Who Dat Whodunnit (13 page)

A car pulled out of a parking space down the block, and I stepped back onto the curb.

“Look out!” Colin screamed as the car headed right for us.

Two of Swords

Indecision

I just stared.

It was like one of those horrible nightmares when you know something is going to happen—but you’re frozen in place and can’t move.

What is that driver doing?
I thought.

It was inconceivable to me that he couldn’t see he was heading for the curb and right where we were standing.

“Scotty!” Colin screamed from somewhere behind me.

The car was heading right for me and wasn’t slowing down. If anything, it was speeding up.

In my daze, I couldn’t tell anything about the driver, but he seemed male. He was wearing a black ski cap with the ubiquitous gold fleur-de-lis on the forehead—but he had it pulled down, obliterating his face.

It was a dark blue car, midsize, maybe a Honda or a Nissan or a Toyota.

It was also incredibly dirty.

There was a dent in the hood and a crack across the windshield.

Somehow all of those things registered in my mind as it came right at me.

The next thing I was aware of was someone grabbing me. I was lifted right off my feet and thrown backward. I landed on my heels and fell back as the car jumped over the curb—right exactly where I’d been standing—before swerving back onto Bourbon Street.

I heard a woman scream just as my body hit the sidewalk.

My head hit something hard and bounced.

And everything went black.

I was drifting through mist.

I was weightless, and I wasn’t cold anymore—which was a really nice feeling.

Everything was gray, like it always was when the Goddess chose to speak to me. It had been a while—not since my last murder investigation—and I was a little relieved to know that She was still willing to appear to me. I’d offended Her the year of Katrina and She had turned her back on me, leaving me on my own. She’d forgiven me during my last murder case—primarily because I was in a position to help right an affront to another one of Her apparitions. After the wrong had been righted, the visions ceased—although I was still able to read the Tarot with some degree of success.

There was the familiar sense of love and protection wrapping itself around me, and a sense of peace and calm I always wished I could replicate when I wasn’t having a vision. I always felt safe in this place She summoned me to—whether it was between worlds or dimensions, I didn’t know, nor would I probably ever know.

There was a strange silence as I continued drifting down through the mist. I closed my eyes and let the smells intoxicate me—lilacs and lavender, roses and jasmine. I breathed the fragrances in deeply as the warmth worked its way through my body, banishing the damp and the cold.

I drifted down, and my bare feet touched soft earth.

I opened my eyes, and the mist began to dissipate. There was a glowing light to my right, reflecting off the fading mist. “Holy Mother?” I called softly. “Are you there?”

“Scotty.” Her voice called softly from the same direction the light was coming from. I turned so that I was facing the soft glowing light, and the mist began clearing completely as She walked toward me. We were standing in a meadow, and the sun came out of the grayness, and its warmth caressed my skin.

As She drew nearer, I couldn’t help but smile.

She was wearing a black Drew Brees jersey, with the big number 9 in gold in front. As always, I couldn’t make out Her face clearly; it was always blurry and indistinct, unless She was appearing to me in a completely human form. Her bare feet were floating several inches above the grass as She moved closer to me.

“Does this mean we’re going to win the Super Bowl?” I asked, gesturing at the jersey.

“Such things do not concern me,” She replied with a wave of her hand. “What care I for your silly human games? The pride and self-absorption of mortals—sometimes it is too much to be borne! What does who wins a game have to do with the Great Plan, with the Eternal Cycle? What does it matter whether some mortal gets a job promotion, or some child gets a bicycle as a gift, or some teenager passes a mathematics test he did not prepare for? Such things do not matter, and in the endless passing of time are soon forgotten.”

“I thought everything was connected,” I replied. “Every event has an effect and changes the future—you’ve told me that enough times. When a butterfly beats his wings in China it has an effect here.”

“Your mind cannot comprehend Truth as I can, Scotty. It is best if you do not ask questions you cannot handle the answers to.”

“But, Great Mother—”

The air got colder. “Are you questioning me?” Her voice whipped around me. “Do you dare?”

“Of course not, Great Mother.” I bowed at the waist. “I am merely confused. I am, after all, merely a human.” I gestured to the jersey again. “And seeing you in a Saints jersey, well, I could not help but assume there was a meaning in it.”

She fingered the hem of the jersey. “Surely you know that when you see me, you see me in a form your mind can handle. Hence this oversized blouse made of this unpleasant fabric. But if it makes you feel any better—” She gestured with Her left hand, and the jersey transformed into a luxurious velvet toga in a stunningly beautiful shade of purple I’d never seen before. “Enough of this talk of silly games! There are much more important things for us to discuss.” She gestured for me to follow Her. “There is great danger,” She said, Her voice drifting back to me on the gentlest of warm breezes.

“Isn’t there always,” I muttered under my breath.

She stopped walking. “I chose you, Scotty. Out of all the mortals, I put my mark on you. I gave you a great gift, one that many would appreciate, that many would give their right arm to have. But there’s always a price, Scotty.”

“I know, Great Mother,” I replied. “I do appreciate it.”

“I doubt that you do.” She turned Her back on me.

I followed her, and She waved Her hand as I came up alongside Her.

We were standing on a cliff, and far beneath us wasn’t a valley, but a road I recognized as Airline Highway, with its box stores and fast food joints. There was a massive structure just on the other side of the highway from us—behind a vast parking lot filled with angry people carrying signs and shouting.

“There.” She pointed.

“The Dove Ministry of Truth?”

“There is no truth to be found in that place,” She whispered to me as the voices grew louder. I could barely make out the words—“No more hate! No more hate!”

“Is that the protest? The one this Saturday?”

“There will be trouble, Scotty, and it is up to you to make sure that it doesn’t happen.” She continued, “This trouble, if it is allowed to come to fruition, will poison the next few years and lead to even more trouble, to great deaths and much destruction.”

“You want me to convince Mom to not have the protest?”

As I watched, the front doors of the church opened and a wave of people came rushing out, heading for the protestors.

“Violence is never the answer, Scotty. It scars the plane—and those scars take an eternity to heal—and more evil comes into the world from those scars.” She began to turn away from me as the mist began to rise again. Airline Highway, the sound of angry voices shouting, and the church disappeared into it.

“You must find out the truth before the violence takes control,” She whispered.

And disappeared into the swirling mist.

“Scotty!” Colin’s voice penetrated the darkness—and the pain.

It took me a few seconds to force my eyes open. My head was pounding, and it was cold. Slowly Colin’s face swam into focus in front of me. Just beyond him I could see the Lucky Dog vendor in his white and red striped shirt across the street, and Oz just beyond him. Out of the left corner of my eyes I could see the front steps of Marie Laveau’s Voodoo Shop. “What—what happened?”

“A car tried to run us down,” he replied grimly. “I pushed you out of the way—a little too hard, I guess—and you hit your head on the wall.” He pulled his cell phone out of his jacket pocket. “Let me call an ambulance—”

“No.” I winced as I sat up, and closed my eyes until the wave of dizziness and nausea passed. “I don’t need to go to the emergency room. I hit my head. No big deal.”

“You could have a concussion—”

“I’m fine,” I snapped. “I have a headache, that’s all.” I felt around the back of my head and felt the painful knot. “It’s 2010, Barack Obama is president of the United States, your real name is Abram Golden, my name is Milton Scott Bradley, we’re on the corner of Bourbon and St. Ann, the date is January twenty-first, and I’m not seeing double.” I forced a smile on my face to take the sting out of my tone. “I’m fine.”

“I’d feel better if you got checked out,” he replied dubiously. “Head injuries…” His voice trailed off, and he gave me a smile. “Okay—but if you don’t feel better later, we’re going to the hospital, no arguments. Is that clear?”

“Aye, aye, sir.” I winced as I tried to get up. I must have landed on my shoulder wrong, because it also ached. “Help me up, would you, please?”

Colin shoved his big hands into my armpits and lifted me to my feet effortlessly. I always forget how strong he is. I leaned on him for a moment, hearing his heart beating and enjoying the warmth radiating off his body. It really was cold. He kissed the top of my head. “Come on, we’d better get you home.”

I started to argue, but another wave of dizziness stopped me as I tried to stand on my own. “Okay.” I swallowed. “Someone seriously tried to run us over?”

He nodded. “Yeah.” He said it with a grim look on his face, which didn’t bode well for the driver should Colin ever get his hands on him. “Headed right for where you were standing—if I hadn’t pulled you out of the way—” His voice choked up.

I closed my eyes and tried to remember. The last thing I remembered was walking out of Domino’s. I took another step and winced. “Man, my head and shoulder are killing me.”

“We need to get you home,” he said again.

“What about the investigation?” I protested. “We’ve barely started on the list.”

“It’ll have to wait.” He shook his head. “Can you walk?”

I took a step without losing my balance or getting dizzy. My head was still throbbing, though, and my shoulder was screaming for Ben-Gay. I nodded. “Yeah, but stick close, just in case. Just get me home and you can go on without me.”

“I’m not leaving you alone. What if…” His voice trailed off.

“Call David and have him come over to babysit me,” I replied crossly. Colin and Frank both have an annoying tendency to try to cover me in bubble wrap, if I’d let them. I mean, come on—I’m hardly a hothouse orchid. “He should be home from work by now. He’ll love the chance to mock me. And I can get the lowdown on Jesse, see if David confirms his alibi. You got the plate number of the car, right?”

“It didn’t have one.” He scowled as we started walking up St. Ann Street toward the river. When we reached the Lucky Dog cart, the vendor called over, “You all right, man?” He had a thick St. Bernard Parish accent. I nodded and gave him a weak smile. He just shook his head and started mumbling something about asshole tourists who don’t know how to drive in the Quarter.

Colin went on, “It was a dark blue Honda—I didn’t get much of a look at the driver, but I could see it was a man, and there was no license plate on the back either.”

“He was wearing a ski cap pulled down over his face—a Saints one with the gold fleur-de-lis on the forehead. But why would someone try to run us down?” It didn’t make sense. Okay, maybe my brains were still a little scrambled, but I couldn’t think of any reason someone would want to run us down. “And you’re sure it wasn’t an accident? Maybe he was just drunk or something.”

“No, it was deliberate, all right. He headed right for us—and he drove up over the curb before veering back into the street.” Colin’s face was grim. “He was definitely trying to run us down.”

“But why would someone do that, Colin? It doesn’t make any sense—none at all. Nobody knows we’re investigating Tara’s murder—hell, nobody even knew she was dead until the story broke just now. Unless—”

“Whoever it was might have just been after me,” he finished the sentence for me. It was eerie how he could do that. “I’ll call Angela—get her started looking into it. Maybe someone tracked me here—it’s always a possibility.” He looked away from me. “You know, it’s always been a fear of mine—”

“Stop right there.” I cut him off as we turned down Royal Street. Colin was careful to make sure I was walking on the inside. “Don’t even go there, Colin. We don’t know anything, so don’t make any assumptions, okay?” I folded my arms, wincing as a lance of pain shot out from my shoulder.