Helltown - Jeremy Bates Page 0,1
Hymn to Satan, a perversion of Bach’s Jesu Meine Freude. The deacon rang a deeply toned bell nine times. Then the high priest raised his hands, palms downward, and said: “In nomine Magni Dei Nostri Satanas, introibo ad altare Domini Inferi.”
The black mass had begun.
The car in the driveway was the first in a string of bad omens for Darla Evans. It wasn’t a pickup truck or even the rusted Ford Thunderbird that Mark’s friend Henry Roberts drove. It was a little red Volkswagen Beetle. It occupied most of the small driveway, so Darla pulled up to the curb, bumper to bumper with Mark’s aging Camaro. She got out and retrieved her suitcase from the Golf’s trunk, breathing in the crisp autumn air.
Seeing her recently purchased home, Darla felt a burst of nostalgia, even though she’d only been away in Akron at the career fair for two days. The house was a quaint turn of the century, three bedrooms, two baths, with a large backyard—a perfect place to start a family.
As Darla wheeled her suitcase up the front walk, her hand absently touching her barely noticeable baby bump, she glanced at the Bug. She wondered who it belonged to. Not the construction guys. They wouldn’t be caught dead in anything so dainty. Someone to do with the wedding? Darla and Mark’s mother Jennifer were taking care of most of the preparations, but Mark had been tasked with organizing the photographer.
Darla didn’t bother fishing her keys from her handbag. Mark never locked up when he was home. Sure enough, the front door eased open, and she stepped into the small foyer. Stairs on the left climbed to the second floor; the living room opened to the right. The entranceway to the latter was sealed with transparent plastic. Through it she could see a jumble of masonry, a few scattered tools, and a gray coating of dust on the floor, marred with a zigzag of booted footprints. She and Mark were refinishing the original redbrick fireplace mantelpiece, which dated back to the 1920s.
Mark’s loafers rested at the base of the cast-iron radiator, next to a pair of black pointed-toe sling-backs with high heels. A work associate? Darla wondered. She tilted her head, expecting to hear conversation. She heard nothing. She thought about calling out, announcing that she’d returned from the career fair early, but given the silence she decided Mark and his guest were likely out on the back patio.
She left her suitcase standing upright and followed the hallway to the kitchen. She frowned at the two empty fishbowl wine glasses on the counter, next to an empty bottle of Merlot. Confusion stirred within her and, hovering beneath that, like a dark shadow, alarm. She told herself a perfectly innocent explanation existed as to why Mark would be sharing wine with someone who wore pumps and drove a red Bug. Of course there was. She and Mark had the ideal relationship. Everyone said so. They’d just bought the house, were expecting a baby. There was no room in that scenario for what the whisperings in her head suggested. She felt ashamed to be considering such a thing.
She continued to the rear of the kitchen and looked through the sliding glass doors. Plastic patio set, old barbeque, sagging shed—nobody anywhere in the yard. Darla thought about calling out again, but this time she kept quiet for a different reason. Because you might disturb them? Because they might have time to—to what? Get themselves decent? She returned the way she’d came, her head suddenly airy, her stomach nauseous.
Back in the foyer Darla stood at the bottom of the stairs, hesitating. She thought she heard a faint something, maybe someone speaking at a low volume. She started up the steps. Ten to the landing, right turn, six more. Carpeted, they didn’t creak. The plan was to toss the carpet and restore the original hardwood hidden beneath.
When she reached the second floor, she confirmed what she’d thought she’d heard. Voices, murmurings, coming from the master bedroom. She started in that direction, floating now, disconnected from herself. It was as though her body had flooded itself with a cocktail of potent chemicals to numb her from the inevitable pain lurking very close. She knew that men and women cheated on each other. It was a fact of life in a monogamous society. She just never imagined Mark doing it to her.
It can’t be him in there, she thought irrationally. It has to be someone else.
Halfway through the