ATwistedMagick (10 page)

Gabe wrote “Glee Club” in his notebook, thinking he might like to talk to the director. “Ms. Hector, did you know them at all?”

The teacher was stout, Hispanic and colorfully but tastefully dressed. “It’s missus. Well, this is a small town and an even smaller school, so I knew them by sight and knew their parents from PTA meetings. I’m the PTA secretary. Miss Lewis was also involved in the PTA, frequently volunteering for the jobs we couldn’t get any parents to step in for.”

Candice gasped and Mr. Porter frowned.

“Shylah, you mean?” Gabe wanted to make sure there wasn’t another teacher with the name of Lewis.

“How can you even mention her?” Candice patted her hand against her chest, like she was having heart palpitations.

Eva turned to glare at her. “That woman is no more a murderer than I am, and the school board perpetrated a huge miscarriage of justice by firing her.”

Gabe was unaccountably cheered to hear someone stand up for the ousted teacher, even if he wasn’t sure of her innocence himself. “Were you friends outside of school?”

“We spent time together with the PTA and school events, but Shylah struck me as a very private person.”

“Because she’s a witch!” Candice made the word sound like the one that started with a B.

Eva ignored Candice and met Gabe’s eyes dead on. “
Mi tia es una bruja
.” She set her jaw, daring Gabe to make something of it.

“
Una curandura?
”

“
Sí, y una Santeria
.” Santeria was often practiced in the Cuban and Dominican neighborhoods in LA, but Gabe had never witnessed one of their rituals.

“We speak English here!” Candice huffed. “Are you saying things about me?”

Eva glared at her. “Who you are is self-evident. We’re speaking of Shylah, who was discriminated against purely because her religion is misunderstood.”

“Satan worship.”

“Bullshit.” Gabe was shocked to hear Al Porter’s voice. “I sometimes joined her to go see the black-and-white matinees. She is a kind and thoughtful woman.”

Gabe would look at Al and Clement closely, simply because they were male teachers. He did want to know where Mr. Wann was from, so he asked.

“Louisiana. Born in bayou country, but lived most of my life in Baton Rouge.”

“Louisiana?” Well, that was interesting. “Spend any time in New Orleans?”

He smiled. “The occasional weekend, football games, Mardi Gras.”

“Did you know that Shylah Lewis lived in New Orleans for a while?”

“Yes, when we worked the fall festival stand together. She said she’d gone to Tulane for a bit, and we talked about the shock of Katrina followed by the oil spill.”

“Nothing about her friends there?”

“No. Just very general conversation.”

Gabe nodded. “And when did you find out she was Wiccan?”

He paused, combing his hand through his short-cropped black hair. “The day she was fired. Candice told me.” He gave the gossiper a not-too-friendly glance.

After a bit more discussion with Candice Bible-thumping while the others defended Shylah, Gabe told them he quickly wanted to run through the basic questions that he was sure Detective Hain had asked them at the beginning of the investigation. They reminded him that two other private detectives had also asked them the same questions—the answers weren’t going to change. He could tell they all believed the case would remain unsolved.

“Lalia Gustava was my cousin, so I’m sorry but I have to cover all of this again.”

Emily’s teary eyes turned to angry ones. “If you’re Lalia’s cousin, why didn’t I see you at the funeral? Why weren’t you here investigating at the very beginning? By now the trail’s gone cold, hasn’t it?”

“I live in California and it wasn’t easy to come up with plane fare. Lalia’s mother understands, and she’s the only one that counts. As far as the ‘trail’, I’m hoping a fresh set of eyes may see something previously missed.” He hated that this question was likely to come up again and again, as it did during the second round of questioning, which consisted of four more teachers and the head janitor and her helpers. No one pinged his radar, other than Candice Self, who probably pinged everyone’s radar if they spoke to her for five minutes. He’d review any background information Detective Hain had come up with for each of them, as well as track down their spouses, because they could easily have had contact with the kids as well.

Back in his car heading to his hotel, he reviewed his list of possible interviewees—Lalia’s real father and her stepdad, preferably away from Angie, since he didn’t want to hurt her feelings. Eva Hector had mentioned an upcoming PTA meeting this Wednesday and invited him to attend. She’d also admitted that she attended the same Catholic church as Angela and Jorge, Lalia’s real dad. But Gabe knew from his own experiences with church that “attending” was a loose term, sometimes implying only certain holy days. And one could go to mass and leave without speaking to anyone, but he added the priest and helpers to his mental list of interviewees. The other teachers and Matthew Horton and his parents attended various churches around town. No matter the population, there was never a shortage of churches to accommodate each denomination.

He did find it interesting that Clement was from Louisiana. Baton Rouge was certainly not far away from New Orleans. Had he lived there when Wanda Nance was murdered? Or could he have gone home for a visit at that time? Most likely none of the teachers had criminal records since the school would’ve checked before hiring them.

No shortage of people to interview, but all of them had likely been interviewed previously more than once.

* * * * *

Grocery shopping had turned into an ordeal over the past couple of months, since Shylah always ran into someone who recognized her. She tried to pick up stuff on her way home from Charlottesville, but every now and then, she needed to go to the local market. She prayed not to run into Candice, who would make a big scene, or the Hortons or Gustavas, who tended to glare at her or burst into tears. But even relative strangers would whisper to each other and point while she waited in the check-out line.

At least I’m standing my ground
. But that was small comfort when so much hate was directed at her.

In the cereal aisle, she spied Clement Wann from school, so she skipped to the canned veggie aisle. She pushed the cart with her head down, focused on the list she held in her shaky hand. Next thing she knew she’d collided with another cart.

“I’m so sorry,” she said before even looking up to see who it was. When she did, she cringed.

“How are you doing, Shylah?” Clement asked. His Southern drawl reminded her of Louisiana, which made her stomach clench. His short black hair was always neatly trimmed. He had brown eyes and a narrow chin. Attractive enough for her to date him a few times, but she’d never wanted to jump his bones the way she did the second she laid eyes on Gabe.

“Fine. Scraping by.” She referred to her diminished budget since she’d been fired, but she didn’t expect him to understand that.

“I’m sorry about everything that’s happened. Have you found another job yet?”

“No. I wanted to stay in town until the murders are solved, but I won’t be able to get another teaching job here.”

He looked away, scowling for a moment, then back at her. “They might never be solved, you know. Maybe you should just move on. Maybe you could go back to New Orleans. Sometimes I think I’d like to go back.”

“Why don’t you?”

“Not the best memories there with everything that happened.”

“You mean Katrina?” She’d lived there a few years after the hurricane had devastated the city. By then New Orleans had mostly rebuilt itself, but several coven mates had lived through it as children and it had left deep scars. Alain had refused to talk about it, since he’d lost not only his home but family members as well.

He nodded.

A couple of girls who Shylah recognized from school wandered up the aisle. Wann immediately turned to watch them, probably to see if he recognized them, possibly to see if their parents would catch him fraternizing with the enemy. Seemed like a good time to make her escape.

“Well, it was nice talking to you. I better get this ice cream home before it completely melts.”

Wann nodded, not looking back at her. Rude, but then what did she expect? After she’d checked out, she found her car in the parking lot and sighed in relief to find that it wasn’t egged or worse. Once inside, she put on some chant music and vowed to do her next shopping in the relatively anonymous city.

* * * * *

Gabe found the nearest fast food drive-thru, got a burger, fries and coffee, hoping the fuel would perk him up a bit. Then he drove to the hotel to finally take a shower. After, clad only in boxers, he spread out on his bed, legs crossed and opened the BOS to Shylah’s next entry.

“First Alain, as high priest, gives High Priestess Claire the Five-Fold kiss, which they always do before the Great Rite. Claire spreads her arms and legs wide and he kisses her feet, her breasts and her mouth. When they’d done the rite symbolically with athame and chalice, the Five-Fold kiss was a mere pantomime, not meant in any way to arouse. But that changed as soon as Alain decided symbolism wasn’t enough to create powerful magic. They needed to build power through increased arousal, he explained, so now, when he kisses her breasts he sucks as well. He kisses her womb and ends by licking her clit. She returns the kiss to him, sucking his phallus to erection.

“This time, as she sucked him, Alain told us all to slide our fingers between our legs and stroke ourselves.

“‘Slowly,’ he said. ‘The object is to build your arousal to its highest peak without dispelling the energy with orgasm.’

“He made it sound so matter-of-fact, so even though many of us had red cheeks, including myself I’m sure, we did as asked. I watched Claire’s cheeks suck in as she drew out Alain’s arousal as I stroked myself the way I like it best, in a small circle on my clit. When I felt my own wetness, I slid my finger inside and brought that finger up to my mouth to taste. I realized Alain was watching me instead of Claire and that made me even hotter. Claire and Alain were no longer a couple outside of the coven. Hearing a moan, I turned to my right to watch Marcus stroke himself. He wasn’t the only one moaning. We were all baring the intimate ways we touched ourselves, combining that energy and working toward a common goal.

“That was Monday night. Tuesday I got fired because that closed-minded woman I invited to observe the ritual blabbed about it at work. Alain says I trust too easily. He’s probably right.

“At the next
esbat
, we were in our usual man-woman-man-woman circle, but two women were not participating, so Alain instructed Marcus and David to touch each other. When they balked since they’re both hetero, Alain reminded them that this wasn’t about sex, it was about using arousal to create power, power like the coven had never created before. The rest of us were to pair with the witch to the right of us, to let them touch us anywhere they pleased and to do the same to them. My partner this time was Matt, who is married to someone outside the coven. I wondered if he’d tell his wife about what happened. Was it cheating if it was meant as worship?

“‘An it harm none, do what thou wilt.’ Only I didn’t think about how this might harm his wife. I do feel bad about that now, but I wouldn’t change the experience. Matt and I touched and tasted each other all over. He smelled of smoke and musk. He has more hair on his chest and a bit more weight on his stomach than I would normally go for, but that didn’t matter in circle. We were totally in the moment and that, in itself, is a spiritual experience.

“Alain motioned Claire to her knees and entered her from behind. I got on my knees as well, closing my eyes as I waited to feel Matt’s hands grip my waist and his cock enter my wetness. What his cock didn’t have in size, he made up for with movement. After a few of his thrusts, I felt like I was going to explode, but Alain had said not to, so whenever I felt close I stopped moving and sucked in a few deep breaths. Matt did the same.

“Alain ordered Marcus to get on his knees and David to enter him, but Marcus said he wouldn’t let some guy butt fuck him.

“Alain shouted, ‘Do you defy your god? Do you deny your priest and your coven?’ His voice and presence seemed larger than life. Gritting his teeth, Marcus lowered himself to his knees. David moved behind him, but had to stroke himself a few times to regain his erection. Mindy, one of the women not participating, handed him some oil, which he applied to his cock and to Marcus’ butt. I think the rest of us were all watching with fascination as David pushed his cock slowly into Marcus’ ass. Marcus squeezed his eyes shut, breathing harshly through his open mouth. Every now and then he would let out a grunt.

“David said it was like ‘fucking a virgin’, just before he thrust his dick in as deep as it would go. He kept his movements slow until Marcus seemed to relax some. When he sped up, both men started moaning.

“Alain yelled that the power was rising and instructed all of us to chant a phrase in Latin, to concentrate the sexual power in on our purpose. The phrase basically meant ‘health and healing’, which we were sending to our coven mate with the broken leg.

“You know, when you hold out on orgasm long enough, it’s like you move out of your body. The chanting was hypnotic, Matt’s thrusts were rhythmic. I could feel the power increasing everywhere in the circle until I felt bloated with it. When Alain yelled ‘Now!’ I let myself go and felt Matt do the same, his cum warm inside of me. After circle, we all admitted that we’d never felt such power before. And we’d accomplished what we set out to do, though we didn’t know it right then.

“Unfortunately, we lost five coven members the next day—Mindy, Astrid, David, Marcus and Matt.”

Gabe had started palming his cock without really thinking about it, pulling it out of his briefs, stroking it hard. He closed the book and tossed it on the nightstand. Reading something like that, imagining being a part of it, definitely turned him on, but it sort of disgusted him too. He thought back to post-graduation when he’d spent some time on the coast of Mexico, Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta, the party circuit. He’d had a great time hanging out with cousins he hadn’t seen since childhood, getting wasted and trying the odd threesome with pretty senoritas. He was lucky to have escaped without an STD, but it had all seemed pretty normal.