“Are you a vegetarian?” Blanca asked Harper.
Harper shook her head.
“Then think about it,” said Blanca. “Is it better for a chicken to be killed at an industrial farm and show up under plastic at the supermarket, or to kill it—quickly—yourself? I mean, really, I used to go visit my abuela on her farm, and she raised chickens, and sometimes you makepollo en salsa verde, and…”
“I get it,” said Harper, not up for the debate over industrial food production and animal cruelty. “I’m just trying to understand why you—or both of you?—were at what appeared to be some kind of satanic ritual at the Perles Mansion yesterday.Not only were you trespassing, but you were disturbing a potential crime scene.”
“We didn’t commit a crime!” Jenny said.
“That’s not what I meant,” Harper replied. “It was illegal for you to be there.”
“And it wasn’t satanic!” said Blanca, touching the cross at her neck. “I wouldn’t put up with that for a second.”
“Okay, I shouldn’t have described it that way. But whatever it was you were doing didn’t exactly look wholesome. You were trespassing on acrimescene.”
“I thought she was found outside, in the garden,” Jenny protested.
“How do you know she wasn’t attacked in the house and then moved to the garden?” Harper asked.
Blanca looked stricken, and Jenny had the grace to blush. “It wasn’t like we were messing with anything related to the murder investigation. This was a separate-type deal.”
“Totally,” insisted Blanca, backing up her friend.
Harper raised her eyebrows. “So, youwerethere, Blanca.”
“I’m sorry I lied to you,” Blanca said. “Are you going to tell the police?”
“Any reason I shouldn’t?”
“Um…” She and Jenny exchanged a look. “We had a good reason.”
“And what might that be?”
“We met these people? And they said they could call on Soren Perles’s spirit. Because it’s getting close to Halloween. They said they had done it before—that Delilah Mason even let them use that weird mirror room one time.”
“Who were these people?”
“We were sworn to secrecy, and even though I don’t reallybelieve in that sort of thing…I mean, what if they really would hex us if we said something?”
“A person can’t go through life under a hex,” said Blanca. “Also, they said they were going to use real body parts in the ceremony. And that fit right into this upcoming episode of the podcast.”
“What do you mean, ‘real body parts’?” Harper asked.
“You know…parts. Of a person’s body,” Jenny said.
“Where would they get these parts?” Harper asked.
“The internet,” Blanca explained. “You can buy anything on the internet.”
“Are you serious?”
Jenny nodded. “Joel told us about it.”
“Joel Aristide? You know Joel?”
“The ghost tour guy? Sure. Everybody knows Joel.”
“Was he part of your chicken-killing group?”
