KILLING ME SOFTLY (2 page)

The lines of his face tightened. "If you're looking for hospitality, you should head on back to New Orleans,
belle amie
."

Deep inside, she shivered. This man was not calling her pretty lady as a compliment.

"All a pretty lady like you has to do is name her price."

But not here, she knew instinctively. Not this man. He didn't play by others' rules. He sought to indulge or please no one but himself. "What I'm looking for can't be purchased."

"Everything has a price."

Even your soul? she wanted to ask, but the question jammed in her throat. "Then what's yours?" she surprised herself by asking.

She wasn't sure what she'd expected, but it wasn't laughter. The rough sound broke from his throat and echoed on the breeze. "My price is my penance," he said, then gestured toward the highway. "And like I said, this is private property. It's time for you to be going."

Time changed people. She knew that. So did loss and betrayal. After months of media notoriety, mentions of Cain Robichaud had trickled off to the point where recently there'd been nothing at all. Not even his photography Web site had been updated. It was as though the man had ceased to exist.

"I mean no harm," she said, realizing she had to backtrack. She'd been wrong to play footsy so quickly. "I was just…" Eventually, he would discover her real reason for being here, but the longer she kept him in the dark about her assignment, the safer she was. "Someone I knew used to come here."

Something sharp and volatile flashed through his eyes, but other than that he went unnaturally still. "There's no one here now but you and me."

Heat rushed through her, despite the cool fall breeze. He was right. There were just the two of them, a woman no one would look for and a man many believed belonged behind the steel bars of Angola State Penitentiary.

Vulnerable
was not a word she liked, but she'd taken her safety for granted before, and it was not a mistake she would make again. "I can see that. I just—" had to come, to see what remained from that night in the not-so-distant past. "—needed to come here."

"Needed?"
In that moment he sounded every bit the cop he'd once been, renowned for securing confessions. Coercion or seduction, the method hadn't mattered. "Trust me. A pretty thing like you, the only thing waiting for you out here is trouble."

That's where he was wrong. Remnants of a life gone by remained, a mystery begging to be solved. There were answers here. And truth.

But those words could not be said.

"I wanted to see if I could still feel her," she said, choosing her words carefully. "My friend who used to come here to clear her head." And to make love with the unorthodox detective who'd made her forget everything she knew about caution and survival.

His expression darkened.
"Who?"
For such a big man, he uttered the question in a deceptively soft voice. "Who is this friend?"

The urge to turn away was strong. Once she spoke the name, there would be no going back. She knew that. If she wanted to walk away, to pretend she'd not stood close enough to Cain Robichaud that she could scrape the whiskers darkening his jaw with her fingertips, she should do so now, before she waded into waters dark and deep. She had only to accept that some questions would never be answered, some needs never met.

She could accept neither.

"Savannah," she said, wincing at the way his eyes went cold and flat. "Savannah Trahan."

It was just a name, that's all she said, but the shadow that fell over Cain made it clear she might as well have cursed his soul to perdition and beyond. Because Savannah Trahan would never be just a name to this man, not when half the parish believed he'd murdered his former lover. Buried her on his land, some believed. Submerged her naked body in the swamp, others claimed. Burned her in a bonfire of her pictures, another said, and let her ashes scatter with the wind.

He stood there so horribly, brutally still, the planes of his face tight, his eyes like shrapnel. Even his mouth flattened, turning into a hard, uncompromising line, and in that instant, he looked frighteningly capable of the cold-blooded murder she'd read about in the newspapers.

Everything became sharper, more intense, carving out the afternoon in sharp relief—the screech of the egrets, the wind slashing through the skeletal trees, the fog soaking into her bones. Even the silence intensified.

He drew the moment out like a death sentence, then shattered it with his voice.
"Who the hell are you?"

Relief flashed so profound she could taste it. He didn't recognize her. Then reason surfaced. Of course he didn't recognize her. There was no reason he should.

"I asked a question," he said in that same quiet voice. "Don't make me ask again."

An endless valley of lies lay ahead, but right here, right now, she chose to offer the truth. "A friend."

"A friend." He made the word sound like an offense. "Any friend of mine or Savannah's knows better than to come here."

The blade of pain nicked fast and deep. "If you're trying to frighten me," she said, "it's not working."

His smile was sardonic. "I suppose you're not trembling, either."

Refusing to give an inch, she hugged her arms around her middle. "It's cold."

"Maybe on the inside, but not on the out. Try again."

She angled her chin, said nothing. The man could see subtleties and nuances others couldn't. Once, the trait had made him a good cop. It also explained his success as a photographer. His work adorned the walls of galleries in New Orleans, as well as many a coffee-table book and calendar. His flair for shadows and light brought solitude to liveliness, sobriety to gaiety.

The quiet spun out between them, thick, pulsing. From the darkened copse beyond the clearing, dead leaves rustled and twigs snapped. It almost sounded as though—

He pivoted toward the cypress trees jutting up like a line of soldiers separating land from water. "Don't move." Slowly he edged forward. Each step, each movement, each breath still screamed the caution of the cop he used to be.

Renee's imagination sprinted along a dangerous path as she watched him go down on one knee.

"Beautiful."

Heart hammering, she turned to see a great blue heron perched atop the old swing.

"Perfect," Cain murmured as he angled a 35 mm camera toward the tire. "Ah … that's ma girl. Me, I'm going to be very, very good to you…"

Until his big hands cradled the sleek metal outfit, Renee hadn't noticed the camera hanging from his shoulder. Easy mistake with a man like Cain. His intensity made it impossible to register anything but the man.

Seconds blurred into minutes, minutes into a searing intimacy. Cain inched closer to the bird while his drugging voice urged the heron to stay in place.

"Let me have you," he coaxed. "I won't hurt you … just want to make you mine."

The black-magic drawl did wicked things to Renee's immunity. How could he shift from suspicious detective to reverent photographer in the space of one broken heartbeat?

Somewhere close by, more twigs snapped. The bird reacted instinctively, lifting its magnificent wings and soaring into the gray sky. But Cain remained crouched, staring at the point where the heron had vanished.

What did he see? Renee wondered. Heavy storm clouds gathering beyond the cypress trees, like she did? Or something different, something no one else could envision.

"You're still here?"

She blinked, saw that he had turned and was moving toward her. "Either that or you're hallucinating."

"My ghosts are my business, Ms.…" He destroyed what remained of her personal space. "I don't believe I caught your name."

"No, you were too busy playing big, bad wolf."

An odd light lit in his eyes. "Do I know you?"

Her heart gave a quick, cruel kick. "That's a question only you can answer," she said with a calm that pleased her. Then she took a leap of faith.

"Renee," she said. She'd known this man and all that he represented would be her greatest challenge, but nothing, not months of preparation, nor layers of scar tissue, had prepared her for the rush of being close to him. "Renee Fox."

"Well, then, Ms. Fox." His gaze flicked down the length of her body in a purely male gesture. He made the return journey slowly, thoroughly, leaving her warm and flushed, as though he'd touched her with those big hands of his. "Shall I walk you to your car?"

"I can manage on my own." Had for a long time. Without another word, she turned and strode toward the rental, refusing to let his less-than-enthusiastic greeting deter her.

"The highway's just a few miles down the road." The falsely friendly words echoed on the breeze. "Don't look back and you'll be in New Orleans before sundown."

Renee ignored the sting and kept walking. No way was she going to give him the satisfaction of looking back. Coming to Bayou de Foi jeopardized the life she'd been quietly building, but she could no longer live without knowing what had really happened the night this man was found with his lover's blood on his hands. She would find out, and she would avenge.

Then, and only then, would she be free from the nightmares that made it impossible for her to sleep with the lights off.

Cain watched the woman slide into the nondescript white rental car and pull onto the narrow road, then grabbed his mobile phone and stabbed a series of numbers.

As always, his cousin answered on the second ring. "Damn, you've got to quit freaking me out like that."

Cain couldn't remember the last time Gabe had answered the phone with a simple hello. An assistant distract attorney, Gabe always got straight to business—unless he was playing poker. Then he could tap-dance with the best of them. "Like what?"

"I was about to call you. There's no way I'll be at Ruby's by six. The D.A. just called a quickie for the end of the day, but he doesn't know the meaning of the word."

An old pickup pulling a boat rumbled up the road and momentarily blocked Cain's view of the woman's car. When the truck had passed, the white sedan was gone. "Neither will I."

"Good," Gabe said, and Cain could see his cousin, who preferred T-shirts but had to wear suits, kicked back at his desk, folders scattered around him, dead coffee in his cup, an empty ash tray next to his laptop. "Then, we can just—"

"I'm not coming."

"—meet later on…" A pause, then a muttered curse. "What do you mean you're not coming? We've been waiting months for
Oncle
to make a move. You can't bug out on me now."

Cain continued to stare at the scarcely traveled road leading to the back of his property. Almost two years had passed since his career with the NOPD crashed down around him, but the instincts that had made him a good cop remained razor sharp. His former partner called it his spider sense, the tingle at the base of his neck that warned danger lay near. The reaction was always the same, a buzz through his body, a disturbance, like a low-pressure system sweeping in fast. The white sedan could no longer be seen, but the hum remained. There was something off about Renee Fox, like a song played in the wrong key or a photograph taken in the wrong light.

Secrets. Half-truths and outright lies. They swirled around the woman like a shroud, reminding him of the mist that hovered above the stagnant waters of the Manchac Swamp.

"Something's come up in Bayou de Foi," he said. "Something I need to keep an eye on."

Someone.

He'd sensed her before he'd seen her. Someone on his land, someone who didn't belong. The locals knew better than to trespass on Robichaud property, and on the rare occasion he did find people, they wore ratty sneakers and carried fishing poles. He'd never run across a woman in a designer suit and high heels. For a long moment he'd just watched her standing there, long dark hair whipping in the breeze and a faraway gaze in her eyes.

It wasn't until she'd turned toward the swing that he'd realized she wasn't just another apparition, a figment of fantasy he'd indulged entirely too long.

Savannah wasn't coming back.

It didn't matter how many times he waited in the clearing or thought he heard her laughter or smelled her perfume. It didn't matter how many times they still made love during the long, dark hours of the night. He knew that now. He understood the evidence.

Savannah was gone.

Cain glanced back at the infestation of cannas surrounding the cottage. Damn things wouldn't go away. They just kept coming back, thicker and more vibrant with the passing of time. Maybe this year he'd try poison.

"Cain? You there?"

Frowning, he ripped himself from the past. "What?"

"That's what I want to know—what the hell is going on?"

He'd finally lost his mind, that's what. He'd found a beautiful woman alone, and instead of toying with her as he once would have, he'd deliberately growled her off his property.

"Nothing you need to worry about. Best case, I'm there tomorrow morning. Worst case, tomorrow night." He headed toward the trees, hoping to reach the remains of an old pier while the light was still right. "What's the word on the street?"

"Same.
Oncle's
back, stronger than before and looking to make someone pay for what happened last time. D'Ambrosia's got his ear to the street but nothing specific yet."

"What about Prejean?" Seven weeks before, Cain's former partner, Alec Prejean, left his wife and turned in his badge, then dropped off the face of the planet. "Any word?"

"Nothing new."

The bad feeling in the pit of Cain's stomach drilled deeper. It wasn't like by-the-books Alec to just … disappear. Or to leave the wife to whom he'd been devoted. "Christ."

"No shit."

Cain reached up and slapped away a cluster of vines. "So much for being dead and buried," he muttered, then wound down the call and tromped into the woods.

Oncle
was back. Prejean was missing. And now a secretive woman had appeared on his land. He'd be a fool to chalk it all up to coincidence.

Assistant District Attorney Gabriel Fontenot hung up the phone and pressed his fingers to his temples. Didn't help. The pressure still pounded against his skull, blurring his vision to the point where he wondered why he'd thrown down two grand for Lasik surgery.