by Nancy Gideon
A twitch of lips that could launch a thousand sighs. “Yeah, we are.” He puffed out a breath. “Silas stopped in to see me yesterday.”
Cee Cee listened to the deets, struggling to suppress a sinking dismay as the list of suspects rolled out. Her conclusions mirrored his when narrowed down to that same common denominator neither wanted to recognize or add.
Dammit! Alain Babineau.
A soft mutter from the bed claimed Colin’s attention. He surged up to bend close as lashes fluttered, wanting his to be the first face she saw. His smile spread as dark eyes opened, unfocused at first then clearing.
“I’m here, Mia. It’s Colin. You and the baby are fine.”
Brows furrowed. “Baby . . .? What?”
“It’s okay. We were in an accident.” His deep voice choked then strengthened again. “Everything’s all right now.”
Breaths quickened. “Colin.” She spoke his name, trying out the sound of it. As his smile spread and his eyes began to glisten, she whispered, “I-I don’t know you,” turning her head away as awareness faded.
– – –
Cee Cee sat in quiet support as Colin prowled the confines of Susanna LaRoche’s office. She’d had to drag him there.
“It’s not unusual with a head injury,” the doctor explained. “As the brain heals itself, she may experience lapses of memory, confusion.”
He paused in his restless pacing. “But she’ll remember.” His tone demanded. His gaze begged confirmation.
Refusing to be pushed for a definitive, Susanna smiled to ease the way into words he wouldn’t want to hear. “It’s way too early for this discussion, Colin. Her vitals are strong. Her test results are amazing. We’ve every reason to hope her recovery will be complete.”
“But?”
“You need to be patient.” As uncompromising as a corrective swat on the nose. “Be a calm, supportive presence. Answer her questions. Don’t make demands. Can you do that? That’s what she needs right now.”
After a deep, steadying breath that shivered out from his soul, he vowed, “Yes.”
“Go home. Shower, change, sleep. We’ll be doing more comprehensive tests, so there’s no need for you to be here until mid-afternoon.”
Cee Cee curtailed any argument. “I’ll see to it.”
“Good. If you want to help her, Colin, don’t push for the results you need. This isn’t about you. It’s about what’s best for her.”
A forceful breath and an affirming, “What’s best for her.”
“We’ll talk again later this afternoon. Much later.”
– – –
Slumped next to her in the flashy Camaro, Colin muttered, “Rico moved our stuff into Savoie’s building. To keep us safe. Kinda closing that barn door too late. I don’t exactly know where home is, except in there, next to her.”
Cee Cee started the rumbling engine. “Easy fix.”
Once she cued up his number, she wasn’t sure what to say to Max without getting in over her head, especially when the low drawl of his voice had her pulse frantically treading water, so she kept it short, “I’m taking Colin to the Towers. I need a code and a room number.”
A pause then he provided, “I’ll text you,” followed by a deeper promise, “and meet you there.”
By the time they pulled into the underground parking structure, the Terriot prince was snoring with earthquake intensity. When she shut off the engine, he blinked awake, instantly alert. Wordlessly, he followed her to the elevator, watched her key in the sequence of numbers and rode up, stoic and silent. Until they reached their floor, where Amber James waited to take him into her arms, holding him, head to her strong shoulder. He leaned, but only for a moment.
Stepping back, she took his elbow to steer him down the short hall to the single door at its end, explaining, “The apartment’s a mirror of ours,” as she tapped in the entry code. “We put what we could away for you. There’s food in the fridge and medicinal alcohol.” When he didn’t smile at that, she rubbed a palm between broad shoulders struggling with the weight of his worry. “We’re right on the other side of the elevator. I wrote down our code for you. Just punch it in on the opposite panel, walk through, and you’re at our front door.”
He went straight to the kitchen area and popped a top, drinking deeply down to the bottom of a well both women knew couldn’t be filled until his other half stood beside him.
“Got one of those for me?”
Colin took out two more cans, passing one to the newly-arrived New Orleans clan leader before heading into the living area. Perched on one of the matching chairs’ edges, he looked anything but weary as he regarded Max.
“Who did this? I need to know.”
While Max guided Cee Cee to the adjacent couch with an electrifying touch of his fingertips to the center of her back, Amber bent to touch a kiss upon Colin’s stitched brow, whispering, “We’re right next door. Get some rest. Frederick will drive you back to see her once you get some sleep. Okay?” After his stiff nod, she stroked his hair, nodding good-byes to the other couple.
When it was just the three of them, Max cut right to it.
“Who brought her back?”
“I thought it was a dream.” Slowly, with an edgy caution, Colin relayed what he remembered through a filter of worry and exhaustion, concluding with, “I don’t care who it was or what their agenda is. I had to have her back . . . them back.”
But it mattered a great deal. They all knew it.
“I’ll step away,” Colin decided for them. “I won’t let someone use me to influence what happens to our people. Until this is over, you have to regard me as a danger to all of you.”
“That’s not really neces—”
He cut off Cee Cee’s sentiments. “Yes, it is. I’m compromised. You can’t trust me. You can’t depend on me to put our goals first. Not after this. I’m sorry.”
“No,” Max absolved him, “don’t be. You’re honest. That’s why you were so valuable to us. You have different priorities now. None of us consider them any less important. Do not apologize.”
Colin held his stare for a long, focused moment then nodded, features taut with regret. “I wanted to be a part of this good thing you’re doing.”
“You have been,” Max insisted. “You will be. You’re a keeper of our next generation.” And as he spoke, Max’s fingers laced through Cee Cee’s to squeeze tight. Before she could respond, he let go and stood. “We need to get busy answering your question. Detective, I’ll walk out with you.”
She rose without looking at him to address the now slumped Terriot in a firm tone. He didn’t need her sympathy. “Rest. Keep us posted. You’re part of our family now.”
Eyes shimmering, Colin nodded as the door closed on his worries.
The ride down had Max and Charlotte cautiously separate in more than just distance. Neither knew how to cross that testy space because neither knew the cause.
“Who has the juice to raise the dead?”
Max snuck a glance at the stoic features of the woman standing close but impossibly distant. Business, it is. “Pearl, maybe.” Jacques and Susanna’s daughter, who was raised in the North with her mother and had been subjected to the same sort of scientific tests forced upon Max during his captivity, was a supernova of unknown and untapped power. “Silas and Nica together, perhaps, but they say not.”
“A woman, Colin said. Your aunt?”
Max frowned at the thought. “I don’t have a sense of her being near. Someone else with an agenda we need to discover.”
That thought clearly terrified.
“He’s smart to step back,” she muttered with respect.
Max nodded. “But it’s a loss to our cause. He has the level head his brothers lack, though Cale’s managed to surprise me lately. Several things have, in fact.” Her distant behavior topped that list.
“My snitch was killed last night. Maybe a coincidence.”
After processing news that explained her absence, he asked, “Do
you still believe in such things?”
“I think someone is scrambling to cover loose ends that could bite him . . . or her, in the ass.”
“Have you found a common denominator, Detective?”
“One I don’t like to consider. Too soon to share.”
A comprehensive glance assessed her disheveled appearance and sleep-deprived edginess. “First, go home, shower, have a good meal and rest.”
The command produced the expected bristling. “I don’t have time for those things.”
“Do you have time for me, Charlotte?”
Cee Cee froze, wide dark eyes meeting his with a vulnerable confusion. The door dinged open, and she jumped at the chance to escape giving that answer. As she strode away, she called over her shoulder, “I have an interview. Don’t know when I’ll be home.”
“I’ll wait up.”
Whether threat or promise, she nodded. Then, without looking back at what she left behind, long strides carried her briskly away.
Leaving unfinished business.
CHAPTER NINE
Home, sweet home.
Delicious silence greeted Cee Cee as she crossed the black and white tiles of the entry hall and started up the gentle twist of stairs. Everyone in the smoothly run household knew of her presence, but wisely left her alone. She ignored the quiet nudge asking if it was what she truly needed.
After a long shower and a few hours searching for the restorative sleep her complaining feet, back and brain needed, Charlotte gave up her restless tossing for cool mid-afternoon spring air on the main floor veranda, nodding to Helen as the older woman placed sweet tea and a hefty BBQ pulled pork with coleslaw sandwich on the table to feed body if not spirit. Sighing out her troubles, she lost herself in the study of a bright new season determinedly pushing its way out from bare flower beds and tree branches. An apt analogy for her own endeavors.
“My favorite time of year.”
Cee Cee glanced up and smiled at the Terriot queen. She looked deceptively young and fragile in Cale’s black sweatshirt over floral-patterned yoga pants, with hair clipped up in a messy bun.
“Mine, too,” the detective replied. “New beginnings.”
“Rebirth,” the pretty blonde agreed with a rub of her belly. “Or just plain birth. Sooner rather than later, I hope.” When expression turned from wistful to worried, Cee Cee nudged out one of the chairs. Kendra sank into it with a sigh. “This wasn’t where I expected to bring a new life into the world.”
Remembering what the other had endured put Cee Cee’s troubles into perspective. “I’m sorry.”
“Me, too.”
Conversation paused as the housekeeper returned with another lunch and a smile for their guest, high praise from the usually stoic female who’d worked for Jimmy even before Max had come to the house. Efficient steps cushioned by hot pink athletic shoes to compliment the sporty collared shirt and cropped pants she wore, the gracefully-aging housekeeper could have served as a spokeswoman for the LPGA. Any trace of normalcy Max had received growing up had come from her care. In Cee Cee’s book, nothing could ever repay that kindness.
Once Helen returned inside, Kendra continued to unburden her heart, musing quietly, “We’ve lost much . . . so many memories . . . some good, some not so good. This little one will never know our way of life.” Before Cee Cee could offer sympathy, the exiled queen gave a cynical sniff. “Maybe that’s not a bad thing. Not all my memories of home are good ones.” After a pensive moment picking at the edges of her sandwich, she asked, “Is this where you expected to raise a child?”
Cee Cee’s laugh burst out, loud and irreverent, freeing all the tension of the past few days as she admitted, “I never expected it at all. Not exactly mom material.”
“But you are,” Kendra argued gently. “You’ve been mothering the city’s citizens since you were what, a child yourself?”
She chuckled at that strangely apt perception. “Pretty much, I guess. But that doesn’t mean I’ll be good at it.”
Rubbing the diamond she wore in one ear, it’s mate affixed in Cale’s, Kendra assured, “You’ll do fine. We both will. Nothing’s easy being with the men we chose. Not with the burdens they carry. But would we have it any other way?” When she got no response, she studied her hostess more carefully, her kind yet probing intensity forcing the detective to dig deep for her own answer as she pretended to enjoy her pulled pork.
Would she? Would she turn back the clock if she could, to walk away from her husband/mate and all the stunning, frightening, and yes, exciting challenges he’d brought into her lonely, regimented life? The comfort and intimacy of his daily presence, the huge supernatural community that surrounded and included her, the grounding welcome of a home and family and the plus-one-more she carried?
Before Cee Cee could reassure her friend, and herself, with an answer, the sound of uneven bootsteps swiveled Kendra’s attention toward open full-length doors. As heat and emotion flooded through the gentle blonde, an uncomfortable awareness of its recent absence in her own life knotted in her throat.
“Hey, baby.” Tenderness rumbled through that soft greeting as Cale bumped up against the back of his queen’s chair. Strong arms encircled as he took up her hands in his, bending to breathe in the scent of her with eyes closed. Resting his head upon her shoulder, he drew strength, comfort, and peace from his other half as she stroked the bristle of his hair.
“How’s your brother?”
A deep inhale and heavy sigh. “Stronger than I’d be. He’s stepped back from clan business to stay with her.”
“That troubles you?” Fingertips soothed a furrowed brow.
“No. It’s a relief. It’s what I’d do. He’s where he needs to be. Rico’s close. He’ll watch over them.”
“Good. Go upstairs, shower, rest. I’ll be up in a minute.”
A husky chuckle. “To assist with both?”
Her kiss brushed his cheek. “It’s where I need to be.”
Cee Cee looked from the tender couple into her own heart. The simple honesty of their relationship contrasted painfully with the complexity of her own. She managed a smile as Cale straightened and drew back his mate’s chair so she could stand, tucking herself within the circle of his arm to both support him and reassure herself. What pierced Cee Cee’s emotions was envy.
“Savoie asked me to tell you he’s meeting with Rueben and some others of his clan and won’t be home ’til later. Then the three of us are having drinks here.”
The message wasn’t a surprise. What surprised was how much it hurt to hear it from another instead of the source. Was that what things had come to, messages instead of moments?
Her smile deflected her anguish. “I’ve got an interview to do, anyway.”
Cale studied her longer than he needed to, gracious enough not to call his hostess on her bullshit. Instead, he offered, “Savoie’s no fool. He’s a lucky man. Takes one to know one.” Then, he swiveled his mate around, with a bump of his hip, leaving the detective to cling to those words.
– – –
Her interview meant returning to the city, to the Pour House where Gloria Joublanc worked the bar the way a stripper did a pole, with sinuous moves and beckoning smiles that encouraged tips. While acres of flawless midnight skin flashed beneath close-shorn peroxided hair, logo-emblazoned tank top, and shorty shorts, piercing dark eyes and muscle-packed arms warned against unwanted attention. With a quick buff of the bar top, she placed a paper coaster in front of Cee Cee, topping it with a glass of seltzer water.
“Cop?”
“How’chu know?”
A flash of strong teeth. “I read folks. My superpower.”
“What kind of writing on the wall did you get from Leo Pomarelli the other night when he was at the bar?”
An uncharitable snort. “Same story every damned time. His lucky night. Big score. Meetin’ people, makin’ money, goin’ places.” She made a dismissive gesture. “Don’t wanna be dissing on the dead, but dat boy weren’t go
in’ nowhere but a forever after in Holt.”
Cee Cee nodded at her reference to a pauper’s burial in New Orleans’ Potter’s Field.
“Hey, Glo! How ’bout annuder Dixie!”
Heading to the end of the bar, Gloria started making small talk and refreshing drinks but eventually drifted back to continue. “Doan know who he were on the phone with. Musta been bad news cuz I had to tell him more dan once to take it down.”
“Did you overhear anything that stood out?”
Brows lowered thoughtfully. “Bebés. He were talkin’ ’bout bebés. Were askin’ when dey’d be movin’ dem up north cuz he found da one dey’d been looking for and were gonna get paid plenty.”
“Those were his words? ‘The one they’d been looking for?’ Think carefully. This is important.”
She didn’t hesitate. “Yeah. Jus’ like dat.”
The rest played out in a colorful retelling. On the first call, he’d ranted and made threats, on the next, he was all confident swagger. That’s when he asked for the room.
“Do you know who Warren Brady is?”
“He one a yours. I seed ’im that night. He come up to da bar, had Jack ’n water. I gots busy and when I comes back, jus his drink be dare.”
So, it could have been Brady. But still no proof. Cee Cee eyed the layout of the room, mentally placing each participant, moving them about with a sweeping glance. Something was missing.
“Anyone else who may have seen something?”
“Maybe Val. Val Harmon. She ’posed to be here an hour ago. Jus’ din show. Dat girl, she never not come in.”
When asked for her address, Glo hesitated. With a practiced smile Cee Cee assured, “I’m sure it’s nothing. I want to check with her in case she has some information.”
Whatever information Valerie Harmon might have had went to the morgue with her. And Cee Cee followed.
– – –
“You got a TOD, Dev?”
Chief Medical Examiner Devlin Devion glanced up at his pseudo-goddaughter, taking the offered cup of coffee with a grateful smile. Using his free hand, he gestured to photos from the scene and the naked female on his table. Cee Cee wondered if she’d ever stop taking that sight personally. She hoped not.