It comes down to sex and money.
Money hadn’t raised its head in this case yet, but sex just made an entrance. Ovsanna Moore and Maral McKenzie reeked of it. I added Ms. McKenzie to my short list of suspects. I only had two names on it—McKenzie and Moore—but it was a start.
And hell hath no fury and all that….
Moore sipped at the iced tea. “Detective King is investigating Eva’s death. Although why you’re involved, Detective, and not the local police, is a question I’d like answered,” Ovsanna added, without missing a beat. She’d taken a seat in one of those tall director’s chairs with the name Marilyn Monroe printed on the canvas back. It looked like Marilyn had signed it in black ink under her name. I’d seen enough copies of her distinctive signature in my mom’s collection to believe it was real. My mom would love it.
The only other places to sit were the sofa and the two banquettes on either side of a built-in table. I stayed standing because I didn’t want Ovsanna Moore towering over me while I tried to interrogate her without her realizing that’s what I was doing.
“Actually,” I said, “I found the body.”
It took the girlfriend a moment or two to process what I’d just said, but Ms. Moore realized the implications immediately. She sat back in the chair and crossed her legs at the ankle, Citizen of Humanity jeans riding up to reveal python Tony Lamas. SuzieQ would shit. “So you came to talk to Eva,” Ovsanna said.
“That’s an interesting assumption. Any reason you’d say that?” Give people enough rope and they’ll talk themselves into the noose.
“Why else would you be in the FX hut, Detective King? It’s not on the beaten path. Something brought you here; what was it?”
“I’m an investigator, Ms. Moore. I investigate. It’s my job to ask the questions, not answer them.”
“And it’s my job to run this studio and to know what’s going on here every minute of every day. I’m not a fool, Detective, don’t treat me like one.” There was a fast shift to ice in her voice and genuine anger. “I listen to the news,” she said. “You’re the lead detective on the Cinema Slayer case. You drove out here because of that, didn’t you? You were looking for Eva.”
“You’re right, ma’am.”
“Call me Ovsanna. ‘Ma’am’ makes me sound old.” Another shift in her attitude. She smiled, maybe attempting to lighten the atmosphere, but the smile didn’t go anywhere near her eyes.
“Ms. Casale’s name came up as part of our ongoing investigation.”
The personal assistant leaned forward, offering me a glimpse down the gaping neckline of her expensive-looking suit. I appreciated the gesture, but it didn’t work. Given the distraction of sex or the obsession of work, I take work almost every time. “You’re not seriously suggesting that Eva was somehow involved in those terrible deaths, are you?” McKenzie went on the attack.
“I’m not suggesting anything,” I said mildly. “Would she have worked with any of the deceased?”
Ms. McKenzie was about to snap a response, but Ovsanna reached out and laid a hand on her arm. I thought movie stars got their nails done, but Moore’s were a mess. “Eva is—was—one of the best up-and-coming special effects artists in the business. Everyone wanted her. She trained with Rick Baker, Rob Bottin, and Stan Winston. And yes, she worked with all three of the deceased—Jason, Tommy, and Mai.”
“I know all three did movies with this studio. Did you personally work with any of them?”
“Yes, I did,” she said immediately. “I gave Jason his break in this business; he played the priest who gets butchered in the confessional in Tell Me What You’ve Seen. Mai was my co-star in Vatican Vampyres and Tommy played a cop in Road Rage.”
I made my notes and wondered if Netflix carried copies.
“What else can you tell me about Eva?”
“She’s worked for me for six years now. Started out as an FX assistant on Tell Me What You’ve Heard, the sequel to Tell Me What You’ve Seen. She runs—ran—the department with a permanent staff of four and hired extra people as she needed them, depending on the demands of the film. Her strength was getting the best effects for the least amount of money. She was clever and inventive and stayed on budget. Take a look at The Convent II and you’ll see what I mean. When Hurricane Katrina hit and production on Blood on the Bayou got held up because they couldn’t get supplies, she used V8 juice mixed with Yoo-Hoo to simulate the blood they needed for the were-alligator’s victims. Nobody knew the difference.”
“Very inventive,” I said, suddenly realizing what was in those bottles Biblical Benny was selling. Ms. Moore certainly knew a lot about her staff. I deal with Beverly Hills bigwigs every day; most of them don’t even know their employees’ full names. Ovsanna Moore was obviously a more hands-on type of boss. “Can you think of any reason—no matter how improbable—that someone would have wanted to kill her?” It’s the standard question, and it always sounds ridiculous.
Ms. Moore shook her head, but I was watching the girlfriend. I saw the tiniest crinkling at the corner of her eyes and knew instantly that she knew something.
“And what about you, Ms. McKenzie?”
Her pupils dilated just before she lied to me. Doesn’t make for a good poker player. She took a step back, her hands crossing her body in classic defensive-denial pose.
Years ago I’d dated a psychologist who taught me the basics of interpreting unconscious non-verbal communication. She had a dozen books on what we cops call body language. Ms. Shrink said mine showed unresolved oedipal issues—I enjoyed hanging out at my mom’s. I said hers showed unresolved Esther Williams issues—I found her fucking my pool man, in the pool. She walked out with her tan and left her books. I always figured I got the best part of the deal. Took me ages to find a new pool man, though.
“I have no idea why Eva was killed,” McKenzie said quickly.
I love it when people lie to me. Means I’m getting close.
“What about her private life? How much do you know about that? Was she seeing anyone?”
Maral shook her head. “There was someone she was sleeping with, off and on. I didn’t get the feeling it was a big romance or anything. I think he was a Born Again or a preacher or something. Every time she came back from screwing him she’d talk about God’s love and blessings.”
Flipping my notebook shut, I looked from Ovsanna Moore to Maral McKenzie. “I think that’s all for the moment. I apologize in advance if this is inconvenient, but I hope neither of you has plans to leave the city in the immediate future.”
“None, Detective,” Ovsanna said shortly.
“And I’m going to have to declare the FX hut off-limits.”
“For how long?”
“A couple of days, at least. I realize that this will cause a problem with your shooting schedule, but the CSIs need time to go over the entire building. We’ll do our utmost to release it as quickly as possible. I’ll also need your fingerprints, of course, and the fingerprints of all your crew.”
Again a flare of anger from Ms. McKenzie, tinged now with what might have been alarm as her eyes found Ms. Moore. Moore reacted, too, her expression shifting to a blank mask. “Why?” she asked.
“For elimination purposes. We take your fingerprints and the fingerprints of everyone we know who had business there, we dust the building, we eliminate all the recognizable ones, and see if anything unusual pops up. It won’t take long and we can do it here, rather than bringing you down to the station.” I smiled my best professional smile to take the sting from the unspoken threat. Neither woman returned it. “Is there anything else you think might be relevant? Anything unusual or out of the ordinary happen recently, any strangers wandering around the set, fights on the set, differences of opinion, arguments?”
The two women were shaking their heads even before the questions were out of my mouth and I knew then that I wasn’t going to get any more out of them. But I’d gotten enough.
“Well, thank you for your time. I’ll leave you my
card in case anything occurs to you.” I was tempted to ask for a signed photo for my mother, but I resisted. I didn’t want to look like some starstruck fan even though a part of me couldn’t wait to call home and tell my mom whom I’d been grilling. Besides, I knew I’d be seeing both women again.
But before then, I needed to know a little more about them. Something I wouldn’t find on IMDb or People.com.
Chapter Eleven
Maral stood by the door and watched the detective amble across the lot towards his car. Her voice was shaking with anger. “What do we do about him?”
“Well, we don’t underestimate him. And we don’t lie to him again. At least, you don’t. He knows you lied.”
“I didn’t really lie. I don’t know why Eva was killed. She wasn’t one of you. Maybe her death isn’t connected to the others at all.” Her anger was giving way to wishful thinking. And fear. I could smell it overriding the Jo Malone Wild Fig and Cassis she must have bathed in.
“You’re too genuine to carry off a lie, Maral. He picked up on it right away. You obviously know more about Eva than you volunteered.”
She turned back to me slowly. Framed in the doorway, with the sunlight turning her blond hair into a white halo of fire while leaving her features in shadow, she was breathtaking. I had to concentrate on the conversation; lust was flushing through my system unbidden.
“Eva was seeing someone…well, more than one person actually,” she said, coming back into the trailer and closing the door. She opened the fridge and took out a bottle of Xango and a bottle of Defense flavored Vitaminwater. Her hands were trembling as she measured a tablespoon of the Xango and followed it with the Defense chaser and suddenly I realized how hard this must be for her. It isn’t every day a colleague turns up spectacularly dead. Nearly half a millennium wandering this earth has inured me to the sight of death. I’ve seen it in all its ugliness, from individual bodies to entire corpse-strewn fields. Now, only the death of a loved one still has the power to move me; it’s one of the reasons I’ve avoided any close associations in the last few decades. Except for Maral. Eva Casale was an employee, and probably a nice person, but I wasn’t going to get too emotional about her death, nor was I going to make any foolish promises about avenging it. I had to believe that her murder was a warning or a threat, a threat I had to take very seriously. The Vampyre Hunter was showing me that he knew how to kill my kind.
Maral lay back on the couch and stared at the ceiling. She pressed the cold bottled water to her forehead. “There was a time when Eva and I were…involved.”
I’ll be damned. I must be slipping in my old age; I’d never picked up on it. I kept my face expressionless.
“It was a couple of years ago. You were shooting Elizabeta at Cinecittà in Rome.”
I remembered. Maral had stayed in L.A. to oversee production on our other films. The irony of shooting a movie based on the life of Elizabeth Bathory had rather appealed to me. She was born ten years after me, in 1560, but I never met her. I suppose today she’d be classified a serial killer—650 women, according to the register of names she kept. A thousand more according to the Hungarian emperor, when he finally imprisoned her. To my knowledge, she wasn’t vampyre, just your garden-variety psycho like Vlad III, the Impaler. Evidently she took it into her head that bathing in the blood of young virgins would restore her youthful beauty. This was pre–plastic surgery; she didn’t have a lot of alternatives. She strung them up by their ankles and bled them alive into a nice warm bath. I had a great time playing that scene. Even with fake blood.
“It didn’t last long,” Maral continued, “and when we broke up, we managed to remain friends. She told me recently that she was seeing a new man.”
“‘A new man’ implies that there is an another man.”
“She was having an off-and-on relationship with the preacher I told the cop about.”
I sighed. Preachers, no matter what God they said they worshipped, were trouble. I didn’t like the way the pieces of this puzzle were beginning to slot together. I’ve come close to death on several occasions over the centuries, and with only a few exceptions the Church and religion of one stripe or another had been involved. If it wasn’t the Christians trying to burn me at the stake, it was the devil worshippers trying to sacrifice me to their horned god. I sent them all to their respective makers.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said suddenly. “We’re going to need to get legal advice. I want to talk to Solgar and I can’t do it over the phone.” Maral looked at me blankly. “That detective is going to discover your connection to Eva. He’s already suspicious of my connection to the three dead stars. And…he wants my fingerprints.” I held up my hands. The pads of my fingers are smooth, without whorls or patterns. The anomaly is unique to my Dakhanavar Clan, and I knew with a chill certainty that my non-prints were going to turn up all over poor Eva’s FX hut.
“We’ve got an alibi.”
“Depends on the exact time of death. And we are one another’s alibi. That’s enough to make Detective King even more suspicious; then he’ll really start digging. You know how vulnerable I am to a comprehensive investigation.” Although I have extensive paperwork, the best money can buy—birth certificate, Social Security card, even SAT scores—no paper is infallible. There’s an ancient Celtic saying that translates as “Happy the man who exists unknown to the law.” For generations my race has survived in the shadows. Now technology is making that increasingly difficult. Where the Church and the crazed hunters had failed to eradicate us, twenty-first-century computerized record keeping might prove our downfall.
Warren Zevon’s “Werewolves of London” howled from Maral’s purse as we hurried across the lot. Her latest choice in ring tones. Just when I’ve forgotten how young she really is, her phone rings to remind me of her puerile sense of humor. It was Bobby Wise, the production manager. Officer Gant on the main gate had phoned in to report that the journalists and news vans had arrived. I was surprised it had taken them so long.
The December sun was beginning to dip in the sky and I pushed my Fendi Suns up into my hair to turn my face to the light, delighting in the heat. Start again from scratch and forget everything you know about vampyres: almost none of it is true. And none of it makes sense. An aversion to the cross—why? That wives’ tale came about from the Christians who hunted us down in the Middle Ages. The crosses didn’t do any harm; it was the guys bearing them. And what about Jewish and Muslim vampyres—what effect was a Christian symbol going to have on them? It would have to be a menorah or a crescent, wouldn’t it? Believe me, those don’t work, either.
Vampyre mythology was created mostly by the movies.
I know. I wrote a lot of it.
It’s a mythology that has been informed by books, movies, and, more recently, TV. And most of that was a figment of some novelist’s or screenwriter’s imagination. And since everything they know is built upon a lie, they are simply perpetuating the lie.
I’ve been writing scripts for the past eighty years and rarely have I included any real truths about my kind. So contrary to what people believe, we don’t burn in sunlight, though we are sensitive to the ultraviolet radiation, but that’s to do with diet, we don’t sleep in coffins lined with our own earth, and we don’t crumble to dust when we die: rather, we dissolve into a particularly foul sludge.
Maral and I climbed into the Lexus and used the security code to drive out the back gate, successfully avoiding the media circus that was making Officer Gant work for his money at the front entrance.
“Tell me about this preacher and the new boyfriend,” I said when we finally turned into traffic.
“I only met the preacher once. He came to the studio—”
I hissed in anger. This was pissing me off. I pride myself on knowing everything that’s going on in my studio, and it was fast becoming clear I didn’t. I’d taken my eye off the ball while negotiating the Japanese deal. It didn’t take a genius to work out that Eva had found out about me from Maral and
had revealed it to the preacher. A man of God had an obligation to cleanse this earth of the unclean, didn’t he?
“I don’t think he’s involved,” Maral said quickly. “I’m not even sure he’s a real preacher, just one of those guys who puts on a white collar and calls himself a reverend. He also sells star maps as a sideline…,” she faltered, and added, “He conducts those tours that go to all the places where stars have died….”
“Jesus. I’d think after you, Eva would have had better taste in men. So, not only was he a preacher, but he was a preacher obsessed with dead movie stars. Maybe he’d graduated from visiting them to making his own. What about the new one?”
“I never met him,” Maral continued. “I got the impression she was a little in awe of him, maybe even frightened.”
I picked more polish off my nails. “What does he do?”
“No idea. He must be in the business, though, ’cause he was always telling her stuff that hadn’t even hit the trades. He sounded powerful.”
“We need to find out.” I had Peter King on my mind as I sorted through my options. This sudden police interest in the studio might frighten off the Japanese. I’d worked too long and too hard to allow that to happen. The Japanese arrived in three days; Anticipation had to be running smoothly by then. On a personal level, I needed to avoid having my fingerprints taken. I was going to need some subtle and expensive legal help. And I needed to aim the police in a different direction…away from me. For that, I was going to have to do their job for them. Time for this vampyre to hunt the hunter.
“Head over the hill. Phone Ernst Solgar and tell him I’m coming.”
“Just like that?” Maral blinked. Solgar and Solari, Esquires, are the best entertainment lawyers in Century City.
Vampyres of Hollywood Page 7