The Devil's Opus

By Margaux Mannion Brown

There are wicked people in this world. Their deeds defy psychiatric explanations, and the extent of their evil has no cure. They create the game to win it, and when they lose, there are grievous consequences.
Leo Buckman is a sociopath, a black hole sucking the light out of anyone that comes close to him. Left vulnerable by the sudden death of her husband, Katie Mezzo falls prey to Buckmans grift, eventually becoming his codependent and willing victim.
After Katies brutal murder, the prestigious and socially prominent Mezzo family is left spinning with questions, spiritual devastation, and a lust for revenge.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 31, 2014
• ISBN: 9781493155675

Margaux Mannion Brown

Margaux Mannion Brown was born in Midvale, Utah, a township about twenty-five minutes from the heart of Salt Lake City. After graduating from Saint Mary of the Wasatch Catholic High School, she attended the University of Utah. There, she studied philosophy, English literature, and education. Her twenty-five-year teaching career began in Salt Lake and continued when her family moved to Nevada in 1988. She currently lives with her husband in Carson City, where she continues to write and play the piano and violin. Ms. Brown loves being outdoors and frequently visits Lake Tahoe and the surrounding Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Book preview

The Devil’s Opus

Margaux Mannion Brown

Copyright © 2014 by Margaux Mannion Brown.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2013923138

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-4931-5566-8

                Softcover        978-1-4931-5565-1

               eBook              978-1-4931-5567-5

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Rev. date: 01/20/2014

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris LLC

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

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CONTENTS

Prologue: Bad News

PART ONE

Affannato (Italian musical term): anguished

Chapter 1: Love and Loss

Chapter 2: Happy Birthday to You

The First Dream Acceptance

Chapter 3: A Trojan Horse

Chapter 4: All along the Watchtower

The Second Dream Crosses to Bear

Chapter 5: Expectations

Chapter 6: Digging Graves

The Third Dream Oh God!

PART TWO

Al Fine (Italian musical term): to the end

Chapter 7: The Redemption of Icarus

Chapter 8: Best Served Cold

The Fourth Dream One Demon at a Time

Chapter 9: Living Well Is…

Chapter 10: The Comeuppance

The Fifth Dream Resolve

Epilogue: The Summation

Acknowledgments

I’m dedicating my book to my deceased father, Ralph R. Brown, who would have loved knowing his daughter is a published author. His constant encouragement throughout my life has given me the courage to trust in my own artistic endeavors.

I believe that there is one story in the world, and only one… Humans are caught… in their lives, in their thoughts, in their hungers and ambitions, in their avarice and cruelty, and in their kindness and generosity too… in a net of good and evil… There is no other story. A man, after he has brushed off the dust and chips of his life, will have left only the hard, clean questions: Was it good or was it evil? Have I done well… or ill?

John S. Steinbeck

East of Eden

PROLOGUE

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, CALIFORNIA, JULY 2000

Bad News

E sther Saldana woke suddenly from her restive sleep. The biting chill of the July mountain air made its way through the open windows of the Saldana apartment, and as she rose to close them, she thought she heard the voices of her son, Eddie, and his friend Leo Buckman in the parking lot of the Tahoe Vista Motel.

The Saldanas, originally from wealthy plantation families in the rich coffee regions of Costa Rica, had been in South Lake Tahoe since 1962. They had fallen in love with the area on their honeymoon, borrowed the money to buy the motel from their parents, eventually became US citizens, and became wealthy themselves on the myriads of summer tourists and winter skiers that visited the Tahoe basin.

The motel was a two-story U-shaped compound with twenty-three rooms, right off the main drag of Highway 50. Their spacious and comfortable family apartment was above the office, laundry, and supply rooms and an attached two-car garage that faced the street. The apartment held three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, a dining area, and a living room whose windows overlooked the cafés and shops of bustling South Lake Tahoe.

It was close to two in the morning. She had turned on the No Vacancy sign around midnight and had expected a sound night’s sleep. Joe, her husband of thirty-eight years, lay softly snoring, his eyelids twitching to a dream he would not remember. Esther made her way to the kitchen for a glass of water, and in the dim glow from the light of the motel sign, she saw Eddie and Leo leaving room 3-A.

Eddie seemed agitated, looking sideways and behind himself for would-be watchers. Leo held a crumpled-up paper bag in his right hand, the kind you might find from a fast-food restaurant. He shoved it into one of the outside garbage cans, making sure it was hidden beneath other debris. They won’t think to look in here, he exclaimed to Eddie, and besides, even if they do find this shit, it could have been put here by anybody.

As they approached Eddie’s car, Esther could see the terror on her son’s face and Leo Buckman’s staid, cool expression. She felt confused but not surprised. Motel rooms were off-limits for Eddie’s personal use, but she knew he had taken advantage of empty rooms since he had started partying and dating in high school.

Esther had never liked Leo. He was unnecessarily charming and complimentary, to the point that she always felt as though he wanted something from her. And he was boastful, with a grandiose sense of himself even though he had no personal accomplishments to warrant this false sense of entitlement. Esther had caught him in several lies over the years and suspected he’d conned Eddie out of hundreds of dollars. She had always thought he’d been a bad influence on her son.

Eddie and Leo had hung around together, on and off, since ninth grade. Neither of the boys had taken school seriously, partying through their four years of high school and barely graduating. Dolores, Eddie’s older sister by two years, claimed that Leo had the worst reputation in the school and was a known user and dealer. The Saldanas tried to restrict Eddie’s association with Leo but soon found out they had little control over his friendships outside their home.

The Saldanas were delighted to see Eddie and Leo drift apart when Eddie entered the South Lake Tahoe Community College in a culinary arts program, an area of study he would change many times during his never-ending college career. Unfortunately, Leo’s absences were always short-lived, and like an annoying and persistent cough that never completely goes away, Leo Buckman always seemed to turn up. When he did, there was trouble.

Esther returned to the bedroom and slipped into her robe and slippers. She made her way downstairs to the office and noticed that one of the master keys reserved for the housekeeping staff was missing and that the light in room 3-A had been left on. Why would Eddie and Leo leave the light on? She didn’t give it much thought and continued to shuffle across the parking lot, her slippers making a soft clapping sound as they slapped against the asphalt.

She stopped at the garbage canister and retrieved the bag Leo had dumped there. She swooned with anger and repugnance when she looked inside to find some used syringes and wads of aluminum foil. What would come next would crush her heart and sensibilities and leave her with the profound realization that her son’s profligate lifestyle had finally overstepped all the margins of conscience and decency.

As the key penetrated the lock of the door, she sensed something was amiss, and as the widening arc of light from inside the room became more pronounced, she saw the corpse of Jamie Lynn Brennen splayed out on the bed.

Jamie Lynn had been Eddie’s girlfriend for the past six months. They’d met in a local café while she was home from her studies at UNR. She was just twenty-two and pursuing a nursing degree. She had been to the Saldana apartment, had conversed and eaten with them, and other than her trendy Goth appearance, they liked her. The Saldanas had even hoped there might be a future for Eddie and Jamie Lynn.

Esther knew Jamie Lynn had been diagnosed with a severe case of lupus since the age of nine and now saw her blanched, translucent skin in stark contrast to her fashionable raven-black hair, lipstick, and fingernails. Esther thought she looked like some creepy caricature of her own death and said a quick Hail Mary.

Her lips began to quiver as she fought back the sharp, peppery tears welling up in her eyes, and as she stood in the doorway, taking in the sickening sight of this poor, disheveled heap of fragile girl, Esther realized Jamie Lynn had overdosed. She had involuntarily gagged on her own vomit. Some of it remained in the cavity of her open mouth, but for the most part, it had spattered over her face and spilled into her hair.

As Esther slowly entered the room, the stench surrounding her was insufferable. It was obvious that during her final convulsions, Jamie Lynn had also let go of her bowels and bladder, the excretions seeping to the surface of her clothing and oozing onto the paisley bedspread.

She noticed Jamie Lynn’s small handbag, a syringe, a spoon, a piece of foil, and a cigarette lighter were haphazardly laid out on the nightstand, giving the impression she had accidentally taken her own life. The gray television screen buzzed with the eerie static of a channel that had long gone off the air, and crushed cans from an empty six-pack littered the wastebasket. They reminded Esther of the dead dreams of this sweet, sick girl who would never know what smacked her.

Esther stepped back outside into the nippy Tahoe morning and sucked in a breath of fresh, cold air. She quietly closed the motel room door, leaving everything inside as it was. It was still dark, and she wanted the darkness to envelop and hide her as she made her way back to the office. She felt small and invisible inside the sobering reality of what had happened, but as she gazed up at the millions of shining eyes staring down on her, she knew the secure and cozy life she and Joe shared here would be changed forever. She deeply inhaled another sharp breath and began to feel surprisingly calm. Inside the office, she placed the bag of syringes in the security safe under the counter. She then phoned the police and went to wake Joe.

The police were inspecting the contents of room 3-A when Eddie and Leo arrived back at the motel. They carried sandwiches and Styrofoam cups full of coffee and attempted to act shocked at what had happened. They kept reiterating that Jamie Lynn was alive and watching television when they’d gone for the food and coffee. Esther couldn’t help but notice the glazed-over look in their eyes and wondered if the police had noticed it too. Eddie started to sob inconsolably, espousing his love for Jamie Lynn, and restated that he didn’t know she was a user.

Leo quickly responded with, "All those Goth chicks use. In her case, it was probably because