The Casquette Girls (22 page)

“Oh, are you cold?” he asked.

“No, I’m fine.” I dropped my arms to appear more convincing.

Ren went around collect
ing money. When he got to us, Isaac pulled out two twenty-dollar bills.

“I can get my own ticket
.”

“No, I got it. You wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for me,” he insisted, but I shook my head. I didn’t want to owe Isaac anything.

“Like I’d ever take your money,
ma chérie
,” Ren said to me. “But I’ll gladly take yours.” He plucked one of the bills from between Isaac’s fingers.

“I promise, I’ll be on my best behavior,” he reassured Ren.

“Oh, honey, I love trouble. Don’t change your ways on account of me.”

“I’m not changing them on account of you,” Isaac said and then glanced at me.

“Interesting…,” Ren mumbled, looking back and forth between us, “very interesting.”

My eyes dropped to the floor.

“Time to start, folks!” he yelled to the group and then beckoned us to follow him down Pirate's Alley just as the sun set.

The flames in the gas lamps became visible, creating the perfect ambiance for a ghost tour, and the bells in the steeple clanged as if they were a planned part of his act. He stopped halfway down the alley and, after an attention-commanding pause, proceeded to tell us the story of how the infamous alley got its name. As he spoke, he focused briefly on something behind us, and then the echoing sounds of heels on stone became louder. I turned to see the silhouette of a girl running down the alley towards us.

Is that Désirée Borge
s
?

Isaac’s back stiffened. “Do you know that girl?”

“Sort of.”

“Sorry, I’m late,” she grumbled, pulling cash from her wallet, but Ren shook his hand, motioning for her not to interrupt. She merged into the group next to me. I couldn’t tell if she was annoyed or relieved to see someone she knew. Especially since that someone was me.

“What are you doing here?” I whispered.

“My dad forced me.” She sounded annoyed. “You know, help boost tourism, support local businesses, blah, blah, blah.”

“Hmm. I’m still surprised you came.”

“I have a plan, and it doesn’t involve staying.” She pointed to a small camera in the pocket of her blazer.

“In that case…” Ren snapped the twenty from her hand. “
Bienvenue
.” Even with the interruption, he didn’t skip a beat. “Listen up, folks, there are two alleyways on either side of the St. Louis Cathedral: one is named after a pirate and the other for a priest. Scientists from all around the world flock to one of them, and claim that it has one of the highest records of concentrated paranormal activity on the planet. Can you guess which?”

Everyone laughed.

“Of course, we New Orleanians do not need gadgets and gizmos to record noises and auras in order to know when we’re in a nexus of supernatural activity.” He looked directly at the blonde woman as he carefully articulated the last sentence. Her back straightened, and her face lit up. She loved it.

“This way!” He walked us around the church, where an illuminated statue of Jesus cast a fifty-foot shadow on the back of the Cathedral.
I guess the Church thought Jesus deserved a generator?

I tried to gauge Isaac’s interest. Like everyone else, he was hanging onto Ren’s every word. I had to force back a smile as I watched his fully engrossed profile.

“
Psst. Adele
, come take a picture of me in front of the statue, but wait until some other people are behind me so it proves I was on the tour.”

“Come on, Désirée, it’s rude. I don’t want to distract Ren.”

“Oh, please, that statue of Jesus could start twerkin’ and Ren wouldn’t break character.”

She had a point. Plus, I wanted her to pick me up for school tomorrow. I sighed and grabbed the camera.

“Get close to the light so I don’t have to use the flash.” I hurried to frame the shot as the group walked behind her.

She held her extra-fake grin as the shutter took the long exposure. I returned her camera and begrudgingly hopped back to Isaac, who was watching me like a hawk. Ren began describing the ghost of Julie, who haunted the Bottom of the Cup Tearoom.

“Only in New Orleans,” I whispered to Isaac. He smiled.

Across the street from Café Orléans, Ren pointed out the luxurious Bourbon Orleans Hotel, explaining that it had once been an orphanage and was, to this day, haunted by children who had burned alive in a tragic fire. The possibility of little ghost children peeking through the curtains at us made me hurry Isaac along.

We walked another couple blocks and stopped on the corner of St. Ann and Royal Street. The moon shone over the corner building like a spotlight for us. The dark-green floor-to-ceiling shutters were latched closed, and wrought-iron balconies wrapped around the second and third floors of the maroon-colored, three-story residence.

“John and Wayne Carter were two brothers who seemed to be just your average men—”

The woman with the long, blonde hair let out a loud cackle and then quickly tried to calm herself. “
Pardon moi
,” she said and squeaked out another giggle.

Désirée mouthed the word “nutcase” to me. I suppressed a laugh and turned back to Isaac, who was staring hard at the woman, and then became nervous that the naysayer might make an appearance. Luckily, Isaac fell back with me as I dropped to the back of the group so others could gather close to Ren for the tale.

“By the way, you look really nice tonight,” he whispered close to my ear. Feeling his breath on my skin made my shoulders tingle.

The compliment caught me off guard. “You look, uh, clean,” I joked.

“Ha, ha. Some of us have to get our hands dirty while others go to fancy schools.”

“That’s not—”

Hands from behind wrapped around my eyes.

“
Piacer
e
!
What’s going on here? Did our invitations to the
festa
get lost in the mail?” There was no way Niccolò would say something so cheesy, which left only one
Italiano
to suspect.

“Your hands are cold, Gabriel,” I guessed, spinning around to face him.

“How did you know it was me?” He kissed both of my cheeks and then moved out of the way so the younger Medici brother could do the same.

“
Ciao
,” Niccolò said, looking almost bashful.

“The tour has already begun,” said Ren.

Isaac smirked.

The blonde woman stared intensely at Niccolò. The way he stared back at her – it was like they were silently daring each other.

Was she the reason for Niccolò’s early-morning stroll? Ugh.
I tried to convince myself that what Niccolò Medici was doing at dawn was none of my business, but still… I wanted to know. Her stern expression faltered momentarily when Gabe smiled at her with a hint of glee. It was painfully obvious they all knew each other.

“Are you sure you can’t take just two more?” Gabe asked, approaching Ren with a couple of crisp bills. “We’re very generous tippers,” he added, looking him straight in the eyes.

“I’ve always had a hard time saying no to a handsome foreigner.
D’accord
, the more, the merrier.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Isaac scowl.

Niccolò turned to me and, no longer bashful, touched my face. “Your wound is finally healing.” He kept one eye on my cheek and the other on Isaac, as if he was some kind of abusive boyfriend – which wasn’t fair and certainly didn’t go unnoticed by Isaac.

“So little time, so much to see,” Ren yelled, scooping his arm towards Bourbon Street. “This way people
,
allons-
y
!
” Isaac grabbed my arm and pulled me along as the group began to move again.

“So, Dee, are you still leaving, or do you need more pictures?”

Désirée must have noticed the bizarre exchange between the brothers and the woman, too, because she looked straight at the blonde, as if rising to the challenge. “Oh, I’m definitely going to need more pictures.” She wrapped her arm around Gabe and snapped a selfie. They looked like a pair of supermodels.

“I’m sure you all know that the
Vieux Carré
, or French Quarter, is the oldest neighborhood in New Orleans and was settled by Bienville in the year 1718. What you probably don’t know is that most of the buildings around you are not actually French. Two great fires in the eighteenth century destroyed nearly everything in the Quarter.

“Spain occupied the city at the time when the old square was rebuilt, so most of the buildings standing before you were constructed by the Spanish. There are only four original French structures remaining” – he looked straight at me and Désirée – “a Voodoo shop, a Creole cottage on Burgundy Street, the Ursuline Convent, and this former brothel.”

I had known our house was an original French cottage (there was even a plaque on the outside from the historic registry), but I had no idea it was one of only four.

“Wow, I can’t believe I’m working on one of those places,” Isaac whispered, nudging me.

“You might be thinking it’s curious that these four buildings survived all of these years, through the fires and the storms. Was it a
coincidence
? After all, what do a convent, a brothel, a Creole cottage and a Voodoo shop have in common? Of course, it wouldn’t have been a Voodoo shop back then…”

“Back then, that sort of thing wasn’t legal,” Désirée finished.

“That’s correct, Mademoiselle Borges. In the early seventeen hundreds, so soon after the height of American witchcraft hysteria, any shop selling magic fixin’s would’ve been illegal. It would’ve appeared to be just a cottage, except items may or may not have been sold out of a back room, and said items might have come with a little
lagniappe. Grati
s
.
But you would know more about that than li’l ole me.”

Désirée rolled her eyes as his accent thickened for the tourists, and then he hurried us along towards the house of New Orleans’s most famous murderess, Madame LaLaurie. I started to move forward with the group, but a tug at my sweater made me pause.

“Hey.” Niccolò’s hand lingered on my arm. “I just want to apologize for this morning.” Just the sound of his soft voice brought me back to our tangled embrace.

“For what?”

“For acting so weird. The truth is, my brother and I were out drinking, and we got into a little scuffle with some guys who were being foolish. I didn’t want you to think I was that kind of guy.”

“What kind of guy?” I wrapped my arms around myself.

“Are you cold?”

“N—” Before I could answer, he stripped off his black leather jacket and swept it around my shoulders.

“
Grazie
. Someone hit you?”

“Oh, Adele, don’t worry about Nicco,” Gabe answered, joining the conversation out of nowhere. “You should have seen the other guy.”

Niccolò rolled his eyes as Gabe tousled his hair.

“Why would someone hit you?” I asked. It was hard to imagine. Niccolò seemed like such the quiet guy in the corner. Gabe, on the other hand, I could totally see instigating a brawl.

“I could think of a couple reasons….” Isaac reappeared, Désirée in tow.

Niccolò’s jaw tightened.

“Don’t start, Isaac.” I could see Mr. Hyde coming out to play.

“Save it for the fraternity house, boys,” Désirée put her arm around me and walked us back towards the crowd. “Don’t look back. Pretend you don’t care.”

“I
don’
t
care.”

“Riiiiiight.”

“She’s beautiful
and
unforgiving,” Gabe yelled. “My favorite combination.”

I felt Désirée’s entire body smile, not that it showed on her face at all. He ran after us, put one arm around each of our shoulders, and broke us apart. Together, the three of us hurried to catch up with the rest of the tour. Désirée let out a genuine giggle.

We had missed nearly the entire story on
le Comte de Saint-Germain
. Something to do with a residence on the corner of Royal and Ursuline.

“And the next two tales bring us to the end of the tour.”

When I looked up from underneath Gabe’s arm, we were standing directly behind the old Ursuline Convent. My heart began to knock.
Paranoid muc
h
?
Gabe looked down at me as if he could hear the pounding.

I moved from underneath his arm to the familiar gate.

This time when the chills rushed up my spine, I simultaneously broke out into a sweat. I tightened Niccolò’s jacket around my torso and looked up at the convent attic – the window I had witnessed explode open was now completely bricked up, preventing even the moon’s beams coming and going.