Soldiers of Fortune (14 page)

“He can’t just change the law,” Ida Belle said.

Marie nodded. “That’s why all these people are here protesting. But that idiot Nelson won’t come out of the building. Coward.”

“The door’s opening!” a man in the crowd shouted.
 

We hurried forward and watched as Nelson walked out of the sheriff’s department and stood on a park bench on the sidewalk. “I’m going to have to ask you to disband,” Nelson said. “You don’t have a permit to occupy this street, so you’re all breaking the law.”

“You rewriting everything,” one man shouted, “or just the things that benefit you and Celia?”

Nelson gave the man a condescending look. “I assume your comment is concerning the recent change to church hours. That law has been temporarily amended for the safety of the community.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” a woman yelled.

Nelson glanced over at us and smiled. “Due to the recent assault on our mayor by a member of the Baptist church, I’ve decided that the safety of the community is protected by ensuring the two groups do not occupy the sidewalk at the same time. If you want to blame someone, blame her.”

He pointed directly at me and I felt the target forming on my back.

“That’s what you get for cavorting with Yankees,” Nelson said.

“I’d rather cavort with a Yankee than a snake,” another man shouted.

The crowd nodded and Nelson’s smile fell a bit.
 

“It’s pretty bad when your hometown prefers a Yankee over you,” Gertie yelled.

Nelson’s expression hardened. “I don’t care what any of you prefer. The fact of the matter is, I’m the sheriff, and what I say goes.”

“But it only goes so far.” Francine’s voice sounded behind us, and everyone turned around.

She stood outside the café, hands on her hips and mad as a hornet. If she’d been holding a weapon, I would have hit the pavement. She walked through the crowd and looked up at Nelson. “You can make all the laws you want about church closing time. Hell, you can let them have Mass on Saturday if you want to, but the one thing you can’t do is make me cook.”
 

There was a collective intake of breath.

Francine turned around and faced the crowd. “Until further notice, the café will not serve banana pudding.” She shot Nelson one final look of disgust and stomped through the crowd and back into the café.
 

As soon as the café door swung shut, the crowd exploded.
 

“See what you’ve done!”

“You and that mayor bitch are going down!”

“You’re ruining the entire town!”

“I swear to God, I’ll shoot you on sight at the next opportunity!”

Nelson wasn’t completely stupid. His expression changed from indignant to fear as he jumped off the park bench and practically ran inside the sheriff’s department. I heard the dead bolt slide into place and seconds later, all the blinds dropped.
 

“You can’t hide in there forever!” a man shouted. “There’s more of us than you.”

I heard the sound of glass breaking and looked over to see a hole in one of the front windows of the sheriff’s department.
 

“We’ve got to do something,” Marie said, “before they burn the place down.”

Ida Belle climbed up on the park bench, stuck her fingers in her mouth, and let out a whistle that should have shattered glass. Everyone threw their hands over their ears and stared up at her.

“Good residents of Sinful,” Ida Belle said. “I know you’re all upset and so am I, but when this is all over, Sheriff Lee and Deputy LeBlanc will need a place to work for our protection. I know how frustrating this is, but I need you to believe that it won’t last. And when the tide turns—”

“It’s open season on Nelson!” a man shouted and people around him nodded in agreement.

“I can’t tell you what to do,” Ida Belle said. “I can only suggest that you don’t do anything that causes damages to this town that we have to pay for later.”

A low grumbling passed through the crowd, and they started to disperse. Marie sank onto the bench, clutching the sides of her face. “It hasn’t even been a week since Celia got voted in, and things are already going to hell in a handbasket. I knew that woman would ruin this town, but I thought it would take longer.”

Ida Belle stepped down off the bench and patted Marie on the shoulder. “Things are escalating quicker than I thought they would, but we’re going to fix this.”

Marie looked up at her. “What if the auditors find that the election wasn’t fixed? What if Celia actually won?”

“That’s not going to happen,” Ida Belle said, her expression grim.

I nodded my agreement, saying a quick prayer that Ida Belle was right. Because if Celia was still mayor after that audit, she was a walking target for Big and Little Hebert, and she’d have no idea they were coming.

“I hope you’re right,” Marie said. “This town has suffered enough lately. I don’t think it can take Celia as mayor without imploding.” She rose from the bench. “I need to get home to shower and change. I’m meeting the auditors in an hour and all this brouhaha has made me a complete mess.”

“Let us know if we can do anything,” Gertie said.

Marie gave her a sad nod and shuffled off down the street. As we walked to the Jeep, I told Ida Belle and Gertie what Little had said about Celia and Nelson.
 

“Do you really think they’d kill her?” Gertie asked.

“Of course they would,” Ida Belle said. “They’re criminals. Do you think they haven’t killed people before?”

“I’m sure,” Gertie said, “but I always figured they were killing other criminals. I would give my good dentures to see her run out of town, but not in a casket.”

I nodded. “I would like to think that a threat would precede action, but Celia is so stubborn…”

“She would ignore the threat,” Ida Belle said, and sighed. “Crap.”

“Well, there’s nothing we can do about it,” Gertie said. “Little is not likely to give us a heads-up before he has someone put a bullet in Celia, and even if he did and we warned her, she wouldn’t believe us, either.”

“Probably not,” Ida Belle agreed. “And the last thing I’m interested in is getting in the middle of that. I don’t want to see anyone die, but that includes myself. If I’m going to take a bullet for someone, it’s not going to be Celia Arceneaux.”

We climbed into the Jeep and I pulled away up Main Street. “Let’s just pray that the audit overturns the election results.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Gertie asked.

“Then we’ll figure something else out,” I said.
 

I glanced over at Ida Belle, who nodded, but I knew she didn’t have any better ideas than I did.
 

“Anyway,” Ida Belle said. “We have bigger fish to fry with our own investigation and an afternoon of relaxation and entertainment ahead of us. Let’s just try to enjoy ourselves for a couple of hours. We’ll be back in the thick of things soon enough.”

“We’re still going boating?” Gertie asked, her voice tracking up like a child.

“Of course,” I said, forcing all thoughts of Celia and cement shoes out of my head. Instead, I replaced it with a mental image of Gertie on the floating alligator, except in my vision, Ida Belle was driving the airboat so fast, the gator hung in midair as Gertie clung on for dear life.
 

“Yippee!” Gertie cheered and pulled the box out of her shopping bag. A couple seconds later, she was huffing into the air valve as if she were in labor. About five seconds in, she dropped the float and started wheezing. “I can’t breathe. Need oxygen.”

“Then stop putting it in the float, you old fool.” Ida Belle took the float from her. “Drop by my house,” she told me. “We’ll fill it up with my air compressor.”

Gertie glared. “Why didn’t you say that to begin with?”

“I wanted to see how long you’d last,” Ida Belle said. “Are you sure you want to ride this thing? I’m seriously worried about your health.”

“I have asthma,” Gertie said.

“You don’t have asthma,” Ida Belle said. “What you have is no aerobic conditioning.”

“I’m retired,” Gertie complained. “I’m not supposed to need aerobic conditioning anymore.”

“The way things are going in this town,” Ida Belle said, “we need you to be a superhero, so do me a favor and start walking. Anything to get your heart rate up a bit.”

I grinned. “I think we’re about to take care of that.”

###

We stopped to fill the alligator up with air at Ida Belle’s, then made a pass by Gertie’s house for her to grab a bathing suit and her water shoes. We got more than a few stares from residents as we drove to my house with the alligator tied to the top of the roll bars on my Jeep.

Since we weren’t going to be tromping around weedy, mosquito-infested landmasses, I changed into shorts and tank top and hurried outside where Ida Belle was attaching the alligator to the airboat with a towrope. Gertie was still inside changing.

“You sure this is a good idea?” I asked.

“Are you kidding me? It’s a horrible idea,” Ida Belle said as she tugged on the towrope. “If she doesn’t break something, it will be a damned miracle.”

“Then why are we doing it?”

“Because she’s a grown woman and I am not going to listen to her bitch for the next forty years.”

“Maybe you could take it easy,” I suggested.

Ida Belle stood up straight and glared at me. “Of course I’ll take it easy. I’m not trying to break the woman. We need her tonight.”

“Maybe a ride up the bayou and back will be enough for her.”

Ida Belle snorted. “We’ll be lucky if she can stay on long enough to pull away from the dock. Don’t worry, Fortune. This will all be over soon, then we can ditch the float and go have some real fun in this baby.”

I cringed a little. Gertie on the float was starting to look like the safer option for everyone.
 

I heard my back door slam and looked over to see Gertie strolling across the lawn. “What in the name of all that is holy?”

The bathing suit was one piece, but that’s where anything nice I could say about it ended.

It was made of red sparkly material that couldn’t possibly be comfortable for the skin, especially when a good bit of a bathing suit usually wound up shoved up your butt crack. The straps were gold chains, and a matching gold chain encircled the waist, two little bits of it dangling down the front of the suit. The water shoes were the same shade of red and had sparkly gold hearts stamped on them.
 

A purple boa completed the ensemble.

Ida Belle climbed out of the boat and shook her head. “Someone is going to mistake you for Nelson’s hooker.”

“Please,” Gertie said and flung one end of the boa around her neck. “That hooker can’t possibly look this good.”

I wrinkled my nose. “I’m no fashion expert, but is a feather boa a good choice for marine sports?”

Gertie lifted the end of the boa and held it out to me. “The feathers are plastic. Isn’t that cool?”

“A plastic feather boa?” I couldn’t begin to process the horror.

Gertie nodded. “I got it from one of those Mardi Gras costume shops in New Orleans.”

Things started to make more sense. “Well, Madame of the Bayou, if you’re done with your wardrobe change, let’s get this show on the road.”

“That looks more like a wardrobe malfunction than a change to me,” Ida Belle grumbled.

Gertie waved a hand in dismissal. “How are we going to do this?”

I took stock and considered the options. “I think it will be easier for you to get on the alligator here in shallow water. Then I’ll launch the boat and Ida Belle can inch forward until the towline is straight and tight. Then we can take off.” I looked over at Ida Belle. “Is that okay?”

“Works for me,” she said, and hopped into the boat.

I handed Gertie a life vest and she pulled it on, securing it tightly around her.
 

“Okay,” I said, “let’s get you on that alligator.”

Gertie pulled on her dive mask and tromped into the water, pushing the alligator with her. When she was about thigh-deep, she stopped, then put both hands on the alligator and shoved down while launching herself upward. But instead of landing on the alligator, in a surprising show of strength, she launched over the float altogether and sank into the bayou. I hurried into the water and a second later, she was back up sputtering water everywhere.
 

“What happened?” she asked.

“You overshot the float,” I said, “and you have a crab hanging off your strap.”

“They like dead things,” Ida Belle said.

Gertie shot her a dirty look and pulled the crab off her suit, then flung it into the bayou.
 

“Try again,” I said, “and this time with less muscle, She-Hulk.”

Gertie moved to the side of the alligator again and this time I held the tail. She jumped up with a little less enthusiasm and landed flat in the middle of the float. She reached for the handles and squirmed around, trying to get herself into an upright position. I clutched the tail to keep the entire thing from tipping over. Finally, she managed to get seated and waved a hand at me.