[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/xPfAC72.jpg[/img][/center] [B][center]Interlude Pt. I[/center] Hollywood 12:53 PM[/b] Charlie Rembrandt looked around the opulent mansion nestled snugly in the Hollywood Hills. His own modest home was just a few blocks away, but it might as well have been on another planet. The cheapest home was probably a sixteen bedroom twenty million dollar mansion deemed a "fixer upper" by a chipper real estate agent who wore too much jewelry. With its lush lawns and Olympic sized swimming pools, it was a nice neighborhood to have bad habits in. And Mark Preston collected bad habits the way nerds collected comic books. Rembrandt walked across the foyer's Italian marble flooring towards the stairs. He was one of nearly a dozen LAPD personnel on site. As RHD, he was the lead detective responsible for the scene and had to make sure everyone was following procedure. The boots were out on the lawn and in the street, keeping reporters at bay, while the crims took photos and bagged evidence. A few of the Hollywood Homicide cops were still on the scene even after booting it up to RHD. Charlie had them downstairs in the kitchen and dining room, interviewing the household staff. A few had found the private security guards who patrolled the neighborhood constantly, lest any commoners linger too long and forget their place. If there was anything worth seeing than the security guards had seen it. Rembrandt needed them all out working so he could be left alone. There was bad voodoo in this house. Not literal voodoo, which Charlie got a crash course in the last time he crossed paths with John Constantine, but just [i]something[/i] in the house unsettled him. This house wasn't that old, but it's history had been pretty remarkable. This home carried a lot of pain in its walls, something had happened here and it had been festering ever since. The Second Sight or whatever it was called was directing him to something inside the house. The whine of a camera drew his attention away from the hallway and through the door. The crims were busy taking photos of Mark Preston’s hanging body from all angles. The corpse rested against the side of the wall, a chair knocked to the ground just below his feet. A necktie that cost more than Charlie’s entire suit was wrapped around Preston’s neck at one end and nailed against the drywall at the other end. “We’re taking bets,” Ray Pinkerton said once he saw Charlie looking in. Pinkerton wore vinyl gloves and was in the process of dusting the wall around Preston’s body for prints. “Either suicide or a sex thing gone bad.” “I think the nail, and the fact that his pants aren't around his ankles, rules auto-erotic asphyxiation out,” said Charlie. “Auto-erotic what? Use small words, Charlie, I’m just a high school graduate. You think he topped himself off because of the news?” “A guy worth as much money as he was worth doesn’t just kill themselves out of the blue. This must have been more appealing than a jail cell.” "Tell you one thing that's fishy," said Pinkerton. "He managed to hit the nail right into a stud without a stud finder." "Some people know their house," Charlie shrugged. "I could do the same at my own house." "He doesn't look the type to know anything about home improvement." "True, but you can never tell about people. I mean, you don't look like the type to be into dogs, but yet..." Pinkerton laughed and flipped Charlie off with his gloved hand. He turned back to the wall and focused on his work, the time for chit-chat seemingly over. Charlie turned away and started back down the corridor. He could hear whispers, pleas and crying all around him. They filtered in and out so rapidly that he tried to shake his head to clear the sound of it. Yeah… this place was bad fucking news. She was waiting in the study, her back turned away from the door and instead looking out the window. There was a perfect view of the front lawn and the mob outside filming and waiting to see Preston’s body rolled out on a stretcher. Charlie knew she wasn’t alive because he could partially see through her. “Excuse me.” She turned and looked at Rembrandt with wide eyes. She was old, the wardrobe was a dead giveaway. A tight knee length dress with black character shoes and a navy cloche hat covering her jet black hair. A lovely string of pearls was wrapped around her neck. Charlie had seen photos of her in history books. Not her specifically, but her type. She was the prototypical flapper. “You can see me?” “Yes,” said Charlie. He pulled his badge and showed it to her. He felt silly flashing his badge at a ghost. If someone happened to walk in it would look even sillier. “LAPD. How long have you been in this house?” “Years,” she said, turning back towards the window. “Years and years. Are they here for Mr. Preston? I wonder if they can see me...” “They probably can’t. And they're here for Preston. I don’t know how much you know about him, but he was an important figure in the film industry.” “He was also a monster,” she said turning back to look at Charlie, her eyes filled with hate. “The world knows that now. We think that’s why he took his own life. Do you know what happened, Miss?” “I know what happened. I think...I think I drove him to kill himself.” Charlie stepped forward and furrowed his brow. “Tell me about it. Start from the beginning.” She walked across the hardwood study floors, her heels making no sound, and clutched her pearls as she spoke. “My name is Pearl Jones, or at least that was my stage name--" her eyes flashed warmly as she thought back to some long ago memory. The memory faded, as did the warmth, and her eyes were once again cold. When she spoke, her voice took on a hard edge. "And my story is one you’ve heard hundreds of times before. A girl who came to Hollywood with big dreams. And then I watched those dreams crash against the rocks…”