Cypress Nights (30 page)

After midnight

S
treams of light shot behind Bleu's eyelids. If she opened them, the bag sent more scratchy dust into her eyes.

She smelled wet earth, mold, rotting leaves. What felt like pipes dug into her back.

When she drew in air, crazy little sounds bounced from her throat. She shook so violently, she bit into the sodden gag. Only forcing her mind to be still, empty, let her breathe through her nose until the retching stopped again, and she calmed down.

It didn't last. The shaking started all over, and the biting, the carving pain from the base of her skull to her eyebrows.

Her ankles were bound together.

The man, he drove her here—never speaking, not touching her again until the vehicle bumped over rough ground. They had stopped, and he dragged her outside. He pulled her in one arm, then threw her down.

She didn't know how long ago he'd left her there.

Struggling only scraped the bag over her skin. She struggled anyway. Several times, she had fallen sideways onto the ground. Now she was sitting again, her back against the pipes, sweating, scraping her heels back and forth, trying to find a way to free her feet.

“My God.”
She heard her desperation inside her brain. If she couldn't get away, that man might come back.

He
would
come back.

An idea niggled its way into her thoughts. She tried to force it back. Her trembling became spasms of shaking that burned her muscles.

What if Michael had asked someone to come after her? What if that person waited until she made the move to Toussaint, then came after her? Michael warned her she'd never be free of him.

An engine, its noise getting louder, didn't register at first. When it did, she tried to scream and felt tears pour down her cheeks. Closer and closer, a vehicle came. And then the engine shut off.

Bleu knew what vehicle it was and who drove it.

A door slammed.

She strained, but heard no footsteps.

Another door opened.

A jangle and a thud. Metal things hitting the ground.

The second door slammed shut.

Cold shot up Bleu's legs. The skin stretched tight and it ached. Slowly, she inched herself sideways along the pipes.

Too much noise. All she could do was pretend to be dead—or unconscious. Deliberately, she let herself slide until she lay on the ground again. She slumped there—her face and body twisted downward, her legs pulled up—and waited.

He was close. The metal clanged again. Another thud, this one louder, sounded.

Grunts shocked her. Sounds of something heavy shifting, a great slap against the ground.

Soon, he'd come for her. He was getting something ready first.

She mustn't make any noise, but mucus clogged the back of her nose and her throat. Bleu needed to cough. The hot tears mixed with grit in her eyes.

Something slid and the man grunted again, and he dropped whatever he was carrying.

She thought he laughed under his breath before the clatter of hard things sounded once more.

And he laughed out loud.

Grinding. A rough sound like cogs falling into place.

I can't, please, I can't do this.

Bleu remembered hearing something like that before. A drill, a very old-fashioned one, crushing its bit through wood. Only the sound was different.

A subtle pop and a cracking. He hadn't made the hole true, and whatever was around it had burst open.

Something to use on her? A box to bury her in?

Sliding, sliding. Sliding away from her. A heavy thing was dragged, while the man strained. He banged into things, but didn't curse.

And, finally, silence fell again.

Could it have been someone else who came back? Had the person failed to see her? She'd been very still. Bleu panicked. What if help had been feet away but, in the darkness, the other person didn't see her?

She moaned.

Listening so intently her ears hurt, Bleu squeezed her eyes shut and fought to hear any small sound.

Nothing.

How could she know if the person who had been there was good or bad? If he'd gone away, surely someone else would come eventually. Roche wouldn't let her stay lost. Neither would Madge or Cyrus or any of the others.

An abrupt thunder of blows on hard surfaces came from all around her. Louder and louder. She was like the inside of a drum absorbing wild beating on her shell.

Around and around it went. Starting at one side and moving in a circle.

Bleu got out a scream, and another. She screamed over and over and rocked her face on the hard ground. Gathering herself onto her knees, she curled over and fought as best she could inside the bag. She remembered her watch and managed to wrench it off. With the catch, she picked away at the cloth under a band of tape.

It wouldn't work. Or it would take forever. Or he'd hear and stop her.

He would stop her anyway.

Not for several seconds did she realize the hammering had ceased.

A door on the vehicle opened. The tools, or whatever they were, landed somewhere, probably inside.

For a long, long time, a sound like wind moving leaves grated at her. To remain quiet was her choice.

Once more, a door closed hard.

The engine turned over, and the rumbling receded slowly until Bleu was left in the dark inside the bag again, with the smells and the occasional skittering of a critter.

Don't let him come back again.

Daybreak

T
oo weary to raise their faces, the men emerged in a straggling line from woods along the back way from Pappy's to St. Cecil's.

Roche kept his eyes down, still searching, even though he'd stumbled onto the broken blacktop on what was an extension of Parish Lane. The lane ran from the center of town all the way to join with Bonanza Alley between the rectory and the church.

“We've got to regroup,” Max told him, arriving to throw an arm around his shoulders. “We don't know if Bleu's been found elsewhere. A report could have been called in.”

Hardly able to hope, Roche used his cell phone to reach Spike. While he waited for an answer, Marc Girard joined them, then Guy Gautreaux with his black dog.

The sheriff answered his phone. “Spike here,” he snapped out.

“Heard anything?” Roche said, driving a finger and thumb into the corners of his eyes.

It took a long time before Spike said, “Nothing. Goddamn it, it's like she evaporated.”

Roche didn't want to consider that image. “We need to know where to start next.” More searchers emerged from the trees and walked heavily toward him.

“Come on in,” Spike said. “We've got more pairs of boots from the state. We need to make sure we're using everything we've got as best we can. We've already started sending for locals to help and we'll get more people from the surrounding areas. Ozaire knows someone with dogs—”

“Stop!”

“I'm sorry, Roche. We're all wearing thin.”

Max move to stand in front of him, his frown deep. He looked into Roche's face.

“Into the station?” Roche said, gathering himself. A small crowd grew around him.

The sight of Madge, limping along the lane, shocked Roche, but before he could go to her aid, Cyrus came from behind her and put an arm around her waist. He half carried her. Sam Bush ran to hold her from the other side and the threesome carried on.

“Spike, you want us at the station?” Roche repeated.

Spike came back on the phone. “Can you wait right where you are?”

“In the middle of Parish Lane?” Roche said. “No. I've got to keep going. I can't waste any time.”

“Wait a minute,” Spike said. Then, “I want you to send as many as are able to go through the town alerting people. We probably need them now.”

“Probably?” Roche heard negatives in every word spoken to him. “You don't think we'll find her, do you?”

“I didn't say that. Send them now. Then they need rest and so do you.”

“I'll go with the others.” He couldn't do anything else.

“Roche,” Spike said. “I've asked the FBI for help. They're already in Toussaint.”

“For God's sake—”

“I had to,” Spike said. “I'd be negligent if I didn't. I'm telling you, so you don't get shocked when you fall over one of the agents.”

“Thanks.” He closed his eyes and muttered, “FBI,” knowing everyone else would feel as desperate as he did, but he couldn't keep them in the dark.

“Wazoo called to say she thinks she knows something useful,” Spike said. “I told her I'd see her at the rectory. She's on her way there now. It's up to you, but if you want to, you could wait and hear what she has to say.”

Roche didn't think he could deal with Wazoo. He told Max what Spike had said.

“Roche,” Spike shouted at him. “Say somethin', will ya? I can't hang on this line any longer.”

“We're on it,” Roche said and hung up.

He looked into his twin's face and Max nodded slightly.

“You think I should hear what Wazoo has to say?” Roche asked.

“Yeah. I'll get the rest going into the town. We've got to have reinforcements. Calling in the feds was the right thing for Spike to do.”

Max slapped Roche's shoulder and walked off.

Wordlessly, Roche continued on toward the rectory. Cyrus, Madge and Sam were ahead of him, and he hated to see Madge hobble. He figured she must have resisted being carried and knew Cyrus wouldn't push that. Or, given her frame of mind, she wouldn't let him push it.

He caught up with them. “Madge, have you hurt yourself?” he asked.

“A couple of days ago,” Sam said promptly. “Turned her ankle.”

“You should stay off that,” Roche said.

Cyrus gave him a bleak look. “Yes, she should, but she won't listen. You know how hardheaded these women can be.”

Madge didn't respond or look amused. She did visibly cringe when Sam lifted her into his arms before she could protest.

“I didn't know how bad it was,” Sam said. “Don't start fussing. I'm carrying you to the rectory.”

A movement caught Roche's attention: Cyrus lifting his hands and looking at them as if he didn't know who they belonged to. He glanced up and met Madge's eyes over Sam's shoulder. She seemed close to tears.

“What is it?” Roche said, falling in with Cyrus. “With you two? There's something horribly wrong.”

“Yes,” Cyrus said simply. “God will have to solve it, because I can't.”

There was nothing Roche could think of to say.

They trudged along through the grayish light beneath a sky streaked with pink and purple. The clouds were brushed into ribbons, and the air still carried a little of the night's cooler temperatures.

“Spike says Wazoo's coming to the rectory with something to tell us,” Roche said. “I don't know how I feel about that. I want to be out there looking for Bleu.”

“I know you do.”

Roche stopped walking. He ran both hands through his hair and searched around. A wild, desperate urgency overwhelmed him. “She never did anyone any harm.
Your God wouldn't let someone do awful things to her, would he?”

“My God is your God,” Cyrus said. He sighed. “For better or worse, He can be a hard master.”

That left Roche with his mouth open. He had no way to answer what he didn't even understand coming from Cyrus.

When they all approached the rectory, the first person they saw was Lil. She rushed to wrench open the gate and trotted toward them, her hair on end and an apron flapping around her.

“Lil,” Cyrus said, hurrying. “It's all right. Whatever it is will be all right. Be calm, please.”

“Calm?” She panted. “Calm, you say? You better come now and hurry. There's men here from the FBI. Me, I never been so frightened. They're trompin' all over the house and all around the garden. Now they said we all gotta stay inside. Well, I ran right out, I can tell you. They're not makin' me no prisoner.”

“Hush.” Cyrus held her arm and started her back the way she'd come. “Did Wazoo get here yet?”

“Wazoo?” she cried. “Why, Wazoo?
There's a hex!
I knew it, there's a hex on us because we upset someone we shouldn't have. Wazoo's comin' to do for the hex? I don't know if that girl's got the strength. She talks a lot, but I don't know.”

The pastor of St. Cecil's deserved medals for not lecturing his housekeeper on the dangers of believing in the occult. Roche admired the other man's control as he plodded toward the side of the house.

They arrived at the back door in a bunch.

Arrived in front of a dark-suited man with a crew cut, old scars from bad skin when he was younger, and a solid body. He held his hands together and dark glasses made
him seem impassive. Roche wondered how difficult it was to see in dark glasses at that time of the morning.

The man stood aside and opened the door. “There'll be questions,” he said, pleasantly enough. “Give your names to the agent inside.”

Roche turned to glance at the garden. Lil had said they were searching that, too. Why would they look at either place, the garden or the rectory? They wouldn't find Bleu there.

He pinched his mouth shut.

Only two men stood in the garden, at the bottom. One faced the bayou, the other the rectory.

A white van, and then another, larger one, rolled down Bonanza Alley and Roche's gut squeezed. He knew crime-scene vehicles when he saw them.

He sprinted, went from nothing to an all-out run in seconds.

“Sir,” the agent by the door shouted. “Sir?”

Roche ran on. He figured they wouldn't shoot him in the back. Both men at the bottom of the garden converged on him when he arrived.

“This is off-limits,” one of them said. “An investigation is under way.”

“Investigation of what?” Roche gauged whether he could get past these two. Neither of them had the brawn of their third man back at the house, but he had no doubt they could stop him.

“We can't talk about this yet, sir,” he was told. “We've got a brand-new development here.”

He noticed activity beside the bayou. Several more uniformed people, male and female, some in white overalls, faced the water, while two of their number hauled on the bow of an abandoned pirogue, pulling it to shore. A rope
trailed behind it and had become tangled around a cypress stump.

Unless it had been tied up there.

Inside the shallow boat, he saw what seemed to be a body covered with a tarp.

He absorbed the leap of his heart into his throat and said the first thing he thought of. “I'm a doctor. Perhaps I can help.”

“We've already got doctors,” he was told.

“Do you know who's in the boat?” His mouth had dried out.

“No, sir.”

“It's likely to be someone local. I could help with the identification.”

Both men's expressions became uncertain.

“It might not be a body,” he said, voicing aloud a vain hope.

“We're pretty sure it is. Why don't you wait right here. We'll let you know if they want you down there.”

“Sure,” Roche said, opening and closing his hands into fists. He shoved them in his pockets. No point showing these guys he was too personally involved.

“Roche!”

Wazoo, all but overbalancing in her haste to reach him, bounded headlong downhill. Hair and skirts whipped out behind her, and he saw how wild her eyes were, well before she reached him.

He caught her before she would have fallen.

She looked around him toward the pirogue and let out a cry. “I'm too late.” She clutched Roche's sleeve. “Me, I should have done something sooner. I called Spike this mornin'. He wouldn't say one thing to me. I know someone's missing. Who is it?”

He kept a hand on her arm. “Bleu's gone. She disappeared after you left last night. You didn't stay long.”

She crammed a hand over her heart. “I couldn't stay there. I feel this thing coming. Somethin' happenin'. I went home to…I had to think.”

He dropped his hand. “Just wait,” he said. How could
he
just wait? Inside, he was freezing up. An ice man with a throbbing heart and pain in his rigid throat.

Instructions were shouted from below. The boat glided to bump against the bank, and people hurriedly guided it alongside.

Roche broke away. He dashed around the agents and vaulted the low hedge between the garden and the path beside the bayou. Shouts from behind him got the attention of those on the bank.

“I'm a doctor,” he said, fighting to compose himself. “Roche Savage. I know most people around here. I might be useful.”

A balding man with fair coloring said, “Hi. Stick around just in case.” He was being polite—but so what? Roche was where he had to be.

Warnings shot through the air. Watch where they trod, watch what they touched, follow protocol to the letter.

As soon as the fair man turned back to his fellows, Roche edged closer, waited, then made a few more inches of progress. He could see as well as anyone who wasn't actually at the edge of the pirogue.

The shape inside didn't have to be a body. Bunched up, the tarp could have been discarded there.

A technician reached out a gloved hand, took hold of the edge of the canvas and eased it first up, then, after glancing back at the other agents, pulled it back.

Roche saw a woman lying there, but one of the men obscured her face.

All attention was on the contents of the pirogue.

“Hoo mama,” Wazoo whispered. “This is one time I wanted to be wrong.”

Carefully, Roche got closer. A shudder crawled his spine.

He cleared the man closest to the woman's head.

“Sick, sonsabitches,” the same man announced. “Why would anyone do that?”

Roche's knees locked and he made himself look down on a corpse, the body of what had been a woman. Congealed blood from a hole in her forehead covered her face and neck.