Hallowed Bones (33 page)

"Say you'll come."

"When I finish my case."

He smiled. "I never doubted otherwise. But after that, you'll at least visit me? I'll arrange the ticket whenever you say so."

"Why?" I asked.

"I want you to see what my life is. I want you to have a real chance to know who I am as a person. Tonight I realized something. I want you in my life."

My heart began to flutter. "I am in your life."

"As a fantasy, as the woman who lives across an ocean, a private investigator with green eyes and lacy black underwear."

So I was a fantasy for him also. It was maybe the best compliment I'd ever been paid.

"I want you to know where I live and the people I work with. The streets I walk and where I have coffee. I want you to know me in the way that a woman knows her man."

Hamilton
knew many of those things about me. I was living a lifestyle he'd left behind, but it was one he knew. I truthfully had no clue what his life in
Paris
might be like. In my imagination I saw the
Eiffel
Tower
, small cafes, petite women with poodles. It would be fun to see what it was really like. And it would be a big step to see who
Hamilton
was in the world he'd chosen to live in.

"I'd love to," I said, meaning it. "
Paris
in December. It sounds romantic."

"It will be," he said, gathering me in his arms. "I promise." He began to kiss me, and images of
Paris
fled before the sensations he aroused in me. It was, indeed, a night to remember.

27

Hamilton
had business in Baton Rouge for the day, and
though he left me with the tenderest of kisses, I could tell something was up with his work. There were the finest worry lines around his eyes. I held his strong shoulders and kissed his face, wishing to make the worry go away. If only we could stay within the walls of his apartment for two or three days, without interruption. We'd moved to a plane where there were real possibilities for us, not just midnight fantasies. We needed time together, but we didn't have that luxury. Lives hung in the balance for him, and Doreen's future hung in mine. His last look was one of longing as he closed the door.

Tinkie answered her phone in a lazy purr. Oscar was having room service send up breakfast. Though Tinkie volunteered to do whatever I needed, I urged her to relax, sample the pleasures of breakfast in bed, and wait until noon before worrying about anything.

I had two choices before me on this Tuesday morning: LeMont or taking care of Cece's errand. I chose the latter. I still wasn't certain what game LeMont was playing with me, but my intuition told me to avoid him.

The tattoo shop was exactly where Cece said it would be, and it looked just as she'd described it. It was a shotgun-style structure that used to be someone's home. Now, like the houses around it, it was zoned commercial.

The front door opened on a living room that fed into what had once been a dining room that led to one or two bedrooms and then on to the kitchen. The bathroom would be an add-on, the caboose of indoor plumbing.

The bell jangled over the door as I walked in, aware immediately that the first two rooms were empty. I kept walking, but I had the feeling that someone was waiting to pounce on me.

The tattoos were colorful, and I remembered my high school desire for one. I was glad Aunt LouLane had forbidden it. I'd wanted a butterfly on my shoulder. Chances are, it would still look good enough--my skin wasn't sagging yet--but it would certainly detract from such a dress as the one Mollie had created for me. Tattoos, after the age of thirty, become a symbol of foolish youth rather than cool.

Beyond the tattoos was a room full of selections for body piercing. Kiley's navel came to mind, and I wondered why she'd done it. Lots of kids in the French Quarter, with their multihued hair, had pierced eyebrows, cheeks, nostrils, chins, belly buttons, and tongues. I didn't care to take an inventory of what lower extremities sported gold studs or chains. It was all just a little too sadomasochistic for me.

"Ah, a virgin," a big, bald man said as he walked through the door. His smile revealed striking white teeth and intelligent eyes in a face crinkled with laugh lines. "Let me see. You've never had anything except your ears pierced, but you have a new lover who's a little more adventurous." His brow furrowed. "Hmmm. You look like the type who wants a nipple ring."

He laughed aloud at my expression.

"How about an eyebrow? Not quite as sensitive as a nipple, but a bit daring."

"Actually, I'm not in the mood for piercing anything, but I do have some questions."

He immediately grew wary. "Are you a cop?"

I shook my head. "But what would it matter? What you do is legal."

"Legal don't mean squat if the NOPD is breathing down my neck. Now, who are you and why are you asking questions?"

With his corded arms and strong chest, he could have worked as a bouncer in a tough bar. No point in pissing him off. "I'm a private investigator from Zinnia,
Mississippi
. I'm here in town on a case where an infant was killed. I'm helping the accused murderer. She didn't do it." All of this pointed in exactly the opposite direction that Cece was interested in. Maybe he would relax and talk.

His eyebrows rose, and I counted seven studs in the right one. "So what is it you want to know?"

"Is there any symbolism attached to body piercings?"

He thought a moment. "Body piercing is a sort of language. Piercings talk about lifestyle choices, and what a person may do in the pursuit of pleasure." He raised one eyebrow. "The line between pain and pleasure is a thin one."

So I'd been told. Maybe I just didn't want to take a walk on that dark side. I preferred my pleasure to be totally pleasurable. "Do you have to have any medical training to be a body piercer?"

"Not by law. I mean, they've been piercing ears in hair salons for years. Every beautician in
New Orleans
has a gun to do ears."

"An ear is a little different than a tongue."

"Yeah, an ear's tougher. You really have to punch it through. A tongue, now, that's easy work."

He was jacking with me, but not in an unfriendly way. Just teasing.

"It would seem, though, that some state laws would dictate a certain degree of medical knowledge. You know, what if a person was on a blood thinner or what if you hit an artery?" In some of the places people got pierced there was a tremendous blood flow.

"I can't speak for the other shops, but I've had training. I was a surgical nurse. Trust me, I ask about medications and things like that
before
I even consider a client. There's a lot of bad stuff out there. Hepatitis C or HIV. Man, I don't need that shit in my life."

"You left the paycheck a surgical nurse makes for a tattoo parlor?"

"I make a lot more here, plus I work for myself. I don't have to take orders from some jerk-off doctor who makes bad decisions and then blames the nursing staff."

I could understand that. I'd been around enough doctors with a God complex to understand how wearing such an attitude could be on a nurse. Of course, there was no telling what one of his current clients might do if they didn't care for his handiwork.

"May I look around your shop?"

"Everything except where I do the work," he said. "You've seen most of it. There's one more room with some leather and stuff. Knock yourself out." He left the room and disappeared into the back portion of the house, the area he'd told me not to go into.

I wandered around, checking out the tattoo and piercing selections, which did make me wince. I'd hoped to find some reason that this guy would have been uncomfortable around Cece. But I didn't see anything that I hadn't seen in other tattoo shops in the French Quarter.

"See anything you like?" he asked when he returned.

"Do you ever do things like permanent eyeliner or lipstick?" I wondered if that was what Ellisea Clay had come to this shop for.

"Sure. That's very popular with some of the local entertainers. We do some nipple enhancement, too. You know, so the rosy areolas show up through a gauzy outfit. It's hot down here. Makeup tends to sweat off, but what I put on stays. Forever."

I was getting nowhere fast. We could swap fashion tips all day, and I'd be no closer to finding out what I'd come for. "Has Ellisea Clay had that kind of work done here?" I asked.

That was all it took. He was on me like white on rice, and I was sitting in the dirt in front of the tattoo parlor before I knew what hit me.

"Stay out of here," he said. Like Cece had pointed out, he seemed more afraid than angry. "Don't ever come back here if you know what's good for you."

"When you talk to Ellisea, tell her Sarah Booth Delaney was asking after her," I said as I dusted off my bottom and started toward my car.

AS I
drove
back to the Quarter, I dialed Tinkie again. She was eager for me to meet her at Madame Rochelle's Tearoom. She wanted her future read. I found my resistance interesting. In Zinnia, Tammy Odom was often a great help to me. She saw things in the future, and I had no doubt of her psychic gift. Here in
New Orleans
, I was suspicious of everyone. My first reaction was that such people were charlatans with some angle to play.

I reluctantly agreed to meet Tinkie, hung up, and called Cece to report my trip to the tattoo parlor. She was disappointed that I hadn't found out anything else.

"That man knows Ellisea and he's afraid of something," I said. "Other than that, I can't tell you anything."

"Beans," Cece said. "I'm sure there's something there. Maybe you could follow that guy."

"I seriously doubt he has a lot of personal contact with Ellisea. I'm sure he called her, but I doubt I could convince the NOPD of my need for a wiretap, and that's the only way I'm going to get anything from that guy unless it's at gunpoint."

"Maybe she'll show up there?"

"Doubtful. Especially not if she knows I know about the place. She'll make a point of staying away. And what would I do if she walked up? Demand to know what's going on? Like she'd just tell me."

"Too bad kidnapping and torture are punishable offenses."

I told her about my visit to the Clay house and the vandalization of Ellisea's car.

"They wrote something?" she asked, interested.

"They
tried
to write some word. I don't think they could spell." I gave her the letters the best I could remember.

Cece was quiet. "Something just doesn't ring true here."

"Can you say the word
obsessed?
Cece, you're taking this just a little too far."

"Dahling, obsession is one of the elements of genius, or haven't you heard. And if you want to play tit for tat"--she laughed softly--"I heard you were fairly obsessed with
Hamilton
."

Obsessed was the wrong word. In the past, I'd been obsessed by the fantasy of him. But now that he was a real person to me, I wasn't obsessed. I was delighted. "He's invited me to
Paris
."

"When?" Cece squealed.

"When my case is over."

"And you're going?"

I only hesitated a split second, but it was enough.

"You are going, aren't you?" There was a warning in her tone.

"I told him yes. Please don't talk about this to Coleman." I didn't want to ask that, but I had to. If anyone was going to tell Coleman, it should be me.

"What is it you owe Coleman?" she asked.

"Only the same treatment I'd expect from him if the shoe were on the other foot."

"I don't recall that he told you last summer when he and Connie took that cruise."

There was truth in Cece's statement, but issues around Coleman weren't black and white. I had the power to hurt him, and I didn't want to do it.

"Cece, I know you understand this. If I tell him, then I treat him with the respect he deserves because of our long-standing friendship."

"Don't screw this thing with
Hamilton
up," she cautioned.

"What? Are you and Tinkie double-teaming me?"

"Dahling, we're on your team and we just passed you the touchdown opportunity of the century. Now we intend to do a little blocking for you. All you have to do is run, baby, run."

Doreen was leading
a class on meditation at the Center when I got there. I had a little while before I was due to meet Tinkie, so I found a space on the floor at the back of the room. Golden sunlight filtered in through the large windows of the room. Outside, the patio bloomed with exotics. It was a lovely space, and many of the people in the class were focusing out the window as they sat cross-legged and listened to Celtic harp music.

I found myself adrift in my own thoughts, even as Doreen's melodic voice urged her class to let go of thought, to move toward an image of white light entering their bodies as they breathed in, of all negative energy departing as they exhaled.