Elise’s mother had come for her in May, signing her out of the hospital at Camarillo and taking her home to Nebraska. Marie had gone with Elise’s mother to sign her out of the institution and help get her ready to go home. She had visited a few times since the night of the fire at Piedmont’s, and had always hoped for some sign of recovery, imagining that the part of Elise that Malliol had taken was able to return to its body once the demon was dispatched. But there was never as much as a glimmer of recognition from Elise, and Marie had been left to hold dear the memory of how Elise had finally overtaken the demon and spoken with her one last time.
Now she pulled the pencil from behind her ear to make a small correction in the manuscript. She saw movement out of the corner of her eye and looked up, expecting a customer to have come in. A smile spread across her face when she saw Tom standing in the doorway of the store. “Hey, good lookin’,” he said.
“Hey.” She set the pencil down and came around the counter to give him a kiss.
“How’s business been today?”
“A little slow. It’s okay, though. We’ll start advertising once all the stock is sorted.”
“We’ll need to work a few Sundays to get it all done,” he said.
“I suppose.” Marie hated the idea of working on Sundays, but she knew there was no way around it for now. Tom had traded the old Dodge for a second-hand Indian, and the pair had lately spent every Sunday riding through the mountains or along the beach. Marie thrilled at the feeling of wrapping her arms around Tom and feeling the wind whip her clothing and hair as he pushed the old motorcycle to its limits. If getting the store completely up and running meant sacrificing a few of those Sundays, she would do it, but reluctantly.
“How’s the story coming?” he asked, nodding toward the little stack of pages on the counter.
“Good.” She smiled.
“Ready to let me read it?”
“I think so.”
“Ready to send it off?” he pressed.
She let out her breath and said, “Soon,” with understated confidence. She nodded toward the magazine rack and all the vivid colors and lurid images on the covers of the pulps. “I just have to decide which one to send it to first.”
“What do you mean, ‘first’?” he joked. “It’ll sell straightaway. I know it.”
“We’ll see.”
Tom reached out to pet the cat. “So if it’s slow,” he said, “what say you close up early and take a ride with me? We could take Sunset out to the palisades and watch the sun go down.”
She had to think about it for only a moment. “All right,” she said. In no time, the register was emptied and the safe in the office was locked; the fan and lights were turned off, and Marie scooped up Murphy while Tom flipped the “Open” sign in the window to “Closed.”
“You parked by me?” Marie asked. When Tom nodded, she said, “Just follow me home so I can drop the old man here, and then we’ll go.”
She pulled the door shut and locked it, hugging the cat to her bosom with her other arm. Tom leaned against the building and bent his head close to hers. “So then we’ll come back later…?”
She smiled wickedly at him. “If you’re a good boy.”
“Mmm. I think I can do that.” As they stepped away from the door, Tom paused for a moment to consider the new sign on the window. “You sure about the sign?” he asked.
“What about it? I think it’s clever.”
He shook his head. “Not the ‘Sunset’ part. The occult stuff.” He pointed at the words. “You put that up and you’re liable to get some pretty strange characters coming in here.”
Marie considered the sign for only a moment, touched by his concern. Then with a shrug, she leaned into his broad chest and said, “I think we can handle ‘em.”
* * * * * * * *
Author’s Note
Thanks for reading The Devil You Know. I hope you enjoyed the book as much as I’ve enjoyed working on it. This book has a rather convoluted history; it started as a science fiction story about parasitic shape-shifting aliens who took on the appearance of good looking leading men, seducing young women in 1940s Hollywood and using their bodies as hosts for their offspring. In that first version, Marie was a secretary for a private investigator and Tom was an LAPD detective. As you’ve seen, the book changed an awful lot by the time it reached its final form, and as challenging as the process was, it was also a lot of fun to watch the story develop.
As an independent novelist, it’s both challenging and rewarding to get my books into the hands of readers, and I’m glad this book found its way into yours. If you enjoyed it, would you do me a favor and post a review to Amazon? There are a lot of books out there, and readers’ reviews and recommendations are some of the best ways to help a book get noticed. You can post your Amazon review here. I would be most grateful if you did.
I’d also love to hear from you, so feel free to get in touch through my Facebook page or the Contact page at my website.
You can also sign up for my Free Newsletter to be kept up to date on new releases, special promotions, and giveaways.
Starting on the next page, I’ve included a Sneak Peek of my novel Take Back Tomorrow, another noir story but this one is science fiction rather than paranormal fantasy. I hope you enjoy it.
Thanks again for reading.
Best wishes,
Richard Levesque
Sneak Peek: Take Back Tomorrow by Richard Levesque
"Raymond Chandler meets Robert Heinlein in this fun and inventive crossover SF novel from Richard Levesque."--J. Orr, Amazon Reviews
"Apart from stopping to have something to eat I haven't been able to tear myself away from this until I had finished it. This is good old time story telling that is well written, and definitely well worth reading."--M. Bowden, Amazon UK Hall of Fame Reviewer
What if all you had to do to make your dreams come true was violate the laws of the universe?
That's not just a philosophical question Eddie Royce has to answer. It's a choice he has to make when the most famous science fiction writer of the 1930s goes missing and his unscrupulous publisher becomes convinced that Eddie knows all of the older writer's secrets--not just the secret of where he's gone, but the secret of how he's traveled in time.
Until now, Eddie's fooled himself into thinking he's got the system figured out, "borrowing" plots from Shakespeare and rewriting them as space operas to make a name for himself in the pulps. But when he finds out that Chester Blackwood--his idol and inspiration--has been cheating the system in ways Eddie could never have dreamed of, the hack science fiction writer finds himself in the middle of a plot that his pulp readers would never have imagined.
Now he has to do all he can to save himself--and Blackwood's beautiful daughter--from the powerful figures who all want Blackwood's secret. And violating the laws of the universe might just be the least of Eddie's problems.
"The pace of the story is quick, and the time transitions are handled well. Overall, this is a good novel, one that even readers with little interest in sci-fi might enjoy." -- Publishers Weekly.*
"Hardboiled 30′s crime thriller meets time-traveling pulp science-fiction for an original fast paced, page turner," --S. Sager, Amazon Reviews
"It has a distinctly 'noir' flavor as well as an old school science fiction feel. It is fast paced and clever."--C. Pellitteri, Amazon Reviews
*This review was of the manuscript version submitted to Amazon's Breakout Novel Awards competition in 2012.
From Take Back Tomorrow
Copyright © 2012 Richard Levesque
CHAPTER ONE
Eddie Royce sat in Whistler’s office on the sixth floor of the Meteor building and waited patiently for the editor to look up from the galleys he studied, a smoldering cigar held between his thick lips and a look of quiet disgust on his face as he read. The muffled clack and ding of a typewriter made its way into the office from somewhere beyond Whistler’s closed door, and Eddie tried hard not to let it
distract him. He sat in one of the mismatched chairs that faced Whistler’s enormous, scarred desk and thumbed nervously through the March 1940 issue of Stupendous, silently going over the pitch he had been formulating for days and hoping Whistler would not notice his anxiety. The magazine had hit the newsstands only three days ago, and Eddie had already read it cover to cover, focusing most of his scrutiny on one story—“Dark Hearts of Mars” by Edward Royce. It was his second publication in Stupendous, his second publication anywhere, really, but he already had two more stories and a serial accepted. After finally seeing his name in print following months of trying and failing, he had quickly come to believe in his success as a writer in spite of what he knew to be true—that he was at best unoriginal and at worst a plagiarist.
As with every issue of Stupendous, the cover of the magazine in Eddie’s hands was a work of art that no doubt accounted for a large portion of sales each month. The covers were always sensational, and this one featured a beautiful female space explorer watching in exaggerated alarm as her space ship exploded in the background, apparently leaving her stranded as she floated in space, her skin tight suit accentuating her curvaceous figure. Eddie knew from having carefully studied “Castaways in Space” in this issue that the story featured no such character or scene, but that did not matter. The Stupendous covers pulled readers in, and the stories kept them there until next month. Dozens of recent issues were scattered around Whistler’s office, each with its brightly lurid variation of the barely clad female warrior, seductive villainess or imperiled princess to draw the eye. With the first installment of his serial to appear in the May issue, Eddie knew that promoting it with a cover illustration would ensure reader interest and secure his position in the stable of Stupendous authors, and he had phoned to make an appointment with Whistler this morning to try to convince the editor of the same thing.
That Whistler had largely ignored him after having him seen into the office had not helped Eddie’s nerves any. He was made even more agitated when Whistler looked up from the desk for a moment and mumbled around his cigar, “Blackwood’s coming in this morning. I mentioned you’d be here. Says he wants to meet you.” He paused, an eyebrow rising to make deeper wrinkles in the editor’s already craggy forehead, before adding “Can’t imagine why” and returning to ponder the galleys before him.
Eddie did not know how to respond. Chester Blackwood was the most famous, most successful writer of science fiction in the last fifteen years. His stories and novels had been among the most inspirational things Eddie had ever read, and meeting his idol was something he had been hoping for since he had first begun getting published in Stupendous.
“I assume you don’t mind,” Whistler said, pulling the cigar out of his mouth and holding it over the galleys like a pen.
“About Blackwood?”
“Yep.” The editor set the galleys down now and stared at Eddie with more scrutiny than Eddie would have liked.
“No,” Eddie said a bit too quickly. “I don’t mind at all.” He paused. “Why would I mind?”
Whistler shrugged. “Star struck maybe. A writer like you. A writer like him. Some guys get antsy.”
“No, no,” he said. “It’s fine. What time’s he coming in?” He realized he might not get his chance to bring up the cover illustration if he didn’t say something about it quickly.
Whistler glanced at his wristwatch. “Should be here now. SOB’s always late, though.”
Eddie barely had time to register shock at the epithet when the door to Whistler’s office swung violently open behind him, slamming against a wall and half bouncing closed again before Eddie could turn in surprise. He heard before he saw the woman in the doorway shouting, “Whistler, goddammit, I’ve had it!” Twisted around in the chair, Eddie beheld a beautiful woman whose anger practically bubbled out of her. With platinum hair hanging to her shoulders and bright, gaudy makeup exaggerating otherwise stunning lips and eyes, she stood in a tattered green terry cloth robe, her chest heaving, her face red and her eyes brimming with tears of rage. She looked to be about 25, perhaps a year or two younger than Eddie.
Whistler stood up behind the desk and calmly said, “Now look, sweetie.”
“Don’t sweetie me, you son of a bitch!” she shouted, stepping all the way into the room, only two feet away from Eddie but oblivious to his presence. “I’m not doing it. Not this time. Not anymore.”
“All right, all right. Just calm down and catch your breath for a second.” When she remained silent, Whistler continued. “This is Mr. Royce, by the way. You may be modeling for one of his stories next month if he gets his way.” Eddie turned again to look at Whistler, stunned at what appeared to be Whistler’s amazing intuition. The editor really did know writers. But probably not women, Eddie thought.
The woman barely glanced in Eddie’s direction and then said, more calmly now, “Not a chance. You either need to get Klaus another model or you need to get me another artist. I’ve had it, I tell you.”
“Let’s not go overboard here, Roxie.” Whistler was beginning to take a patronizing tone with her. Eddie doubted that it would do any good. “Now tell me what the problem is, and we’ll see what we can work out.”
“This is the problem,” the woman said, her voice rising again as she quickly undid the terry cloth belt and pulled open the robe. Eddie felt his face grow red, and he glanced quickly at the floor before finding himself compelled to look up again and stare. She stood in an outfit that would have been perfectly suited to one of the women on the covers of Stupendous: gold boots that went to just above the knee, fish net stockings covering her thighs, gold short pants that went only to the tops of the thighs and wide, gold suspenders that crisscrossed her bare chest, leaving her breasts almost completely exposed. They swayed slightly from the motion of her arms having yanked the robe open, and Eddie found himself wondering what kept the suspenders in place. It was the same question he would have asked if he had seen her on the cover of the magazine.
Whistler cleared his throat. “A little too much skin, huh?”
“Yeah,” she responded sharply, her eyes growing wide, challenging.
“You know he’ll change your face on the final drawing. It’s not like you’ll be walking down the street and people will recognize you from the cover. They never have before.”
“That’s not it, and you know it. He’s a pervert! You should see the way he stares.”
“He’s an artist, Roxie. He’s got to look if he wants to paint you.”
“But do I have to be dressed like this while he does it? Couldn’t I just strike the pose?”
Whistler sighed as though he had been through this with her before. “You know he’s got his limitations. He needs his models in costume, or he can’t capture the feeling of the scene.”
“He can change my face but not the outfit? You know that’s not it. You know it as well as I do. Even you can see that, can’t you?” This last was addressed to Eddie, and he felt himself grow redder, both at having been acknowledged by her and at having been caught so obviously staring at her breasts.
He self-consciously looked up into her eyes. They were deep and blue and stared right back at him. “I . . .” he began, but she waved her hand dismissively at him, glared once more at Whistler, then turned on her heel and strode out of the office, the robe still open and fanning out behind her as she walked past a tall, gray haired man outside Whistler’s door.
“Hi, Daddy,” she said and kept walking.
Behind Eddie, Whistler let out a long sigh and then said, “Eddie Royce, meet Chester Blackwood.” Eddie spun quickly to look at Whistler, then turned again as he got out of the chair to face the door. “You’ve actually met the whole Blackwood family now,” Whistler added, sounding quite amused.
Blackwood stepped into the office, a mischievous look on his face. He was taller than Eddie had imagined and looked considerably older than the pictures on the backs of his books. He wore a wide brimmed fedora, which he took off almost immediate
ly to reveal a head of thinning gray hair. He had a full, thick mustache that drooped down past the corners of his mouth, hiding his smile almost entirely. His eyes were the same deep blue as his daughter’s but with deep crow’s feet around them. When he smiled, the wrinkles lifted and were more expressive than his mostly hidden mouth, but when the smile faded, the wrinkles made his eyes appear heavy, weary and empty. He smiled now as he gave Eddie a firm handshake while Whistler formally introduced them.
“Roxanne can be a bit volatile,” Blackwood said as he released Eddie’s hand and looked back at the door his daughter had just stormed out of. Eddie could only grin in embarrassment. Painfully beautiful, Roxanne’s presence alone would have been enough to shake Eddie, but her outburst and her costume had left him in a spin, and immediately meeting the writer he most wanted to be like after Roxanne’s tempestuous departure had caused Eddie to feel almost numb and self-consciously foolish. It was not the professional meeting of peers he had fantasized about. After a few moments of exchanged pleasantries, Whistler left them, clearly feeling the need to find a pretense to leave the two writers alone. His departure was so awkward and obvious that it made Eddie even more nervous, as though Blackwood had made it known ahead of time that he wanted to be alone with the younger writer, something Eddie had not been prepared for. Under any other circumstances, he would have been thrilled, but now it made him uneasy.
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