“Uh-huh. Well, save your pennies and—”

“I’m thinking you’ll buy it for me.”

“Excuse me?”

“Payback,” he said. “For a huge favor.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Not going to ask me what it is?”

“I’m afraid to.”

“Come on.”

“Fine, but requesting the information in no way obligates me to—”

“I surrender. No more Lucas-speak. That ritual Cody was conducting in the Facebook photos? It’s a bastardized version of a very old home-security ritual. It’s complicated, and witches and sorcerers have developed better and faster spells since. It’s not something you’d learn unless your family was out of the supernatural loop, still using the old stuff.”

“It’s real magic, then?”

“Based on real magic, which means Cody Radu is a sorcerer, which is why I called you right away. Stay away from him if you can and if you can’t, dark sunglasses are a fashion must.”

“We’ve already met.”

A pause. “Face to face?”

“Eye to eye. He’s not a sorcerer.” Witches recognize sorcerers on sight, and vice-versa. “He could be a magician”—a minor form of sorcerer—“or a shaman, druid, Vodoun priest, necromancer, somethingwith magic juice, maybe learned the spell from a sorcerer buddy, remembered the basics for frat night.”

“The important thing, though—”

“—is that we’re dealing with a supernatural, which means we’re probably dealing with the killer. Damn. I hate the obvious choice.”

“Don’t jump to conclusions. Just because he’s a supernatural, doesn’t mean someone else isn’t. Oh, and that symbol on the gate? It’s Santeria. A bastardized form. I found it online at a site selling amulets. They claim they’re Santeria, but look like a mix of voodoo and Santeria, which means you probably don’t have a real practitioner.”

“Just the kind of wannabe that keeps occult shops in business.”

“Yep. So, do I get a new top?”

“Better invest in duct tape. Now, I need to run so—”

“Call me later.”

I gave an evil laugh.

“Let me rephrase that,” he said. “Call me sometime later than now, but before midnight.”

“We’ll see.”

fifteen

fifteen

I still had almost two hours to kill before meeting Cody. I called Jesse to let him know I’d sent the files. He was on the other line and said he’d phone back. I wandered into the first shop I came to—the hardware store where Dorothy claimed Cody and Claire had argued. I was browsing, trying to attract the clerk’s attention so I could ask about it, when a voice behind my shoulder said, “I thought PIs were supposed to be unobtrusive.”

I turned to see Megan. The rest of her group was outside, milling about.

“Getting in a catfight with the main suspect’s wife?” she said. “On Main Street?”

“She started it.”