Bayou Heat (4 page)

“She hasn’t shown up for work in a week.”

“No calls?”

“Nope.”

“Any idea where she might have gone?”

“Last time I saw her, she said she was headed to that new
club Intempo.”

“When is your next payday?”

“Friday.”

“Thanks.” Rob closed his pad and put the paper and pen back
into his pocket as he stood.

“Let’s go.” He walked to the door and waited for Eris to
catch up.

“You wasted your money. I could have followed Debra’s aura.”

He opened the door for her and she walked through. “I like
facts. The harder and the colder they are, the better.”

“Things aren’t always concrete.”

Rob slipped his shades on against the midday glare. “They
are for me. I live in a black-and-white world.”

“Must be really boring.” Eris turned to the right and started
walking.

“Intempo is this direction.” Rob pointed to the left and
waited for her to come back.

“I know that.” Eris stopped and turned to face him. “Debra
didn’t go that way, she went this way.”

“The bartender said she was headed to Intempo.”

“I heard what he said and I’m telling you that he’s wrong.”

The temperature felt as if it had risen another ten degrees
while they were inside. Beads of perspiration formed on his body, causing his
shirt to stick to his back. God, he wasn’t going to follow her around the
Quarter in this unbearable heat. “What are you planning to do? Wander the
streets until you stumble over a body or drop dead of heat stroke?”

Her smile was sugar sweet but fire flashed in her eyes.
“Bite me.” With that, she turned and sashayed away from him.

“I’m not going that direction, so don’t expect me to save
you the next time you walk headlong into trouble.”

“Fine by me.” Her words were tossed over her shoulder at him
as she rounded a corner and disappeared from sight.

Eris kept her feet moving and refused to look behind her.
The man could go find a very high cliff and jump for all she cared. He was
stubborn, narrow-minded and controlling.

She laughed at the thought of living in a black-and-white
world and then thought how cold and lonely that must be. She lost the thread of
Debra’s aura she was following and silently cursed herself for letting the man
distract her. After a few seconds of intense concentration and searching, she
picked it up again and continued down the street.

The aura circled the block and before she knew it, she was
once again on Bourbon Street headed toward Esplanade. Several minutes later,
she crossed Esplanade and entered an older residential neighborhood that had
seen better times forty years ago. Twenty minutes later, Debra’s aura became
more and more confused as she approached a rather run-down house.

Eris stopped on the sidewalk and studied the building. There
wasn’t a doubt in her mind this place was a crack house, and Debra was either
here or had been here recently. She lost the clear connection she had to the
girl as Debra’s essence became more confused and agitated. It was hard enough
tracing a person when they left a clean path to follow—this wasn’t one of those
times. There were a lot of factors that could muddle a person’s residual
spirit, not the least of which was drugs, she thought, studying the old house.

She swiped at a bead of sweat running down the side of her
face. July was a scorcher in New Orleans, she thought absently as she finished
off her now-warm water.

Opening her senses to the unseen world around her, she tried
to get a better, firmer fix on Debra. The onslaught of multiple feelings hit
her hard, causing her to stagger back. These personalities were jittery,
agitated, needy and hurting. Immediately she felt unbalanced and nauseated.
Taking deep, cleansing breaths, she bent over and placed her hands on her knees
for support. It was like being on a cup and saucer ride at the carnival with a
nasty hangover.

Eris was on the verge of being sick when a warm, rough hand
touched the bare skin at the small of her back. Instantly she felt comforted
and the nausea subsided. For a moment, she let herself enjoy the rare feeling
of being calmed.

“What’s wrong?”

She jumped away from the gentle touch and the deep baritone
voice as if a hot iron had branded her. Whirling around, she faced the man
whose touch made her feel safe but whose presence made her want to pull out her
hair. “Let me guess, you couldn’t find Intempo and, being a male, refused to ask
for directions?”

For a few seconds, his face showed genuine concern for her
discomfort, but her words sufficiently wiped that expression away. Now he
looked more than peeved at her and she could deal with that.

“I know exactly where Intempo is located, considering I’ve
visited it a few times.” His words were short and clipped.

That didn’t surprise her at all; he looked like a
high-priced playboy. “So why are you here and not there?”

“Because I have an assignment to do whether I like it or
not.”

“Ah. The responsible type.”

“Very much so. You, on the other hand, go running off
without thinking twice about it.”

“True, but there is nothing wrong with that.” She put her
hands on her hips and glared up at the man. Boy, he sure was tall.

“Didn’t say there was anything wrong with that. If you would
have stayed put another ten seconds we wouldn’t have needed to walk in this
heat and we wouldn’t both be standing here looking like two melted ice-cream
cones.”

“How so?”

“We could have retrieved my car from where I left it.”

“Then I would have been stuck doing things your way.”

“True, but then we would have gone to the club, talked to a
few people and found that Debra’s been hanging with a guy named Jerome
Broussard. Then, after a phone call or two, we would have come up with an
address for the guy, which happens to be on the other side of town.”

The smile was gone from his face and she knew he wasn’t
happy with her, but she refused to back down. “How do you know all of this?”

“I made some phone calls while following you on this
cross-country hike through the Quarter and learned everything we needed to
know.”

Eris considered his words for a few moments then dismissed
them. He didn’t understand how she worked. “You didn’t learn everything.
Jerome’s address might be on the other side of town, but Debra is here.”

“I hope you’re right. Because soft-shoeing it back across
town in heat pushing one-hundred degrees isn’t my idea of fun.”

She hoped she was right also because she couldn’t get a good
read on Debra and really didn’t want to face this man if she was wrong. Maybe
the extreme heat was distorting her ability. Once again she’d gotten so
involved in following someone’s essence path she hadn’t paid attention to the
world around her. Now that he mentioned it, she noticed the way her clothes
clung to her damp body, making her uncomfortable. She could only imagine how he
felt wearing a suit and tie.

She turned toward the house. “Well then, let’s go find out.”

She walked toward the house, not waiting for a response. The
closer she got, the more distorted the aura became. A hand on her arm stopped
her from entering the house, and then it was gone.

“Don’t tell me you’re going in there?”

“Okay, I won’t.” Opening the screen door, she walked into
the entryway of what once was a grand house. The screen door slapped shut and
she heard a muttered curse as the door opened and closed again. Then Rob’s
presence was behind her, strong and dependable, like the man.

There were two doors on the bottom level and stairs at the
end of the hall leading to a second floor. Her guess was the house had been
divided into four apartments.

“Which door?” Rob’s asked as he moved past her.

“We’ll have to try them one by one.”

Moving to each door in turn, she dismissed them both after
studying the auras that surrounded each. Upstairs, she stopped in front of the
first door. She placed her right hand against it and swayed at the anger
emanating from within. Dropping her hand, she stepped back.

“She’s in there.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.” She crossed her fingers behind her back as she told
the lie.

Rob raised his hand to knock, but she stopped him. “What? Do
we have to wait for Venus and Jupiter to align before we can find out?”

She rolled her eyes. “No. It’s just that there is some bad
stuff going on in that place. Two people are in there, and at least one of them
is in an out-of-control rage.” Without a second thought, she retrieved her
pistol from the holster strapped to her right calf. She’d worn the holster,
with jeans to cover it, because she didn’t want to deal with her purse.

“You know how to use that thing?” She felt him watching her
every move as she chambered a round.

“Yes and I even have my carry permit, thank you very much.
I’m guessing you’re carrying?” She hadn’t seen him wearing a shoulder holster
or side arm that morning.

He gave her a knowing smile and reached behind him to pull
out his gun. “Amazing that we find common ground in the guns that we carry.”

She watched as he pulled his pistol from its holster. It was
a larger version than hers, but they were both top-quality pieces. “I’ve tried
carrying mine at my back but I find it bothers me too much. It doesn’t bother
you?”

“I’m a good four inches taller than you, which gives me more
room to work with. I also like the fact the gun can’t be seen like a shoulder
holster can when wearing a jacket.”

At five-ten she’d always had the problem of finding a man
she could look up to. That wasn’t a problem with him. She was still staring up
at him when there was a muffled scream and the sound of glass breaking from the
other side of the door. Rob gently pushed her to the side, stepped forward and
kicked the door open before she could stop him.

Bedlam broke out inside the apartment as Rob disappeared.
Eris took a deep breath and followed. The apartment was a single room that
smelled of sex and drugs, had holes in the walls and ceiling and should have
been condemned years ago, such as so many others in the city. A roach crawled
across the two-burner stove and disappeared into a crack in the wall. Eris
turned her attention back to the rest of the room. The bed was shoved into a
corner and huddled there was a sobbing woman with the covers pulled to her
chin.

Between the bed and Rob stood a naked man brandishing a
large, wicked knife and shouting threats.

“Drop the knife. We only want to talk to the lady.” Rob’s
voice was barely distinguishable above the woman’s hysterical crying.

“I paid good money for the bitch and I ain’t done with her
yet.”

Eris watched as Rob holstered his gun, never taking his eyes
off the man.

“Your time just ran out, so why don’t you hit the road.”
Rob’s words were hard and cold.

“Like hell.”

The man jabbed and her heart did a double flip as Rob
grunted and moved back. In the small confines of the apartment, there was
little room to avoid the attack. The man pulled back and smiled before lunging.
This time, instead of moving away from the attack, Rob stepped into it, taking
the man by surprise.

Before she could tell what Rob was doing, the man was
sailing through the air directly at her. Eris hit the floor as the body flew
over her and slammed into the wall behind her. The stunned man dropped his
knife as he slid to the floor and she quickly scooped it up.

Rob stepped over her, grabbed the man by the arm and slung
him out into the hall. He slammed the apartment door, turned the lock and then
leaned one shoulder against it. The man bellowed and cursed from the other
side, demanding his clothes and threatening to call the police.

“Find his clothes before a neighbor calls the cops,” Rob
ordered. “I really don’t want to explain this.”

“Maybe you should have thought of that before you kicked
down the door.” Eris scrambled to her feet and gathered the man’s pants, shirt
and shoes. The underwear and socks he could live without because she wasn’t
about to touch them. She bundled the items together before handing them over to
Rob.

He took the clothes from her and held them casually in one
hand. It was then she noticed how cool, calm and collected he was about
everything. The noise from the other side continued as the man resorted to
slamming his entire body against the door. Rob remained unfazed. “If I wanted
to think about every action before doing it, I’d have stayed with the FBI.”

He flipped the lock, placed his free hand on the doorknob
and turned to her. “Get back over there with her and stay out of my way.”

Another loud crash sounded from the hall and Eris wasted no
time getting in position next to the girl, who remained in the bed with the
sheet pulled up around her, crying uncontrollably.

Eris tightened her grip on the gun as she gave Rob a slight
nod, indicating she was ready, and watched as he opened the door. Unthinkingly,
the man barged into the room, only to be greeted by Rob’s fist to his jaw. Eris
straightened as the man hit the floor and lay sprawled on his back.

“You sonofabitch. I’m calling the cops,” the man growled as
he started to get up.

Rob shoved him back to the floor with a foot. “Please do,
and when they arrive, you can explain to them why you’re here paying for sex
and whose drugs are scattered about the room.”

Eris watched the man deflate as Rob’s words sunk in. She
couldn’t help but be impressed by his handling of the situation and was
fascinated by his controlled strength. She wondered exactly what the suit,
shirt and jacket disguised.

Rob tossed the man’s possessions into the hall. “Be glad I’m
in a good mood today or I’d be pounding you into the ground. Now get the hell
out of here.”

The man scrambled out of the room without a backward glance.
Rob closed and locked the door but stayed close in case the man decided to
cause more trouble. He looked across the room and watched as Eris put her gun
away before she turned to comfort the hysterical young woman.

He couldn’t help but wonder exactly what LD had gotten them
into by taking this assignment. Glancing at his watch, he noted the time and
stifled a groan.

Five more hours until Matt relieved him.

He could do this.

He was fast on his feet, strong and, most importantly—he was
packing.

There was a commotion over by the bed and he looked up to
see Eris attempting to convince the young woman to get up. By the tone of Eris’
voice, it was obvious she had little patience.

Speaking of others, he wondered where Eris’ kid was. Knowing
her, the boy was probably left home alone all day in that small apartment with
nothing more to do than watch TV and get into trouble. That thought caused his
already foul mood to plummet.

He checked Eris’ progress and sighed. It was obvious he was
going to have to get the girl moving or they would be there all evening. As he
pushed off the wall, his cell phone rang. He retrieved the phone, checked the
caller ID and smiled. “I’m going to take this call out in the hall. Why don’t
you try to get her dressed?”

Rob walked out the door as quickly as he could but not
before he heard, “What do you think I’m doing?”

He chuckled as he closed the door. By her tone alone, he
knew she wasn’t having fun. Which was fine by him because he wasn’t having fun
either. He held the phone to his ear and forgot all about etiquette. “You owe
me, LD. Since I walked out of our nice, air-conditioned office, I’ve hiked
across the Quarter, gone to one strip joint and decked a naked man, which could
land me in jail if he presses charges. And all of this happened in the last two
and a half hours.”