“Your father got his start in the deli business in New Orleans,” she said for the thousandth time. “And Anthony has seen how well you’ve done for yourself after moving there. He wants a chance to do the same thing.”
When she put it that way, I couldn’t begrudge my brother a shot at a new career. But I could begrudge him everything else. “Honestly, I think it’s a dumb idea. But whatever.”
“I’m glad you agree.” She twisted my words to suit her worldview. “Now that it’s all settled, he’ll be at your place within the week.”
The bathroom began to spin.
“Wait a second,” I wheezed, returning to my safe place on the floor. “He’s not living with me, is he?”
“He won’t be there long, Francesca. Just until he gets on his feet.”
“Uff,” Nonna pffed in Italian. “He never get off-a the couch.”
For once I was glad my nonna was on the phone. “She’s right, Mom. Anthony doesn’t get on his feet. And don’t forget that I live in a one-bedroom apartment. I don’t have room for him here.”
“Your father and I lived in a one-bedroom house with all three of you kids when you were small,” she shrilled, making her maternal misery known. “God knows we’ve sacrificed for you. It’s your turn to sacrifice for us.”
My eyes narrowed. Was this some kind of parental payback for being husbandless and childless? They unloaded their freeloading son on their single daughter?
“Goodness, I’d better get off the phone.” She verbalized my sentiments all along. “I need to get a move on if I want to get Anthony packed.”
I wouldn’t swear to it, but I thought I heard her squee.
“Goodbye, dear.”
The line went dead. And so did my hopes for the future.
I’d been a fool to fear the caped figure.
Anthony was the one coming to suck my blood.
“Where are you?” Bradley shouted into his cell phone above the jazz blaring at The Court of Two Sisters restaurant. “I’m going to have to head out in about twenty minutes to make my flight.”
Disappointment joined the hunger already chewing at my insides as I clutched my phone and mentally cursed the red light. “I’m about to turn into the Quarter. I’ll be there in ten.”
“We’ll have a few minutes together, then,” he said, sounding content.
Carnie’s comment about the grocery store date came to mind, and my disappointment turned to annoyance. Was that all Bradley needed with me? A few measly minutes?
“Franki? Are you still there?”
“Yeah. See you in a few.” I tapped End, which symbolized how I felt about the whole situation—not seeing him the night before, not warranting more than a brunch date that morning, not being invited to New York for the weekend. And “a few minutes” was all the time I needed to tell him that.
The light turned green.
I hooked a right onto St. Ann Street, and I flinched.
The scene before me looked like the college textbook pictures I’d seen of San Francisco’s Summer of Love—but in the French Quarter in the fall. And judging from the look of the hippies hanging out on the sidewalks, they were the same flower children from the summer of ‘67—only they’d matured into flower fogies.
The light at the next intersection was red, so I slowed to a stop. Wondering whether the hippies were getting ready to rally for pot or protest a war, I looked around for their picket signs while I waited. Not seeing any, I glanced at the light.
Then I looked down.
A pair of black go-go boots had caught my eye because the wearer was marching up the middle of the street. The next thing I knew, “These Boots are Made for Walkin’” played in my mind. But when I raised my gaze, it wasn’t Nancy Sinatra’s face I saw but Nancy Reagan’s—with long black hair and gray roots.
The woman reached the cross street, and I realized she wasn’t alone. Shuffling behind her slight frame was a chubby dachshund in a tie-dyed T-shirt and a band of merry—and hairy—men.
As I looked on perplexed, she paraded to the front of my 1965 cherry red Mustang convertible, lowered her peace-sign sunglasses, and stared straight at me. Then she raised her bell-sleeved arms, and her entire entourage sat down.
Unsure how to react, I sat immobile as the haughty hippie draped her arms around a sixtyish male with gray chest hair sprouting from his suede-fringed vest and proceeded to swap spit.
Then I remembered that I, too, was wearing boots. I threw open my car door and stomped up to the impassioned pair. “Listen, I hate to break up your love-in, but you need to clear out.”
The fringed flower fogy broke the lip lock. “This is a sit-in, man.”
“Well, could you sit in somewhere else? Like on the sidewalk?” I pointed at my Mustang. “Because I need to get through here.”
“That would defeat the purpose.” The hippie chick’s tone was hoity-toity. “We’re sitting in to protest the cruel and inhumane practice of boiling live crawdads.”
I looked at her like she was high, which was a definite possibility. “Um, good luck because they’ve been boiling them here for hundreds of years.”
“Don’t listen to her, Pam,” a frizzy-haired burnout in bell-bottom jeans and Jesus boots advised. “She’s part of The Establishment. You can tell by her cream-colored pants.”
“What’s wrong with cream?” I protested. “It’s an earth tone.”
Pam leaned back on her palms and tilted her head. “Yeah, I’ll bet she wants to break us up so she can go to brunch.”
My head retracted. “I am going to brunch.”
“Boo, hiss,” the hippies heckled.
I recoiled again. I’d never heard anyone actually say “hiss,” and it seemed kind of harsh.
A car horn blared.
We turned and saw an elderly male in a Mercedes behind my Mustang.
“See?” I shouted. “I’m not the only one you’re blocking, so why don’t you keep on truckin’ and get out of the street?”
Pam’s old man rose on well-worn flip-flops. “We’re not moving, dig? So flake off.”
Based on the context, I was pretty sure he was telling me to leave. But he did have a skin condition.
Pam stood on scrawny legs. “Like, get back in your car and split.”
“Like, I would, but you’re blocking my way.” I scrutinized the not-so-dynamite duo with a surly stare. “And whatever happened to promoting peace and love?”
She grasped her live-and-let-live locket. “The times they are a-changin’.”
Her comment reminded me that the times they were also a-wastin’. With mere minutes to meet Bradley, I balled my fists and stormed over to the man in the Mercedes. “You might as well turn around, sir.” I cast a glare worthy of a brunch-eating Establishment member at Pam and her people. “Those hippies are downright hateful.”
Without further ado, I jumped into my car, pulled over to the curb, and parked. I might’ve revved my engine too.
The hippies watched as I climbed from the car and slammed my door. Flinging my bag over my shoulder, I set off on the three-block walk to the restaurant.
“Righteous,” Pam said.
My boots practically screeched to a halt. What I really wanted to do was “rap” with her—and I didn’t mean “talk.” But at least ten minutes had passed since I’d talked to Bradley, so I decided to mellow out and keep on keepin’ on—and to stop using hippie lingo moving forward.
After a couple of blocks, I emerged from the hippie hotbed into the usual tourist traffic. The strange thing was that the queasy-uneasy feeling of the night before had returned. I told myself it was nerves about confronting Bradley, but even I knew that was a lie.
Because something was up. I just didn’t know what.
“Hello, Franki.”
The gruff Boston accent was familiar.
A couple of buildings further ahead, I spotted a balding, beer-bellied guy in an orange island shirt and blue toe shoes that looked like gloves for feet.
“Lou Toccato.” I flashed a sincere smile as I made my way over to greet him. I got a kick out of Lou and his kooky last name, which was Italian for “touched,” as in “crazy.” The irony was that Lou was sane while his psychic wife, Chandra, was the loon. But I was indebted to them both because they’d bailed me out of a bad place on a homicide case. “I haven’t seen you since the plantation investigation.”
“That’s right.” He gave me a hearty handshake and then hiked up his sagging shorts.
Even though I was in a hurry, I had to stop and chat with Lou, especially since I didn’t have to deal with Chandra. “Hey, so how’s business? Are you still in Mid-City?”
“Nah.” He shoved his hands into his pockets. “Chandra and I formed an LLC.”
“Huh,” I said, surprised. “A plumbing and psychic services company?”
“Yup, yup.”
In a weird way, it made sense. There were plenty of people in New Orleans who would equate overflowing toilets with misdeeds from the dead. “Where are y’all at?”
He jingled the keys in his pocket and rocked back on his heels. “Over on Frenchmen Street.”
I nodded, impressed. “That’s prime real estate. The plumbing business must be treating you right.”
Lou rocked forward to his toes. “Actually,” he said in a confidential tone, “Chandra’s the breadwinner in the family.”
If he’d hit me upside the head with a pipe wrench, I could not have been more floored. As psychics went, Chandra, aka the Crescent City Medium, was just plain sad. Not only was she phasmophobic, she was also a flat-out fake. “Where is she, anyway?”
He jerked his shoulder toward an open door.
It was unmarked, so I read the overhead sign. “Boutique du Vampyre?” Startled, I took a step back. “What’s she doing in there?”
“Buying supplies,” he said with a shrug. “They sell candles.”
“And custom fangs,” I added, reading from a placard on the wall. It was probably a psychosomatic reaction, but my neck throbbed. “I’d love to pop in and say hello to her, but I really have to—”
“Why, Franki Amato.”
Chandra’s honeyed voice hit me like a hammer. And I rued the run-in with the hippies at the sit-in. Thanks to their concern for the crawdad, I was going to be sidelined by the psycho psychic.
She studied my face as she stepped from the store, and I eyed her outfit. She was dressed like a Dallas Cowboy cheerleader but built like the Pillsbury Doughboy. Since I’d seen her last, she’d toned down the size of her Chanel bag, but she’d ramped up the breadth of her frosted bouffant bob.
I mustered a polite smile. “Lou and I were talking about you.”
“I know you were.” She raised a blood bag with a straw to her tiny lips.
For a moment, I was relieved because it finally dawned on me that I was having a nightmare. How else would I explain the blood bag—and the hippies? But then Chandra shoved the bag in my face, bringing me back to my bizarre and bitter reality.
“It’s not a real blood bag. It’s an energy drink,” she said, as though reading my mind. “Cute, huh?”
Like a leach on a baby’s bottom.
She put a pudgy hand on Lou’s chest, causing the suns, moons, and stars on her charm bracelet to jingle. “They have a blood clot spread that would be perfect for your cooking class.”
The queasy feeling intensified. I wasn’t sure what kind of class Lou was taking, but I was positive I didn’t want to sample his cooking.
“Boy, I need to get a look at that.” Lou headed for the door. “Nice seeing ya, Franki. You’ll have to drop by the house sometime.”
“Will do, Lou.” I watched him go inside with regret. The thought of being alone with Chandra and her psychic shenanigans reminded me why I hadn’t kept in touch with her. “I wish I could stay and chat, but I’m super late for a date with Bradley.”
Chandra put a purple paddle-shaped fingernail to her lips and giggled. “Oh, you’re not going to make it.”
“Is that a prediction?”
“No, reality.”
I remembered another reason I hadn’t kept in touch with her.
My phone vibrated.
“Must be Bradley.” I looked into my purse.
Jingling started, and the blood bag hit the ground.
I watched as red liquid squirted onto my cream-colored pants, ruining my chances of making it to the brunch—and of being an Establishment member.
Then I looked up.
Chandra’s eyes had rolled back in her head, and her left arm was raised, both signs that a spirit was in the process of inhabiting her.
“Nope. This isn’t happening today.” I tried to pull her arm down. Chandra might’ve been a fake, but she was no flake, to use the term in the proper idiomatic sense. If she was pulling the vibrating act, then she knew something—something that most likely had to do with me. And whatever it was, I wasn’t ready for it.
Ever.
The vibrating stopped, and her eyeballs returned to their places.
I held up my hand. “Whoever is talking to you, I don’t want to know.”
“But a young man is in distress.” She dug her nails into my arm. “You have to help him.”
“If he’s dead,” I said, pulling her paddles from my flesh one by one, “then it’s too late to help him. And no offense to your spirit clients, but at Private Chicks Inc., we only work with the living.”
“The human thing to do is hear him out.” She began to pace in her white platform boots—the second pair to walk all over me that morning. “But I can’t quite understand him. It’s like he’s drunk.”
“Well, if I were dead and calories were no longer a concern, I’d be drunk too.” I pressed my back against the building. “Who is this guy, anyway?”
“He won’t tell me.” She flailed her arms. “He keeps going on about drinking and sex.”
I eyed a guy who was two-fisting foot-long drinks and escorting feather boaed–women on either arm. “That doesn’t exactly narrow the playing field in these parts.”
Chandra gave a ghastly gasp and put her hands to her moon-pie face. “He’s not just talking about booze. He’s saying something about someone drinking his blood.”
This time my eyes rolled back in my head. It was obvious Chandra had seen the police news conference the night before and was using it to push her services. Doing my best to sound serious, I said, “Oh. If this is about a bloodsucker, ask the guy if it’s my brother.”
She blinked. “How did you know? He mentioned Anthony.”
My head snapped back. I’d never uttered my brother’s name to anyone besides Veronica. Some things—like Anthony—were best kept in the family. “In what context?”
“He said he’ll be in danger when he comes here.” She stopped pacing. “And he’s not the only one.”
I knew she was probably guessing my brother would visit me at some point, but I decided to play along—just in case. “What kind of danger are we talking?”
She pressed a palm to her cheek. “The same thing that happened to this poor young man.”
“Which is?”
Her eyes were as round as full moons. “He’ll be strung up like an animal and have his blood drained.”
Maybe it was because she was talking about my brother, or maybe it was because I’d been in this situation with Chandra before, but I believed her.
And, as if to back up the blood-draining business, the blood promptly drained from my face.
3
“You went home and went to bed?” Veronica gaped at me from her seat at the two-top table in our office kitchenette. “At ten thirty yesterday morning?”
“Why else would I be here at eight a.m. on a Monday?” I hoisted myself onto the counter and pulled a beignet from a Café du Monde bag.
Her gaze didn’t waver from my face despite the doughy distraction. “But why would you do that?”
“Were you not listening to my Sunday saga?” I set the pastry on the bag, so I could
tick off the awful events of the previous day on my powdered sugar–encrusted fingers. “First my mom announced that she’s sticking me with her slacker son, then those high-and-mighty hippies hijacked the street, and after that Chandra shook me up with her psychic shtick. So, I missed brunch with Bradley, and he didn’t even try to seem disappointed.”
Veronica’s forehead wrinkled. “I still don’t see why you didn’t go to the restaurant.”
“To do what?” I picked up my pastry and pouted. “Wave goodbye?”
She stood and snatched the beignet from my hand. “To inform Mr. Bradley Hartmann that you’d be taking him to the airport, so you could discuss your relationship during the drive.”
My mouth twisted to one side. I hadn’t thought of that.
“Wait a minute.” She shook the beignet at me, and I lamented the loss of the powdered sugar that fell from it. “Did you avoid The Court of Two Sisters because Anne Rice set one of her books there?”
“Do you really think I’m that paranoid?” I feigned outrage. Because we both knew I would’ve stood outside the restaurant wielding a cross if I’d so much as suspected that the author of The Vampire Chronicles had set a story in there. “The thing is, I was already frustrated when I ran into Chandra, and then she got me so freaked out that I wanted to go home.”
Veronica smoothed the back of her brown leather pencil skirt and returned to her seat, taking my beignet with her. “Why would you listen to that medium when you know she’s a fraud?”
I pulled another beignet from the bag and bit off half to buy time to think. After chewing it over, I replied, “Sometimes Chandra knows things that make me wonder if she does have a sixth sense.”
“Because she pays attention and uses the details she picks up to draw you in?” Not only did her tone leave no room for disagreement, it practically called me a dummy. “But if it makes you feel any better,” she said, picking at my pastry, “I watched the news last night and this morning, and there were no reports of vampire attacks.”
Campari Crimson Page 3