“I won’t be long,” Jake said. He went into the bathroom and stripped away the rest of his clothes, which he left on the toilet seat with easy access to his .38. He twisted the gold shower handles and stepped into the claw-foot tub without waiting for the water to heat up. The gentle spray hosed the day’s grime off his body.
Three weeks in New Orleans. How much longer could he stay?
As long as it takes.
A shadow passed over the clear plastic shower curtain. Jake lowered the soap. Jasmine stood nude on the other side of the curtain. Feeling himself growing hard, Jake swallowed.
She parted the curtain and joined him in the shower’s spray. “I told you those men won’t come up here.”
Admiring her dark brown skin and full breasts, he took her word for it.
TWO
Jake ate breakfast at the same window seat in the French Lily’s dining room every morning. He enjoyed gazing at the colorful people on the sidewalks, who outdid even those in Lower Manhattan. He identified the newer hotel guests because they nodded or pointed at Edgar in his cage, which Jake set upon the sill.
He had gotten a good night’s sleep after spending a few hours online, rested after the workout Jasmine had given him. She was a lovely girl, and although he hadn’t exactly reentered the dating scene, he appreciated her attention, fleeting though it may have been. He could get used to New Orleans.
Vincent’s blue Dodge Challenger pulled over to the curb. Jake had hired the young man to serve as his guide on Walter’s recommendation three weeks earlier, only to discover Vincent was Walter’s nephew.
After finishing his second cup of coffee, Jake left a twenty-dollar bill on the table and returned the hostess’s smile as he carried Edgar’s cage out of the dining room, through the lobby, and onto the sidewalk, where the humidity blasted him.
Vincent opened the passenger door for Jake.
“I keep telling you that isn’t necessary.” Jake set the cage down in the middle of the backseat and secured the seat belt and shoulder strap around it.
Edgar cawed at the calypso music rising from the speakers.
“A lot of things in life aren’t necessary,” Vincent said. “But it’s the little things that make a difference.”
Jake sat up front and closed the door.
Vincent slid behind the wheel beside him. “What you got planned for us today?”
Jake held up a sheaf of printouts. “Take me to the Ninth Ward.”
Vincent took the printouts from Jake and read the addresses. “Easy enough to get to, not so easy to look at, especially for a tourist like you.”
“I’ll manage,” Jake said.
Vincent pulled out.
The Ninth Ward proved harder for Jake to see than he had expected, with its ruined houses and piles of rubble left like gravestones in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. He glimpsed the tattered remnants of disintegrating blue roofs, rusted-out trailers, and shattered tree trunks. His body turned numb at the sight of the devastation, even when he saw signs of recovery: repaired houses sitting atop new raised foundations on the same block as collapsed houses in weed-choked lots. Deep down, he knew it wouldn’t recover. The grim faces of residents who refused to leave their homes depressed him even more; they resembled the shell-shocked survivors of third world countries existing in a constant state of war.
Vincent turned down a street with cracked asphalt and tall weeds. “It’s a little hard to find my way around without street signs.”
Staring at the ruins, Jake was sickened to think of the wealth hoarded and squandered by Karlin Reichard and the other members of the Order of Avademe, whom Jake had helped take down just three months earlier. The cabal members had been billionaires, and Reichard had flown a chocolate cake in from Germany for one of their dinners. Seeing misery around him, Jake found it impossible to rationalize the existence of Avademe, the mutant octopus creature the cabal had worshipped.
Vincent pulled alongside a trailer parked before the ruins of a house. Two black children, a boy and a girl, played in an inflatable swimming pool.
Jake got out, leaving Edgar in the car with Vincent.
A woman emerged from the trailer before he reached the swimming pool. She wore sandals, shorts, and a blue muscle shirt, her dark hair pulled back. “Can I help you?” Annoyance and suspicion tinged her voice.
“You can if your name is Elaine Roberts.”
“It’s rude to ask who I am before you introduce yourself.” She glanced at Vincent sitting in the car. “I know it isn’t much, but this is my house.”
Jake took out his wallet and handed her a business card. “My name is Jake Helman. I’m a private investigator, and I’m trying to locate Miriam Du Pre.”
The woman looked up from the card. “That name doesn’t mean anything to me.”
“Her mother was Louise Du Pre. Her sister was Havana Du Pre until she became Havana Evans, and her niece was Ramera Evans.”
The woman’s brown eyes flickered. “My family lived next door to them. I was friends with Ramera when we were in school. She moved to NOLA from New York City after drug dealers killed her parents. I got my own place”—she gestured at the house—”after high school. Some place, right? Ramera attended Tulane U, then wrote some big book about vodou that riled a lot of the locals. Secret ways are supposed to stay secret, you know? After Katrina, her grandma Louise’s body floated right down the streets. I never knew Ramera’s aunt Miriam, but Louise mentioned her. Why are you looking for her?”
“Ramera’s dead. I need to find Miriam to tell her.”
“Someone kill her?”
“No.” A lie: Edgar had killed the bokor, who had adopted the name of Katrina. “She fell at a construction site in New York City. Why would you think someone had killed her?”
“Because Ramera changed after Louise drowned. Who wouldn’t? Last time I saw her was at Louise’s funeral. She was all fancy and educated, but she also seemed … dangerous. Dangerous and vodou don’t mix well. I heard she went back to New York. Heard she got into trouble, did bad things.” She glanced at the children in the pool. “I guess things didn’t turn out so bad for me after all. Who hired you to find Ramera’s aunt?”
“Nobody. I’m doing this on my own. My best friend dated Ramera. Something happened to him. I’m told Ramera’s aunt is the only person who can help him.”
The spirit of Jake’s dead wife, Sheryl, had appeared in Jake’s office and told him only a blood relative of Katrina’s could reverse the transmogrification spell that had turned Edgar into a raven. Jake had since discovered Katrina’s aunt was her sole remaining relative.
Elaine narrowed her eyes. “I heard Ramera was dating some big-time drug dealer out there. If he was your friend, that doesn’t say much about you. If something happened to your drug dealer friend, I can just imagine what it was.”
“Ramera was trouble; I’ll give you that. And she did get involved with some bad men. But my friend is a cop—a good, clean cop. He didn’t know what kind of woman she was, and he didn’t deserve what happened to him.”
“And you came all the way here to help him?”
Jake nodded.
“Louise migrated here from Pavot Island. Miriam was born there, too, but Havana was born here. Miriam went back to Pavot Island and got married. When she returned to the States, she settled in Miami. That’s where she lived the last time I spoke to Louise.”
Miami! “Do you know her married name?”
“Santiago. Now you know what I know.”
Elaine handed the card back to Jake, and when he returned it to his wallet he removed two twenties. “Thanks for your help.”
She took the money and folded it in one hand.
Jake returned to the car and got into the front seat.
“Well?” Vincent said.
“I need to get to Miami.”
Standing in his hotel room, Jake called Carrie in New York City. He had left his assistant in charge of Helman Investigations and Security while he was away.
“Hi, boss,” Carrie said, no doubt recognizing his cell phone number on the display on her desk.
Jake tossed his clothes into his rolling suitcase. “I’m checking out. Book me a room in Miami for tonight, even though I probably won’t be checking in until morning. I’ll need a car when I get there, too.”
“Should I get you a motel room, so Edgar isn’t a problem?”
“You read my mind.”
“How long are you staying in Miami?”
“Tell them three nights for now. Find me everything you can on Miriam Santiago, daughter of Louise Du Pre, sister of Havana Evans, aunt of Ramera Evans. Miriam was born on Pavot Island. Havana was murdered in the Bronx. Louise died in New Orleans during Katrina. Ramera died in Manhattan nine months ago.”
“You hope to find Miriam in Miami?”
“That’s the idea. E-mail me whatever you find but call me, too.”
“It was nice having you, Mr. Helman,” Walter said as Jake signed the credit card charge slip. The middle-aged black man glanced at Edgar. “And your raven. I hope you enjoyed your stay.”
“Thanks, Walter. This is for you.” Jake handed him a fifty-dollar bill.
“Thank you, sir.”
Jake also handed Walter an envelope. “Would you see that Jasmine gets this?” He had left her a note and his business card.
“Certainly.”
With a bag slung over one shoulder, Jake rolled his suitcase outside, where Vincent popped his Dodge’s trunk and loaded the luggage.
“You know exactly where we’re going?” Vincent closed the trunk.
Jake secured Edgar’s cage in the backseat. “Not yet. Just Miami.”
“Play it by ear, free as a bird. I like that.” Vincent opened the passenger door for Jake, who got in.
Jake waited until Vincent sat beside him before saying, “Drive for two hours, then we’ll get lunch. After that, I’ll spell you for an hour.”
“You’re too good to me,” Vincent said, shifting the car into gear.
Jake reclined his seat and closed his eyes. He heard Edgar croaking close to his ear.
His cell phone’s ringtone awoke him from a half sleep seventy minutes later, and he returned the seat to its upright position.
“I’ve got your room and your car, five minutes apart,” Carrie said. She read the addresses to Jake, who programmed them into Vincent’s GPS. “There’s only one Miriam Santiago in Miami. Her husband is in jail on Pavot Island. He’s some kind of political prisoner.” She read Miriam’s address, which Jake jotted down on the back of a business card.
“Good work, kid.”
Vincent drove along the Gulf Coast into Mississippi. Jake stared out his window at the gray water. First Katrina, then Rita, then the British Petroleum disaster had devastated the area. While most of the world had recovered from the economic collapse Jake had partially brought about by causing the death of Nicholas Tower, his former employer, the deep southeast continued to languish. Although microbes had eradicated much of the spilled oil, the question of how much damage these man-made dispersants would have on the ecosystem lingered like a ticking time bomb.
In Biloxi, they ate lunch in a large boat that had been carried several hundred feet inland by Hurricane Camille and then converted into a restaurant at the very spot where it had come to rest.
Jake took his turn at the wheel, and they crossed into Florida. The sudden appearance of palm trees made him feel as if they had entered a foreign country, and in Tampa, sitting in the passenger seat as the sun turned orange, he pointed out an alligator on the side of the highway. They pulled over to a McDonald’s for dinner, so he wouldn’t have to worry about leaving Edgar in the car, then got out and stretched their legs. Mosquitoes as thick as houseflies swarmed around them as the pink sky darkened.
“It’s growing season year-round down here,” Vincent said.
“I don’t think I could ever get used to it.”
“I know other New Yorkers. You’re all the same: you think that little island you live on is the center of the universe.”
Jake knew better, but he didn’t say so. He fed Edgar some birdseed, then took his turn behind the wheel again.
“Let me know when you get tired,” Vincent said.
“I’m tired.”
“Damn.”
Forty minutes after they changed places once more, the sky turned black, clouds outlined in red.
“You want me to stop at a motel?” Vincent said.
Jake yawned. “No. We’ve made good time so far. Let’s keep going.”
“In that case, are you going to tell me why you’re going through so much trouble to find this woman and what it has to do with Edgar?”
“No.” Jake found it highly unlikely Vincent would believe Edgar had been a cop before becoming a raven, that Miriam Santiago’s niece had caused his transformation, or that Sheryl’s spirit had told Jake only a blood relative of Ramera Evans could reverse the spell.
Vincent fiddled with the radio, then turned it off.
At 2:05 a.m., they pulled into a motel parking lot and got out. The streetlamp made the bushes glow bright green, and frogs croaked in the darkness behind the trees. Jake left Vincent holding Edgar outside while he checked in, then they took the luggage to the second level.
Inside the room, Vincent looked at the double beds. “You aren’t going to make me drive back now, are you?”
Jake opened the cage door, allowing Edgar to hop out onto the desk. “You can stay here tonight. I need you to take me to the car rental agency in the morning anyway. But if you snore, you sleep in your car.”
“I don’t snore,” Vincent said. “Does Edgar?”
Edgar turned and blinked at Vincent.
Jake changed the newspaper liner in the cage. “No, but he has other more annoying habits.”
Vincent switched on the air-conditioning. “I’m beat. I don’t care what he does.”
They took turns washing up, then climbed into the separate beds.
“You live one interesting life,” Vincent said in the darkness.
Jake felt Edgar waddling across the bed. “You have no idea.”
THREE
Jake steered his rented Ford Fusion through the financial district of downtown Miami, an amalgam of glass, steel, and mirrored buildings, with Edgar’s cage nestled in the passenger seat beside him. Vincent had left after breakfast, their parting unsentimental.
Finding himself surrounded by international banks, Jake wondered how many of them the Order of Avademe had sunk its tentacles into and how the banks fared now without Avademe and the cabal of powerful old men manipulating world affairs to enhance their profit margins.
Jake wore sunglasses, a polo shirt, and knee-length shorts for comfort, and he had tucked his .38 into the side compartment of the door for security. He had learned the hard way not to travel without protection.
The black Fusion’s GPS guided him west to Little Havana. Green trees and plants encircled pastel stucco houses, and Latin music filled the air. Jake navigated several turns and stopped before a mauve-colored house.
Removing his shades, he gathered the large envelope in which he carried his documents and Edgar’s cage and got out of the car. He passed flamingo lawn statues, then knocked on the wooden door and waited. A lawn mower hummed in the distance. A red Nissan Versa drove by, its driver a Hispanic woman in her late twenties or early thirties wearing shades, who didn’t glance in Jake’s direction.
The front door opened, and a woman who appeared fifty stood there, her brown skin smooth and youthful looking. She had wide greenish eyes like Katrina.
Jake’s heart beat faster. “Miriam Santiago?”
The woman looked Jake up and down. She wore a shiny sky-blue dress, and her short hair had been straightened. “Yes?”
Jake handed her his card. “My name’s Jake Helman. I’m a private investigator from New York City.”
Miriam glanced at the card, then at Edgar, then at Jake’s good eye. He wondered i
f she sensed his left eye was made of glass or if she was merely avoiding the scars on that side of his face, a common reaction.
“What’s this about?”
Jake hesitated. After months of searching for Miriam, he didn’t know how to present his request. “I knew your niece Ramera in New York City.”
“Then you know she’s dead.”
“Yes.”
“The police told me she died with a drug dealer she was seeing. Either they jumped to their deaths at a construction site, or someone pushed them.”
“She called herself Katrina.”
One of Miriam’s eyebrows twitched. “That figures.”
“She and Prince Malachai—the dealer—were manufacturing and selling a drug called Black Magic. Are you familiar with it?”
“I was born on Pavot Island.”
“Do you know what the drug is, what it does to those who use it?”
“I know what it’s supposed to be and what it’s supposed to do.”
Jake felt disappointment creeping in. “You’re not a believer?”
“My mother was a bokor. She taught Ramera vodou after my sister and her husband were killed. I disagreed with her decision, but I’d already moved back to Pavot Island, so I didn’t have any say in the matter. It’s nonsense.”
Jake’s heart sank. A nonbeliever would do him no good. “Mrs. Santiago, did you ever study vodou?”
“I grew up with it. I couldn’t avoid it. But I never took it seriously, and I only laughed at my mother when she tried to force it on me.”
The energy drained from Jake’s body. “I have a problem involving a vodou spell Ramera cast. I’m told only a blood relative of hers can reverse it. I hoped that meant you.”
Glancing at Edgar again, Miriam clucked her tongue. “I’m sorry. If you’re looking for a witch doctor, I can’t help you.”
“Is there anyone else?”
“I’m the last living member of my family.”
A queasy feeling developed in Jake’s stomach. “Thank you for your time. If you think of anyone who can help me or any way you can help me, please call the number on my card.”
Tortured Spirits Page 2