of the man.

  Katie came back in and stood next to Lenny’s chair. She touched his arm and looked at his watch. “Lenny the exterminators should be about done. We need to head back home.” She sounded much more together after her trip to the bathroom. She had even taken a minute and smoothed out her hair and sweater.

  “Oh good point,” Lenny replied. “Well is there anything else we can help you with Mr. Peters?”

  “No, our little chat has been most enlightening.” I reached for the stack of business cards on the desk and pulled off the top two. “If you think of anything that might be useful, please let me know.” I carefully handed one to each of them. Katie seemed to flinch as my hand touched hers. There was an almost unperceivable spark of magic pass between us. I began to wonder what she had really done in the bathroom.

  Dusty butted my hand with his head. “She smells different.”

  “We’ll let you know if we think of anything else,” Lenny said as he took Katie’s hand and headed for the door.

  The outer door rang as they opened and closed it, just as Griff shot into the room and slid to a landing on the desk, knocking my pencil and pad off into the floor. “Boss we got fairies knocking on our shields. There are a lot of them and they want in real bad.”