The Devil's Luck

by W E DeVore

  Sanger moved to kiss Yvie and she shook her head slightly.

  She said in a soft voice, “Don’t make a show. They’ll get the wrong idea.”

  He leaned towards her and asked, “The wrong idea about what, sweetheart?”

  “They’ll think we’re… dating,” she said.

  Sanger took her face in his hands, “Well, I like to think that we are dating, Yvonne. Or did I miss something last night?”

  Q widened her eyes and she moved to the makeshift bar by the refrigerator to pour herself a cup of iced tea. She peeped over her shoulder, along with every other member of Ben’s immediate family to watch Sanger kiss Yvie and most definitely make a show of it.

  Danielle leaned over from the potatoes she was peeling and whispered in Q’s ear, “You are officially my hero. I don’t think I could have taken another minute of Yvie whining about that man.”

  Q elbowed her in the ribs. “Calm down, will you? They’ve only gone on a few dates.”

  “Doesn’t look that way to me.” She moved closer and whispered, “Yvie says he has the biggest dick she’s ever seen.”

  Q glared at her. “You know, Danielle, for a lesbian, you sure do talk an awful lot about penises.”

  She shrugged. “She volunteered the information.”

  “Of course, she did. Y’all tell each other everything. And it’s weird. You know, every single one of you has been embarrassing poor Icarus at the nail salon when you go in there with Ben. He told me all about it.”

  Danielle glanced over at her wife and back at Q. “You should be glad. You’ve been benefitting from those discussions for years.”

  Q laughed and grabbed a knife to help finish peeling the potatoes. “So has Icarus’s wife, apparently.”

  They glanced back to see Sanger and Yvie still kissing. Lila finally intervened and yelled, “Yvonne Marie Bordelon, stop kissing that man in my kitchen and make yourself useful. Jeez and Petes, you’re as bad as Q.”

  “Hey!” Q argued. “Talk to your son. I was just being accommodating.”

  Ben grinned at her from the greens. “You want to show them how it’s done?”

  “It’s not a competition, Bordelon,” she replied.

  Lila dried her hands and pushed her daughter and Sanger towards the door. “Yvonne, go take Aaron around and introduce him so your sisters can gossip about y’all in peace.”

  “Ma,” Ben whined. “I’m standing right here.”

  Q smiled at him. “She said, ‘sisters,’ that does include you, mister.”

  “Come on, Aaron,” Yvie said, pulling Sanger out of the room. “I’ll take you on a tour.”

  “Not upstairs!” everyone in the room exclaimed.

  Yvie blushed, and they left the room presumably so that Sanger could be introduced to the rest of the clan spread throughout the house. The first time Ben had taken Q on a such a tour, it had ended before it began in his childhood bedroom. They still hadn’t lived it down.

  Lila set down a cutting board in front of Q. “Start cutting up those for the potato salad, darlin’, and then start explaining how you finally got that man to come around. Because, if we’re being honest, I didn’t think he was interested in Yvie in the least little bit.”

  Q grabbed a peeled potato and said, “Would you all just lay off? Aaron is just now getting back to himself. You’re going to scare the poor man.”

  When she was greeted with silence, she said, “Fine. I bought him a box of condoms and made him come to Shabbat dinner.”

  Grace screwed her face up in confusion. “Q, please don’t be offended, but Jews are strange.”

  She grinned. “Whatever. It worked. And you should be glad it did. Your brother’s been encouraging him to be anything but a nice Jewish boy.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Ben asked.

  “He told me about that scheme of yours, Bordelon.”

  “What scheme?”

  “The gym,” she said, exaggerating the movements of her lips and looking at him sideways down the length of the counter.

  Ben bit his lip and smirked. “That was the women’s Crossfit class’ scheme, not mine. I was just an innocent bystander.”

  “Yeah, I bet,” she said.

  “Yes, you did and now you owe me one cancelled week of touring of my choosing.” He flashed a broad grin at her from the other end of the long counter.

  “Cheater.”

  Ben dried his hands and moved to stand behind his wife. Wrapping his arms around her waist, he bent down and kissed her shoulder.

  “I’d do just about anything to keep you home with me.”

  Q smiled to herself and continued to dice up the potato in her hand.

  “Would you quit groping your wife and finish up those greens?” his mother scolded him, and he reluctantly let go of Q’s hips. “So, Q, honey, how long are you home for?”

  “For a few months this time. I start rehearsals with Dark Harm next week. Derek will be home in a couple of days, then it’s all work all day for the son of Satan until my contract is up.”

  “Lord, I had such a crush on him when I was thirteen,” Grace sighed. “He’s so… I don’t know.”

  “Creepy?” Q suggested.

  “No…”

  “Predatory?” she tried again.

  Grace threw an ice cube at her head and she ducked. “No. Sexy. You can’t honestly say you don’t find him hot as hell.”

  “Yes, yes I can.”

  “Well, Yvie said he was charming,” Grace pouted.

  “Most sociopaths are, Grace,” Q reminded her.

  Lila pushed Q out of the way with her hip, setting down the jars of ingredients for the potato salad dressing on the cutting board. “Well, I happen to think he’s a very talented boy.”

  Q pulled back to regard her mother-in-law. “You do?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Since when are you a Dark Harm fan, Ma?” Ben asked, unable to keep the horror out of his voice.

  “Since Gracie used to lock herself in her room and blast that first album over and over. It kind of grew on me. Angela and I took Grace to see them play in Houston, remember, honey?”

  Grace grinned. “Of course, Mama. One way of the other my big brother was going to be married to a Dark Harm fangirl.”

  “Q isn’t a fangirl,” Ben corrected. “She works for him sometimes, is all.”

  The fact that both Ben’s late-fiancé and his wife had an affinity for the man he so obviously loathed, was too easy a target for his baby sister not to use to goad him on a regular basis.

  To get a little revenge for being tricked into betting against her own career’s interest, Q decided to add some fuel to the fire and said, “You know, Mama. He’s not really that much younger than you… and you’re just his type…”

  Still stunning in her sixties, Ben’s mother would have been able to get backstage all on her own in the nineties with little more than a wink and a smile at Derek while he was on stage, had she wanted to. Q hoped she’d hadn’t, if for no other reason than a revelation of that nature would have killed her only son dead on the spot.

  Lila laughed. “Yeah, I bet. I said he was talented. He’s little on the skinny side for anything else.”

  Q grinned and Ben glared at them both. She blew him a kiss and left the kitchen to retrieve her nephew’s guitar from the car, deciding that she was going to take back the mantle of Best Auntie Ever in front of all five of her competitors. As she skipped down the steps to the driveway, she spotted Sanger angrily pacing and yelling into his phone.

  “What the fuck, Rex?” he yelled. “How could you just hand everything over without talking to me? I told you to make copies, you fucking moron.”

  Sanger and his new partner, Rex Landry, were stuck in an uncomfortable stage of their work relationship: Sanger was still trying to get his footing as senior partner and Rex was still trying to figure out how to be less of a dumbass. The fact that the latter’s maturity level had been stunted and frozen solid at age fifteen wasn�
��t helping.

  Q pulled the guitar bag from the backseat and slung it over her shoulder. She walked up the driveway towards Sanger, who was saying in a more measured tone, “Well, next time, I’m going to need you to forget procedure and remember whose team you’re on…. Of course, I’m pissed. Listen to me. If Agent Jeffries calls you, whistles at you, sends a telegram, or a carrier pigeon, or anything else your way, you tell her that she has to come through me. Me. Got it?” He paused and listened to the argument on the other end of the line. “I don’t know. Play dumb. It’s what you’re good at.”

  He hung up without waiting for a reply and shoved his phone into his back pocket.

  “Lover’s quarrel?” she asked.

  “Shut up, Clementine.”

  She kicked his foot. “You should ask for a new partner, Aaron. How much longer are you going to put up with Rex being an idiot? What did he do this time?”

  “Jeffries showed up at the station last night. He handed her the entire Ackerman case file - autopsy report, toxicology, the works - without making a copy first.” He put his hands on his hips and turned his face heavenward for assistance.

  “Well, cowboy, far be it from me to defend Rex’s penchant for stupidity, but maybe it’s for the best.”

  “How you figure that?”

  She looped her arm through his and moved him back towards the house. “Mike was mixed up in some bad shit, Aaron. You said it yourself. Maybe this isn’t a case you want. I’m kind of partial to you continuing to breathe and I know Yvie’s pretty partial to that face staying as handsome as it is.”

  He pulled her closer and kissed the top of her head. “Maybe you’re right. But I’m still reading that woman the riot act first thing tomorrow. She had no business cutting us out like that.”

  “Your pride is bruised. I get it. But put yourself in her shoes. If you’d been working on putting together a case against Urian Galanos for months, and some detective and his adorable sidekick stumbled into it on a Saturday morning, wouldn’t you come down on them like a ton of bricks?”

  “I guess,” he reluctantly admitted. “But I don’t think Jeffries thought you were adorable. Not in the least.”

  Q waved her hand dismissively. “Pish. I’d bet good money that if I sent her two tickets to that Dark Harm show at the Orpheum, she’d be my very best girlfriend until the end of time.”

  Sanger’s eyes widened. “Could you?”

  “Could I what?”

  “Really get two tickets to that show?”

  “I’m the motherfucking Archangel, cowboy. Of course, I could. I have them already. Tom and Charlie decided they wanted to come to the Arena show, not the Orpheum. They’ve got a side bet that I’m going to tank in front of fifteen thousand people.” She inwardly cursed as her brain finally caught up to Sanger’s scheme. “No.”

  “Please, I’ll be your best friend,” he sing-songed.

  “I’m already your best friend.” She stopped walking and faced him. “Why are you doing this?”

  “Just trying to be friendly.” He flashed his easy smile and she pursed her lips at him in annoyance.

  “Save it, Sanger,” she grumbled. “I don’t want you working this case.”

  “Well I haven’t wanted you working at least three of my cases, but that hasn’t stopped you. Come on, Clementine. This case stinks and I can’t just let it drop. Besides, you owe me.” He gestured to the guitar on her back. “Lest you forget, we wouldn’t be in this mess if you weren’t so obsessed with your ‘Best Auntie Ever’ title.”

  “Aaron Edgar Sanger, are you insane?” she asked. “What? You think you’re just going to waltz into Jeffries’s office tomorrow morning with two crisp Dark Harm tickets in your pocket and steal your files back?”

  “No. I think we’re going to waltz into her office, and you’re going to give her the tickets as a way of thanking her for letting you have that guitar on your back and be your charmingly quirky self. And somehow, she’s going to let me copy my files. I haven’t figured that part out yet,” he admitted.

  “You could just call and tell her you need them. If you’re asking me, I don’t think I’m the person she wants to be charming her, Mr. Monster Cock.” She glanced down at his crotch for emphasis.

  Sanger’s face turned an unnatural shade of red. “What did you just say?”

  “I should have warned you before. The hens tell each other everything. Yvie was very pleasantly surprised and told all seven of her sisters, including me.”

  “Wait,” he said. “I thought there were six including you and Emmy. Who’s the seventh sister?”

  “Who do you think? Ben. He’s worse than Emmy and that’s saying something.”

  He laughed and put his arm around her shoulder, changing the subject. “So, you’ll help me?”

  “I suppose,” she sulked. “But I don’t like it.”

  “God damn, I like you,” he said, nudging her with his hip.

  “See? It’s not creepy when you say it either.”

  “Come on, Clementine. Let’s go get you back your title of Best Auntie Ever.”

  She stopped walking and asked, “On a scale of one to ten, how bad is this thing you’re trying to get mixed up in?”

  “Barely registers.”

  “You promise me.”

  “I promise,” he said, looking at her intently. “And I always keep my promises.”

  Q knew she was going to regret saying it as soon as the words left her lips. “Not always, Aaron.”

  He flinched, knowing that he’d broken the biggest promise he’d ever made to her when he continued his affair with her mentor’s wife. “How about from now on, then. I’ll never break another promise to you from now on.”

  “I’m going to hold you to that.”

  “I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

  Chapter 7

  Bywater Blues

  Q scowled at Sanger all the way down St. Charles Avenue. By the time they pulled up to the stoplight at Calliope, Sanger was fed up with her silent recriminations.

  “Stop it, Clementine,” he finally said.

  “Stop what, Sanger?” she asked.

  “Glaring at me. You’re creeping me out and it’s starting to piss me off.”

  “Do we even have an appointment?” she demanded.

  “You do,” he replied in a more measured tone. “I made one for you this morning.”

  “I can’t believe you’re actually making me do this. I thought we decided last night that you were going to just take the tickets and seduce the woman…”

  “No, you decided,” he corrected. “I never agreed to it.”

  After telling Ben about Sanger’s scheme to make nice with Agent Jeffries, her husband had injected some much-needed realism into her decision to assist their friend with another investigation, reminding her that she’d almost been killed twice already and had witnessed a suicide doing exactly what Sanger was asking her to do once more. The memories of her previous attempts at casual investigation had been enough to snap her back to common sense. She’d immediately called Sanger to tell him to leave her out of it. He’d shown up on her doorstep in the morning anyway and refused to take ‘no’ for an answer.

  “Besides,” he said. “The plan works better with you there.”

  “How in the sweet hell do you figure that?” she demanded.

  Sanger shrunk back somewhat and scrunched his face. “I might need you to steal the files if she won’t give them over.”

  “You’ve officially lost your damned mind.” Q moved to open the door before the light changed. “I’m out, cowboy. I’m done being your damned ride or die. You feel me? Call Rex. He’s your partner. I’m your friend. Stop trying to turn me into a cop. I’m fucking sick of it.”

  The light changed to green and Sanger peeled into the intersect, throwing Q back in her seat. “You love it.”

  “No, you love it.” Q frowned at him. “I end up back in therapy. And I fucking hate shrinks.”

  “Just what do you t
hink is going to happen?” he asked. “We’re just going to give Jeffries the tickets, make nice, get my files, and go. What could possibly go wrong?”

  “Let’s recap, shall we, Sanger?” she replied. “The first time I went rogue and tried to solve a murder on my own, I got beat halfway to death right after I got Ben’s skull cracked open. Then I helped you with an investigation and I almost got strangled by a serial killer; but, not before he made me touch his dick for five solid minutes.”