Devils night, p.13
Devil's Night, page 13
Finally, they passed through the bottleneck, and people spread out over Main Street. Barriers kept the crowds from going too close to the buildings, but people were taking pictures and craning their necks like this place was the haunted mansion at Disneyland.
Krista had been to Eden several times before, just on jaunts with friends, and she had to admit that the transformation was impressive. Penny and her team had made Eden into a giant, open-air rave. Lights shaped like tiny skulls were strung along both sides of Main Street. The ghost town’s windows were all lit up with orangey light, like the buildings were aflame. But as you passed each one, you could see the wrecked insides. The stage was at the end of the street, where multicolored lights strobed over the canyon walls. The whole place felt wicked and alive.
Krista felt pretty good herself. She and Scott had smoked before they came. But the security line had taken way too long, and her buzz was threatening to wear off. At least she was away from the inn. Her parents had been making her answer the phone to screen requests for interviews, which her father forbade any Wright living under his roof from accepting. Downtown Ashton was a snarl from all the traffic, and this week every restaurant had a two-hour wait to get in.
She didn’t love the “Dark Energy” banners everywhere. She’d tasted the energy drink two days ago when Penny brought samples to the inn. It was too fizzy and tasted like overripe watermelon. The worst part was the color—a deep purple. Krista’s mom had warned that nobody better drink the stuff near her favorite white couch.
Since she was little, Krista had grown up in Penny’s shadow. Everybody knew who Penny was; the town asked about her still. How’s Penny doing in Los Angeles? Nobody asked what was new with Krista. Secretly, Krista was glad that her sister lived so far away. It lowered the bar on getting approval from their parents. Unlike her older sister, Krista didn’t have a need to constantly prove herself. She was happy to work at the inn and have ample time off for her friends, for trail running in the summer, and back-country skiing in winter. She took her recreation very seriously.
Krista occasionally wondered if she should be jealous of Penny’s life. It seemed exciting, living near Hollywood with all those celebrities, the famous music venues and clubs and the crazy things that supposedly happened on Sunset Boulevard. Not that Penny enjoyed any of that. It was all work-work-work, LA is so expensive, I was in traffic for three hours yesterday. Her job at Sterling PR seemed like a nonstop grind, nowhere near as glamorous as you’d think a “public relations boutique”—as it said on the website—would be. Yet Penny did seem lighter there, as if she’d shed some invisible weight that she always wore back home in Colorado.
Finally, Krista spotted the two other people she’d come with: one of her best girlfriends from high school, and Ray Castillo, who worked for the sheriff’s office. Deputy Ray looked cuter in his civilian clothes: jeans and a Red Rocks Amphitheater t-shirt. He was relatively new in town, still an unknown quantity. Krista had never noticed his tattoo before, a hummingbird on his inner bicep. She found it surprisingly sexy. He was single, too, and Krista’s friend had sworn to have no interest. Krista wasn’t looking for a boyfriend. But she was always chasing that heady mix of adrenaline and endorphins; didn’t matter if she found it on a ski slope or in a hot guy’s bedroom.
“What should we do?” Ray asked. “Eat?”
“I brought gorp,” Scott said, scooping a handful into his mouth.
Krista’s stomach was twisting with hunger, and not for Scott’s sweaty trail mix. But Penny had tucked the concessions behind Main Street where they’d be out of sight. It looked better in pictures, sure, but it wasn’t super practical. And who knew where the port-a-potty ghetto would be.
Krista decided to figure that stuff out later. “Let’s see how close we can get to the stage.” Right now, all she wanted to do was press herself against Deputy Ray and dance.
About an hour later, the screaming started. People started running toward the exits. But Scott had already disappeared.
Chapter Twenty-One
Nobody seemed to know where June had gone. Penny checked with the security guards via radio, but they didn’t know. Neither did Anvi. Penny and Linden discretely asked around as they mingled at the party, not wanting any of their guests to worry—especially not the SunBev execs. But apparently, no one had seen June since earlier that day in Ashton.
“Did she seem happy with us the last time you spoke to her?” Linden whispered to Penny. They were standing by the velvet rope that blocked off the lobby stairs.
“I think so.” June had been nervous and distracted ever since that first day she arrived. But though Linden and Penny had both tried, she hadn’t wanted to talk about it. And then they’d gotten so busy with their interviews.
“I hate this kind of crap,” Linden said. “Some clients will act perfectly content to your face and then badmouth you to Tripp after the campaign is over. ‘She wasn’t listening to my needs.’ I like June, but if she pulls something like that…”
“I doubt that’s it.” Penny put a hand on her friend’s arm. “Go have fun. I’ll try to get in touch with June.” If she couldn’t get cell reception, she could always hike back to the trailer and get on the satellite.
“And just in case,” Penny added, “you could turn up the charm with the SunBev execs. Make sure they have a good time?”
“You are learning.” Linden smiled and gave her a wink, then headed for the dining room.
Penny slid her phone out of a hidden pocket in her thigh-high boot. She sent off a text to June and waited to see if it would go through.
Then she glanced up. Matthew stood in the hotel entryway. He was wearing a black shirt, black jeans, and his dusty work boots. Not exactly a costume, but she wouldn’t change a thing. Her stomach swooped, like she was on one of those swinging carnival rides. Just a friend, she reminded herself. Right.
She went over to meet him. “Looking good, Larsen. You made it.”
His hands were in his pockets, and there was hesitation in his posture. “I realized I shouldn’t miss it.”
Part of her wished the obnoxious Matthew would come back. This would be a lot easier. She was supposed to be working. In fact, she was supposed to be finding June.
“Why don’t you grab a drink and enjoy the event?”
“Penn, wait. Please. I…” He glanced to the side. “There’s something I need to say. And I’m afraid of waiting again until it’s too late.”
“Too late for what?”
June, she reminded herself. Think about June.
He took a breath, then blew it out. Put his hands on his hips, like he was preparing a speech or something. His eyes came back to her, and the earnestness there struck her right in the heart.
“I care about you,” he said. “I want you to know, if you ever decide to move back to Ashton, I’d like to see where this goes. You and me.”
“You and me,” she repeated.
A warm flush spread across her skin. She was overheating. The lace collar of her dress was too tight.
“You’re asking me to move back to Ashton? Now?”
“I said if you decide.”
She was tempted—that was the worst of it. Even right now, when she should be celebrating and looking to her future at Sterling. But if he thought she’d just drop everything and move to Colorado—for any guy, even him—then he didn’t understand her at all.
She put a hand over her eyes. “I have a life, Matthew. You have no idea how hard I’ve worked for it. And now you’re asking me to give that up just to ‘see where this goes’?”
Matthew frowned, a crease appearing between his eyebrows. “I don’t want you to give anything up. As long as you’re happy. Tell me you love Los Angeles. Say that PR is really your passion, and I’ll step aside. But I don’t think it is. I think you’re meant for something more.”
“What do you even know about—”
She looked up. Movement had drawn her eye to the second-floor landing—the balcony overlooking the lobby.
June was standing up there, her hands on the railing.
“Oh my God,” Penny said. “June!”
Matthew spun and looked at the balcony, taking a few steps back. “What is she doing? Nobody’s supposed to be up there.”
The other people in the lobby started pointing and murmuring. They weren’t sure yet if something was wrong. Penny didn’t want to alarm anyone without reason.
“Hey, June.” She kept her voice calmer this time. “Are you all right?”
June’s expression didn’t change. Her eyes were glazed, staring out over the room without seeing. She leaned against the railing.
“Hey, please back up,” Penny said. “June?”
There was a terrible crack as the brittle wood gave way. June toppled forward. Several things happened at once. There were screams in the lobby. Penny gasped, covering her mouth in horror.
Matthew lunged, his arms outstretched.
Then June slammed into Matthew, and they both crashed into a heap on the floor.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The door to the port-a-potty slammed open. Scott Mackey rushed out into the clean night air. He shouldn’t have gone overboard at the street taco stand. That habanero salsa had burned a path through his insides. Hopefully, the reek wasn’t on his clothes now. He didn’t want Anvi to smell it.
He lifted his shirt from his shoulder and gave it a sniff. Nah, all good.
About twenty minutes ago, he’d slipped away from his friends Krista and Ray. They were still dancing while some semi-famous DJ did his thing. But after carting the employees of Sterling PR and SunBev around for almost two weeks now, Scott knew all about the behind-the-scenes workings of the festival. Maybe his ticket didn’t say “VIP,” but he was planning on an exclusive experience tonight. Just him and Anvi.
Scott walked along the rear of Main Street, checking his phone for reception.
On my way, he texted to Anvi. Meet you there?
She hadn’t seemed super eager to meet tonight, just smiling and tilting her head in that coy way of hers when he proposed it. But she hadn’t said no, either. She was hot and sarcastic, and she smelled really good. Lemons and some flower he didn’t know the name of. Anvi was a little mean at times, too. Really smart, but snarky. Like the time he was driving her to Eden, and Anvi couldn’t stop laughing because he’d mispronounced “Kilimanjaro.” Anybody could’ve gotten that wrong. But he wasn’t averse to learning things. Expanding his horizons. Maybe she’d fall for him and invite him to visit her in LA. Probably wouldn’t happen. But it could.
Scott checked his phone again. No texts from Anvi yet.
He turned up his volume all the way, then stuck the phone in his pocket.
He reached the back of the bank building. It was a rectangular hulk of brick, crumbling at the corners. He’d been hoping that he could just slip past the security guards. They didn’t have nearly enough of them patrolling, and he’d even asked Anvi about it. But she said their budget was getting stretched thin with all the lighting and the sound system and the extra photographers they’d hired. Apparently, the VIP party alone was costing north of thirty-grand.
But there was a security guard resting his girth against the fence right behind the bank. Possibly a problem. But not insurmountable.
Scott came closer, recognizing one of the guys who worked as a ski instructor during the winter season. Scott nodded to him. “Kurt, hey! How’s it going?”
“Hey, man. Not bad. This party’s kinda weird.” Kurt was a glass-half-empty kind of guy. Always grumbling about something, like not enough free granola bars in the ski lodge, which instructors weren’t supposed to take anyway.
“Nice looking ladies, though. You seen the costumes?” Scott whistled.
“Naw, I can’t see jack over here. They’ve got me stuck in no-man’s-land. It’s not fair.”
Scott leaned a hand against the fence. He glanced over at the bank. There were no doors except the front, but there were a couple boarded-up windows at the rear. Last night, Scott had loosened the plywood of one from its frame, so it still appeared secure but wasn’t attached to anything at the bottom.
“Twenty bucks, and I can keep an eye on things if you want to go check it out,” Scott said.
Kurt shrugged. “I’ll get canned,” he said sulkily.
“I doubt it. But suit yourself. I already saw at least half a dozen girls flash their tits at the DJ. I was thinking of sneaking behind the stage, getting an eyeful…” Scott started meandering away.
“No, wait. Twenty bucks? You swear you won’t leave this spot for the next hour?”
“For two twenties, I won’t.” Scott knew he was laying it on a little thick, but he wanted Kurt to believe him.
“Forty an hour? Jeez.” But Kurt still took out his wallet and slipped a couple of bills into Scott’s hand.
Scott waved at Kurt’s back as the guard disappeared around the corner.
Then he jumped over the barrier, dragged over a couple wooden pallets, and climbed through the window.
His feet hit the ground, and he stumbled on the bag he’d dropped through the window yesterday. He picked up the bag and threaded his arm through the strap. The interior of the building was pitch black, save for the light coming from the higher windows. He almost tripped over a plastic-covered conduit of electrical wires. These connected all the way to the generator trailers, which were parked outside the fence to cut back on noise.
In his bag, Scott found his flashlight and switched it on. The space was gutted. A fire had gone through the room at some point. It smelled like fresh sawdust.
He made his way across the room. He walked over a thick layer of rubber matting, which had been laid down over plywood as a makeshift floor. It thumped hollowly beneath his feet.
The lighting guys had been in here. One edge of the stage was attached to the front of the building, with metal scaffolding for mounting the huge lights. From outside it looked cool, all those multi-colored lights shining on the stage. But inside the bank, things were kinda sloppy. Scott was no electrician, but he doubted this mess was according to code. A mass of heavy duty electrical cords ran up from the floor and along the inside wall. All the windows were boarded up, and the cords ran through holes in the plywood, feeding power to the stage lights and systems. It reminded him a little of the setup in his basement when he was growing up, though on a larger scale. His brother’s sound board had been hooked up to different speakers and computer monitors, all the wires twisted together beneath the table.
He used to listen to his brother playing classic rock. Scott would sneak out of bed and go downstairs, and his brother would smile and make a shhh sign with his finger over his mouth. The amp wasn’t too loud because Scott’s mom would’ve gotten angry. His brother didn’t play whole songs, only the guitar solos—Stairway to Heaven, Hotel California, Free Bird if he was in a great mood. He recorded different versions, playing them back with a serious face. Sometimes Scott would fall asleep right there on the ratty plaid couch. Any song could be a lullaby if you felt safe and warm hearing it.
Now his brother lived in an RV in Oregon somewhere. The recording equipment got sold. Whatever. Scott’s stepdad used the basement for a home office; he was an elementary school counselor. Always with the questions.
He checked his phone. No texts from Anvi yet.
Earlier that day, Scott had cleared off some space beside a free-standing wall, where they’d be out of sight of the bank’s front doors. Not that he expected to be interrupted.
If Anvi would just effing get here.
He went over their last conversation in his mind. She’d been flirting with him, right? She’d pretty much said she’d meet him at ten. Or at least, she hadn’t turned him down. It was only ten-oh-five. She wasn’t quite late yet. Maybe she couldn’t get away from her bosses.
He opened his bag. A thick picnic blanket made a nice rug for the floor. A metal flask held Tito’s vodka, and he took a couple swigs as he set up. Candle—check. Vape pen, loaded up yesterday—check. At the dispensary, he’d chosen the strawberry-lemonade cartridge, betting that Anvi would like it.
Then he heard a noise. The same sound his shoe had made against the floor a few minutes ago—echoing inside the cavernous space of the bank.
“Anvi?” he asked quietly. “That you?”
He got up and shone his flashlight over the dark space. There was another footstep, but this one came from the opposite direction. He spun, pointing the flashlight beam. But nothing moved. The electrical cords on the front wall looked like snakes, slithering upward.
Maybe he’d just imagined it. Outside, the DJ was still spinning and the crowd was carrying on. Scott settled back onto the blanket. Ten-ten, now. She was only ten minutes late. She’d gotten held up somehow.
He took a few more swigs from the flask. The vape pen was just sitting there, so he took a puff. Fake berry and citrus flooded his sinuses. After a few minutes, he was feeling much calmer.
But there it was again—that sliding, shuffling sound.
“Hello?”
A cold sweat broke out over Scott’s chest and arms. He was sure something was moving in the dark, just out of reach of his flashlight. Every time the light moved, the thing moved too.
Was it a raccoon? A coyote? Jeez, something with rabies? But animals with rabies came straight at you, didn’t they? Not skulking around in the shadows. Or so he hoped.
Scott checked his phone again, sure that Anvi had finally written him back. But he had no new messages. It was ten-twenty-three.
“I’ll wait five more minutes,” he announced into the room, though he wasn’t sure why. Maybe just to hear his own voice. Besides, he was totally going to wait at least ten more. Because what other hope did he have of getting laid tonight? His chances with Anvi were pretty minuscule at this point—he knew that—but a small hope was better than none.
But that creeping feeling wouldn’t go away. It wasn’t just the cannabis oil in his vaporizer. Beads of icy sweat were forming on his upper lip and brow. He waved his flashlight back and forth across the room.
