Cypress Nights

by Stella Cameron

  Cyrus closed his eyes and made himself wait a moment. Then he said, “Thank you for calling, Ozaire. Look after yourself and God bless you.”

  When he put down the phone and looked up, Madge frowned at him. “What was all that?”

  “Ozaire is still trying to convict Kate Harper of murder. Tomorrow, I’m going to visit her again, myself. She’s got to know there are very few people who believe these crazy stories. And she’ll have heard them by now, I’m afraid.”

  “She surely will,” Madge said. She walked to the table and picked up her glass. She gave Cyrus his. “You’re going to see her tomorrow, aren’t you?”

  He nodded.

  “I’ll come with you,” Madge said. “I’m overdue to see her, anyway. Now let’s have those few quiet minutes.”

  He tipped up his glass and swallowed some of the wine. It flooded him with warmth and he wished he could hold on to that.

  What Madge had put in her hair was a comb. Along the top there were tiny blue crystals set very close together, covering the bar. The comb pulled her hair back at one side.

  “I like your hair like that,” he said. “And the comb. And the earrings!” He laughed. “Sapphire earrings look good on you.”

  “They’re fake,” she said, but she smiled with pleasure. “Pretty good, though.”

  Madge never wore much makeup. She didn’t have a lot on tonight, but her eyelashes, always thick, looked even thicker and darker and she wore lipstick, a pinkish brown that showed off how pretty her full mouth was.

  “Now you’re checking out the makeup,” she said. “Is it too much?”

  “Oh, no. It’s just right.”

  Her laugh made him smile. “As if you’d know anything about makeup,” she said.

  He gave her a withering look. “I know enough to recognize when a woman’s turned herself into a clown or just added some nice color. You’re in that group, the nice-color group.”

  “Thank you.”

  “And I’ve never seen you in a better dress.” Shiny blue silk, the skirt fitted quite tightly and finished a couple of inches above the knee. The top was one of those halter things that crossed over in front and went around the neck, leaving her back bare. “Just…Sig Smith is a lucky man and he’d better appreciate it.”

  Madge laughed. “Are you sure you don’t have a shotgun hidden away around here?”

  “If I needed a shotgun, I probably couldn’t wait to cock it before I pummeled the life out of Sig Smith.”

  Unfortunately, he meant every word he said and it was time to control himself. “Sit down,” he said, eyeing her shoes. “And don’t fall over in those things.”

  The heels of her shoes were high and narrow; thin straps fastened around her slim ankles.

  He didn’t want her to go out with Sig Smith, or any other man. Men were all instinct, and she would have the kind of effect on Sig that would have his instincts doing cartwheels.

  Madge crossed her legs.

  “Do you like the wine?” Cyrus asked. He concentrated on his own glass, but not before he’d seen her skirt rise high on her thighs, and looked at the vulnerable underside of her leg above one knee. Her shoulders and arms were smooth.

  “It’s good wine,” Madge said. She looked too serious. “I completely forgot to ask if Millie is okay here with you overnight.”

  “I like her here,” he said honestly. He liked the gentle warmth from the little body curled against him in his bed. “You just have a good time.”

  “What do you think about Roche’s idea to see about the Cashman land?” Madge asked.

  “It would be a great idea if St. Cecil’s had any way of raising the money to buy it. If it’s even for sale. But it’s impossible.”

  “Probably,” said Madge. “But I would like to know who owns that parcel, wouldn’t you? I never thought about it before, but now it’s a mystery. I don’t know of anyone called Cashman. You know how I like to solve mysteries.”

  “I imagine Roche intends to do that,” he said. With every second, he struggled between wanting her to stay and wishing she would go quickly so he couldn’t look at her anymore or think about Sig Smith’s hand at her waist, his thumb resting on bare skin.

  He would want to kiss and hold her.

  He would want more than that.

  Cyrus looked away. He bent forward and propped his elbows on his knees.

  “What is it?” Madge asked.

  “Nothing.” Now he sounded like a petulant teenager. “It’s been a long, hard day. I’ll try to catch up on some sleep after you leave.”

  “You should.” She got up and sat down again, near to him. “You keep going as if you don’t have the needs other people have. But you do, my friend.” She rubbed her fingertips up and down his spine.

  She didn’t have any idea what she did when she touched him like that.

  “I know when I’m pushing too hard,” he told her. “I have ordinary needs that get in the way when I want to keep going. But I do know when I’m worn out. Don’t worry about me.”

  “I do. I always will.”

  He checked his watch. “Shouldn’t Sig be here?”

  “Any time now,” she said. “Unless he’s got cold feet.”

  “Fat chance.” Cyrus looked back at her. She wore a very light, lemon-scented perfume. “Where’s Millie?”

  “I fibbed.” Madge winced. “I didn’t forget to ask you if she could stay, I just took you for granted. She’s on your bed. I told her she was staying with you and she went right up there.”

  Cyrus slept in a simple room on the third floor. It had been built beneath the rafters of the house and had a single dormer window. He felt peaceful there—most of the time. “You can take me for granted. You should hear what Millie and I say about you when you’re not around.”

  She giggled, then hitched at the bodice of her dress.

  “Is that thing behind your neck going to stay?” The bow she’d tied seemed ready to unravel.

  Madge turned away from him. “Make sure it will. Put a knot in it, then tie the bow.”

  Bows were not Cyrus’s forte but he dutifully undid the one that was ready to come undone, looked over her shoulders to make sure he had the fabric even and straight. He felt the weight of her breasts and might as well have been kicked in the gut.

  “Do you want me to do it?” Madge raised her arms, showing the side of a breast. How pale the skin was there.

  “I can do it.” Once he concentrated he got a fresh knot tied with little problem. “Maybe I should just put the ends flat. The bow sticks up a lot on top of the double knot.”

  “Good idea.”

  Cyrus spread the ends of the ties against her back, smoothing away wrinkles. This should feel forbidden to him, but it didn’t. Such a simple, but intimate gesture seemed natural, right.

  “That looks okay.” He tweaked one last time, let his fingertips drift down over her shoulder blades, and moved away. He picked up his wine again.

  “Thank you.” Madge still faced away from him.

  The front doorbell rang and Cyrus sprang to his feet. “That’ll be Sig.”

  “Stay here,” Madge said, standing herself. “You don’t have to greet someone here to see me.”

  “It’s more appropriate,” Cyrus told her, waving her back onto the couch. “Sit there and sip your wine. Look nonchalant. Not a bit eager. It won’t hurt for him to know I’m responsible for you.”

  “You’re not,” Madge said, but she sat down yet again.

  “You spend most of your time here with me. You have no male relatives to look after you. I am responsible for you. That’s the way it is.”

  Chapter 13

  He left the room before Madge could get another word in. Her head spun a little and she wasn’t sure if it was the partial glass of wine on an empty stomach—unlikely—or the past half-hour in Cyrus’s company. The answer was a no-brainer. He watched over her like a protective father, or brother…or something else. He had become her family. A family of two members who
had started to hurt each other.

  She heard voices approaching. A laugh. The deep tones of two men.

  “Hi.” Sig Smith came into the room and walked straight toward her. He gave her a white box tied up with gold ribbon. “You don’t have to wear this if you don’t like it. But it smells nice anyway.”

  A little above medium height, buff, as they said, with a long, sun-bleached crew cut, very dark eyebrows and disconcertingly piercing gray eyes, Sig shifted from foot to foot a couple of times before he settled and smiled at her. That smile would be enough to stop most women in their tracks. Madge enjoyed it, until she noticed Cyrus’s expression.

  Her boss, her friend, had never looked so conflicted or so sad. She wanted to see Sig out, to tell Cyrus she’d made a mistake and wasn’t interested in any kind of male partner after all.

  Cyrus felt her eyes on him and flashed her a smile.

  No other man’s smile competed with Cyrus’s.

  “Come on,” Sig said. “At least take a look at it. Your dog can wear it on his collar if it seems too much like something meant for a prom.”

  “She,” Cyrus said.

  The cool sound of his voice sent Madge’s stomach toward her feet.

  Sig raised a brow.

  “Madge’s papillon is named Millie. She’s a girl.”

  “Ah.” Sig grimaced. “Sorry about that. I haven’t really met Millie.”

  Quickly, Madge opened the white box and removed a gardenia corsage from a bed of green. She smelled the blossoms and closed her eyes. “They have to be the most beautiful-smelling flowers.”

  Sig took the corsage from her, pulled a pearl-studded pin from the back and placed the flowers on the left side of her bodice, just below the collarbone. Very carefully, he put two fingers behind the dress, against her skin and bent close to secure the pin through the florist’s tape.

  Once more she glanced at Cyrus, and this time she felt ill. His blue eyes could turn navy sometimes, usually when he was unhappy about something. They were navy blue tonight. He watched Sig with the closest thing to hate she had ever seen on Cyrus’s face.

  Cyrus didn’t hate anyone.

  This was her fault, and he would suffer because he’d blame himself for reactions he had sworn never to allow himself.

  “I thought I’d take Madge to the new place, the supper club, Claude’s. Would you like that, Madge?”

  “I’ve never been there, but I’ve heard it’s lovely.” The new club had been opened a few miles east of Rosebank and the Savages’ clinic. It was said to be very popular and very expensive.

  “I expect you know all about our trouble here at St. Cecil’s,” Cyrus said, as if he hadn’t heard Sig mention the club.

  “Yes, indeed.” Sig nodded. “Jim Zachary was a really good man.”

  “How would you know?” Cyrus asked, sounding unreasonably sharp.

  “I don’t normally speak about these things, but I guess it doesn’t matter now. Anyway, you were Jim’s priest. He was a patient of ours. Roche and I thought highly of him.”

  “Roche never mentioned treating him,” Cyrus said.

  Sig’s dark brows shot up. “Which probably means I shouldn’t have, either.”

  “We won’t mention it, will we, Cyrus?” Madge said.

  “Not unless it becomes necessary,” Cyrus said. He wouldn’t look at her. “You live in Toussaint, don’t you, Sig?”

  “I do, yes. Next door to the clinic on Cotton Street.”

  “That’s what I thought,” Cyrus said. “Just bring Madge back by here after dinner, and I’ll take her home.”

  Madge hoped she wasn’t as red as she felt. Saying anything at all would be a mistake.

  “Wouldn’t think of it,” Sig said. “I can come right past Rosebank on my way back to Toussaint.”

  Cyrus was quiet a moment. “Yes. Well, I’ll come and get you in the morning, Madge. They’re taking their time with your car.”

  “They finished it today,” she told him. “And they took it home for me. How’s that for service?”

  “It’s good service,” Cyrus said. He gave a forced smile and slapped his hands together. “Well, off you go, you two. Hope you got a reservation, Sig. They do say that place is busy.”

  “Yes, I did that.”

  “Good man.” Cyrus thumped Sig on the back and urged him and Madge toward the front door like a pair of high schoolers.

  Sig opened the door for Madge and she looked back at Cyrus. He gave her a wave and started to turn away. “See you tomorrow. Have a good time.” Then he turned toward her again. “What about Millie? You’ll probably want to stop and get her before you go home. Sig will need to get on, so I’ll take you back.”

  She needed to cry. And she didn’t want to go out. “Millie will be good, Cyrus. Her crate’s in my office. If she get’s rambunctious, just put her in there for the night.”

  Cyrus nodded. And felt a complete fool. But more than feeling like a fool, he had pains in his gut and the start of a sweat at his hairline, even though he was icy. “Of course Millie will be fine,” he said, forcing a big smile. “We’re going to practice bad habits until you get in tomorrow.”

  Madge gave him a puzzled look, but smiled when he did, and Sig ushered her outside.

  Until he heard a car engine come to life, Cyrus stayed where he was, his heart beating hard.

  The sound of the car faded into the distance, and he returned to the sitting room. He went to a window and looked out into the darkness of the backyard. Dark but for Madge’s fairy lights and, more distantly, moonlight on the bayou.

  Did a life alone make a man a better priest?

  His own question shocked him.

  Alone was the way he was, the way he was supposed to be and the way he would remain.

  What he must do was obvious. No matter what it cost him, he would stay in Toussaint until Madge was settled and safe, then he’d ask for reassignment. After a sabbatical.

  He didn’t know if he could be the one to perform the marriage ceremony, but if that’s what she wanted, he’d try.

  When he turned toward the room, he ran into the back of the couch and paused to calm down. He was getting ahead of himself.

  Quickly, he gathered the two glasses—still not empty—and took them to the kitchen in one hand.

  Once more, he felt drawn to the window.

  He faced what he’d been trying to avoid. What if this crazy killer decided that murdering Madge would be the way to stop the project? Murdering her and perhaps throwing her body in the bayou.

  He should feel the same about the possibility of anyone getting harmed.

  Anyone wasn’t his Madge.

  The sweat on his brow broke free and trickled down the sides of his face. The colored lights outside shot prisms in every direction and he looked at them as if through rain beating on glass.

  There wouldn’t be another attack until—and unless—the madman realized the project wasn’t going to stop.

  He could stop it, Cyrus thought. He’d have to make a special request now that the project was approved, but a man’s death would be all the justification he needed. Not that Spike and his people were convinced Jim died because of the school. One of their theories was that the brochure had been meant to divert them from the real motive.

  He could scarcely breath. Smith had looked handsome and perfectly dressed. He and Madge made a nice couple. The man looked at her…he looked at her as if he couldn’t and didn’t want to see anything else.

  Isn’t that what I want for Madge? Someone to adore her?

  Pulling air in through his mouth, he approached the deep old enamel sinks. “Damn it,” he said. Then he shouted. “Damn it, God. You ask too much.”

  A squeaky sound vaguely touched his mind, but now the kitchen turned gray. He passed the back of a shaky hand across his brow.

  “No!” he yelled, and hurled the glasses into the nearest sink, smashing them into an explosion of crystal shards.

  Cyrus took several steps backward, his h
ead hanging down.

  He heard the squeaking again and looked for the source.

  Under the table, the glint of her black eyes scarcely visible, he saw Millie.

  Grabbing a dish cloth, he wiped his face and threw the cloth aside again. Now he was so useless, he was into frightening five-pound dogs.

  “Come here, girl,” he said, stooping.

  Millie zipped out and leaped into his arms.

  Cyrus held her shivering body against him and took off along the corridor to the stairs. He didn’t stop running until he reached his austere room under the eaves and fell to his back on the bed. He left the lights off and lay there, staring at the ceiling with the dog curled up on his chest.

  Chapter 14

  At the same time

  Bleu pulled her Honda all the way into the carport. That way Roche would have plenty of room to park in the driveway behind her.

  She pushed open her door and barely stopped it from slamming wide open and into an old bike left by some previous occupant of the townhouse. Excitement fluttered in her belly. If she didn’t calm down, Roche would see how much it meant to her to see him after two days. That, or she’d make an idiot of herself in some other way.

  Usually she avoided getting home after dark, but she’d spent the afternoon at Sam Bush’s office and they’d worked late. At least he hadn’t asked her out again, as she had feared he might. Sam was a lonely man. It had to be hard for him not to be free even though his wife had taken off.

  Bleu liked Sam but he wasn’t her type.

  The light outside the front door had burned out. She unlocked the front door, put her bag down to hold it open and reached to unscrew the dead bulb.

  As soon as she touched it, it flashed on and she jumped. Immediately, the light went out again, and she barely stopped the globe from falling. With a shaky sigh, she screwed it back in. She was too jumpy these days.

  Roche would arrive in less than an hour—barely time for her to shower and be ready. And she had to decide what to wear for a date at home. He was cooking dinner!

  Bleu smiled, but her tummy twisted. She shut the front door and ran upstairs to her bedroom. The mattress she slept on was made, and her green cotton quilt helped make up for the Spartan surroundings, including the lack of an actual bed. A tall, unfinished chest of drawers, two green-striped carpets and a straight-backed wooden chair made up the rest of the decor.