The Seventh Night

by Amanda Stevens

  The young woman who had spoken caught my glance. I smiled awkwardly, having been caught eavesdropping, then turned back to face the front of the line. I tried to close my ears to the ensuing conversation, but, like it or not, the bizarre topic had captured my full attention.

  “Now, Patsy, Father Ingram said we mustn’t let our imaginations run away with us,” the older woman admonished her companion. “We’ve come here to Columbé to combat such superstitious nonsense.”

  “I know, but Mary Alice was here for three months last year and she said…she said…” The quiet voice faltered, and I found myself mentally prodding her. What? What did Mary Alice say?

  “She said zombies really exist. By using poisons and black magic and…evil spirits, some people here have the power to capture another living human’s soul. That’s what makes a zombie—someone alive, but without a soul. A body without a will. Mary Alice said you have to be very careful about traveling the back roads and that you must never, under any circumstances, leave your car after dark.” Patsy’s voice lowered dramatically. “They move by night.”

  A hand touched my arm, and I jumped violently. The customs official looked at me without smiling as he bent and lifted my suitcase, heaving it onto the sturdy table. In spite of the sweltering heat in the terminal, goose flesh prickled the hair at the back of my neck as the man flipped the locks and raised the lid.

  “Will you be staying in Columbé long?” the official asked in the lilting cadence of the islands. The dark look he gave me was in direct contradiction to the lyrical sound of his voice.

  I met his gaze and threw him what I hoped was an engaging smile. “A few days. A couple of weeks at the most. I’m not sure yet.”

  “You have a return airline ticket?”

  “Yes, but the date’s open. Is there some problem with that?”

  He answered my question with another. “Where will you be staying?”

  Something in his expression made me stare at him for a moment. “I’m…not sure.”

  A definite look of suspicion crept into his eyes as his gaze flickered over me, taking in my conservative navy suit, my low-heeled pumps. All in all, my nondescript appearance probably looked very much like that of the missionary ladies behind me, and the thought crossed my mind that perhaps that was the reason for the man’s wariness.

  Foreigners, particularly those peddling their own ideals, were not always welcome in Columbé, I’d read.

  “My father lives here,” I rushed to inform him. “What I meant was that I’m not sure whether I’ll be staying at his home or at the hotel. He owns the St. Pierre in Port Royale.”

  A shadow passed across the man’s face, so swiftly I couldn’t be sure I’d seen it at all. Then his gaze lowered as he continued to rummage through my things. It seemed to me he was taking an inordinate amount of time, and I suddenly remembered a movie of the week I’d seen recently where a customs official had planted cocaine in a woman’s suitcase. For what reason I couldn’t remember, but nervously, I stood on tiptoes and peered over the lid.

  “Is there a problem?” I asked again.

  Without removing his gaze from mine, he closed my suitcase and snapped the locks, then thrust the case across the table toward me. Light sparked the gold of his ring and drew my gaze to his hands. The metal had been molded into the shape of a snake, and as I stared at it, I suddenly had the strangest sensation of déjà vu.

  And then I knew why, as a new memory stirred to life.

  We were sitting in the restaurant that first night of father’s and Reid’s visit in Chicago and my father had just made a toast.

  Reid lifted the crystal flute to his lips, and I watched in fascination as the millions of bubbles spiraled upward to the top of his glass. Like flame to a moth, the motion of his large hand captured my gaze, held me in thrall.

  He stared back at me, his smile knowing. “I see you’re admiring my ring.”

  He set the glass back on the table, and I noticed for the first time the heavy gold ring he wore on his right hand. An S was carved into the metal and entwined with the image of a snake. “My father gave it to me years ago,” he said, twisting his hand to stare down at the ring. “The emblem is supposed to have magical properties for those who believe. Do you believe, Christine?” he asked softly.

  I lifted my gaze to meet his. “In magic? Of course not.”

  “There’s magic…and there’s magic,” he murmured, raising his glass once again. “Damballah Wedo, the most revered loa in the vodun religion, assumes the form of a snake. When the spirit mounts the body, the experience can be…powerful.”

  “Stop teasing her with that nonsense, Reid,” my father said in annoyance. “I’d like Christine to come to Columbé someday. Don’t scare her off before she ever gets there.”

  “Christine doesn’t appear to me to be the type who frightens easily. Am I right?”

  “I’m certainly not afraid of voodoo. Sounds to me like Columbé is still living in the Dark Ages,” I replied primly, sipping my club soda with an air of what I hoped was disdain.

  “In many ways we’re still very primitive,” Reid agreed darkly, gazing down at his ring once more as he stroked the metal with the tip of one finger….

  The memory drifted away as the customs official gave my suitcase another deliberate shove, ramming it against my hand.

  “Have a nice stay in Columbé,” he said, dismissing me. I took the cue without further prompting, struggling for several seconds before I could haul the heavy suitcase from the table. Neither the customs official nor anyone else bothered to help me, and I wondered if that incident might well be a preview of what was to come.

  Well, so what? I asked myself as I half carried, half dragged my luggage to the terminal exit. Since when had anyone ever helped me? My father had fallen in love with Claudine St. Pierre and left my mother and me without so much as a backward glance when I’d been hardly more than a baby.

  My mother had loved me in her own way, I suppose, but she’d loved drinking more. Two years after my father had left us, she’d died in terrible pain from a liver disease brought on by her alcoholism.

  Years and years of intense loneliness had followed. My father had already moved out of the country by that time, so my maternal grandmother took me in. The act was not so much one of kindness on her part, but rather some sort of revenge against my father.

  She was a woman already well past middle age, and she’d worn the trials and tribulations of her life like medals of honor. She’d never failed to remind me of how much she had sacrificed for my benefit, nor how my father’s selfishness had caused my poor mother’s death.

  She was a bitter, resentful woman who, in some miscreant way, had blamed me for everything wrong in her life. As punishment, I was never allowed to have friends in the house, never allowed to attend parties or proms. Instead, I was subjected to lecture after lecture on the evils of men and their unholy desires.

  She’d had no way of knowing it, of course, because I would never have admitted it to her, but those sermons had fueled an already active imagination. I used to lie in bed at night and fantasize about the glamorous life my father led on the Caribbean island where he’d gone to live. In my dreams, he would come for me, pushing my grandmother’s protests aside, and take me back to Columbé with him.

  Much later, after his last visit during my freshman year in college, those fantasies had begun to alter. No longer was my father cast in the role of rescuer, but instead a tall, dark, handsome stranger—a man who looked strikingly like Reid St. Pierre—would sweep me off my feet and carry me off to his romantic island home….

  In reality, I never saw my father or Reid again. They’d both gone home after their week-long visit and forgotten all about me. And I’d tried to forget about them. I’d been married and widowed in less than a year. I’d faced tragedy and survived. In the end, I’d had to rescue myself. In time, I’d discovered I could slay my own dragons.

  So bring on your zombies, I thought defiantly as a su
dden vision straight from Night of the Living Dead flashed through my mind. Horror movie ghouls could hardly frighten me. My grandmother made Boris Karloff look like the boy next door.

  In the next instant, however, an inkling of the terror I’d felt in my dreams washed over me, and I realized my bravado was entirely false. I could be as fearless as the next person—while it was still daylight outside.

  Turning, I scanned the terminal once more with growing concern. We’d been on the ground for almost an hour, and there was still no sign of my father. When I’d last spoken with him on the phone to tell him my plans, he’d been adamant about meeting my plane. His voice had still contained that same sense of urgency I’d told Dr. Layton about.

  “I need to see you right away, Christine, before someone else—Never mind. Just get here as quickly as you can. I’ve got a lot to tell you, decisions I’ve made that could greatly affect both our lives. You have to help me. You’re my only living blood relative.”

  When I’d pressed him further about his plans, however, he’d grown quiet, mysterious, and he’d hung up soon after, leaving me feeling strangely disquieted.

  Giving the terminal one last glance, I shoved my suitcase against the wall near a pay phone, inserted a coin into the slot, and dialed the St. Pierre Hotel’s number. The operator who answered had a faint French accent.

  “Christopher Greggory, please.”

  “One moment.”

  The pause lengthened until I wondered if I’d been disconnected. Listening impatiently to a recording of a steel band, I drummed my fingers on the metal shelf under the phone and worried about why my father hadn’t met my plane. Had he changed his mind about seeing me? Had he decided he didn’t want a relationship with me, after all?

  The questions and mounting doubts gnawed at my insecurities. I was just about to hang up when the receiver clicked and someone came on the line.“

  “Reid St. Pierre.”

  I very nearly dropped the phone. The sound of his voice, so close and so intimate in my ear, stunned me. The deep, rich tones shook me to my toes. My throat tightened, my mouth went dry, and my fingers holding the receiver began to tremble. With those two words—that name—I’d stepped into a time capsule and reverted back to the shy, insecure eighteen-year-old I’d tried so hard to leave behind.

  “Hello? Is anyone there?” His voice was edged with annoyance now.

  I tried to gather my shattered poise. “I…I was holding for my…for Christopher Greggory.”

  “He isn’t here at the moment. Is there something I can help you with?”

  “Is he on his way to the airport?” I asked, wincing at the tremor in my voice. I bit my lip and tried to recall what Dr. Layton had told me. “You’re twenty-eight years old, Christine…no longer the confused teenager you were at eighteen.”

  Right. So why did I feel just as confused now by the mere sound of Reid St. Pierre’s voice?

  “Why would he be on his way to the airport?” His tone was sharp, distinct and tinged with what might have been suspicion.

  “Because he was supposed to meet me here an hour ago. If he’s not on his way, I’ll just grab a cab—”

  Very quietly, he said, “Who is this?”

  Definite suspicion this time. I lifted my chin in defiance. “This is Christine Greggory. His daughter.”

  The pause that followed could only be called pregnant. I could almost feel the tension popping and crackling along the phone line. But when he spoke, his masculine voice revealed nothing but a mild curiosity. “Am I to understand that you’re here in Columbé?”

  “Yes.”

  “And Christopher was expecting you?”

  “Yes. Didn’t he tell you?”

  Dead silence met my question. Then he said softly, almost indifferently, “When were these…arrangements made?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “When did you last speak to Christopher?”

  “Last night. Look, if he’s not there—”

  “What time?” The question was quiet, but somehow I sensed a note of urgency behind it.

  “I don’t know,” I answered, my tone vague. “It was late. Maybe nine or so, Chicago time. I’d had a teachers’ meeting and just gotten home—” My eyes rolled skyward. Obviously, he’d wanted that last bit of information like he wanted a hole in his head. I took a deep breath and tried again. “I don’t have his home phone number with me. Do you think there’s a chance he’s there?”

  “No.”

  The finality in his voice stopped me cold. Beneath the cool questions, the suspicion, I heard another inflection in his voice that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. And for some reason, I experienced an unprecedented sense of foreboding.

  I cleared my throat, trying to shake the feeling. “Obviously, we’ve somehow gotten our wires crossed. I’ll just catch a taxi, except…I’m not sure where to go. Do you think he’ll come back to the hotel, or should I go directly to the house?”

  Another one of those pauses. I could almost hear his mental calculations: What’s the fastest way to get rid of her? “Just sit tight,” he said finally. “I’ll send a car for you.”

  “You don’t have to do that.” The last thing I wanted was to feel indebted to Reid St. Pierre. “There are taxis all over the place here.”

  “I’ll send a car.”

  I had no trouble at all identifying the imperious note in his voice. It struck me suddenly that Reid St. Pierre was a man used to giving orders and having them obeyed, and he expected no less from me. The notion irritated me, but at the moment, I was hardly in a position to argue.

  “All right,” I acquiesced. “I’ll wait. But do you have any idea where my father might be?”

  This time I expected the pause. My fingers were already tapping an impatient staccato on the shelf, but he answered quickly, catching me off guard.

  “We’ll talk about it when you get here.”

  “Talk about wh—”

  The phone clicked in my ear, leaving me with a dead receiver and a dreaded certainty that something was terribly wrong in paradise.

  * * *

  “Miss Greggory?”

  I gazed up from where I was perched on the edge of my suitcase to find a young, smiling, dark face hovering over me. A smile at last, I thought, feeling tremendous relief at the first hint of warmth—other than the climate—I’d glimpsed since arriving on the island.

  “I’m Christine Greggory,” I answered, throwing back a smile that seemed to surprise him for a moment. I rose and offered him my hand. “You must be from the St. Pierre.”

  “My name is Jean Marc.” He took my hand, but dropped it almost immediately. “This is all your luggage?” He nodded his head toward my suitcase.

  “You won’t say that when you lift it,” I warned, but the weight of the thing seemed not to register when he picked it up. He moved with the kind of unaffected grace I would later come to associate with the people of Columbé, along with the beautiful café au lait complexion of the Creoles.

  “This way, please,” he called over his shoulder, and again I caught the brilliant flash of a milk-white grin.

  Outside, the heat and sultry humidity, even well after sunset, hit me with a shock, but the assault was a welcome one. April had been wet and cold in Chicago, with no more than a promise of spring. This was—I inhaled deeply the fragrant dusk air—this was indeed paradise.

  I surveyed the surrounding scenery with one detailed sweep. Lushly verdant mountains aspired to touch a deepening sky still tinted pink and gold on the horizon. Flamboyant trees glistened like rubies in emerald green jungles, and bougainvillea plunged purple from walls and fences.

  It was a scene profoundly beautiful, yet in the distance thunderheads rolled over the sea, a reminder of nature’s ambivalence, even in paradise.

  We climbed into the car, and with a blast of our horn for the car that slipped in front of us, Jean Marc joined the free-for-all of vans, limos and dilapidated, overflowing buses heading for Port Royale and the outlying
resorts.

  The light faded as we drove, and a full moon rose over the sea. A few diamond-bright stars began to twinkle out among the clouds. My window was down and the night wind tickled through my hair, whipping it about my face like unruly strands of golden brown silk. I peeled it away and tucked it behind my ears, feeling my blood surge with excitement as lights from the city came into view.

  Port Royale at dusk was a city cloaked in mystery. In the violet mist of twilight, the abject poverty was softened, filtered, masked by the fragrance of jasmine and cinnamon and the sea. Even the gaudy lights of the bars and clubs seemed to hold a rakish sort of charm, and it struck me anew that this city, this island paradise, was my father’s home. In just a short time, I would be seeing him again.

  To say my feelings were mixed would be an understatement. For years I had felt nothing more for Christopher Greggory than resentment and hurt and a deep-rooted sense of betrayal. But after all was said and done, he was still my father. As he’d said, the only living blood relative I had left on this earth. Like it or not, we shared a bond, and that bond was what had brought me all this way.

  But what of his other family? a nagging little voice reminded me. I’d never even met my stepsister, Angelique, and judging by Reid’s less than enthusiastic greeting on the phone, I felt safe to assume neither of them would welcome me with open arms.

  I comforted myself with the knowledge that I was only here for spring break. What could happen in a week, in just seven short days?

  My gaze lifted suddenly and I met Jean Marc’s in the rearview mirror. “How long have you worked at the St. Pierre?” I asked, trying to shake the disquieting notion that he’d been watching me.

  “Not long,” he admitted with an open smile. “My uncle has worked at the hotel for a long time, though. He got me the job. I’m lucky to be working. There aren’t many jobs on the island these days. I’m very grateful to Monsieur St. Pierre.”

  “You mean Reid St. Pierre?”

  “Of course. He’s the owner.”

  “Then you must know my father, as well. He and Reid are partners.”