No Humans Involved

advantage. If I knew I was being taped, I could put on a good performance. And I could make damned sure I didn't pick my nose, scratch my ass or badmouth anyone in the common rooms. As long as they weren't taping me in my bedroom…

I put down the contract and searched. No cameras. Whew.

AS I headed to breakfast the next morning, Becky called to me from the living room. When I caught up with her, she was already vanishing into the study that now served as a communal office.

'I wanted to thank you for helping us out with Grady yesterday,' she said as she shut the door. 'I really appreciate it, and I want you to be the first to hear Mr. Simon's amazing new idea for the show. I just know you're going to love this.'

I braced myself. In Hollywood, the words 'you're going to love this' are more plea than assurance.

'Rather than pepper our show with random seances, why not make it a theme?' She lifted her hands, punctuating her words with a jab as if pointing to them on a marquee. 'One final curtain call for the tragic dead of Brentwood.'

'You want us to contact more dead movie stars?' I said finally.

'Not just movie stars. Brentwood stars. Those killed under mysterious circumstances, like Tansy Lane. A theme, leading to the grand finale with Marilyn Monroe.'

'It's an… interesting concept,' I said carefully. 'Certainly ambitious-'

'We don't expect you to do as well with every ghost as you did with Tansy. You can ask how they died, but we won't expect any real revelations. We'll intercut with some talking heads giving their theories, some old detectives reminiscing about the cases, and by the end of the segment, no one will even notice that we didn't actually find out anything new.'

'It sounds… interesting.'

Becky crumpled, bracing herself against the desk. 'It's horrible. I'm so sorry. We're still having issues with Grady, and this is Mr. Simon's solution, knowing how much Grady loves working with mysterious deaths.'

'I'm not comfortable with changing the format at this point. It's been changed once, when they set it in this house, and I was very understanding about that.'

Terror filled Becky's eyes. Part of me wanted to stand my ground and tell her that if she wanted to make the show she envisioned, then she'd better grow a backbone and stand up to men like Bradford Grady. But another part of me remembered being young, ambitious and overwhelmed, and I wanted to be the one person not making this shoot a living hell for her.

'I'll consider a change of format, but on several conditions.'

'Name them.'

'I want a written guarantee of equal screen time in the final production and equal preshow promotion. Is the Tansy Lane segment in danger of being cut?'

'Definitely not. I'll get Mr. Simon to put that in writing. No matter how much weight Grady throws around, your success with Tansy stays.'

Her cell phone rang. A few quick words, then she hung up. 'I need to run. The next seance will be after lunch. We're keeping the locations and subjects a secret. Yes, I know-Grady is an expert and by tonight his team will be faxing him dossiers on every semifamous person who died in this neighborhood. But I have a plan.'

She headed for the door, then stopped. 'Oh, and before you leave, there's a release form on the desk. Just an addendum to your contract. It's in the blue folder. Take it with you to read over. No rush.'

I OPENED the blue folder she'd left on the desk. Inside was a single printed sheet. On first glance, it looked more like a memo than a release form.

Subject: Gabrielle Langdon.

The name sounded familiar, but I had to read a few lines before I realized what I was looking at: a detailed summary of the life and death of arguably Brentwood 's most famous murder victim.

I slapped the folder shut and scanned the desk, but there were no more blue folders. No folders of any color.

Becky said she had a plan, and now I knew what it was.

I HAD lunch and the early afternoon off, so Jeremy picked me up. He'd already checked in with Robert and a second potential source: Clay. Like Jeremy and Elena, Clay worked part-time and primarily from home-the advantage to having a healthy communal bank account and little desire for material goods. From Jeremy and Elena, I knew Clay was passionate about his work, but he rarely talked about it with anyone outside the Pack.

While Robert Vasic looked like the stereotypical professor, no one looked-or acted-less like one than Clay. Yet that's what he was: an anthropologist. His specialty was religions with animal deities. There's a name for it, which I can never remember, and it's not like he's about to discuss it with me anytime soon.

'Any luck?' I said, shutting the car door.

'Very little,' he said as he pulled from the curb. 'According to Clay, we're barking up the wrong tree. Of course, he said it in far more colorful language, but the point he made was that the link between pagan religions, like Wicca and Druidjsm, and sacrifice is significantly overemphasized in popular culture.'

'You mean they aren't out there slaughtering babies every full moon? Bradford Grady would be mightily disappointed. And probably out of a job.'

'Wiccans and satanists don't practice human sacrifice, whatever the tabloids might say. But even the more mysterious religions are far more benign than I assumed. Animal sacrifice, yes. But not human. Those that did practice it did so only in the very distant past and have since found substitutes more acceptable to contemporary mores. One sect Clay did mention was tantraism.'

'That's related to Buddhism, isn't it?'

Jeremy shook his head. 'This is different. It's a religion based in India that practices sacrifice. Usually animal sacrifice, but reports of human sacrifice do arise, sometimes child sacrifice. Then there are 'muti' murders, primarily in southern Africa. Not necessarily human sacrifice per se, but the killing of people, often children, for medicine.'

'Does that kind of stuff make its way over here?'

'I don't know, but if I haven't heard of it, it's likely very rare.'

'Good.'

'They suggested we concentrate on the occult underworld in Los Angeles, which won't be easy.' He turned a corner. 'Speaking of tabloids, though, Elena suggested someone else who might be able to cut through the research for us. Hope Adams is here for six months, on a work-exchange.'

'Hope? Oh, right the True News reporter.'

I'd never met her. Her contact with the council was Elena, a fellow journalist. A half-demon with a sixth sense for chaos, Hope covered paranormal events for a supermarket tabloid. Through a werewolf in Jeremy's Pack-Karl Marsten-she'd hooked up with the council and alerted them to any potentially real supernatural activity that crossed her desk. Strictly a volunteer job, but to kids like Hope, money never seemed to matter. Working for a good cause was payment enough.

DEMONS AND DEBTS

WE PARKED IN A LOT so expensive that in Chicago, I'd have expected valet service and a car wash. It was still a few blocks to where Hope worked, so Jeremy offered to drop me off, but I refused.

As we walked down the street, the smell of falafels and fresh-cut fries reminded me I'd skipped breakfast. It was a business district, respectable enough, but with little else to recommend it. A hodgepodge of small office buildings and take-out restaurants, interspersed with nail parlors, boutiques and gourmet coffee bars, as if the neighborhood was taking one last stab at trendiness.

I updated him on the show situation: the hidden cameras, the newly scheduled seances and Becky's blue file folder.