Dark Lily: Shadows, Book 4 (11 page)

Chapter Thirteen

Gaby had one of her more horrible nights on a lumpy mattress in a tiny, sweltering room with jazz music blaring, people partying and car horns blasting. The aroma of fried catfish would have enticed her if it hadn’t been mingled with the smell of someone cooking up the swamp—likely a turtle—in the adjacent building.

She woke up late, on the floor and tangled in the top sheet. The image of a man choking on black coffee in the back of his van thundered like a tribal drum in her head.

“I am seriously going to start taking sleeping pills,” she said to the water-stained ceiling. “The only good thing I saw all night was the damn dog.”

“What damn dog?”

Mitchell didn’t knock or apologize for his unannounced intrusion. He simply strolled in with a mochaccino latte for her, a black coffee for him and a pair of beignets that smelled like heaven compared to the swamp-stench still lurking in her memory.

She regarded him from the floor. “Half-zipped jeans and no shoes or shirt isn’t dressed, Mitchell.”

“Neither is a twisted sheet with nothing under it.”

“My room, my sheet, pal.”

“My club, my food. If I leave, the coffee goes with me.”

“I hate you.” Climbing to her feet, she wrapped the sheet around her. “However, since I’m in desperate need of caffeine, I’ll take partly dressed and suggest you not rent this apartment to anyone except maybe an insomniac. Also,” she added when he started toward her, “I want you to eat your beignet over there, because I’m too muddled right now to decide if this is a good time and place for us to have sex.”

He hadn’t shaved for a few days, so the grin he sent her immediately scrambled her pulse and heartbeat. “Place is just fine, Gaby. Not sure about the time.”

And now she was disappointed. How contrary was that? A crease formed between her eyes. “Why do I feel slighted?”

He chuckled, ignoring the dangerous look she shot him. “Think, Gaby. You’re naked under that sheet, and I’m not pressing to take advantage. You have to know there’s a reason for my superhuman control.”

“You’re gay like the guy who beats on your slot machines?” she said sweetly.

“If you think that, your senses need a tune-up.” He drank his coffee. When he grimaced, she laughed, made sure the sheet was secure and accepted the cup he gave her.

“Got it. You’re hung over.” She tapped her temple. “My senses are fine. My mind’s still in the swamp.”

Straddling a hard-backed chair, he nodded at the beignets he’d set on a low table. “Help yourself. I’m not up to food yet.”

She broke off a small piece and bit in. “Way better than boiled turtle. Mitchell, what if someone had gotten in here last night while you were overindulging?”

“I’d have shot him.”

“What if you’d passed out?”

“The slot-machine beater would have shot him.” Mitchell swallowed more coffee. “I cut the guy a deal. I told him he could wail on my slots as long as no one got past him into the hallway leading to the second floor stairwell. Windows up here are barred, bed’s not in line with any of them, and I can drink a hell of a lot before I pass out. Gift from my late grandfather.”

“So your grandfather preferred booze to women, was a miser of sorts and made your grandmother’s life a living hell. Interesting man.”

“Not from where I sit. And speaking of where I sit, you might want to pull that sheet up a little higher before it occurs to me that a hangover doesn’t render a man non-functional. We need costumes.”

“Right, about that…”

“The theme’s gothic New Orleans, very specific. Graveyards and the undead.”

Amusement glimmered inside her. “Like Madeleine?”

“Only if she’s on the guest list.”

“Security’s that tight, huh?”

“Let’s say the riverboat’s owner isn’t overly fond of party crashers. Plus, venues like this hold a limited number of people. Tell me about the dog you saw in your dream.”

The memory returned in an instant. “He was sniffing around the dead man in the Chevy van. German shepherd. Gorgeous animal. There was a woman with him, also gorgeous. They climbed into the van, then jumped right back out. Next thing I knew, the woman was dragging a second corpse inside.”

“So there are two dead men in the van?”

“As of the time I dreamed it. Things got a little swampy after that, probably due to someone around here cooking a turtle. Please don’t ask me to describe the smell.”

“I don’t have to. I got the full benefit from the living room sofa. Before my stomach decides it doesn’t like the memory enough to accept the coffee I’m pouring into it, let’s switch to the masquerade party. CJ’ll be there, all handshakes and false smiles. The riverboat belongs to a man named Emmett Delacroix. He’s rich and quietly powerful.”

Gaby reknotted her sheet before asking, “How powerful?”

“He makes my grandfather look like a piker, and that’s not easy to do. He’s got his fingers in dozens of pies, all the way up to his elbows. In his own subtle way, he’s been backing CJ for several years.”

“You don’t believe he’s Leshad though.” She studied his face. “I can see you want to, but you don’t. Why?”

“He’s too visible. Too out there.”

“Is it possible he’s a front man? Someone posing as a potential Leshad?”

“I’d say yes, except Delacroix was in Haiti when Madeleine Lessard was murdered. His alibi’s airtight. He was at a head-of-state dinner, being plied for money by every head in attendance. He made a fifty-minute speech. Those who didn’t sleep through it attested to his presence in the room until two am.”

“That’s quite a bit of information you just supplied.” Keeping her gaze on his face, she sipped her latte. “Do you plan to tell me who imparted it to you?”

“Not Phoebe, which I’m sure is what you’re thinking. I had a long conversation on my cell phone last night while I was drinking myself semi-stupid.”

“You’re letting me visualize a picture Ryder showed you of a large, bald man who habitually wears black and wants very much to meet me.”

“Crucible.”

Gaby couldn’t read his tone, but she knew he wasn’t impressed.

“He went to the house in Bywater after we left, contacted me after that. It was his assistant, Miranda, who found the man in the Chevy van dead, exactly as you dreamed it.”

“The first man, the driver, was poisoned.”

“Miranda shot the second man. He was sneaking up behind her with a gun. As for the driver, someone slipped the aforementioned poison into his coffee. Crucible’s understandably curious as to how that happened.”

“Makes three of us.” She lifted steady eyes to Mitchell’s face. “I hope.”

A faint grin crossed his lips. “In spite of the look you just sent me, I know you didn’t do it, you know I didn’t do it, and Phoebe didn’t do it either. I checked. Her hands are clean.”

“I’ll take the Fifth on that and ask you why it is that Crucible’s not grilling me as we speak. Because if he has your cell phone number, he must be aware of this club.”

“He’s very aware of it. He’s also smart enough to give me the play he thinks I want before he moves in.”

Gaby sighed. “This is starting to sound extremely like reverse psychology. Look, I don’t need dirty details, but I would like to hear the gist of your conversation.”

“He knows about the riverboat masquerade party.”

“And the psychological games screech to a halt. I’m not entering Crucible’s world. Ryder’s wife told me he’s a highly controlling individual. And Ryder doesn’t think he can be trusted. Not all the way. Suggests to me that Crucible would be willing to risk a great deal if he believed the risk would lead him to Leshad. Now you and I both know I’d be more than willing to be part of the leading if I thought for a moment it stood a chance of success. But I don’t.”

“Neither do I.” Mitchell rose. “My feeling is Crucible’s gotten himself into a major pissing contest with some or all of the directors. Ryder’s on board with the idea, and Phoebe doesn’t trust any of them.”

A laugh slipped out. “Talk about complicated. Last question then, before I throw you and your half-zipped jeans into the hall. If Crucible knows about the riverboat party, and the man who’s giving that party is almost certainly involved with Leshad—not to mention CJ Best and God knows how many of Leshad’s other lackeys who’ll also be in attendance—why do I want to go?”

Fixing his gaze on hers, Mitchell crossed the room and took her by the arms. “Because you’re the person everyone wants. And I’m going to speculate that all the people you mentioned are aware by now that you plan to be on Delacroix’s riverboat tonight. Delacroix, CJ, Crucible, the directors—”

“Leshad’s henchmen?”

“Yup, them too. But they’re not going to get you, and that’s a promise.”

Gaby watched through wary eyes as he lowered his mouth to hers.

The heat and hunger that pumped into her were more than enough to disrupt her senses and stop any attempt she might have made to read him.

Not that she needed to. It stood to reason there’d be one more significant person on that riverboat tonight. The person who wanted her enough to kill and kill and kill. The faceless man from the calling cards left behind at countless murder scenes.

Leshad.

* * * * *

It felt to Mitchell like the profusion of noise and music that permeated New Orleans from dusk to dawn became a bizarre backdrop to the ominous whispers spinning through his head.

Although the air was hot and muggy, a bank of clouds, black and threatening, had begun to gather to the north. They’d be paddle wheeling toward the bayou tonight, directly into those brooding thunderclouds.

Because he needed her to be on her guard, he bullied Gaby into taking a nap while he ran his checklist. Then he tortured himself by thinking about her naked under a thin cotton sheet on his bed.

He made a point of doing that thinking downstairs, however, in the empty club that he’d closed early, with Etta James on speaker and a pair of soft blue lights burning in two overhead fixtures.

It had to be that his mind was otherwise engaged, or it might not have startled the living crap out of him to glance up from his laptop and see Billy the doll seated in the chair across from him.

“Jesus.” He managed not to leap to his feet, but his boots hit the floor with a distinct thump. “Where the hell did you come from?”

“Oh, that Billy, he’s always popping up someplace or other,” a female voice drawled. “Mostly where and when a body least expects it.”

Mitchell scanned the heavily shadowed room. “Makes sense.” He set his laptop aside. “Speaking of bodies, why don’t I see yours?”

A chuckle came from one of the dark corners. Dark, but not impenetrable. There was no one in the room, no one anywhere, only a doll glowering at him from across the table.

“Could be you need to believe a little more before your eyes can take me in,” the voice went on. “Don’t matter much if seeing me’s not possible yet. You see Billy. That’s fine for now.”

“Depends which side of the table you’re on.” Mitchell ran through the possibilities. “You’re not Madeleine. Gaby said she sounded old and fragile. So who the hell are you, and why’s your wooden companion glaring at me? I’m not planning to sell Gaby out to Leshad, if that’s what you and Billy are thinking.”

Another chuckle, this one low and gravelly, reached him. “If Billy thought anything like that, you’d be weaving baskets in a rubber room by now. He’s checking up on Gaby is all. Him and me both. You took her away from Bokur Island. Twila and Tallulah sent her to Bokur to keep her safe.”

Pushing back from the table, Mitchell made a physical search of the shadows. “Lady—or whatever you are—Rapunzel hated the tower she was locked in. What makes you think Gaby’s any different? Other than the fact that she’s a flesh-and-blood woman and not a fairy tale princess.”

“No one wants to lock her away. We just want to see her safe until the evil that’s Leshad realizes he won’t be getting what he wants from her. Ain’t no curse in or out of the swamp can be removed by any but the one who did the cursing. Now, Leshad, he killed that person good and dead, so he can look from now ’til the day his curse takes full hold, and he won’t find a soul capable of undoing it.”

Mitchell eyed Billy in some suspicion. Why were those painted eyes fixated so fiercely on his face? “I’m no authority on curses, so I’ll accept that the one on Leshad can’t be undone. But why tell me? It’s Leshad who needs to hear this. Come to the masquerade party on the river tonight, and make your announcement there. Even if Leshad doesn’t show—unlikely in my opinion—he’s bound to hear about it.”

“He could hear the truth every minute of every day, and he wouldn’t believe. You want my opinion on what’s best? I say you should bring Gaby back to Bokur Island. Not to make her a prisoner, but to give her what you’d call leverage for when Leshad finally does catch up with her.”

“Yeah? My understanding was that Leshad’s too spooked by voodoo to set foot on Bokur.”

“He don’t need to set foot there personally. He just needs to see again and again what happens when somebody evil like he is does. And I expect you could be mistaken in any case. A man as desperate as Leshad is gonna take chances that go against the grain. Old Madeleine, she was a powerful woman in her lifetime. Ain’t no one alive got what she had inside her.”

Mitchell glanced at Billy’s gritted little teeth and intense expression. “I’ve been told that Twila’s great granddaughter, Rosemary Sayer, has power.”

“Yes, she does. And so does Gaby. But if you’re thinking they could combine what’s in them to fight Leshad, you can squash that notion right now. A body gets what she gets, and she does what she can with it. Gaby sees spirits of the dead. Her mama knows that. She also knows Leshad will kill Gaby when he realizes she can’t remove the curse he’s living under. So what’s the answer?”

“Are you asking, or planning to tell me?”

Her voice began to echo. He assumed that meant she was leaving. And taking Billy with her, he hoped.

“Voodoo’s a complex practice, Mitchell Stone. The magic of it flows deep in Gaby’s blood. The fear of it festers in Leshad’s. Think on that for a moment. If you were Leshad and living under a curse, how would you feel, believing as he does, that what terrifies you most is the only thing that can save you?”