Quinn stood, drawing his gun.
And heard a scream.
* * *
“Don’t move. Don’t whisper. Don’t fight me!” the man said.
He was tall and wiry-strong; Danni felt she was held in a death grip.
She saw, from the corner of her eye, that he was wielding a knife.
A butcher knife. Large. Even in the shadows, its razor-sharp edge seemed to glisten with just a hint of what it could do to human flesh.
“Which one is it?” he demanded.
She shook her head, pretending she didn’t know.
He dragged her down the hall to the ledge, her feet scraping on the stone floor of the mausoleum.
“Damn you,” he growled. “I will slice you from ear to ear, and don’t think your boyfriend is going to save you. I’m not alone.”
They got to the end of the tomb—and the ledge. To Danni’s surprise, he stopped. He didn’t need her help anymore. He seemed to be listening to someone who wasn’t there.
“Yes, yes, I’m here. I’m here for you!” the man holding Danni said.
She thought there must be someone near...but there wasn’t! Quinn had to be close by, though—if he hadn’t been ambushed. This man had just said he hadn’t come alone, but...
He shoved Danni away from him and tossed a burlap bag at her. “He says you’re to pick him up, cover him, get him in the bag.”
He was referring to the bust.
She got her first good look at the man. He was wearing a shoulder holster, and she could see the sheen of his gun. He was carrying the knife tightly in his left hand. She wondered if he was ambidextrous.
Just her luck.
“Do it!”
She turned. The bust was heavy, but then it was marble. The eyes seemed to stare at her as she lifted it and got it into the burlap bag.
The lips seemed to curl in complete enjoyment.
As she turned back, the man took the bag and slung it over his shoulder with an audible grunt. At the same moment, he pulled her to him using his knife hand, the blade nicking her flesh.
“Let’s go. He said not to kill you until I’m in the clear,” the man said.
Danni was numb with dread, but she had no choice. She felt the steel of the knife against her throat as he propelled her to the front entrance of the tomb.
* * *
Quinn raced around to the main entrance. He didn’t dare take the coffin slide—he’d be trapped with no vision and no aim. He sidled around the main door, looking in. He heard nothing for a moment. And then a voice called out.
“I can see you,” it said. “Move outside or she dies.”
His eyes adjusted. A bulky man he’d never seen before held a knife to Danni’s throat, a heavy burlap bag thrown over his shoulder and a gun tucked in his holster. Quinn was furious with himself. He’d taken Danni to learn how to shoot. Why hadn’t he insisted she carry the gun today? He’d assumed they’d have another chance at the range, so she could become more proficient. And it hadn’t occurred to him this morning that she might need a weapon....
He heard the grass rustle behind him. He turned in time to see a second man stealthily coming his way. The man saw him and raised a gun.
Quinn shot first, hitting his target in the chest. He whirled around but the man with Danni was charging him, blocking any chance he had of shooting because Danni was his shield.
The stranger approached in a whirlwind, thrusting Danni toward Quinn so hard and fast that they were both thrown backward. As Quinn scrambled to right himself, the man took off. When Quinn got to his feet, he heard a shot and he saw that the man with the burlap bag was racing among the myriad tombs of this City of the Dead.
He started to take aim but a shot rang out in his direction and he ducked low.
He stayed down as another shot came from a tomb to his left. The bullet ricocheted off the stone beside him and plowed into the ground just inches from where Danni was scrambling to rise.
He saw that the shooter had partially emerged from the tomb, the muzzle of his gun trained on Quinn.
But before the man could fire, something came leaping out at him.
Wolf!
The dog seemed to appear from nowhere, bared teeth sinking into the man’s gun wrist. He screamed. His gun went flying, and Wolf bore him to the ground, standing over him, fangs at his throat.
“You all right?” Quinn asked Danni.
She nodded wildly. “Go! Chase the man with the bust!”
He ran, weaving through the vaults. Tourists were rushing out of the cemetery; they’d heard the sound of gunfire—and now sirens. The police and an ambulance were arriving at the gates.
He jogged around more vaults, looked down “boulevards” and “streets,” but the man had vanished.
He ran back to the tomb for the Sisters of Mary’s Virtue. Danni was still on the ground, catching her breath, watching Wolf keep his prisoner pinned down.
“The bust—the bust is gone,” Danni told him. “It was my fault. I didn’t see or hear them.”
Quinn pulled her to her feet. “It’s not your fault, it’s mine. They’ve obviously been stalking us, and I led them right to it. Thank God you’re alive. I’m alive.”
“Billie...” she began anxiously.
“Billie’s going to have a headache, but he’ll be fine.”
He saw that a trickle of blood dripped onto Danni’s throat. She’d nearly died. He tried not to shake; he did slip an arm around her, drawing her close. “How badly are you hurt?” he demanded.
“What? Oh, just a scratch,” she said. Gesturing at the man on the ground with the dog over him, she asked, “Should we...go help?”
“Let him stare at Wolf’s fangs a little longer,” Quinn said bitterly. He touched Danni’s throat, assuring himself that she was telling the truth.
Then he walked back to the man who’d tried to jump him—the man he’d shot and killed. He’d never seen him before. He was a stranger, about thirty-five or forty, with a number of gang tattoos. But it wouldn’t matter who he was. He’d been hired from somewhere else by someone with no name. He’d been given a hefty payment and promised a great reward.
They did have one man, though. One who’d survived. Who could perhaps give them a lead.
But it was true, Quinn thought angrily. This was his own fault. He’d led them right to the bust.
And the bust was gone.
“Quinn, we got him! Call off your dog!”
He turned. Larue was in the cemetery. The place was now swarming with police. Danni ran to the emergency medical techs who’d come, leading them around to the back of the tomb and the place where Billie lay.
Quinn whistled for Wolf and walked over to Larue. “They have it. They have the bust,” he said.
“They who?”
“There were three of them. One dead, one that Wolf ran down—and one who got away with the bust.”
“I’ll get men searching immediately. You have a description?”
“Big guy, carrying a burlap bag. Fortyish. Tattoos. Brown hair, ravaged-looking face. A few pockmarks on him.”
“But we’ve got one of them. And the other—”
“Yeah, the other’s dead. When someone attacks me with a gun, I shoot to kill.”
Larue nodded. “Well, you know the drill. Let’s get started on the paperwork—and questioning the man who’s alive.”
* * *
Danni went to the hospital with Billie. He had a mild concussion and they were going to keep him overnight. She had the cut on her neck treated, but luckily—especially considering its location—it was a superficial wound.
In the hospital, Billie was a bit of a problem. He didn’t want to stay. He was disgusted with himself for having been jumped so easily, but Dan
ni convinced him they’d all been taken by surprise.
When she left him, getting dropped off at the police station by one of the med techs who was ending his shift, she began to wonder just how they’d been found. Who the hell had known where they’d be heading? Or had the shop been spied on all this time? Had they been followed whenever they’d come and gone?
At the police station, she was led into an observation area where Quinn watched Detective Jake Larue in another room, grilling the man Wolf had taken down. Wolf was next to Quinn; someone at the station had rewarded him with a nice bone. He was happily chewing away, but did pause to look at her, giving a happy thump of his tail before returning to his bone.
“Is he getting any information?” she asked anxiously, nodding at the one-way glass.
“Sure,” Quinn said. “The guy’s name is Peter Huxby, and he’s from Detroit, like those other guys who showed up at Natasha’s. Whoever’s pulling the strings on this must have some connection with the underground in that city. The man heard there was big money to be made in New Orleans. The only person he ever saw once he got here—until today—was the guy who escaped. The man who has the bust. His name is ‘Bigsy.’ And that’s all Peter knows. Bigsy was the one who met him when he came down, and he’s the one who paid him. Cash. Worn bills, nothing bigger than hundreds. Oh, and naturally, he was given a pay-as-you-go phone, and naturally, Bigsy got hold of him using a pay-as-you-go phone.”
As Quinn told her what they’d heard so far, Larue rose, left the interrogation room and joined them in the observation area.
“What’s up?” Quinn asked.
“He just requested a lawyer,” Larue said.
Quinn shrugged. “Par for the course.”
Larue’s phone buzzed. He answered it, listened a moment and said, “Thank you,” before hanging up and turning to Quinn again.
“The man you shot was named Alex Renault. He’s got a rap sheet a mile long. He was born in this area, but he’s been hopping around from state to state—when he hasn’t been in the pen. What are your plans now, Quinn? I suggest you think out your next moves very carefully. I know a statue doesn’t kill people, but people are killing over that statue. You may want to leave it alone. We’ll nail Shumaker eventually.” He paused, narrowing his eyes. “You might notice you’ve been in a few dangerous positions while tracking this thing down.”
“I can handle it, I was a cop, remember.”
“Ms. Cafferty was not,” Larue argued.
“I’m okay, really,” Danni insisted.
“But we’ll think about all the complications,” Quinn said. “Wolf, come on, bring that bone if you want, but it’s time for us to go.”
“Quinn, keep me informed,” Larue said wearily. “I’m glad that, so far, the bodies I keep picking up in your wake haven’t been yours or Ms. Cafferty’s.”
“Me, too,” Danni whispered. “Me, too.”
* * *
A few minutes later they were in Quinn’s car, heading toward Royal Street.
“Why are we going to my place?” Danni asked.
“Because Larue is right. I don’t want to get you killed.”
“Well, then, you should’ve thought of that before you walked into my shop,” Danni told him flatly.
“You could have died,” he said. “That’s not the first time, either.”
“And you could have died today, too.”
“Danni, I was a cop, I was in the military. I know more about self-defense.”
“Something, again, that you should’ve thought of before,” she said stubbornly.
“I have to protect you.”
“Because we slept together?”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” He turned to her with a mischievous smile. “Something you should have thought about before.”
She shook her head and said, “Quinn, we also had a discussion about being who and what we are. You’re going out to Martin’s Hold and you think you’re dropping me off at the shop? Well, guess what—you’re not. So just keep driving.”
“If you’re going to go running around like this, we really need to get you back onto a shooting range, buy you a holster—”
“And nothing’s happening until tomorrow night,” she reminded him. “Let’s go there now and see if we can find any sign of the activity that’s supposed to take place—or the bust.”
Once again, Quinn wished with all his heart that Angus Cafferty was with them.
Or that Danni Cafferty had proven to be a miserable shrew or a spoiled princess.
“You are going to keep driving, right?”
He sighed. “Yes. I’ll keep driving. After we make a stop.”
“Oh?”
“We’re going to pick up the little pistol I had you working with. Just make sure you don’t shoot me with it, huh?”
“Hey!” Danni yelped. “That’s insulting!”
“No insult intended. I think you’ll be a real expert one day. But you don’t have any experience yet.”
“I’ll try very hard not to shoot you.”
They made a quick visit to the shop so Danni could run upstairs and change her clothes. She considered telling Jane what had happened to Billie in the cemetery, but she couldn’t do that without more of an explanation than she had time for or wanted to give. She’d say something tomorrow if necessary, keeping the details as vague as possible.
Jane was busy at the cash register, so Danni decided they’d just slip out. Hopefully, Billie would be home soon.
They headed out of town and toward the bayou country.
“What do you think we’ll find?” Danni asked.
“A trail of dead, I’m afraid.”
Chapter Fifteen
BIGSY TAYLOR LOOKED at the burlap bundle next to him and laughed with delight. He had it, he alone. He possessed the bust and he’d be the one to make the fortune, shared with no one. He wasn’t a double-crossing SOB—he hadn’t made his fellow conspirators go down in a rain of bullets and a dog attack. It had just happened. So the bust was his.
As he drove, doubling through the city a few times as he’d been ordered, he began to feel an eerie sensation sneaking along his spine.
That usually meant cops.
He checked around; they couldn’t have found him yet. He’d parked his car around the block from the cemetery and he’d seen the cops who were chasing him running in all the wrong directions. The dog had already been occupied. His escape had succeeded. There was no reason for the cops to be after him.
“Get this off me,” someone said.
The voice was so close that he jumped. He nearly ran off the road.
“Drive as if you know how to!”
He looked to his right. The voice was coming from the burlap bag.
It was a trick. It had to be some kind of trick. He reached out and ripped the burlap from the bust. To his amazement, the bust seemed to grow...like one of those trick pictures in a booth at an arcade.
There was a man sitting next to him. Thirty or so, dark-haired, wearing a ridiculous toga thing around his shoulders. But Bigsy didn’t laugh. He stared—and nearly drove off the road again.
He felt the man touch him. Something raced through him, like an electric pulse.
“Go. Go straight to where you’re supposed to be. Now.”
Terrified, Bigsy drove. He was afraid to look to his right.
“You’ve got your gun?”
Bigsy nodded.
“When we get there, you shoot anything that moves, you understand?”
Bigsy nodded again.
He pulled off the highway and found the old road. It had never been paved and the car jolted as he drove. Tree roots made for more bumps, and foliage slapped the windows. Finally, he neared the ruins of the old mansion and mill.
Bigsy got out of the car, holding his gun. He saw vaguely that there were people in front of him, people expecting him—it was an ambush! He raised his gun and began shooting wildly, missing his mark.
A volley of bullets came his way. The first caught him in the stomach and he was aware of blinding pain.
The next caught him dead center in the forehead, and he went down like an ox.
* * *
Brandt Shumaker walked to the car, followed by his priestess. He kicked Bigsy, making sure he was dead, even though the giant hole in his head assured him the big man was gone.
“What the hell caused that?” he asked. “No matter. I was going to have to get rid of him, anyway.”
“The bust. We don’t know if he has the bust,” the woman said.
Shumaker opened the door. The bust lay on the seat. Just seeing it, he felt power surge through him.
“Are you going to set it up for the ceremony?” the woman asked.
“Hell, no. That thing stays with me wherever I go,” Shumaker said. “But we’ve got to dispose of the body and the car.”
Shumaker wasn’t concerned about hurrying. He walked around to the passenger seat and looked at the bust for a minute before cradling it in his arms. The second he touched it, he felt fulfilled. “My friend—the things we can do!” he said.
He saw the eyes open; saw the smile that curved the marble lips.
“Yes, my friend. We will rule the world.”
* * *
Quinn glanced at Danni and then back at the road as he drove. “There’s going to be a dead man somewhere. Bigsy, whoever he is, doesn’t have much of a chance now. He’s had the bust in his possession.”
“You think it kills that...quickly?”
“I think the bust has been seeking a certain personality type—with a certain level of intelligence.”
“The bust can call out to who it wants?” she asked skeptically.
“It’s possible. I also think the bust demands the utmost loyalty. When people won’t commit an act of brutality, they end up taking their own lives.”
Let the Dead Sleep Page 23