Killer Girlfriend: The Jodi Arias Story Read Online Free Page B

the “Provo push,” a maneuver
     that gets its name from the predominantly Mormon city in Utah that is home to BYU.
     The faith discourages sexual intimacy of any sort out of wedlock.
    At this point, Travis was already trying to get Jodi to join the Mormon church, even
     sending missionaries to her house in Palm Desert.
    By the end of the weekend, their intimacy had escalated far beyond just rubbing their
     bodies together. They performed oral sex on each other. They had breakfast at a truck
     stop restaurant and went home to their respective cities.
    Jodi claimed at her trial that she felt used by Travis during the weekend, “like
     a prostitute.” But at the same time, she could have just written Travis and the whole
     weekend off as a silly, passion-filled mistake. Of course, she didn’t.
    She called him Saturday when she was driving home. No answer. She called him again
     Sunday. No answer. She sent text messages on Monday. Travis was starting to see another
     side of Jodi, an obsessive one that would rear its head again.

Chapter 5 The Mormon Courtship

Chapter 5
The Mormon Courtship
    “No man for any considerable period can wear one face to himself and another to the
     multitude without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.” —Nathaniel
     Hawthorne.
    An overlooked fact about the relationship between Jodi and Travis is that they knew
     each other only for 21 months. They met in September 2006, and he was dead by June
     2008.
    The relationship between Jodi and Travis can essentially be broken up into three
     acts. The first was the initial courtship that included an introduction to the Mormon
     church and Prepaid Legal. That lasted from September 2006 until February 2007.
    The second act was Travis and Jodi as boyfriend-girlfriend, a period that covered
     five months, from February 2007 until late June 2007.
    The final act — reminiscent of a Shakespearean tragedy — was the breakup period,
     during which they continued to see each other for sexual trysts. It ended on that
     fateful, violent June 4, 2008, day in Travis’ bathroom.
    Each facet of their relationship was intriguing in its own way, but the Mormon saga
     was especially fascinating. The story is a clash between the chaste values of the
     Mormon church and the innate sexual desires of a couple finding it increasingly difficult
     to resist each other.
    Travis began talking up the Mormon church to Jodi almost immediately after they met
     at the Prepaid Legal event in Las Vegas. As they began their months-long courtship
     through a series of phone calls, text messages and hotel hookups, Travis slowly began
     convincing Jodi that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was the right
     religion for her. She considered herself an Evangelical Christian growing up, but
     was drawn to the church — never mind the fact that at the time she was unmarried and
     living with Darryl Brewer, loved Starbucks and was performing oral sex on Travis.
     All three would be considered violations of church doctrine _ no living with a person
     of the opposite sex out of wedlock, no caffeine and certainly no sex of any kind.
    Jodi said Travis would always bring up anal sex to her. To him, anal and oral sex
     were acceptable under the Mormon faith because they did not involve vaginal intercourse.
     Jodi said that Travis had the “Bill Clinton version,” where oral sex, well, wasn’t
     really sex.
    It was an utterly false rationalization. Chastity means chastity in the Mormon faith.
     No exceptions. Jodi also said Travis started sending photos of his erect penis to
     her via text message, causing her embarrassment on one evening as she had dinner with
     friends in California.
    By November 2006, Jodi had decided she wanted to join the church. She said her parents,
     siblings and extended family cautioned against the move, urging her to not jump so
     quickly into a religion that required so much dedication and commitment. It’s not
     the type of