Crescent Moon (4 page)

“So you smuggled them into this country,” Juste said, keeping his tone carefully
uninflected.

“We did nothing illegal … in this country. In my own, the oversight
was slight … a clerical error. Mummies are plentiful, not usually a
remarkable find.”

Juste studied his expression. “And yet you didn’t identify what went
missing when you placed the call.”

Haddara bowed his head. “We would like this matter kept quiet.”

From that small gesture and Haddara’s gleaming eyes, Juste knew Haddara
suspected this possibly unremarkable find was likely very remarkable indeed. He
raised the photo in his hand of the two mummies. “I’ll keep this. We’ll get a
crew here to dust for fingerprints and anything else the robbers might have
left behind. Call in last night’s guards as soon as possible. We’ll interview
them here. And I want a supervised inventory of the contents of the remaining
crates, just in case anything else is missing.” He turned to his new partner.
“I have somewhere else to be.”

His partner nodded. “I’ve got this covered.”

Juste was sure he didn’t. Mikey might have his heart in the right place,
but he hadn’t been around long enough to smell a lie. From Juste’s standpoint,
there was an elephant’s crapload of lying going on. But missing mummies and
hard-eyed desert “protectors” weren’t foremost in his mind. He had a ballgame
to get to.

Denise, Bobby Guidry’s widow, glanced up from her seat in
the bleachers and offered Juste a small smile. “Glad you could make it. I
wasn’t sure you would. Heard you had some trouble.”

Juste turned sideways to slide between the bleacher seats.
“Trouble’s blown over,” he said, flashing an easy grin.

She grunted and crossed her arms over her stomach. “Bobby
would have liked seein’ you shake the snot out of Lieutenant Maines.”

He leaned down and picked up Maisy from the bench, before
sitting beside Denise. Maisy was four, but unusually solemn these days. She
didn’t understand much more than the fact she missed her daddy and still looked
for him everywhere. But her expression brightened as Juste set her on his knee.
Her dark gaze clung to his face as she popped a thumb in her mouth—a habit
she’d outgrown a year ago. Knowing the action comforted her, he didn’t comment.

The last time he’d seen her, she’d cuddled against his chest
during the service for her father’s funeral. He’d been late, having only made
up his mind to attend because he didn’t want Denise to be without “family.”
When he’d slid into the pew, Denise, her face tight from trying not to break
down, had leaned toward him. “Thank you,” she’d whispered.

He’d felt a pinch in his chest. “Sorry I missed the band.”

“They made a mournful sound,” she’d said quietly, a tear
glistening beside her eye.

“As they should,” he’d murmured, kissing her cheek. “As they
should.”

And then they’d quieted as the priest and a host of speakers
followed each other.

His arms had grown weary holding the little one close, but
he hadn’t cared. He could do this for Bobby. Be there for his little girl and
boy. Bobby had taken the bullet meant for him. Juste would make sure they never
wanted for anything, that he’d be there to watch Bobby Jr.’s games and to sip
imaginary tea at Maisy’s tea parties, and he’d dance the father’s dance at her
wedding when she grew up. Long before they’d been partners, he and Bobby had
been best friends.

Juste thought the hole in his heart might never mend.

He glanced out at the field, noting the black and white
uniforms of the opposing team, and then glanced into the dugout where Bobby Jr.
sat.

The boy stared, his dark face split by a wide grin. He
waved.

Juste gave him a nod, then tapped his nose twice and rubbed
his chest over his heart—his signal to tell him
good luck
. Then Juste
sat back, Maisy dozing against his chest in the shaded bleachers, and let his
worries—his irritation over the new investigation and his baby-faced partner—bleed
away. With Maisy’s little-girl, talcum-and-soap scent in his nose, he finally
relaxed, but not without feeling a pang in his chest that Bobby wouldn’t have
anymore moments like this. Not that Juste would ever forget he shouldn’t be the
one here. Not with Bobby’s son looking so much like his lanky daddy fidgeting
in the dugout.

His phone vibrated, and he pulled it from his pocket to
glance at the screen.

Two guards coming in tonight. Last not answering phone.
Sending squad car to house.

Juste tapped
k
and shut the screen.

Denise raised an eyebrow. “Forgot how annoyin’ that is.”

“I’m not leavin’.”

Her brow arched. “Sure you shouldn’t?”

Juste lifted his chin toward Bobby Jr. who strode to the
plate, his uniform hanging on bony shoulders. “Not until they win the game.”

Denise chuckled beside him. “Your new partner know how
stubborn you are?”

Juste’s mouth quirked up on one side. “Don’t think it’s a
secret.”

Her chuckles faded, and they both turned their attention as
the first pitch flew. Bobby Jr. swung. The ball cracked against the bat.

Juste’s heart soared at the look of pure joy on his godson’s
face as the ball arced high and over the fence. Tears pricked, but he blinked.
It was just the sun. And just a game.

He’d cried once. When Bobby’s breaths slowed and stopped as
he held him in his arms.

Juste drew a deep, jagged breath and felt a soft hand touch
his forearm.

“He’s more like his daddy every day,” Denise said, leaning
her head against his shoulder.

Juste cleared his throat. “That make it harder?”

Her head turned. Her dark eyes gleamed with a hint of tears.
“No. Bobby’s here, in both the little ones. I’m not the one he left all alone.”

When Juste returned to the museum, the sky was darkening
with clouds. It looked like rain would soon fall, and from the forecast, the
storm might produce some flooding. He hoped like hell they could wrap up soon
so he wouldn’t spend the night there.

Inside the door, he donned latex gloves. The crime techs
were still in the warehouse. One was on a ladder dusting the camera in the
corner for prints.
Good idea
. He looked around for his partner.

Mikey stood beside a crate with a clipboard while museum
workers carefully swept away straw before pulling out bubble-wrapped artifacts.
His partner gave him a nod. “With the storm comin’ in, I told the two guards
we’d see ’em here in the mornin’.”

Juste grunted, irritated he’d made that call. The sooner
they wrapped this one up, the better.

Mikey lifted his shoulders. “It’s mummies, not shooters,” he
muttered under his breath.

Not liking the reminder he wasn’t in homicide anymore and
that robbery investigations didn’t proceed with the same urgency, Juste
smothered a curse. “I’m gonna take a look around the back.”

Mikey gave him another nod and then returned his attention
to the items. By the look of all the empty crates, they were nearing the end of
the inventory anyway.

Juste felt a moment’s guilt for leaving Mikey with the bulk
of the tedious work, but only a moment’s. He scanned the room, found Dorman and
Haddara sitting beside the white table, talking quietly.

Because he wasn’t ready to make nice with either man, Juste
strode deeper into the storage area, away from the activity, through crates and
metal racks where less important items, or perhaps ones that were rotated in and
out of the museum’s displays, were stored. The lighting was poor and so far
from the faded daylight spilling through the cargo bay door that he withdrew a
small flashlight from his jacket pocket and flicked it on.

Toward the very back, he found rolled-up rugs and emptied
boxes. And a crate nearly buried in refuse. A crate that didn’t look to be
nearly as dusty as everything else around it. By the painted arrows on the
plywood, the box sat on its side, the lid facing him.

Juste glanced around, but no one was watching. He gently
knocked on the box and listened to the sound. By the dull, muffled rap, he knew
the crate wasn’t empty. Curious, his belly knotting in the way it always did
when he had a hunch, he gripped the nailed face of the crate and tugged. There
weren’t enough nails to keep the crate closed. The lid gave slightly beneath
the second tug.

And then he heard a sound. A soft mewling cry. His heart
stopped, and then thudded dully against his chest. He leaned close pressing his
ear against the lid and listened again.

The noise came from inside the box.

Juste pulled harder on the lid, prying it back. The wood
splintered, then gave, and he carefully pulled it off to lean against a rack,
trying to keep down the noise because he didn’t want anyone else alerted. Maybe
it was just an animal trapped in a crate.

He shone the light into the crate. “Well, I’ll be damned,”
he whispered.

A bundle lay on the floor, covered in black plastic trash
bags. The bundle was moving, and from the outline, there was something inside.
His heart hammered. By the shape, it wasn’t any small animal.

“Sonofabitch.” He hunched down and entered the crate,
kneeling beside the struggling figure to begin pulling at the bags to tear them
away. Once he’d cleared away the plastic, he sat back, shock rendering him
still.

The wriggling body was wrapped in dirty strips of fabric. A
fucking mummy with the exact same drawings covering its body as the mummy he’d
seen pictures of. Not that he thought for a minute this was some dead thing coming
to life. No, some bastard had played a horrible trick, leaving a living person
like this to die. Anger swept through him, but also caution.

This wasn’t a simple robbery anymore. And he didn’t know
who’d had the misfortune to wind up in the crate. Better to proceed with
caution.

Again, he bent over the figure and noted the sounds of short
gasping breaths. “I’ll get your face freed first so you can breathe. Hold
still.”

After wedging the flashlight high in a corner to free both
hands to work, he stripped off his gloves and reached into his pocket for his
keys and the short pocket knife attached to the ring. Opening a blade, he
wedged it beneath one of the stiffened strips, cut it, and then peeled it
slowly away. The mouth beneath it was soft, feminine. Opening for air. With her
tongue, the woman pushed out something lodged inside her mouth. A round stone.
She swallowed hard, and then opened her mouth fully to gasp.

He worked faster, peeling strips from the woman’s eyes. They
remained closed, but he noted the thick black eyeliner rimming the upper lids,
the long dark lashes lying in a fringe along the lid. He lifted her head,
unwinding more of the strips, peeling them off to reveal soft, brown hair
matted with moisture.

“It’s okay, sweetheart. It’s okay,” he whispered more to
himself, because he still couldn’t believe this. What sort of monster would do
this to someone else?

As her breaths became less jagged, her quiet sobs faded. He
went to work tucking his finger under the cloth at her neck and hacking through
the stiffened fabric, hardened by some resin-like substance. He couldn’t
imagine how she’d lived, because the strips were tight and constricted her
chest.

He sliced a line down one arm and then turned to the other.
From the side of his eye, he saw her free arm raise and something glinted. Out
of instinct, he reached up to deflect the wild swing and caught her wrist.

A blade clattered to the floor.

He glanced toward her face. Her eyes were wide open and
staring wildly back at him. They gleamed golden and sparkled ferociously.

Juste didn’t know if she had meant to kill him, but he
couldn’t take the chance. Not when he only had her partially freed. Moving his
right leg, he straddled her body, careful not to give her his weight, and
pressed her arm to the floor. “I’m here to help. Let me help you.”

She shook her head and said something in a language he
didn’t understand, something guttural but soft, sounding Arabic perhaps.

“I don’t understand you,” he said more loudly, but realized
shouting wouldn’t make her understand him any better. With his free hand, he
cupped her cheek, finding it soft and moist with tears. From what he could see
of her features, she was young … and hauntingly beautiful.

His breath caught as her gold-flecked gaze locked with his. “Let
me help you,” he repeated, then eased his hand from her wrist. He raised his
short blade to show it to her, and then climbed to the side and resumed slicing
the fabric.

This time he started talking, a monologue of nonsense, just
making sounds to soothe her as he worked. She had to be frightened out of her
mind. He could only imagine the horror she’d been through. And then he made
himself stop that line of thinking and start thinking like a cop. She was
wrapped like a mummy; her skin was olive and her eyes were shaped like almonds.
She might well have something to do with the exhibit, might have been involved
with the theft. Or she could be a witness. How she’d run afoul of the thieves .
. .  Well, he wouldn’t know until he got her to the station.

At her collarbone, he stuck his fingers under the fabric to
lift it high enough to run the knife beneath it and was further surprised to
slide his fingers along naked skin. Juste pulled in a deep breath and shot
another glance at her face.

Her features were still, not a blush or a grimace crossing
her face. Perhaps she was too shocked to realize she’d be naked as the day
she’d been born by the time he was done. But what could he do? He wasn’t
leaving her in this death shroud—evidence or not, he was ridding her of the
wrappings.

Unfortunately for his peace of mind, the body he revealed
inch by inch was achingly lovely—slender, with skin the color of golden honey.
He tried not to think of what he uncovered, tried to keep his gaze busy with
what he was doing, and not lingering on her pretty breasts with their soft, tan
nipples. More breathtaking was her feminine mound, which was completely bare.
Her long silky legs were gently curved. Crusts of the resin, which had hardened
the wrapping, stuck to her skin but failed to detract from her beauty. From the
tip of her head to her slender toes, Juste had never seen a more perfectly
formed female.

The woman barely breathed, staring upward from her plywood
bed.

Realizing he’d studied her body a little too long, he
shrugged out of his jacket. “Wear this until I can get you out of here. I have
a blanket in my car.” He held out the coat.

But she didn’t move to take it. She laid there, her gaze
studying him. And then she opened her mouth. “Say … that … again,” she
said slowly.

Her words held no hint of an accent, as he would have
expected. Her voice was raspy, as though she’d shouted herself hoarse. And
perhaps she had. “You understand me?”

“I do now.”

He shook his head, narrowing his eyes. “Who are you?”

She got her elbows under her and slowly raised her torso.
Her gaze darted around the crate. “Where am I?”

Trying to ignore what that raised position did to her
breasts, he muttered, “In the Garden Museum. The storeroom near the cargo bay.”

A frown dug a wrinkle between her brows, and her lush lips
thinned. “I’m not in the Duat?”