“Not a dog person?”
“Not really. He’s awfully big. Good for public relations, don’t get me wrong. People love people who love animals.”
“But you don’t,” Donovan said. “I’ll put him in the bedroom.” He hooked Oz’s collar and hauled the protesting animal away.
“I heard about the car bomb,” Jenny said. “How are you?”
“Pissed off.”
“Well, I suppose that beats dead. I'm surprised your phone hasn't been ringing off the hook.”
Donovan returned from the bedroom. “I asked the hotel not to put any calls through.”
“We'll need to put out a press release,” Jenny said. “This looks better if the bomb was meant for Riga rather than you.”
Riga stiffened. “Who cares if a casino owner gets killed?”
“I'm sure you know what I mean.”
Riga sucked in a breath. Yes, she knew. This would revive the speculation linking Donovan to financing terrorism. He'd been cleared of the accusations last year, but few seemed to remember that. And Jenny was the Supernatural Encounters PR consultant, not Donovan's. Her goal was to make Riga look good.
“You are a reasonable target now that you're investigating the serial killings,” Jenny continued.
Riga's eyes narrowed. “How do you know they're serial killings?” The police had been keeping the occult side quiet, and she hadn't thought the murders had been linked in the press. But she hadn't been watching much TV lately either.
“Dirk told me.”
“Dirk?”
Jenny smiled. “He's a client of mine. It was only natural since he's been living in New Orleans. But he is something of a handful.”
“Oh?”
“Well. You know Dirk.”
“Not as well as I should, apparently.” She turned to her husband. “What does your PR team have to say about this?”
“I haven't spoken with them yet, but I'm sure they'll come up with something.”
“We should coordinate,” Jenny said.
Grabbing his phone off the desk, he thumbed through the contact list, handed it to her. “Tell them I asked you to call.”
Jenny added the number to her phone. “Now back to your problem. Given the Crazy Cat video, this shouldn't be a hard sell as another attack on you, Riga. Have there been any others I should know about?”
She rubbed a point above her left eyebrow. The hoodoo hit man incident hadn't exactly been an attack, and she wanted to keep it quiet. Everything had been happening so quickly – first the hit man, then the hanging murder, then the attack on her in the hotel hallway, then the beheading, the sniper, and another beheading...
Riga's lips parted. Good God. Was it a pattern? First an attack on her and then another killing?
“What, Riga?” Jenny prompted. “Do you remember something?”
“What? No. No other attacks.” Riga plucked at the gold piping on the arm of the couch. “How much do you know about the murder investigations I've been consulting on?”
“Just what Dirk’s told me and what's in the press.”
“Then you've heard about Muriel Erickson's death. She was a PR consultant like you, wasn't she?”
“No. Muriel used her connections to get people invitations to elite parties and events. It wasn't a profession.”
“She wasn't paid?”
“Not in cash, if you know what I mean.”
“I don't,” Riga said.
“Muriel collected favors. Oh, nothing dark. It wasn't blackmail. Just... she liked having people owe her. She didn't need money.”
“Everybody needs money.” Riga crossed her legs.
“Not when you've inherited forty million dollars from your poor, deceased parents.”
“Who gets the money now?”
“I don't think she had any family. And as to her agency being worth anything, Muriel was pretty much a one-woman band. Aside from her assistant.” Jenny's brow furrowed. “Who must be looking for a job right now.”
“And whose head is filled with all those delightful client lists.” Donovan’s smile was lopsided.
Jenny laughed and swatted him on the bicep. “You must think I'm terrible. But the poor woman will be in need of a job, and if I can give it to her, what's the harm?”
“None at all,” Donovan said. “But we'd like to talk to her. What's her name?”
“Let me think.” Jenny looked at the textured ceiling. “Shenaya Jackson? Jefferson? Jefferson, that's it. Now you're not going to steal her away from me, are you?”
“I wouldn't dream of it,” Donovan said.
“Good.”
“Did Muriel have enemies?” Riga asked.
“I don’t know. Dirk dropped her, but he never told me why, and I was too polite to ask. That's when I convinced him to go with a real PR professional.”
Riga's breath quickened. Dirk hadn't said anything about knowing Muriel. He'd looked green and shocked when he'd found her head, but Riga had been sickened too. If he'd known her, why hadn't he mentioned it?
“Now Riga,” Jenny said, “let's talk strategy.”
They argued for over an hour. Grudgingly, Jenny agreed to keep the response low-key and stick with a simple statement of shock and anger toward the perpetrator.
Jenny put down her tablet and leaned across the table. “But you must go on an interview, at least with the local news.”
“No interviews.” Riga folded her arms across her chest.
“Your contract says—”
“My contract says I have to do interviews for the Supernatural Encounters show, not for an incident like this.”
“The show could push this. There may be a connection.”
“They'll only push it if you do,” Riga said. “And you won't, will you?”
Jenny sighed, sitting back in her chair. “I won't. But it's a missed opportunity.”
“No interviews about the car bomb.”
Riga hustled Jenny out the door and leaned against it. “A missed opportunity, she says. It's a ghoulish opportunity.”
Brigitte uncoiled from her position as a doorstop and flapped her wings. “Bah! You look too pleased with yourself to be indignant. What have you learned?”
“Each attack on me is followed by an occult murder.”
“Your ego never ceases to amaze me,” the gargoyle said. “Everything really is about you.”
“When someone tries to kill me, it's about me.”
“If you're right, there'll be another murder.” Donovan knit his brow. “And then another attack on you. This has gotten out of control.”
“If we return to Tahoe, the murders may continue here and the attempts on my life there. Someone hired the hit man and likely the sniper and the man who assaulted me in the hallway as well. The answer to that is here, and so is Pen.”
“I didn’t say anything about Tahoe.”
Riga covered her face, rubbing her eyes. “I know. I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m getting defensive.”
“Well. I might not have said anything about Tahoe, but I was thinking it.” Lightly, he grasped her arms, pulling her close. “We’ll figure this out together. And we don’t abandon family.”
She leaned her forehead against his chest, feeling its rise and fall. “Thank you.”
Brigitte harumphed.
Riga pulled away from Donovan. “Brigitte, I need you to follow the Old Man. If he moves, you know how to contact me.”
“I do not know where he is,” the gargoyle said.
Riga gave her the address.
“And is ze street number painted on ze hotel roof? Ze address means nothing to me. I cannot walk down ze street like—”
“Fine.” Riga opened her laptop computer on the coffee table, pulling up an overhead view of New Orleans. She pointed out the hotel. “Here. Just follow the stench of black magic.”
“And we need to learn more about your hit man,” Donovan said. “We can do some research over dinner.”
Riga frowned. They should go t
o the hoodoo hit man’s house, learn what they could. But she was bone tired. And yes, hungry. It could wait until morning.
“Dinner? Dinner?” Brigitte flapped her wings, knocking a pillow from a sofa. “How glad I am that I am made of ze stone rather than weak flesh and blood.”
“Oh, it's not so bad.” He passed Riga a knowing look.
“I am hungry,” she admitted. “But I don't think I can stand to go out.”
“I wouldn’t want you to. You’re a target.”
“And I can’t hide in the hotel forever.”
He smiled, but his eyes conveyed a different message. “Dinner is a problem easily solved. That, my dear, is what takeaway is for.”
Chapter 17
Riga dreamed of fire, her skin blackening with smoke and heat.
The ringing of her cell phone jerked her from the dream. Morning sun slanted through the curtained windows. She lay pressed against Donovan, his body hot beneath the down comforters.
She hurried into the living area, shutting the door behind her, and the dog bounded to her. Snatching the phone off an end table, she checked the number. Her heart dropped. It wasn’t Pen.
“Hi, Sam.” She scratched the dog’s ears.
“I heard about the car bomb. How are you doing?”
“We're fine.” Riga tugged free the edge of her negligee, which had somehow become tucked into her panties.
“I called the producers in L.A. They still want us to wrap up. The team's headed back this afternoon. What about you?”
“What about me?”
“We thought... Well, Dirk thought if you were going to stay here, there might be other opportunities to use you in this episode.”
“I thought Dirk's cameraman was for Dirk?”
Oz licked her hand.
“He's got two. He suggested sharing.”
“Dirk? Dirk suggested sharing?”
“He's really not a bad guy once you get to know him.”
“Yeah, you've said that before.” Riga gnawed her lower lip. Dirk hadn't been straight with her about the last murder victim. Even though the Old Man was still her prime suspect, she couldn't ignore Dirk's obfuscation. “Okay.”
Sam released his breath. “Great. I'll give him your contact number. I think you'll be really pleased with the footage we have so far. Er, have you heard from Pen?”
“Not yet.” Donovan's PI firm was still tracking down possible cab companies. Had it only been yesterday when Pen had taken off from the hotel?
“Well, if you do, she needs to get back to L.A. We've got editing work for her. I'm willing to cut her some slack, but that only goes so far.”
“You've already gone farther than we had any right to expect. When I find her, I'll let her know. And thanks, Sam.” She hung up, and Oz followed her to the bedroom.
Donovan tossed the comforter aside and rose from the bed. Naked, he stretched, Riga admiring the play of muscles across his broad chest.
“Gagh!” Brigitte hopped into the room. “Put some clothing on! All that flesh is disgusting!”
Oz yipped.
Donovan put his hands on his hips, grinning. “It's a good thing I have a healthy ego. And this is our bedroom, Brigitte. It's off limits.”
“Off limits? I am not ze household pet.” She sneered at the dog.
“Are there any messages from your investigative firm about Pen?” Riga interrupted the brewing argument.
Donovan snatched his phone from the end table. He swore.
“What?” Riga hurried to his side.
“A couple dozen work-related messages, and the man who attacked you in the hallway… He’s out on bail.”
Riga dragged her hands down her face. One more enemy on the loose.
“Riga…”
“He’s a thug,” she said. “He won’t try anything with you and Ash around. If he’s smart, he’s left New Orleans.”
He massaged her shoulder. “I’ll have our PI firm track him.”
“Thanks. I'll order breakfast.”
He headed into the living area. “You know what I like.”
“I can hardly avoid seeing your husband naked, if he insists on parading about the suite without clothing.” Brigitte hopped onto the dresser. It creaked beneath her weight.
Riga flipped through the room service menu. “You're the only one bothered by it. How did it go last night?”
“I did not see ze Old Man leave the hotel.”
“You didn't see him leave, or he didn't leave?”
“He did not leave. You were wrong. Again.”
“What about his nurse?”
“You did not tell me to follow his nurse.”
“Did she leave?”
“Yes. At eleven o’clock. For an hour.”
“Dammit.”
“But he remained inside. Either there will be no murder following your latest attack and your so-called pattern is a fantasy, or there will be a murder and someone else is ze killer. Ze Old Man was tucked away in his hotel all night. And what is this about ze brave Pen?”
“The brave Pen is a pain in my ass.” Riga told the gargoyle about Pen's voluntary disappearance.
“That is not good, Riga. She is young and not in control of her powers. What if ze Old Man learns that she is here and vulnerable? You must kill him now. Why are you hesitating?”
“You just admitted he may not be the killer.”
“This time. We both know he has hundreds of deaths on his blood-stained hands. Kill him.”
“I'm not going to become Lady High Executioner just because there's a bad necromancer in town.” If she stepped off that bridge, there was only one direction she could go. Down.
And now she was thinking in cheap metaphors like Dirk Steele.
Fantastic.
Riga slapped the menu on the bureau.
“Someday, you will have to face him,” Brigitte said.
“You used to tell me my calling was necromancy. Now you seem to think it’s murder.”
“It is justice. And you know that ze legal system cannot handle someone like ze Old Man. He is beyond mundane justice.”
“No, he's not. And there's a slim chance he's not guilty of these murders.”
“You do not believe that.”
“No. But I'm going to make damn sure I know who is guilty before I take action.”
“And then you will kill him.”
If anyone deserved death, it was the Old Man. But she didn’t want to be the one to deal it.
Riga picked up the phone, ordered fruit, juice, coffee, and beignets.
“And bacon and eggs,” Donovan hollered from the next room.
“And bacon and eggs, poached,” Riga said into the phone. “Oh, and pain perdu. And extra bacon, crispy.” She hung up, then dialed the concierge and requested the hotel dog walker.
“Aside from eating,” Brigitte said, “what are you going to do today?”
“Interview suspects.”
“You are wasting time.”
“But you won't be. Brigitte, I've got an assignment for you.”
After thirty minutes trying to wheedle information out of Muriel Erickson's assistant, Riga began to think Brigitte was right. Riga and Donovan stood in Muriel's home office, watching Shenaya dolefully shift manila files from a filing cabinet into a cardboard box.
Donovan sat against the wooden desk, legs crossed. “No one is universally loved. Someone killed Muriel. You must have some thoughts on the matter.”
Shenaya blotted her broad face with a tissue. “Sorry. No.”
“Business associates then?”
“Like I told the police, I can't think of a single reason why someone would kill her.”
Riga flicked the polished leaf of a spider plant. “She wasn't, for example, oh, I don't know, a member of a secret society of black magicians?”
Files slipped from Shenaya's grasp, slid across the whey-colored carpet. She gaped. “I'll be... How did you know?”
Donovan straightened. “She... What?”
>
“I always thought that woman was a vampire, the way she slept all morning, then would crawl in here wrapped like a mummy and wearing dark glasses. She was always out all night. That's why they cut her head off, wasn't it? So she wouldn't rise again?”
Riga frowned. “According to lore, that's one way to kill a vampire. But her body didn't crumble to dust, so no, she probably wasn't vampiric.”
“Or a werewolf? Because on new moons, when the moon is completely dark, she was never around. Werewolves are a part of Louisiana history, you know. Everyone talks about vampires and voodoo, but we've got werewolves too.”
“Never around on new moons?” Riga asked. “How do you know?”
“I knew never to schedule an event for her on a new moon. She said she had a standing appointment on those nights.”
“I believe werewolves turn during the full moon,” Donovan knelt and picked up the files, “not the new moon.”
“Well, that makes it even stranger.” Shenaya took the folders, and stuffed them into a box. “Whoever heard of having a standing appointment on a new moon?”
Riga handed the woman a business card. “If you think of anything, please call us. And thanks for your time.”
Saying goodbyes, they exited the house. Two members of their new personal protection team waited on the tree-lined sidewalk.
“The new moon business is odd,” Donovan said. “What do you think?”
“That moon phase is ripe for necromancy. We know three of the victims socialized. Maybe they practiced magic together too.”
“I hate to say this, but it may be time to consult your aunts. They must know how groups of necromancers operate. They've been in this game longer.”
Riga scowled. “And that's exactly how they treat it – like a game.”
“Perhaps they have to. They remind me of cops joking at a crime scene to give themselves distance.”
Startled, she said, “If you're feeling empathy for my aunts, you're a better person than I.”
“I wouldn't go as far as empathy. I'm well aware what they're capable of. On a different subject, I've been thinking about this hoodoo hit man. How thoroughly were you able to search his house when you were there with Mean Streets?”
“Not very. I'd like to go back.”
“Let's go.”
The Hoodoo Detective Page 13