Innocent Little Crimes (22 page)

“Maybe that’s what Lila wants—for us to all
kill ourselves. Then she’ll be happy.”

“Oh, get off it, Mil. She just wants
Davis.”

Millie shook her head, mostly from the cold.
“What’s gotten into you?”

Della blurted out, “You heard her, Mil. She’s
got us all by the shorts. We have to do what she says. We have to
get Davis back.”

“And you really think you can persuade him to
give up Cynthia and marry her?”

“Hey, he’s got the most to lose. You heard
her—she owns him. She made him and now she’s going to ruin him.
What choice does he have?”

“He could just say no. He did.”

“Well, he’s going to change his mind. And why
not? He can get the marriage annulled right afterward—and then go
home. Then Lila can’t do anything.”

“You think she’ll be satisfied with that?
She’ll just keep at him—at all of us—ruining our lives forever, if
that’s really her plan. We can’t keep running. We’ve got to band
together and get some legal advice—”

“—
And she’ll buy out whatever lawyer
we’d find.”

“Oh, come on. She can’t bribe every lawyer in
the country.”

Della clenched her teeth. “I hate that woman.
I hate what she’s done to me. Why don’t I kill her? Then everyone
would be relieved. She’d be out of our lives for good.”

Millie gasped. “Della!”

Della yanked on her arm. “Come on, Mil, we
can’t quit now. Davis may have already found a way out of
here.”

Millie pulled her arm back. Della shot her a
vicious look.

“You don’t have anything to lose, do
you? So what if Dick ends up in jail—you’d be better off without
that S.O.B. Lila can’t hurt
you.
”

“You have nothing to lose, either,” Millie
said.

“I don’t have a pot to piss in. Any time I
get on my feet, Lila will pull the rug right out from under
me.”

“You could go to the police.”

Della burst into laughter. “Right. And what
do I say to them? That the rich and famous Lila Carmichael is
blackmailing me and ruining all my chances for success? What a
joke.”

“They’d believe us if we all went.”

Della sucked on her cigarette.

Millie continued. “You could . . . go to
business school or learn a trade. You could find a way to support
yourself. You could get some kind of job.”

“And maybe she’d make sure I’d lose that job,
too. Millie, you’re so dense. Lila has money and power. You can
control the world with the kind of power she has.”

“And you’re content to follow orders.”

“I have no choice. It’s my life on the line.”
Della turned and started jogging down the beach, catching up to
Dick and Jonathan. Millie stood and brushed the wet sand off the
sequined gown. The hem was caked with mud. In her haste, she had
forgotten to change her clothes. She yanked off the heels and began
running in her stocking feet. She was probably destroying a thirty
thousand-dollar dress, but what did that matter? Nothing mattered
except stopping this madness.

The cold, stone “castle” was ominously quiet.
Peter shuffled around the shambles of the living room, wondering
where to start cleaning. He dimmed the lights; the bright glare
only emphasized the enormity of the task before him. He knew he
could leave it until Monday, but he imagined the look on the faces
of the locals hired to come in and put everything back in order. He
eyed a bottle on the buffet. Even though he’d avoided drinking the
entire evening, through that horrific game, he deserved a drink. He
cleared a space on one of the couches and slumped over his knees.
Gin straight. A hideous taste, but it did the job. His gut
instantly lit on fire.

Outside, branches rubbed and squeaked against
the glass. Peter imagined himself in some Alfred Hitchcock movie,
but worse. This was more melodrama than he wanted to experience in
a lifetime. Collecting his thoughts, he vacillated from feeling
anger to remorse to despair. Something inside him had shaken loose
this evening and he felt more alone than he had in years. How could
Lila go to sleep? He knew she was a master at manipulation and she
certainly proved her ability tonight.

He recalled a fairy tale about a man who
caught a magic fish that granted wishes. The wife was so greedy
that she demanded more and more from the fish, first riches and
splendor, then power. Finally she demanded to be queen of all the
land, then, even God of the universe. Finally, the fish told her
she had gone too far, and, in punishment, took everything away. She
had gotten too greedy, and was returned to her former destitute
state. That was Lila—up in her tower, demanding the power to rule
the world.

Peter surveyed the room and clenched his
teeth. It wasn’t his job to be a maid. And it wasn’t his destiny to
be a slave, either. He would have it out with Lila—now. If she
wanted to fire him, then fine. But he wasn’t going to pretend that
nothing happened tonight. And those poor fool guests wandering in
the storm because of her antics. Someone could get hurt out there.
Yet, they chose to go out. They could have stayed and refused Lila.
They could have gone to bed.

Peter looked at his empty glass. What in
God’s name did she really want with these people? Maybe Lila drank
herself to sleep, but he was going to wake her up. She had some
talking to do, drunk or not.

Cynthia hated to admit it, but she was
scared. In all her nineteen years, she had never even gone camping
in the Sierras. The forest seemed friendly enough during a day
hike, but the night changed the woods into a dreaded fairy tale
haunt. She prayed that there were no wild animals lurking behind
the trees. That game of wolves had set her imagination running. If
only the clouds would part so the moon could shine through.

Cynthia stopped to rest; she needed a minute
to get her bearings. She had gone down to the beach, and to the
flagpole to look for footprints, but the rain and wind blown
debris made it impossible to decipher anything. She shuddered when
she thought of those people chasing after Davis. She cursed Lila
under her breath. Lila purposely got them drunk and used it to her
own sick advantage. Her world was falling apart and it was Lila’s
fault. Surely, Davis never meant to behave the way he had. Lila
just seemed to bring out the worst in everyone.

Cynthia stood. She heard someone. “Davis, is
that you?” Her voice came out a whimper. She startled when she
heard a branch crack. The wind kicked up and pulled at her scarf.
Despite her determination to remain strong, tears welled up. She
pressed on but couldn’t find a clear trail through the woods. The
pines grew thick, and ferns and shrubs poked at her. She thought
she had retraced her steps back toward the beach, but instead found
herself in a small wooded clearing, entirely unfamiliar.

Don’t panic
.
She remembered that when you got lost, you were supposed to stop,
not continue on. People got lost in woods all the time—and died
yards from safety. But how could she just stop and wait? The rain
and wind pounded her. And Davis was in danger.

Quickly, she squeezed through the
easiest opening between the trees, looking for signs of a trail,
for anything familiar. She blinked back tears
. Oh, Davis! Where are you?

The pounding grew louder. “This is the most
damnable headache I’ve ever had,” Lila said. “It feels like my
brain is about to cave in, which would serve me right.” Lila tugged
at the down comforter and then sat up in the dark. As she looked
out the turret windows, she could barely make out the ocean in all
that blackness. The wind kept up a persistent moaning. Lila felt
like moaning along with it. The pounding started again.

“Lila, it’s me, Peter. We need to talk.”

“Go away.”

The door opened. “I’m coming in.”

“If you must.” She patted the chair next to
her bed and lit the oil lamp. It cast a dull glow on the stone
walls of the octagonal tower room. “Come in, my cohort in
treachery, have a seat.”

Peter strode toward her. “That’s just what I
wanted to talk to you about.”

Lila grunted. “I’ll bet. So, all the little
birdies have flown the coop, right?”

Peter’s expression told her all she needed to
know. He was displeased with her. But what the hell did she care?
What did she care about anything, anymore?

“Since we’re having trouble sleeping, let me
tell you a bedtime story.”

“Oh, spare me, Li.”

“Here.” She reached for a bottle of
Courvoisier and poured two drinks. She handed him the brandy
snifter filled to the top. “Relax. Have a nightcap.”

Peter took the glass from her hand. He
waited, watching for her next move.

Lila cleared her throat and assumed a
dramatic voice. “Once upon a time . . .”

“Lila, I don’t need a bedtime story. We need
to talk—”

“Avon,” she snapped, then reined her temper
in. “Peter, my love, bear with me. Believe me, you’ll feel better
when you hear my story. Well, at least I’ll feel better. So shut up
and listen.”

Peter sipped his brandy while the wind droned
on. Lila eyed him curiously.

“You know why you and I get along so well?
We’ve very much alike.” She ignored Peter’s expression of
disagreement. “We don’t fit in; we don’t play by the rules. We’re
lone wolves, you and me.”

“I think I’ve had enough of your wolves for
one night, thank you . . .”

“Shut up and listen. You’ll love it. Trust
me.”

Lila took a long sip from her glass and
settled back against the pillows. “I’m going to tell you a story
that has everything. Pain, tears, thrills, and chills. The whole
ball of wax.

“Once upon a time there was a man who talked
to God . . .”

Chapter 22

At the age of twelve, George Carmichael had
his formal introduction to Jesus while sitting in an outhouse in
rural Arkansas. Sweating in the stifling heat, he nearly slipped
into the chasm below when the Lord and Savior called out his name.
Over the years, Carmichael recounted this experience innumerable
times in tent revivalist meetings as he traveled the dusty roads.
Throughout the years, he told his faithful, holy-rolling flocks of
his awesome, intimate moment with Christ, the bright light that
nearly blinded him, and his overwhelming humility in being chosen
at such a young age, and in such an embarrassing and humbling
circumstance.

Before he received yet another vision in a
dream that commanded him to found the Church of the Holy Light,
Carmichael spent most of his years in Dark Corners, Arkansas. And
dark it was, Carmichael often reflected, spiritually dark. Even
when he returned as a grown man to visit his father’s grave, only
one road led into Dark Corners. The small one-room post office next
to the wood-paneled church with the fake stained-glass windows
looked even more dilapidated than he remembered. And the cotton
fields still stretched as far as he could see.

George was a pudgy, clumsy boy, who grew into
an awkward, gangly man, his religious fervor making up for whatever
physical stature he lacked. His mother had died shortly after his
birth from hemorrhaging, so he grew up under his father’s cold,
impersonal hand; a hand that showed no compunction for beating
George when the mood took him.

Power and fire grew behind George’s eyes, and
when they set sight on Darla Jenkins of Little Rock in behind a row
of pews, they burned with desire; desire Carmichael misread as
infusion of holy spirit. He had never noticed the dark-haired,
withdrawn girl on the other visits to her congregation until he
spotted her midway through his sermon on marriage. With the words
of the apostle Paul on his lips—better they should marry than burn
with passion—his eyes met hers for a brief instant before she
blushed and turned away. Darla had seen how the available
church-going girls flocked around him when he came to give talks at
her church. She found his charisma extraordinary.

After the lecture, he approached Darla with
unwavering aplomb, leaving her breathless at God’s revelation that
she was chosen to be the wife of the good Reverend. She immediately
said yes, then went out behind the bushes and threw up her
breakfast. It wasn’t from disgust; rather, she was so surprised
that anyone would have her, an old maid at twenty. After asking her
name, he gazed into her eyes, the windows of the soul, and knew.
Never mind the aching in his groin, the aching he had repressed for
ten years by distracting his adolescent fever with marathon Bible
research.

Darla had never even held hands with a boy,
let alone imagined what God meant when he said the two will be
yoked together. Unlike many of the local rural families who raised
and bred farm animals, Darla’s father owned a small grocery. As far
as she knew, babies were something that appeared miraculously, like
the infant Jesus.

On their wedding night, George transformed
into a guttural, snarling animal, letting loose a painfully
dammed-up flood. Darla bit her lip, drawing blood to keep from
screaming out, praying fervently for strength to endure her
suffering. Over the years, his ardor, though tempered, was never
replaced by finesse. He satisfied himself, never understanding her
needs. Her pain subsided to mere discomfort. She assumed sex was
part of her wifely duty. And it certainly wasn’t anything she could
discuss with her husband—or the Good Lord, for that matter. She
endured George’s passions as a test of faith, assuring herself that
God knew what he was doing in arranging this physical uniting of
bodies, although the thought of it continued to sicken her.

So, years later, when she found herself
pregnant with Delilah, relief washed over her. Now there was no
more need for this joining of flesh. They had been blessed with the
desired result—the procreation of life. But George didn’t let up.
He reached for her, even in her pregnant, bloated state. He found
her swollen body irresistible. It excited him to know his
first-born son was growing inside her. A son to carry the torch of
the Lord. Darla, on the other hand, grew rueful at her lack of
reprieve, remaining sullen and joyless.