Hollywood Dead: Elisabeth Hicks, Witch Detective

by Rachel Graves

  “Don’t be late. I might not be here.”

  “Yeah, yeah, what do they say?”

  “First is a new sale. All of the transfer paperwork hasn’t come in yet but I got you the dealership from upstate. Second is a fleet car, owned by one of the studios out in—oh hey look at this—LA, where you just happen to be going today.”

  “Life is full of strange coincidences like that,” I agreed. “I think I’ll pick those up on my way out of town instead of this afternoon.”

  “Surprise, surprise,” she marveled before hanging up. I wondered where I’d seen the second plate. There’d been too many things going on lately for me to keep track. One of those things was my car. They’d taken it away on Wednesday and my first stop was the dealership to try and get it back.

  16

  Swapping the loaner for my car went smoother than I expected. Check written and keys exchanged, I headed toward Garcia, hoping that having one less thing to worry about would make it all make sense. On the drive, I tried to ignore the stack of paperwork next to me. I’d read enough at home to pique my interest. Thankfully, the drive out to county was short and the conversation with Garcia about how I really ought to consider joining the force was even shorter. With an interoffice mail envelope that would never see the interior of the office again and my own car back, I was ready to head into LA and what waited for me there.

  I was on the on-ramp when my cell phone chirped. I grabbed it, checked the number and tried to decide how to handle this one. “How’s Tina?”

  “Tina?” Calvin asked, sounding confused.

  “The woman you fed off of last night.”

  “Oh her. A little bit of a freak but otherwise pretty tasty.”

  My stomach did a few lazy flip-flops. “So, just the biting?”

  “Actually, it was all about how she wanted to be bitten. Most women want—”

  “I don’t want to know.” The steering wheel slipped under my sweaty palms. I tightened my grip, taking control of the wheel and the conversation. “I meant what did you learn?”

  “Uh-huh, I knew you didn’t want to hear it, Hicks. Survivors never do. Anyway, apparently studio security has been ordered to keep Jeremy Steel away from women.”

  “Why? Does he hurt them? Beat them? What?” Alarm bells went off in my head. I kicked myself for not going back to that bar to rescue her last night.

  “I have sympathy for your situation, Hicks, I do. What with things you don’t want LaRue to know and who you’re trying to protect but work with me here, okay? Your sister’s a big girl. She can take care of herself.” He paused, waiting for me to agree with him. When I didn’t, he went on. “Tina doesn’t know what the deal is, but it’s their job to keep Jeremy Steel away from women except the ones the studio likes.”

  “What ones does the studio like?”

  “Costars, actresses. She told me the names but I don’t know any of them.” He paused again, swallowing. This time I didn’t think I was supposed to say anything. “She told me where Samuel is. They bled him and locked him in a back-lot basement. It’s covered in crosses. Even if he had the strength to get out he couldn’t.”

  “Uh-huh.” I decided to give him nothing and see where he went with the conversation.

  “I need you to get him out.”

  I figured that’s where he was going to go. “What’s he going to be like?”

  “Honest answer? A dried-out husk. You’ll have to carry him and wrap him in a blanket or something. In that state, the sunlight would dust him in seconds.”

  “Or we could wait until tonight and he could walk out on his own,” I tried.

  “Maybe if we went together and you opened the place for me, then I feed him enough to wake him up. But see there’s a problem—when I feed him, he’s not going to be himself for a while.”

  My hands clenched into fists around the wheel again, suddenly nervous. “What does that mean?”

  “He’s going to be pretty much an animal until he gets enough blood in him. You probably don’t want to be around for that part.”

  “You’re damn right I don’t.” I didn’t like being around vampires when they passed for people, let alone when they were animals.

  “You get him during the day, wrap him up like a package and bring him here. We wake him up at night, when you’re far away. Or you get me in, wait by the door. I wake him and you deal with your inner conflicts.”

  “What about I get you in, we get him, I drive you home, and then you wake him.”

  “That’s not my favorite option.”

  “Funny, it’s mine.”

  “No doubt, but what happens if today they find out what Tina said to me? Or they don’t hear anything but they decide to get rid of him. It’s nearly dawn now. I don’t want to risk that something happens today and he gets staked.”

  “Why is he alive anyway?” That part of this equation didn’t make sense. If I’d caught a dangerous vampire, he wasn’t going to last for someone to rescue him.

  “I don’t know, but seriously Hicks, he’s one open window shade away from dust. I don’t like him sitting there.”

  “Have you talked to LaRue?” I wanted Calvin to tell me he couldn’t get to LaRue until this afternoon. I needed an excuse not to deal with a corpse that could wake up as a blood-crazed vampire.

  “Not yet. You tell him.”

  “Fine.” I didn’t like Samuel when he was normal. I’d like him less when he was a mad dog. That didn’t mean I wanted him dead. “Where is he?”

  “Lot b72.”

  “Shit.”

  “What?”

  “That’s next to where Jeremy was filming the last time I was out there.”

  “Well, maybe you could stop by, say hello, beat on him until he talks, that sort of thing.”

  It wasn’t a bad idea except, with all those muscles, Jeremy might be able to take me. “How about I get Samuel and we do that part together?”

  “Glad to. Look, I got to go,” he said, distracted, maybe even scared.

  “You sound freaked out.”

  “It’s after sunrise. Any minute now my heart’s going to stop. I won’t be able to breathe and the whole world will go dark.”

  I’d never asked Jo what it was like to stay up past dawn; never asked any of them. Calvin made it sound pretty horrible. “Sounds like dying.”

  “Every morning. I’d really like to be asleep when it happens.”

  “Gotcha. I’ll call you when I have Samuel, leave a message, then take him to LaRue’s.”

  “Good.” He paused. “Hey, Hicks?”

  “What?”

  “Be careful.”

  Dead spirit witches passing along advice and morally bankrupt vampires didn’t make for a good morning. Thankfully, the memories of Ted and the things we’d done—combined with a dark coffee in my hand—did. I thought leaving a message to William about the files but if Ted’s place was bugged, that wasn’t the best the idea. In a way I was grateful to Samuel for getting kidnapped. If I got him out today and back to LaRue’s, there was a good chance by tonight the Jeremy Steel problem would be solved. Then I could concentrate on the OPS files sitting on the seat next to me.

  I’d gotten on the highway too late—or maybe too early. Either way cars slowed to crawl. There’s was nothing to do but sit in stop and go traffic and curse. After ten minutes, I reached over to read the OPS files, all except for Ted’s. His file up was locked up tight in the safe that usually held only firearms and ammo. He’d practically given me permission to read it, but I wondered how much I wanted to know. As I flipped through the reports of what Rudy had done with his time, I grew surer that I didn’t want to know at all.

  OPS was charged with getting the answers when no one else could. Not just intelligence, but counter intelligence—they went against people who knew how to keep a secret. According to the file, Rudy was good at extracting secrets. He also specialized in suturing the wounds he opened, and doing things with pliers that just weren’t right. It seemed every OPS
agent had two specialties though, and Rudy was good at both information extraction and psychic coercion. That last one probably involved some of the potential psychic abilities in his personal profile and a lot of really nasty images.

  I shivered as the car crawled forward another few miles then grabbed the second R. Dollern report.

  It turned out that Rudy had a sister, not a brother—Ruby Dollern. I cursed their parents for giving them what was essentially one name. They had a similar background, too. Same messed-up parents who beat on each other until they’d died, same distant but not unloving grandparents. The only difference was that Ruby, born five minutes before her brother, saw herself as his caretaker. For that reason, OPS had separated them, forcing them to work on different continents when, as far as anyone could tell, they’d always shared a bedroom. Ruby hadn’t been pleased at all with the arrangement. A string of complaint letters to her superiors filled her file. She was positive her brother needed her. Nothing in his file indicated he thought twice about the arrangement.

  Traffic opened up enough to make reading not a good idea. Left to wander, my mind began to ask itself if I was being the Ruby to Gina’s Rudy. Maybe the spirit I’d spoken to this morning was right and I could trust Jeremy Steel. Maybe Calvin was right and Gina was a big girl. I did my best to balance my desire to go fix the problem and keep my family safe for another two miles, or twenty minutes. Thinking about the spirit from this morning reminded me of the one who’d told me someone was coming to kill me. I’d dismissed it as nothing, maybe even a bad dream, but now I wondered if it had been related to Ted’s problems. Traffic crawled by. Completely without a solution to my personal life, I turned off on to a side ramp.

  Lost, but not thoroughly lost, I ended up just two blocks away from Dan, producer and cheating husband. My camera was in the glove box, just in case, and I decided to take the opportunity.

  I trudged up the stairs to the roof, promising myself it would only be an hour or two before I would grab Samuel. Because, really, I didn’t want him dead, I just didn’t know what to expect from a vampire in his condition. My ignorance –or maybe even fear – made me want to put things off, but not for too long. Waiting until noon, or close to noon, when the sun was highest in the sky and the traffic was thin just made sense.

  Dan was working in his office. I watched through the camera’s telephoto lens; glad there was a ledge to set it on. He read through a script, or something that looked like one for a while, and then fiddled with his phone. A minute later a very dashing looking young man walked in, one that had the familiar face of a working actor. Not quite an award winner, but a guy who you sort of remembered, even if you couldn’t remember his name. They talked across the desk from each other, the actor slouched, casual; Dan leaning forward, interested. They made an odd pair—the older man in charge yet almost too eager, the younger man somewhere between bored and anxious.

  I turned away from the camera, doing my best to squeeze just another drop of coffee out of the third cup of the day before checking my watch. Almost noon, which meant time to give up on this. I looked back, hoping for a reason to stall. I got one. Dan and the actor were gone. I swiveled the camera to the left, back to the office, but the door was shut and the secretary in the outer room hadn’t moved. To the right, in the bedroom, there was ample movement.

  The Hollywood casting couch was alive and well in Dan’s office. I shot the memory card full and then switched to another one. Nearly three hundred photos and a few choice video clips later, I thanked whoever had come up with the digital zoom and packed up. The gravel twisted under my feet, sending up clouds of white dust I wouldn’t ever have to inhale again.

  At the door to the roof, I locked it securely behind me, knowing I wouldn’t need to come back. And maybe, if I was forced to admit it, still procrastinating. A part of me didn’t want to get Samuel, but with no more reason to delay, and no more traffic, I didn’t have a choice.

  17

  Tina left a badge for me at studio security. The room looked the same—gray fabric-covered cubicles and sturdy desks, but now it held people, too. A pair of teenage boys, probably busted for some prank, half a dozen folks in gray security uniforms, and a receptionist with a Hollywood smile. The last one made me wonder how many studio employees had started out dreaming of becoming a movie star.

  “Good morning, how can I help you?” She glanced up at me with her dark brown hair half swept up and half down, tortoiseshell glasses making her look sexy-smart. In any other town, she’d be a superstar. In Hollywood, she was just another working stiff.

  “There’s a visitor’s badge for me.” I flashed my ID. It took her less than a minute to find the badge. Too soon I was outside, headed for the back lot that held Samuel, wishing it had taken longer.

  I had a suitcase, a tarp, and about thirty bungee cords in my car’s trunk. If Samuel had been put in a small space, folded up, his body would be dried into that position. He’d fit in the suit case. If he’d been put in a coffin, he’d be stiff and stretched out, too brittle to bend, and I would wrap him in the tarp with the cords making sure it didn’t slip off. Planning didn’t do wonders for my appetite but it reassured me about the whole thing.

  The studio lacked the glamour that I wanted it to have. No Roman gladiators crossed my path, no wolf men, or beautiful stars. Today, the actors who walked in front of me could have businessmen and women going to lunch. I stifled my disappointment and turned down another row of shiny steel mushrooms. Each sound stage was marked with letters and numbers, painted black and stretching a foot high on the outside. A smaller marker indicated the movie being filmed along with the star. I didn’t smile when I saw Jeremy’s name. I parked the car and thought about him sitting with my sister only a few feet away from the men who had attacked Samuel.

  Gina, my pretty, stubborn kid sister. The one who always got what she wanted and could be a bit of a brat. She deserved better. At nearly nineteen, she wouldn’t want to hear that from me, but I didn’t want Gina ending up in a basement somewhere—or worse. Just because they hadn’t killed Samuel didn’t mean they wouldn’t kill her.

  I threw on the parking brake with more force than I needed, taking the things I needed from the trunk—tarp and cords tucked inconspicuously in the suitcase—and headed into the doorway in front of me.

  If you act confidently enough people don’t question you, even when you’re hauling around a suitcase in the middle of the day. My performance seemed perfect until my fingers brushed the door of the sound stage and I heard my name.

  “Elisabeth?”

  It was tentative but I knew Jeremy’s voice by now. “What?” I asked through clenched teeth.

  “I’m glad I ran into you. You’re probably busy following someone but I wanted to explain what happened.”

  The offer was exactly what I wanted – an excuse to leave Samuel for just a little longer. But sundown would sneak up on me. I couldn’t keep stalling. “I’m not following anyone, but what I need to do can’t wait.”

  He took a step toward me. “Then I’ll go with you. Because we need to talk about the other day. I handled that really badly and then Gina told me about your protective streak and…” I turned around and he stopped. Maybe it was my face, or maybe it was the out-of-place suitcase.

  “Not right now.” I turned back to the door and he grabbed my arm.

  “No, right now. This is important. You’re Gina’s sister and she matters a lot to me so I need you to understand.”

  I didn’t like being grabbed so I let my temper go. “No, you need to understand. There were two guys following you last night from studio security. The day after I met you, they called me and threatened Jo. When one of my friends came out here to look into it, they nearly killed him. It’s taken two of us working together to find him and now I have to get him out before they decide to finish him off.”

  His face went flat, passive, only the tight line of his lips betraying his rage. “I’ll help you.”

  I studied him, trying
to get some read off him with my magic. I wanted him to be shocked, to not know anything about the studio tailing him or, one better, to know everything and spill it. Angry silence didn’t help me. Why wasn’t he shocked? Did he know about all this? Was I even in a position to question his motives? I might be going for a docile corpse but the possibility of finding a blood-starved insane vampire loomed. Even if I didn’t trust Jeremy, I could use his help. I yanked the door open, less than happy with the situation. “Suit yourself.”

  Inside, high wooden shelves held props of all sizes and shapes. There was no rhyme or reason to the way things filled those shelves, huge empty planters sat next to a stack of medieval shields. At the end of one row, a grass hut waited for some native to call it home.

  “Where are we going?” Jeremy asked.

  “I don’t know. All I know is he’s in the basement.”

  “Then it’s this way.” He took the lead, going through the maze-like shelves without blinking.

  “How long have you worked here that you know your way around this well?” It didn’t seem like an actor should know the prop rooms. The sound stages, the lights, the makeup maybe, but props? Shouldn’t a big star have people to do that for him?

  “A while.” He evaded the real question while opening a door at the end of the building. The pitch-black inside didn’t bother me, the idea that Samuel—crazed for blood and stronger than ten men—could be waiting inside did. I let Jeremy go first.

  It was the right decision. He flipped on a light switch and revealed a room full of bodies. They were wax or maybe just foam, but they looked real—vacant eyes and lifelike skin.

  “They’re from horror movies. Anytime you need someone to melt, you make a wax copy. Then you turn on the heat lamps and they go like an ice cube.”

  “Or you just computer generate it.” The wax figures creeped me out. I walked close behind him, waiting for one of them to come to life and attack us.