Dead End (25 page)

“I want you to be honest with me. Am I ugly?”

He made a noise that had no distinct meaning.

“Am I, Dante? Look at me and tell me.” She leaned toward him over the stick shift and braced her weight between the seats.

Dante kept his eyes lowered. “You’re a beautiful woman, Miz Chauncey. If he ain’t givin’ you much attention it’s because of what you said. He’s pretty strung out now.”

“I’m hot-blooded,” she told him. “And when I don’t get any satisfaction, I’m not reliable. I can’t help myself. Pretty soon the opportunity for a little fun, and relief, presents itself, and I lose my head. You wouldn’t want me to do that to Chauncey?”

“I would not. But there ain’t much I can do about it.”

She rocked forward on her arms until she could nudge Dante’s face up and close in for a full, wet, tongue-thrusting kiss. He resisted, for about ten seconds.

Panting, Precious let her head fall back. “I knew you were a passionate man. Think of it this way. You’re doing it for the man you most admire, to make sure his wife doesn’t spread herself around in dangerous places.” With her mouth still moist and open, she looked at his crotch and said, “I like a man who stands ready to sacrifice himself for the good of another.”

Dante came for her with fire in those dark eyes. He dug her breasts free of the purple mohair and held them like oversized doorknobs which he turned and pulled.

Finesse wasn’t the man’s forte. But despite the discomfort, she was turned on. How Chauncey would hate knowing about this. She hadn’t planned to do more than ring Dante’s chimes, but why take your hand out of the cookie jar minus a cookie?

She pulled the top undone and opened it wide, then transferred her weight behind her. Precious had felt eaten alive before, but so far this guy had the biggest appetite she’d encountered. She was going to be bruised, but what the hell.

He took one of her hands to his zipper and molded her around him. “Okay, big boy,” she said, and opened up his pants. “I guess you’re loaded and ready to go.”

No clever words of seduction came her way.

“I gotta have it now,” he said, ripping his belt undone and pushing his pants and shorts down to his ankles. He didn’t seem to notice that his pole was framed by the two sides of his soggy jacket and shirt.

Precious said, “Oh, Dante,” and actually felt something close to passion. He had plenty to play with, and she buzzed in all the right places.

Kneeling on his seat, he yanked her by the waistband of her skirt, fumbled beneath to rub his fingers hard between her legs. He yelped. “Ouch. Damn it.” He pulled out her car keys and threw them on the floor.

Dante was like a kid in a candy store. He didn’t know what to fill his mouth with first. He tried to stand her up until he realized it was impossible. Finally he tore off her panties and pulled her legs across the drive shaft, only to discover the gear shift was right where he wanted to be.

Precious yelled, “Careful,” and he managed to hike the second thigh free.

At last, with her head under the steering column, and one knee hooked over the back of the seat, Dante took her with the delicacy of a jackhammer. From her angle, she could see his skinny ass pumping up and down and managed to swallow her laughter on account of really admiring the only part of him that wasn’t undernourished.

One second, two, three, four, “You’re taking me all the way to heaven, baby,” she squealed, and that’s what happened, she flew on that boy’s efforts. “You may never know how much I needed that,” she said, panting. “Good stuff shouldn’t be over so quickly. We’ll just have to do it again real soon.”

Dante’s response was to shiver and return to his door-handle action. She caught him by the sleeves and hauled herself up to a sitting position again. Playfully slapping his hands away, she pulled her sweater around her and squeezed her legs together. “Look at the time. Where did it go? Oh, Dante, we gotta get back before Chauncey suspects something.”

He turned chalky white and nodded.

“Be a good boy and get out of the car while I get myself together here. I can’t do it with you so near. I’ll forget what I’m supposed to be doin’.”

Her coy smile brought a man-of-the-world curl of the lip from him. He winked and got out of the car.

Precious gave him sixty seconds to feel like a stud. Then she drove away, and she didn’t need to hear him to know he was cursing as he leaped from the Jag’s path.

       Reb had neither a “nose” nor a “palate” when it came to wine, but the Chablis Cyrus had apologized for tasted good.  He had taken a call from Ozaire Dupre just as the three of them arrived at the rectory, and left.

“How long do you suppose Cyrus will be gone?” Marc stood in the middle of the black and bronze carpet in Cyrus’s second-floor sitting room.

“Hard to be sure.” She didn’t like Marc’s hollow-eyed, distant look, although she couldn’t expect the events of only two days earlier to have left him unscathed. “He wouldn’t have left if he hadn’t thought it was important. Ozaire Dupre’s mad enough to be threatening.  He’s using his wife’s shock to his own advantage.”

“Lil was upset.  She hyperventilated or something.  What mischief could he do with that?”

“Spread lies if he doesn’t get what he wants. He says bird woman’s the sign he’s been expecting. Evil—like Oribel’s sculpture.”

“That capering thing’s growing on me.” Marc swayed as if to some music she couldn’t hear. “Hey, we found out we dance well together, huh?”

Reb rolled her eyes and pulled her feet beneath her on Cyrus’s beloved dark green leather couch. “Ozaire is into barter.” She wouldn’t reveal how he’d fleeced her on the bike transaction. “He gives this or that. And what he wants is always worth more than he’s prepared to give up.”

Marc finished his wine, looking down at her while he drank. “So he’ll keep the devil worship stuff to himself in exchange for what?”

I don’t know all the specifics. Something to do with higher wages for Lil, and Ozaire getting to sell fish outside the church after Mass every Sunday.”

She didn’t blame Marc for laughing. “Cyrus told me last night that Ozaire was making things up so folks will start asking questions about what’s going on in this house.”

“Nothing is,” Marc said, then smiled cynically. “Apart from me. But, of course, that’s what’s got a feather up the guy’s…I’m the reason Dupre and the rest of them are all riled up. Is Oiseau still actually in town?”

“Oh, yes. One more person who’s looking for a fast buck. She’s got a room from—are you ready?—Chauncy Depew. It’s no more than a cubicle in one of his warehouses. She’s going to do night watchman duties in return for living rent-free.

“In the few days she’s been here she’s worked up quite a trade for readings. I saw May Lynn Charpentier sneaking away. She took one look at me and ran.”

“Geez,” Marc said. “And they think I’m trouble, that I’ve brought trouble to their quiet town. I guess they’re right, only not in the way they seem fixed on, and not like some of the crazies who fit into Toussaint like oiled screws.”

“Your mother owns a lot of this town,” Reb pointed out. “By default, that means
you
own it. These people still haven’t got a reason to be reassured you mean them and their businesses no harm. They barely get by. A rent hike would take some of them out altogether.”

“Damn it all.” He thrust out his jaw. “If they want to keep things smooth with me, they could try treating me with some respect. I don’t mean they have to grovel, just behave like regular people. I swear it’s as if they’re baiting me into making their lives difficult.”

She avoided the temptation to go to him. “Are they managing to do that?”

Marc gave her his narrow-eyed stare. “What do you think?”

“I think I should give you a physical. You don’t look so good.”

“Really?” His new grin was purely lascivious. “Now that sounds worth being sick for. He indicated Cyrus’s afghan-draped sofa. “I’ll stretch out there. I don’t need to put on a gown, do I? I’m not shy if you aren’t.”

“I bet Cyrus would like walking in on that scene,” she told him.

Marc gave a brief shake of the head. “I doubt we could do anything to shock him. I’ve about had it, Reb. At night I’m jumping out of my skin. I sweat, then get real cold and have to take a hot shower. That’s when I’m not taking a cold shower.”

He looked at her pointedly, and she averted her eyes.

“Do you like this room?” she asked and felt ridiculous.

“As a matter of fact, I do. It’s lived in, but it’s comfortable. Cyrus has a good sound system, funny to have no TV, though. Did you notice all the kids’ books on the bottom shelves?”

“Oh yes. He does family counseling up here and believes in putting everyone at ease. He also loves children.”

“What a waste.”

“Hm?”

He wandered to look down on a basket of baby toys. “He’ll never have kids of his own, that’s what I meant. Too bad.”

“He has hundreds of children of his own—children of all ages.” In truth, Reb agreed with Marc, but she was honor bound not to say so.

“I guess.”

It was dark outside, and branches hit the windows. She got up and drew the brown velvet drapes. “Some of these chilly days and nights must be breaking records for July.”

“Maybe it’s not so cold. It could just feel that way because of what’s happening.”

She strolled back, pausing every few steps to sip the red wine. “Either way, everything seems strange.”

“Does having me in Toussaint seem strange?”

“You’re fishing.” And she couldn’t bear looking at him after a question like that. She cleared her throat. “I’m glad you’re here.” She was also panicking, just a little, at the prospect of his leaving again.

Abruptly, Marc put down his glass and left the room.

Reb stared after him, her stomach doing flips and goose bumps shooting over her skin. Whatever he’d wanted her to say, she’d apparently chosen the wrong thing.

Minutes passed and he didn’t return.

The corridor outside the room ran the width of the house with bedrooms to the right and to the left of the staircase. This room was a converted bedroom.

Reb poked her head into the corridor. Marc was nowhere to be seen, and she couldn’t hear him. She went to the top of the stairs and looked down. Again, no sight or sound of Marc.

He wouldn’t just walk out without a word.

A door opened at the far end of the corridor, and he looked out, looked at her. He waved, and beckoned to her. He held a finger to his lips.

Frowning, Reb tiptoed quickly toward him. “What are you
doing?
” she whispered. “What will Cyrus think if he gets back and finds us poking around his house?”

“His car’s still gone,” Marc told her when she arrived on the threshold of a small bedroom. “I’m keeping an eye open at the window. This was Amy’s room.”

She thought
Bonnie
’
s room,
entered and looked around. “How do you know?”

“There’s nothing here but sympathy cards. They aren’t written to anyone specific, but they’re all sorry Bonnie died. Makes sense Oribel might put them in here.”

Reb nodded. “She puts on a good act, but she’s sentimental.”

“I thought we might check around…just a bit.” Marc sounded unsure of himself, as if he wanted her approval. “There’s nothing happening, Reb. Not a word about finding, or having a lead on the…on Amy’s body. And Spike’s still refusing to discuss the tape recorder.”

“Be patient,” she told him, knowing it wasn’t what he wanted to hear. “It’s only been two days.”

The single bed was made up with a clean blue chenille bedspread on top. Nothing personal was to be seen anywhere.

Marc opened the closet. “Empty.” He moved on to drawers and even looked under the bed and passed his hands under the mattress. “I guess there wouldn’t be anything.” He sat back on his heels and looked at Reb.

She snatched up a card and pretended to read. Her decision to pretend they’d never almost made love wasn’t working. She couldn’t get it out of her mind, and each time she saw Marc she was back in her study—with him.

“How are you doing, Reb?”

“Fine,” she said and heard her own sharpness. “You?”

“Sometimes I think I can’t keep on going—not without feeling you in my arms again.”

“That’s not fair.” She blinked rapidly before looking at him. Her eyes stung, and her throat let her know what denying him was costing her.

“I don’t mean to be unfair,” he said, his voice very low. “But I’m only telling you what’s true. I want you.”

“Stop it.”

“I want you. All of you. I want you with me all the time, waking and sleeping. I don’t want to try to sleep again without knowing you’ll be there when I wake up.”

“Marc.” The battle to hold back tears was about to be lost. “You have feelings. I have feelings. Neither of us has a right to expect to get our own way all the time.”

“How about some of the time. Like now.”

She blushed until her body glowed.

“Okay, okay, later, then.”

“We’d better get back before Cyrus does.” And before she did something outrageously stupid.

“I told you he’s not here yet. I’ll hear him when he comes.” He stood up slowly and let his hands hang at his sides. “Will you help me get them to let me see Amy’s effects?”

Each time he opened his mouth he threw her another curve. “Why?” She didn’t tell him those few things belonged to Bonnie Blue.

“Because I might find something useful, something that means nothing to anyone but me.”

Reb thought about it. The few feet between them were too much, but if she didn’t want a disaster on her hands, she’d better widen it. “I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it. You don’t have a right to see them. That means strings would have to be pulled.”

“I don’t care if it’s only been a couple of days, something must have happened. I don’t get why they aren’t telling me anything.”

This was so hard. “You can’t prove there’s a reason for you to be informed,” she told him.

The instant she opened the door he was at her side, ushering her into the corridor. They walked side by side until Marc put a hand at her waist and excused himself to use a bathroom that stood open.