Bare Bones (3 page)

Janice blushed. I don’t think I’d ever seen the reporter blush. “We have a date tomorrow night. He’s already texted me.”

We both squealed and stomped our feet, which caused our waiter and several other patrons to turn and stare. Even the two teens looked our way before moving off the step and heading down the pathway toward the aquarium. I didn’t care. It’s not like the little outdoor raw bar was particularly upscale, and I was thrilled for my friend.

At least
something
had gone right yesterday.

“So…” Janice squirmed, giving me a sly smile. “His name is Sean Merrill. He’s a real estate developer in Harford County. Divorced two years with no kids. He was already hinting at taking me to an upcoming campaign fundraiser for one of the mayoral candidates. If things go well tomorrow night, I might be shopping for a black-tie dress.”

Wow, she really
had
hit the jackpot. “That’s awesome!”

She grinned. “I know! We’ll have to double-date with Zac one night.”

A double date with Janice and her new beau wouldn’t exactly send the “just friends” message I needed send to Zac. Darn it. It sounded like such a fun, mature, adult couple thing to do. It sucked that the one guy in the last two years that I really wanted to be with was dead. Or undead, actually.

“Sean really wants to meet you.” Janice nodded enthusiastically. “In fact, at first I thought maybe he was interested in you, not me. He saw your tattoo and commented on it. He was fascinated to hear that you were a Templar. Couldn’t stop asking me questions about you. I was starting to get a bit jealous.” She laughed. “After you went off with Zac we got to talking and suddenly he was asking me to have coffee with him.”

Maybe I was overly suspicious, but that whole speech worried me. The guy
could
be a history buff who did lots of reading about the Crusades. Or maybe he was less interested in Janice until he realized I was already taken. Still…

“You wearing your bracelet?”

Janice hid her wrist, shooting me a guilty look. “I love it, Aria, really I do. It just bangs on my keyboard when I’m typing and I forget to put it back on.”

“You really should wear it. Just in case.” How the heck could I say it might protect her against sharks in the water? Might. If I’d done the spellwork correctly, that is. It sucked that I had no one to call about these things, to double check my magical work.

Janice scowled. “Just in case what? I’m okay with the attraction charm, but if Sean needs the equivalent of a magical roofie to want to date me, then I’m not interested.”

I raised my hands. “Okay, okay. It’s not another attraction charm or anything though. It’s meant to shield you. I’m sure Sean seems nice and everything, but the bracelet will let you know if he doesn’t have your best interests at heart. It will protect you in case he’s just some player.”

“Oh.” Janice looked only slightly mollified. “I can protect myself. It is pretty, though, and I know you worked hard on it, Aria. I don’t want to seem unappreciative. I’ll try to remember to put it back on after I’m done typing.”

Janice was never done typing. I’d just have to rely on women’s intuition—both Janice’s and mine—to clue us in if Sean was a scumbag or not. It’s not like I was one hundred percent sure the bracelet charm would work anyway.

“So, how are things with you and Zac?”

Janice had the sly look on her face. No doubt she’d seen him with his arm around me at the reception. She’d been privy to my angsty discussions about my love life, or lack thereof. She’d also met Dario and Tremelay. And she’d admitted to being Team Tremelay, despite my repeated assurances that we were just friends as well as sort of investigative partners.

What to say? I didn’t want to ruin Janice’s fresh bloom of possible love with my decision to dump Zac. That girlfriend convo would have to wait for a few days at least.

“Well, we went off for some adolescent nookie in a back closet, but I was cock-blocked by a dead body.”

“What?” Janice shrieked.

Oh yeah. I’d forgotten that she hadn’t been there for my tussle with a corpse. The police weren’t particularly forthcoming when it came to releasing such gruesome details to the press. It had probably come across the police blotter as a medical emergency on Charles Street. It’s not like they made a habit of pronouncing anyone dead on the scene either. Even though the guy was without a doubt deceased, they would have claimed he was dead-on-arrival at the hospital.

“Yep. Dead man in the broom closet. Actually he was skinned, and I don’t think he’d been in the closet for long. Or dead for long, actually. There was no way to ID him, so I’m waiting for Tremelay to call me with the M.E. results.”

Although he might not call. If this was just some whack-job murderer, he’d have his hands full and no reason to waste time bringing his supernatural expert into the loop on a case that was not in her realm of expertise. I’d need to read about it in the paper eventually, along with all the other curious folk in Baltimore.

“Skinned? As in the dead body did not have any skin on it? Holy shit. I’m so pissed that I missed that. Of course the police are going to put the lid on all the details. Damn it.”

Yep. Sometimes you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. And by that I meant me, not Janice.

“Hey, everyone needs a day off. You were having coffee, entrancing the oh-so-eligible Sean Merrill with your considerable charm.” I patted her hand at her disgruntled noise. “You’ll be first in line when they find the Psychotic Skinner. In the meantime, you’ve got that great human interest piece about demonic possession and the lack of funding for mental health services.”

She smiled. “Yeah. There’s that. Are they seriously, calling him the Psychotic Skinner? Can I quote that?”

“
I’m
calling him the Psychotic Skinner. As far as I know, the police have not yet given the killer a catchy tweet-worthy name.”

“Figures.” Janice shoved the tray of oysters over to me. “Slurp down the last one and let’s get going. I’m thinking it would be really bad form for us to be late to an exorcism.”

I wasn’t one to let shellfish go to waste, so I did as Janice said and we hustled to her car.

The event was taking place at a lovely single-family home in the Canton neighborhood. It was a short drive from the harbor and there was plenty of parking was available both street side and in the wide driveway leading to a two car garage. Janice chose to park on the street. We walked up to the door past beautifully manicured hedge and rang the doorbell. A distraught woman answered. She wore yoga pants and a fitted T-shirt, her hair a messy bun on the top of her head.

“I’m Janice Oswald. The reporter from
The Sun
.”

The woman grabbed Janice’s hands, practically dragging her into the house. I followed, looking around with curiosity. The inside was just as neat and clean as the outside. The oak furniture had clearly been bought from the same high-end collection. Accent pieces were color coordinated in burgundy with splashes of light green that gave the décor a modern flare. The carpet was white plush and I grimaced, checking my shoes for dirt. Clearly this woman didn’t have kids. Or pets.

“He’s upstairs. He just got home a few moments ago. Father Bernard is already here.”

I hadn’t been introduced yet, and the sister of the possessed man didn’t seem to care, so I followed them up the carpeted stairs and down a hallway to a large bedroom. Inside was a man who looked to be in his early twenties. He wore jeans, a T-shirt promoting a band called Rabid Rabbit, and had a backpack slung over one shoulder. In the other corner was a priest, looking like he’d rather be anywhere but here on a Saturday afternoon.

“That’s Bradley. At least, it used to be Bradley. Now it’s a demon in Bradley’s body.”

“Would you knock it off Amanda? I’ve gotta go. I just stopped in to grab my backpack and some cash. I don’t have time for your crazy demon-talk.” Bradley looked hunted as his eyes darted from his sister to the priest, then to the doorway that I was blocking. His head wasn’t spinning around. He wasn’t frothing at the mouth and spouting curses in arcane languages. He wasn’t levitating and convulsing. This didn’t look like a demon possession to me. Maybe the sister was the one who needed therapy and good pharmaceuticals, not her brother.

And how the heck were they living in this sweet home in Canton, anyway? The sister wasn’t any older than I was, and her brother looked maybe twenty-one or two. I didn’t get the feeling this was their parents’ home. Had the sister married well and her brother was sponging off of her, taking up residence in one of the guest bedrooms, sleeping all day and getting drunk at Rabid Rabbit concerts at night? Not that I wanted the white plush carpeting, but I was having a serious case of house envy here.

The priest sighed. “Bradley, I’m going to ask you a few questions—both you and your sister. She’s very concerned about you.”

Frustration flashed across Bradley’s face. “Will this take long? I’ve got a job interview in an hour.”

“That’s
not
Bradley.” The woman pointed dramatically at her brother. “He hasn’t been himself since yesterday. A job interview? Oh, please. Bradley hasn’t looked for a job after he got fired from the Crab Shack last year. He doesn’t eat meat, but I caught him eating a twelve ounce filet last night. I saw him doing the laundry this morning.”

Poor Bradley. What a control freak he had for a sister. I folded my arms across my chest, continuing to think some very uncharitable thoughts about this woman.

Janice was busy taking notes. I looked over her shoulder and saw something about dietary changes and personality disorders.

“Bradley? What do you have to say to this?” The priest wiped a hand across his sweaty brow.

Bradley slid the backpack off of his shoulder and dropped it onto the crimson and black bedspread. “Seriously? After all the complaining she’s done since I quit college, I finally get my act together and she calls in the church?”

He had a point. The situation was looking less like an exorcism and more like a reality show episode. Crazy Housewives of Canton: Sisters Who Nag Their Younger Brothers.

“He’s a demon,” the sister shouted.

“You’re crazy,” he shouted back.

This was getting tedious. It was time for the priest to do his thing so Janice could get her story and I could get back to…whatever it was I needed to do on a Saturday afternoon.

“Why do you think he’s been possessed by a demon?” I asked the sister. “Has he been involved with the occult in the past? Has he been ordering books on summoning and black magic off the internet? Is he drawing sigils in a binding circle in your basement?”

Now everyone was looking at
me
instead of Bradley.

“Nooooo,” the sister said, eyeing me as if
I
was the one needing exorcism. “But there was the blood. And I overheard him talking to some friends in the driveway about killing people.”

“Blood?” All of us asked at once. Well, except for Bradley, who looked rather irritated at this point.

“There was blood all over his clothes and on his body. It was last night, right when he started eating meat and doing this whole job-search thing. He came home covered in blood, tried to sneak into the house. When I saw him, I felt afraid. It wasn’t just the blood. He looked… I don’t know, he looked swollen and was moving funny.”

“Oh for fuck sake, Amanda!” Bradley threw up his hands and paced a few steps. “I was in a fight. Some guy jumped me in an alley, stole my wallet and beat me up. Of course I was swollen and bloody. And I was sore. And I was limping. And yes, I probably said I wanted to kill him. Do you blame me? Shit woman, get off my back.”

Amanda winced. I narrowed my eyes, wondering if this was the talk of a young man who’d just had enough of his meddling sister, or something else. I could see having this kind of argument with Roman. Well, without the profanity, anyway. Obsessive sister. Fed up brother. Poor Janice. I wasn’t even sure she could get a story on mental health services out of this family drama.

Except Bradley didn’t look all that worse for wear today. If he’d been beaten up enough last night to be bloody and swollen, then he’d sure healed up quick. I would have at least expected colorful bruises and a few bandages. The guy looked fresh as a daisy.

“I’m going to suggest some family counselling,” Father Bernard interjected, stepping between the two siblings. “I’d be happy to provide weekly sessions, or I can refer you to a few secular therapists who specialize in group sessions.”

Amanda and Bradley glared at each other around the priest. Neither seemed particularly happy with the idea of weekly therapy.

Father Bernard turned to face the sister. “In the meantime, I’d like Amanda to work on holding back a bit, giving Bradley the room to grow and change. Unless he’s doing something that endangers himself or others, he should feel free to try new foods and explore different career options.”

Amanda gave a short, grudging nod.

“And you.” The priest turned to point at Bradley who took a wary step backward. “Your sister has given you opportunities most young men never have. She deserves to be spoken to with respect, her concerns heard. Can you do that?”

Bradley’s nod mirrored his sister’s.

And there we were. Another episode of Drama in Canton.

Janice tapped her pen against her lip. “Father, can you do the exorcism anyway? Just in case?”

I choked back a laugh. Always the reporter, Janice was determined to salvage something from this story. There might not be demons or psychiatric issues, but even if nothing came of it, Exorcism in Canton would make a better story than Family Drama in Canton.

Father Bernard raised his eyebrows. “But there’s no indication that demonic possession is in play here. I honestly believe with a month or two of weekly counselling sessions, Amanda and Bradley can resolve their differences.”

“I think Amanda might be able to accept that and be more receptive to group counselling if she could put these ideas of demonic possession to rest.”

Janice was good. Really good. Next time I had to go before the Elders, I was taking her. The woman could negotiate like a boss when there was something she wanted.