by Laura Leone
“Nick,” Diana whispered. “It’s almost two in the morning. I’m stiff as a board. Do you really think Claude is coming?”
He looked at her tumbled hair gleaming in bright streams of celestial light. Her usually straight spine was slouched with exhaustion. His throat ached, and he knew he would do anything to be her champion tonight. But he couldn’t dictate Claude’s actions.
“He still might come. Try to get some sleep, honey. If Claude turns up, I’ll wake you.”
“What about you?” she asked. “Aren’t you tired?”
“I’m used to it.”
“How long will we stay here?”
“Peter will relieve us around dawn.”
Diana rolled her head on the car seat and looked at him. “Do you have a family?” she asked softly, suddenly curious. Maybe he would finally answer personal questions.
“I’ve got a sister in Seattle. My parents live in Los Angeles.”
“Is that where you’re from? California?”
“Yeah. I came here for college—Tulane—about fifteen years ago, and I loved it so much I never left. It just seemed like I was coming home, like I was always meant to be here.”
“I know what you mean. It’s hard to believe I’ve only been down here two years. I can’t imagine living anywhere else now.”
“Why’d you come in the first place?”
She smiled sleepily. “My sister asked me to come. I had quit working in theater and was getting my yoga certification. Sheila knew I wanted to leave New York and change my life. She asked me to come down here and check on Felix, because she didn’t think he should be living alone. I only meant to stay for a few weeks but, like you, I felt I belonged here.” She sighed. “We’ve been happy in the House of Ishtar. Until all of this happened.”
Nick’s throat tightened, and he didn’t know what to say to her. He was sure she counted him among the disasters that had befallen her and Felix during the past few weeks.
There was a long silence. He thought she had fallen asleep, until her voice came softly to him in the dark. “Nick?”
“Yes?”
“What if you’re wrong? What if Claude isn’t the one who took Felix?”
Not many things in his life had hurt as much as Diana’s calm and reasonable doubt in his judgment. “If I’m wrong, then we start back at square one and try to figure out who wants Felix out of the way.”
“Oh.” Then, many minutes later, “Nick?”
“Hmm?”
“I feel guilty, but it was kind of fun.”
“What was, honey?”
“Play acting. You know, pretending the car was broken, waving my arms and creating a distraction while you checked out all the cars and trucks. It was an adventure.” Diana sighed sadly. “I just wish it wasn’t an adventure at my father’s expense.”
“We’ll find him. I promise you,” he said huskily. “Now try to get some sleep.”
But by the time Peter’s car pulled up nearby, Nick was wondering if he had been rash in his promise. He woke Diana quietly, and he hated the dispirited look in her eyes when he told her no one had left the house all night.
“Relax,” Peter said upon hearing Nick’s brief report. “You’re not thinking clearly.”
“I was so sure last night, Pete,” Nick said, leaning against the side of the lavender jalopy. He would rather lose his right arm than fail Diana like this.
“I think Claude’s the one who pulled the snatch, too, but there are all sorts of variables. If you were yourself lately, you’d know that.” Peter glanced significantly at Diana, who was busy staring at the grass. “I’ll stick around here. You have another talk with the cops. Have Diana go through Felix’s study with a fine-tooth comb. The usual.”
“Yeah, I’ll call your car phone later today and let you know what I find out.”
When he opened the car door, Peter added, “Uh, Nick, one other thing.”
“What?”
Peter looked hesitantly at Diana before saying, “Maurice LeCoz’s wife still hasn’t turned up.” He took a deep breath. “I think that if we can’t find her in time for the hearing, we’re sunk.”
Nick lowered his head and squeezed his eyes shut, struggling with the swelling turmoil inside him. Everything was crumbling around him. He had never felt so worthless in his life. “It’s my fault,” he said hoarsely.
“No, it’s—”
“It is. I’m sorry, Pete.” Nick swung the car door open, slid into the seat, and slammed the door shut again with a violence that made the old jalopy rattle.
Diana cast a questioning glance at Peter, wondering what had just happened. When Nick ignited the engine and gunned the motor furiously, she ran around the hood, pried open the passenger door, and got in beside him before he could drive off and leave her.
Nick gripped the wheel so tightly, Diana thought it might snap off in his hands. She strapped herself into her seat while he drove the car down the country roads with a careful attention that couldn’t conceal the pain and distress engulfing him. She had never seen him look like this, had never imagined he could be so vulnerable, so in need of comfort.
Nick glanced at Diana, and the worry and doubt written all over her expression was the last straw. “You still think Felix was right, that I’m the man to help you?”
She nodded dumbly.
“Then the cosmos must really have it in for you,” he said grimly.
Chapter Nine
EIGHT OF SWORDS
Minor Arcana
Meaning: Captivity of indecision, paralysis; a “no win” position.
Reversed: Release from fear; promise of new beginnings.
The morning had been long and depressing, and the ransacked study in the House of Ishtar made Diana feel desolate. She had, of course, closed the shop until further notice. She couldn’t operate the business under these conditions.
Now that Felix had been missing for a whole night, the police conceded that he had probably done more than just “wander off” somewhere. Nick assured her that they were taking all the proper steps.
“How effective will that be?” she asked as the two of them finished cleaning up the mess.
He shrugged. “In a big, crime-ridden city like New Orleans, it means they’ll keep their eyes open. But they’ve got their hands full with murder, rape, armed robbery, and arson. That’s why people often hire private investigators to find missing persons.”
“Missing persons like Maurice LeCoz’s wife?”
Their eyes met. His blazed with something unrecognizable for a moment, then he turned his back upon her. “Yes,” he said shortly. “Now let’s see if we can figure out what the kidnappers burned.”
A thorough examination of Felix’s files and records revealed that all information pertaining to Mrs. Bouvier had been destroyed.
“But that’s not all that’s been burned,” Diana pointed out.
“They probably burned a dozen clients’ records, hoping to obscure the trail,” Nick said. “Even Claude couldn’t be stupid enough to destroy only his mother’s file. It would be like drawing us a map.”
“So what do we do now?”
“Now I go around the neighborhood and see if anybody saw anything unusual around here yesterday.”
“Like the kidnappers?”
“That’s unlikely, I’m afraid. You’ve got strangers wandering in and out of here all day, and the French Quarter is packed with tourists day and night.”
“Then what are you looking for?”
“Maybe someone saw a car or van that was here for an unusually long time. Maybe they saw Felix leave with someone. After that I’ll make a few phone calls to see if I can find out where Claude would be likely to hide someone he didn’t want found. The Bouviers probably own property and buildings all over the state. We’ve got to narrow it down.”
“What can I do?”
“I want you to stay here, behind a locked door and within a few feet of the phone.”
“Nick—”
&
nbsp; “See if you can get hold of Mrs. Bouvier by phone. Don’t mention Claude, just deep reiterating that you’re worried about Felix and that he told you her family would be involved. She’ll do the rest.”
“That’s not going to take all day,” she insisted.
“Then get some rest. You hardly got any sleep last night.”
“You didn’t sleep at all,” she pointed out.
“I’ll sleep after I find your father.”
Nick dragged her up to the apartment, searched it for intruders, made sure that all the doors and windows were securely locked, then admonished her once again to keep the phone handy and the door bolted until he returned. “Don’t let anyone in except me,” he reminded her for the fourth time on his way out the door.
“Yes, I got that part,” she said, wishing he wouldn’t push himself so hard. He looked exhausted and defeated, and seeing him that way twisted her heart with pain. She touched his cheek. “Please eat something before you go.”
His eyes sparked with a feeble gleam of humor. “I’ll grab a burger later.”
Diana shook her head in exasperation and locked the door behind him. Her sense of duty forced her to telephone her sister Sheila to explain what was happening. It took thirty minutes to convince her that Diana, Nick, and the New Orleans police were currently doing everything that could be done.
“Call me again tomorrow morning,” Sheila ordered. “If you haven’t found Felix by then, I’m flying down.”
“All right,” Diana agreed reluctantly. She understood why Sheila wanted to come, but her sister could be pushy, and Nick obviously wasn’t in the mood to be pushed. What was more, Diana was forming a plan of her own, and she knew Sheila wouldn’t approve. Actually, Nick wouldn’t be too crazy about it, either. Brushing that thought aside, Diana said, “I’ll call you first thing in the morning. In the meantime, stay calm. Nick assures me that Felix is alive.”
Sheila made an obscene comment that expressed how little faith she had in the private investigator’s opinion.
Diana spent the rest of the morning trying to get hold of Mrs. Bouvier. She telephoned the Bouvier estate a dozen times, only to be put off with transparent excuses by servants and secretaries. Finally Claude Bouvier himself came onto the line and warned her to stop harassing his family.
She hung up the phone and stared at it, wondering if Mrs. Bouvier was involved, too. Her mind was foggy and sluggish, and she didn’t know how Nick could work after a sleepless night. But the moment she lay on her bed, she knew she wouldn’t sleep for even a few minutes. She was so tense that she had to concentrate just to unclench her jaw.
She tried unsuccessfully to meditate, proving her students’ claim that meditation only worked when you had nothing to worry about. So she gave in to her fierce need for activity by cleaning the whole apartment and doing all the laundry. She went down to the second floor and prepared Nick’s room for him, thinking how much he would need to lie down for a while when he finally returned.
She tried to comfort Ishtar, who was agitated and miserable, mewling and howling as she paced up and down the stairs, searching the entire house again and again. The poor creature hadn’t been separated from Felix in twenty-eight years, and she was taking this awfully hard.
If Nick hadn’t discovered anything by the time he came back, Diana decided, she would speak to him about her plan. She could hardly believe she was even going to suggest such a thing. A few weeks ago, she would never have considered Felix’s methods suitable for solving such a serious problem. But Nick’s entrance into their lives and all the strange events that had followed had changed her perspective on everything, from the secrets of the stars to the nights she spent alone and lonely.
It was late afternoon when Nick returned. Against his orders, Diana had opened all the windows on the second and third floors to let the April breeze waft through the house. He was obviously too tired to comment on that. He slumped into a chair at the kitchen table, accepted the glass of fruit juice she pressed into his hand, and reported an unsuccessful day.
Diana clenched her fingers to keep herself from running them soothingly through his hair and massaging his tense shoulders. She was the one, after all, who had insisted things would be strictly business from now on. It was simply a Leo’s nature to comfort the weakened and afflicted, so she would have to conquer her impulses.
After he had gulped down his glass of juice and slipped off his denim jacket, Nick studied the seemingly random spread of tarot cards on the table. “What are you doing?” he asked.
She sat down next to him. “It’s the Triangle.”
“It doesn’t look like a triangle.”
“That’s because I only just got started. It needs seven cards. I’ve got five down.”
“What’s the purpose of this?”
“It’s one of the layouts Felix taught me. It’s useful for answering fairly specific questions. Another, the Star, highlights the inner and outer influences in a person’s life at a given moment. Felix’s favorite is the Gypsy spread. He’s never taught me that, since it requires forty-two cards, and he says it can cause psychic indigestion if you’re not experienced.”
“Psychic indigestion?” Nick smiled wearily.
Diana’s heart started to thud with a confused mixture of tenderness and terror. “What if we don’t find him?” she whispered.
Nick’s face clouded, and a bleak expression fogged his bright eyes. He leaned forward and covered her hand with his own. “I promised you we would, didn’t 1?” She nodded mutely. “And I owe you this, don’t I?”
Diana smiled tremulously. “We haven’t discussed your fee.”
He brushed her strawberry-blond hair away from her face. “Just a little faith. And maybe...” His voice had dropped to a whisper.
“What?” she asked breathlessly.
Don’t spoil it, he warned himself, wanting to see that tenderness in her eyes even more than he wanted to taste her on his lips. He forced an iron control on himself and suggested, “Maybe you could tell my fortune?”
Diana smiled wryly. “I don’t have Felix’s gifts or experience. Just a limited, unfocused, layman’s knowledge of the tarot.” She glanced at him from under her lashes as she echoed the words he had uttered to Felix when he first came to the House of Ishtar. “But I’ll give it a shot.”
She gathered together all the cards, asked Nick to shuffle them, which he did, and began laying out a new Triangle. “These two cards, forming the base of the Triangle, represent your present position.” She turned them up.
“The Fool,” Nick murmured dryly.
“And the Eight of Swords.” She smiled nervously, surprised by how accurate the random selection was. “Meaning you face difficult choices and danger, and you’re currently stuck between a rock and a hard place.” She turned over two more cards. “These represent your immediate future.”
“The Magician and the Wheel of Fortune.” He glanced questioningly at Diana.
“That means things will change soon. And for the better.” She swallowed convulsively. “I think it means you’re going to rescue Felix.”
After an uneasy pause during which Diana wrestled with a superstitious fear against continuing, she laid down two more cards, the third side of the Triangle. “These represent your immediate future.”
“The Queen of Wands,” Nick said, transfixed despite himself. “That’s you, isn’t it?”
“And the Two of Cups.”
“It’s... uh, I forget.”
“I think it’s something good, isn’t it?” he asked curiously, wondering why she was flushing. She nodded and he prodded, “Something about friendship and romance, right?”
Diana cleared her throat. “Sure. I mean, if you believe in this stuff.”
“You said there were seven cards. Where’s the last one go?”
“In the middle.” Her voice sounded weak.
“Well? What does it represent?”
“It influences all the other cards.”
“Better lay it down, then.”
Her fingers closed around the deck in her hand.
Nick wondered why he suddenly wanted to know what the central card would be. It was only a tarot reading, for God’s sake. It was even being read by someone who confessed to lacking a true knowledge of the tarot and to having no particular gift for it. So what did it matter? Surprised at himself, Nick gently gripped Diana’s hand and pulled the next card off the top of the deck. She took it from him and turned it over to lay it in the center of the Triangle.
“The Lovers.” Diana almost choked on the words.
Nick stared at the card, at the depiction of a naked man and woman, forever frozen in position as they reached toward each other. Sexual desire and spiritual love; a relationship with trials and choices attached to it.
More disturbing than the card was the way Diana avoided his eyes when he looked at her. It reminded him too much of her reaction as he had awaited Felix’s judgment downstairs, two weeks ago. It was just a deck of cards, he fumed silently, with no more meaning than what Diana chose to attach to it. And this time, he was not going to sweep her up and into his arms, so she could blame it all on the stars when things got too hot for her to handle. No, this time she would have to come to him on a strictly earthbound level.
Nick pushed back his chair and stood up. “I called Peter a while ago. He said Claude still hasn’t left the estate. I think I may need to try to get in to see him again tonight.”
“When do we leave?” she asked, still avoiding his gaze.
“After sunset.” Nick rubbed his hand against the knot of tension in his neck, trying to ignore the knotted desire in his belly. He wasn’t going to play by the Stewarts’ crazy rules anymore. “I’m beat. I’m going to take a shower and catch a couple hours of sleep before we go.”
“I put fresh sheets on the bed in your room.”
“Thanks. Wake me in three hours.”
Diana watched him go, biting her lip so she wouldn’t moan at the pain welling up inside her. She swallowed and blinked back tears as she heard the door close behind him. He really, really didn’t believe, despite everything. And maybe he had lost respect for her, because she couldn’t help believing.