Jillian Cade Page 6

  “Jillian, look at me.” It was hard not to, being that he was right there in my face. “Yes, I lied to you about the meth thing—”

  “And about the cop thing.”

  “Right, that too. But I’m not lying to you now, I swear. There are other things, things in this world that are beyond what most people think of as true . . .”

  God, now he sounded like Norbert.

  “Things that defy logic.”

  Yep, definitely Norbert talking.

  “Things that are bigger than we are,” he said. “Scarier. Darker. Jillian, please. Trust me.”

  I had never looked into a boy’s eyes like this, not this close and not when he was staring back with this much emotion. Now I was doing it for the second time in one day. It didn’t make any sense, and I didn’t trust things that didn’t make sense.

  Also, I didn’t trust people. Any people.

  Especially this person.

  “Why should I listen to you?”

  “Because I can be a lot more than the guy who lies.” He sounded almost pleading. “Or the new cute guy at school—”

  “You’re not that cute,” I lied in return.

  “Fine. Then because I can help you. If we save Todd Harmon, I can prove there’s more to the world than what most people see.”

  “Why?” It had to be asked. “Why now, and why this, and why me?” He opened his mouth but I interrupted. “And don’t say ‘fate.’”

  “Because I am not those guys. I am a very ordinary dude with a very ordinary life.” Sky reached out and wrapped his hands around my upper arms. “But you, Jillian. You are extraordinary, and your life is extraordinary, and you don’t even realize it. Just like your father, I believe in the darker, hidden parts of our world.”

  My father.

  “And Jillian.” He pulled me closer. “I believe in you.”

  As I stared up at him, I wanted to sink into Sky’s version of me. I wanted to be that special girl he claimed I was, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t extraordinary. I was just weird. And sad. And lonely.

  And most important: a fraud, like he’d said before. Like my father, whom Sky couldn’t see as the fraud he was too.

  I pulled away, taking a big step backward. “No. None of this is real.”

  “Jillian.”

  “Goodbye,” I said.

  Then I jumped into my car and headed west on Nordhoff Street to break into Todd Harmon’s place.

  Eight

  Todd and his roommates lived in a sedate complex off Nordhoff and Darby. The break-in was absurdly easy. The spare key was exactly where Corabelle had said it would be: stashed under the got beer? doormat. Honestly, I had expected something a little better from a pre-med student.

  I knocked first. When no one answered, I let myself in. The apartment looked exactly like a place where three twenty-year-old dudes lived together. Old pizza boxes. Recycling bins overflowing with Bud Light cans. A San Diego Chargers jersey thumbtacked to the wall.

  I skirted an IKEA table with mismatched chairs and tiptoed down the hallway. There were four doors: three bedrooms and a bathroom.

  I ruled out the first bedroom because of the pink sticker over the doorknob that said, “Property of Meredith” in curlicue handwriting. Poor Meredith’s boyfriend. I poked my head into the second bedroom—hockey sticks leaning against the unmade bed, a giant stuffed panda, an open Playboy magazine—and then into the third.

  Bingo.

  Right there on the nightstand was a framed photo of Corabelle. I picked it up. She was standing on a dirt path surrounded by trees. Patches of sunlight dappled her face, which was surprisingly devoid of her usual makeup. She was wearing a too-big CSUN shirt over muddy jeans. The shot had caught her midlaugh, her head turned slightly away from the camera, one hand pushing back her blond hair. She looked happy. Happier than I’d ever seen her at school.

  Okay, so as of Friday morning, Todd was still waking up to a picture of Corabelle. That was something. I checked out the rest of the room. Basic double bed with off-white sheets and a tan comforter, unmade. Mainstream rock posters and a map of the world. A desk piled high with textbooks.

  I opened Todd’s closet and shoved through a dozen Oxford shirts in various colors. Sandwiched between a periwinkle and a salmon pinstripe was a patch of clothing that obviously belonged to Corabelle: a little black dress (emphasis on “little”), a red nightie, one pair of designer jeans, and two tank tops sharing a hanger. It was unfathomable. Corabelle—who was only a year older than me—kept personal things at her boyfriend’s apartment. I couldn’t imagine wanting to do that. I couldn’t imagine someone wanting me to.

  I was about to close the door when I caught a gleam of metal in the back corner. I pushed aside a half dozen pairs of khakis for a better view. It was a hook jutting from a small canvas bag. The bag clanked when I lifted it to look inside. More hooks and some clips. I dropped it on the floor and shoved the rest of the hanging clothing over to one side so I could see what was crammed in the back of Todd’s closet—an orange, mesh, two-person tent.

  Camping, my ass.

  Back in my car outside the apartment complex, I found I’d gotten another text from my father, two from Norbert, and one from a number I didn’t recognize:

  havent solved case yet. you?

  Sky! How had he gotten my number? But the moment I sent the question, I knew what he would say:

  Corabelle.

  He followed this up with:

  duh.

  I turned on my car to head for home . . . and then I killed the engine. And sat there, pondering. Maybe there was something—granted, a very tiny kernel of something—to Sky’s theory. Our theories (mine and Sky’s) had more in common than I’d originally thought. It was very probable that Todd was cheating on Corabelle with a girl. Sky believed that Todd was cheating on Corabelle with a succubus. When framed that way, our two theories weren’t that dissimilar. If you took the crazy out of the equation, that is. Point being: maybe Sky and I could work together.

  If Todd was indeed too much of a wuss to confess to Corabelle that he was with some chick, why not tell her it was a succubus? It fell in line with the lies—I mean, “mythology”—on Umbra’s website and would probably pave the way to Corabelle accepting a “love charm” of her own as a partial solution. I could claim that the spell of a succubus is unbreakable, maybe even dig up some “evidence” to support this, and she would just have to move on with her life. Sky would go along with it because he would believe that the other girl really was a succubus. It was a win-win.

  I pulled out my phone again and sent Sky a text message:

  Can you meet me in 20 minutes?

  He answered almost immediately:

  where?

  I sent him details and turned the key in my ignition.

  Sky was already there when I arrived at the benches on the south end of Lake Balboa. As I plopped down beside him, two big white ducks in the water changed course and headed toward us. They didn’t come on land but paddled right by the concrete edge, eyeing us hopefully. I hadn’t brought any bread along, but I wasn’t surprised to see them. I’d pretty much chosen this spot for the same reason I’d chosen the bench at school: there was a lot of bird poop around, in this case, duck poop; the benches tended to be unoccupied.

  Sky swiveled so that his knee grazed my leg. “Did you find something out?” he asked. “Something succubus related?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “A clue about where Todd might be?”

  “More like a clue about where he’s not. He’s definitely not camping.”

  Sky frowned. “Then why are we here? You don’t buy the succubus theory, and you’ve been trying to get rid of me all day. Why the sudden change of heart? What do you want?”

  I moved back a little. “Look, I don’t have to believe in the existence of succubi to know
something weird is going on with Todd Harmon. Also, although it pains me to say it, I acknowledge that you have a desire to help. And although you may say ‘succubus’ and I may say ‘sorority girl,’ at the end of the day, we’re both trying to find the last person to lay eyes on Todd.”

  His green eyes sparkled. “So you want to work together after all?”

  I held a finger up in front of his face. “Under one condition.” I gave him a stern look. “If we are going to do that, I have to trust you. I have to know why you want to help. I have to know that you are being honest with me. So prove it.”

  “Prove what?”

  “That you really believe in this succubus stuff. That you’re not just messing with me. Go on. Tell me what you know—or think you know.”

  Sky looked at me as if I were the crazy one. “It’s all from your dad. I was being serious when I told you that, Jillian.”

  My shoulders sagged. “Right. You’re an expert on the famous Dr. Cade.”

  “I stumbled across a lecture on YouTube, and then I couldn’t stop watching him. His bit on Zoroastrian eschatology was spot-on. His interpretation of the Vendidad was amazing. Once I heard what he had to say, I wanted to find out more. I wanted to know everything.”

  I nodded, hating that Sky bought into Dad’s lies and yet also feeling relieved. If Sky had done this much homework, it was harder to believe that this was all one big practical joke with me as the punch line. Of course, it didn’t explain why he seemed so interested in me.

  “I also get why you’re not into this stuff,” he added. “There’s so much bullshit out there.”

  “A lot of it perpetrated by my own family,” I reminded him. “My dad included, Sky. You know that, right?”

  “Right. Your father capitalized on superstition, and now you’re doing the same thing.”

  “Only to keep Umbra afloat,” I shot back.

  “I’m not judging,” said Sky. “Sometimes we all do things because the end justifies the means, but here’s my point: not everything paranormal is bullshit. Not everything supernatural is false. Some of it is real; some of it is true. Your father would agree with me.”

  “But that’s where you’re wrong,” I told him. “My father is a con artist. He doesn’t buy any of it. The only thing he believes in is the utter stupidity of the people who swallow that paranormal crap.”

  Sky shook his head. “It’s like Santa Claus. Your dad knows there’s no jolly man in a red suit sneaking into kids’ houses at night to give them presents. But he also knows that the story of Saint Nicholas came from somewhere, that it was based on something real. That’s what’s happening here. Most of Umbra’s cases are pure fiction, but somewhere back behind the superstition and made-up nonsense, there’s truth. Your father sees that truth.”

  I frowned. “You’ve never even met my father.”

  “I feel like I know him.”

  “That’s ridiculous. I don’t even know him.” I clamped my mouth shut. Too much info to give a guy I’d only met that morning.

  “I’m telling you, I’ve seen everything he’s ever posted online. I’ve read every thesis and article out there. I would have signed up for one of his classes when I got into town, but . . .”

  “But you couldn’t,” I finished. “He’s not here.”

  “Right. He’s not here.” Sky gave me a gentle smile. “But you are, and I wanted to meet Dr. Cade’s only daughter.”

  Unless he has another daughter named Rose. Remind me to tell you about that sometime, Sky.

  “That’s why I was at your locker. I was hoping to find you. By coincidence, you dropped your combination. Except that it wasn’t a coincidence. It was fate.”

  I stared out over the waters of the man-made lake. In the spring, all the cherry trees surrounding it would burst into magnificent pink blossoms, and the whole place would look like a fairy tale. But at an hour before sunset in late August, it was only a regular old park hidden away in the middle of a very large city. The same way Sky was just a regular guy. No—worse. He was a believer in my father, which made him a sucker. It made me think less of him. It made him less attractive.

  And maybe that was a good thing.

  I turned back to him. “Okay.”

  “Okay?”

  “Okay.” I stuck out my hand. “You can tag along.”

  He smiled and shook it. “In that case, I’ve got news. Diane Bedloe isn’t a succubus after all.”

  I had to smile back. “You think?”

  “Yeah. Norbert did a search for me.”

  “Norbert?!”

  “Yeah, Norbert. You know, your cousin?”

  I glared at him, suddenly seething. “My cousin is off-limits. You don’t talk to him behind my back—”

  “Relax,” Sky cut in. “He wanted to help. He came up with two Diane Bedloes within Los Angeles city limits. I tracked down the first one. Preschool teacher in Los Feliz. Not a succubus job.”

  I forced myself to calm down. I could very easily imagine why Norbert would be eager to help Sky—an older kid, relaxed and self-assured and handsome (i.e., everything Norbert was not)—especially since I’d shut him out of the case. “And just what is a succubus job?” I asked.

  “One you can do at night or in shadows. When I was mapping the preschool online, I realized something. There are palm trees around the playground, but they don’t give a lot of shade. That particular Diane Bedloe must spend a lot of time in direct sunlight, and—”

  “Sunlight kills succubi.”

  “Exactly,” he said. “Which means that the Diane Bedloe who was a new patient at Todd’s workplace couldn’t be a succubus.”

  I nodded. “Because she came in during the day.”

  “Right. And it’s not like I didn’t think of that in the first place, but Diane’s appointment was at nine in the morning. You know how the marine layer always settles over the Valley on summer mornings? I figured she was still protected by the cloud cover, except that then I went back and checked Wednesday’s weather. Remember how it was really hot last week? The marine layer burnt off early. There’s no way a succubus would have been out in the daytime. She would have fried for sure.”

  Clearly there was no use being upset that he’d gotten to Norbert; they were meant for each other. I took a deep breath. “All right, so we’re crossing Diane Bedloe off the list of potential succubi.” I tried to sound like I meant it.

  Sky squinted at me. “You don’t mean it.”

  I couldn’t win with this guy.

  “You’re right,” I said. “I don’t. But since I am temporarily allowing you to assist me on the case, I’m going to play nicely. At least, I’ll try.”

  “There is a succubus loose in Los Angeles. That I know for sure.”

  “And if you’re wrong?” I asked him.

  He considered. “If I’m wrong, I’ll leave you alone. Norbert too. Even when your dad comes back. Your whole family. Completely, utterly, totally. Happy?”

  Oddly enough, I wasn’t, but I nodded anyway. “Beyond happy.”

  Sky leaned closer, lowering his voice. “However, if I’m right . . .”

  I gazed back at him, once again too close to those green eyes. The seconds ticked past. Not attractive, not attractive, not attractive.

  “What? What if you’re right?” I demanded.

  Sky grinned and tilted away from me. “I’ll let you know.”

  I stood up, relieved. “Then I’ll get busy holding my breath. See you tomorrow.”

  He didn’t follow me. Instead he called to me from the bench as I walked away. “Bye, partner.”

  I knew he was still smiling.

  Nine

  By the time I pulled into my driveway, the sun had almost disappeared. The sky was darkening, along with my mood. I was more tired, hungry, and confused than I’d been in a while—a considerable feat, consi
dering I’d been fending for myself the past year. I was holding way too many questions in my brain and way too many emotions in my . . . wherever emotions live: anger at my father, fear about the obituary and what it meant, confusion about Sky, frustration with Corabelle’s case. Not to mention curiosity about who this “Rose” person could be.

  Funny: as usual, an Umbra case was the only thing in my life over which I had some small measure of control.

  I decided to focus on it.

  Todd seemed like a reasonably together guy—job, school, apartment, eyes on the future. So if he lied about going camping to his friends and ditched work, something really might be off with him. Something more than just a girl. I made an internal note to ask Corabelle if she knew about any history of mental illness in his family. Tomorrow, of course. Right now I needed a granola bar. Or a half bag of stale chips, or an apple, or a bowl of cereal without milk. Those were the options awaiting me . . .

  Shit. I was almost to my garage stairs when I remembered what I’d promised Norbert: Dad’s stupid red box.

  I let myself into the back door of my father’s house. It was really dark, so I slid my hand up the interior wall to the light switch. I flipped it up . . . and nothing happened. Oh yeah, the electricity. The other thing I’d forgotten: pay the final past-due notice. One of the big reasons I needed Corabelle’s case in the first place.

  With both arms blindly stretched out before me, I shuffled ahead until the floor under my high heels changed from wood to linoleum: the kitchen. Reaching out to the left, my fingers closed on the handle of a drawer and pulled it open. After a second of groping around the cluttered interior, I found what I was looking for—a box of emergency candles and a book of matches.

  After all, we did live in earthquake country.

  I lit a candle and used its flickering light to find one of my mother’s delicate china saucers. Drops of wax fell on the porcelain until there was enough to secure the candle in place. Holding my makeshift torch, I pushed open the slatted saloon doors separating the kitchen from the living room. They creaked when they swung shut behind me. A cobweb drifted over my face. Yet more reminders that everyone who used to live here was now somewhere else.