Devil Dead (14 page)

“Look, Ms. Collins,” Claire said, and yes, a tad annoyed perhaps. “We are intelligent people so we understand everything you say, so quit asking us if we know what you mean after every sentence.”

Nev looked rather hurt by Claire's rather irked remark and sent a rather pretty little pout up Novak's way. One that said:
That mean old girl's bein' freakin' mean to me, man. Make her freakin' stop it. Wanna smooch?

“And you didn't think it was important to tell that to the cops?” Novak asked her, still not in receiving for any of Nev's winsome love looks.

“They didn't ask.”

Okay, blood out of a turnip, anyone? “Who is he?”

“Her guy, you know. They hooked up in February, I guess. After he broke it off with Pru. Andi didn't ever get to go home 'cause her family lives in Australia or New Zealand, or somewhere far off like that. South of China, she said. In the ocean.” She looked at Claire. “You sure got a good tan. Where you been at?”

“Tahiti. That's south of China in the ocean, too.” And right now, she wished she was still there. Okay, apparently Nev was not a geography aficionado, probably made a flat F in it, even if she crammed and didn't wash her hair. She probably couldn't find her way to Baton Rouge or Metairie, either.

“Tahiti! You mean, like in
Mutiny of the Bounty
and stuff? The Mel Gibson one?”

“Yeah, pretty much the same place. But now it's in the present.”

“Okay, sure, awesome. But back to that guy. Carvy's really a pretty cool dude. Real hot and stuff.”

“Is he a student here?”

“Used to be. Got suspended for smokin' weed in his dorm suite. You know the score. Brought it all down. Freakin' bought time back.”

Huh? Claire was gonna have to invest in a Tulane student-speak translation book. Or maybe just a Nev-speak translation book.

“Do you know where he lives?”

“Yeah. Not far from here. In the Garden District. He got himself an apartment upstairs in one of those old houses that everybody's always goin' freakin' nuts over. You know, them bein' so old, and stuff like that.”

“Really? He lives around here?” That did surprise Claire. A pretty nice address, that was, especially for a punk drug dealer. But she was thinking of Jack Holliday's house on St. Charles Avenue, and Jack Holliday was loaded with old money and new money and every other kind of money you could think of. Not as much as Black had of course; nobody in Louisiana had that much money, not even the governor or Brangelina, although Brad and Angie were probably getting close. Jack had plenty, too, no doubt about it.

“Where exactly?” said Novak. “And try to be specific. You know the name of the street?”

“Dude. I don't know all those streets over there. Guess I can show you, if you take me with you. You gotta car? The two of us could go case out his place. Maybe get some lunch later?”

“Okay, let's go,” Claire said, determined to get something concrete to go on before the sun went down. Even if it meant dragging Nev along with them until Kingdom Come.

“You goin', too?” Nev asked Claire, no doubt worried Claire would crimp her seduction of Novak.

“Afraid so.”

“It gonna take more than an hour?”

“Not the way she drives,” said Novak.

Nev laughed coyly and batted her caked mascara at Novak some more. Wow. Just wow.

When they reached the Range Rover, Novak opened the door and deposited Nev Collins in the backseat, real gentlemanly all of a sudden, and then he climbed in and settled his bulk in the passenger seat. Claire punched the child lock so Nev wouldn't forget and get out while the vehicle was still moving. It took a little while to get over to the right street, maybe because of the eight thousand red lights, and it took Ms. Airhead even longer to find the exact house. She finally did so, out around Eighth Street and Magazine. It wasn't exactly a Scarlett O'Hara house, and not up to par with Jack Holliday's rather stately mansion at his rather posh address, but that neighborhood was reserved for millionaires or women who used to be married to millionaires or actresses from Los Angeles who were trying to act like they weren't millionaires. Claire pulled up just down the street in front of a hole-in-the-wall bookstore with posters in the window that depicted Stephen King's latest book. Good cover on it, too. Creepy.

“He lives upstairs,” Nev was leaning up close and saying to Novak. “See that stairway goin' up on the side of the house? That's how he gets up to his door.”

More brilliant commentary from a pea brain,
Claire thought. “So you've been up there?”

Claire watched Nev closely, not sure yet what to think. Maybe this girl was smarter than she acted. Maybe she was putting on a dumb-as-a-stump show for them and knew a lot more than she was letting on. Nah. She didn't have any super-sized plethora of smarts. Nobody was that good of an actor.

“Oh, yeah. Yeah, sure. Coupla times. With Andi and Pru. Not lately, though. Like I said, I haven't seen much of 'em. They been freakin' skippin' out on most of their classes. Partyin', I guess. Gonna freakin' flunk out, both of 'em.”

Boy, Nev had really regressed into college speak now.

“What's this guy look like?” Novak asked her, turning in his seat to look at Nev. He was actually being more patient than Claire would have expected out of him. More wordy, too. But that wouldn't take much. He was now pushing up to five words at a time.

“He's tall and kinda skinny and he's got that kinda little beard, you know, like, I don't know, like, rappers I guess. He's crazy hot, freakin' hot, and he's got a real nice butt. You know. Especially in tight jeans.”

Claire said, “No, we don't know. Think specifics, Nev. What kind of beard? What color is his hair? Get a picture of his face in your mind, hold on to it a minute, and tell us what he looks like. Was it a goatee, a mustache? What? Think back.”

Nev thought back, and it looked like it gave her a headache. The conversation sure was hurting Claire's head. Finally, aforementioned twit said, “It's a goatee, and it goes up around here.” Nev sat up even closer to Novak, perching on the front edge of the backseat while she made a little circle with her forefinger up the side of Novak's mouth and across under his nose and down the other side. Then she drew a line up his jaw across his knife scar to his ear. It did appear that the kid was enjoying the bodily contact more than Novak was.

Okay, Novak was not a pretty boy, but he did have that virile thing down pat. But, and alas, Nev's feminine wiles did not work. Novak did not look all turned on or good to go. He leaned back out of said siren's reach, and said, “What color is his hair?”

“Brown. He's kinda pale, kinda hot, kinda nice, I guess.”

“Does he kinda carry a firearm?” Novak said. Aha, his heretofore admirable patience was wearing a bit thin, or so it seemed.

Nev looked up at Novak. “Oh, yeah, sure. A freakin' big one, too, you know, stuck down in the back of his pants, like yours is. I think he might deal drugs, or something. Those guys are always armed. You know, just in case.”

Well, the girl knew enough to notice that Novak was carrying concealed and where he kept his weapon. That was interesting. “Does Carvy always carry?” Claire said, not particularly thrilled at the possibility of having a gun battle before lunch. The not-life-threatening-but-aching-like-the-devil scissors puncture was enough excitement for one a.m.

Novak opened the door, got out, and leaned back inside to look at Claire. “Take her back to campus. I'll wait here and see if he comes out.”

Irked that she had to be the one to put up with Nev all the way back to campus, but also more than pleased at the opportunity to get rid of Nev and her freakin' this and freakin' that, Claire agreed to drive her back with freakin' alacrity. “Well, don't do anything until I get back. Wait for me.”

“Then make it quick.”

Claire watched him stride off toward the quaint bookstore and a couple of other shops located just down the sidewalk from their parking place. He was an in-charge kind of guy, true, but she was the boss and she hoped he remembered that. If he didn't, she would remind him, of course. She took a right at the next block and headed back to Tulane, very eager to get the incessantly chattering girl out of the car and on her way to wherever inane bubble-brained coeds hung out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Although Diana had now seen many a full moon and many a ceremony inside the Sanctuary in the years since that very first time, she still dreaded her mommy's bad moods so much that she nearly always had a sick stomach. She hated calling her mommy Luna, too, but she had to do it, or Luna's wrath would be triggered. Worst of all, now that Diana was growing older, Luna made her go hunting every single morning with her bow and poison arrows, and kill more animals for Luna's taxidermy needs. Then she'd have to pull off their hides and do all those terrible things that she really hated with a passion.

But Luna would not let her stop. She said that it was the family business, and Diana was gonna have to learn it so that she could carry on when Mommy was planted deep in the earth and turned back into dust again. Spirit didn't like all the killing, either, or the smell of disemboweled animal carcasses, but he still went with her. After they got back home, though, he would slink away and hide in the bushes when Luna went into the taxidermy shed. He probably thought that he was next on Luna's list of things to kill.

Then one night, when Luna went shopping in town, she caught a ride back home with a man. A man who was the biggest person Diana had ever seen. Diana had never really seen a man before, not close up. Maybe some of the people in Luna's coven were men, but Diana had never really seen any of them. Mommy had certainly never brought a man home, either, at least not when Diana was awake. But this time, Luna brought the big guy right inside their house and let him sit in the parlor on their good blue settee with the red fringe on it, and everything.

Luna told her that the man had picked her up on the bayou road and offered her a ride home so she didn't have to walk so far in the hot sun. Then she invited him to eat dinner with them and took out her good crystal goblets with the little flower designs on them and brought out her best bottle of red wine and poured it for him, wine that reminded Diana of the animal blood she had to collect in all those Folgers coffee cans outside in the yard.

The big man drank his wine very slowly and smiled at Diana now and then, and seemed to like her, almost as much as he liked Luna. When Luna went into the kitchen to get the roast duck she was serving for dinner, the man told Diana that she didn't have to be afraid of him, that he wouldn't hurt her. He told her that he lived down the bayou and was her neighbor and that if she and her mother ever needed help with anything, then she should come see him.

But she was scared to death of him and didn't answer when he spoke to her and didn't even look at him. She wasn't sure yet if she liked him or not. Men were so big and strong and frightening to look at, and she was still very little. But he didn't hurt her or hurt Luna or Spirit, just smiled and spoke softly and politely and then after dinner, he got in his truck and left. She was glad that he was gone. She didn't trust any other people, not at all. She hoped he never came back or bothered her mommy, not ever again. And he didn't. She never saw him again after that, not one time.

As time went by, Luna turned into her scary person, the one that Diana didn't know, many more times. That's when their little place in the swamp got all frightening to live in, and she sometimes wondered if the nice ladies who lived down the bayou and gave her bread and sugar cookies would hear Luna screaming at her, and come and help Diana. But they never did. And when they did come to visit, sometimes Luna would take Diana and Spirit and they would all hide together in one of the upstairs closets until the women quit knocking and went away. Other times, when Luna was her mommy again, she would take the ladies into the company parlor like she had done with the big man, with its carved and heavy and dark old furniture and the white crocheted doilies that Gram had made long, long ago. There, Luna would serve them sweet tea and little tasty petit fours that she liked to bake and that she always kept on hand for visitors. Those were the times when Diana knew she was safe from her mommy's crazy fits, and her mommy really did act like her mommy and would stay that way, at least until the ladies went back home.

So, in the years that followed, Diana and Spirit tried to be quiet and cause no trouble and be very, very good. And it worked, too. Mommy was gone a lot, out in the swamp behind the Sanctuary. She sometimes stayed there for several days without coming back to the house, and Diana didn't know for sure what she was doing out there all alone. But she always ended up coming back home. After Luna started those overnight trips in the swamp, she didn't go crazy so much anymore. The times that she threw Diana in the bayou and slapped her around and chased Spirit out of the house and into the swamp with her broom came less often. She acted more calm and sweet and talked about the full moon that would come soon, and that she would have to go down to some tavern called the Crab House Bar and find them a suitable Sacrificial Lamb. Diana had no idea what a tavern was, or a Sacrificial Lamb, either, truth be told, but she suspected a tavern was a little grocery store. She'd only been one time to the store down the bayou road, when she was pretty little, but she remembered all the different kinds of food on the shelves and the chocolate candy and chewing gum in the glass case beside a front door that had a little silver bell over it that rang every time somebody came inside.