Soul Reckoning

by Nancy E. Polin

  He leaned back, his mouth smiling, his eyes not. “I think it’s important to meet your obligations, not run from them, oui?”

  Rowan stared back and narrowed her eyes. Her heart still thundered but temper won at the ambiguous threat. Breaking the visual lock, she gestured to the server as he passed. Stopping before her, the young man’s face queued into polite and attentive. “Yes, miss? Would you like more wine? Or is dessert on your mind? We have an amazing chess pie.”

  “No, I’m good, but this guy—”

  “Miss? I’m sorry?”

  She looked across the table to find the green-eyed man gone.

  “Miss?”

  “Um…” Bewildered, she glanced around, expecting to see the man walking briskly down the sidewalk parallel to the restaurant, but didn’t see him. She peered past her server through the entry and into the main hub of the restaurant. He must have gone in there. The inside was dim, patrons indistinct compared to those sitting outside within the sharpness of the afternoon sun. “Um… I think I’m ready for the check, please.”

  The server pulled his brows together in a frown. “Are you okay, miss?”

  Was she okay? The man had vanished. No, that was ridiculous. He had to have gone inside. Either way, she wanted to leave. “I’m fine, thank you.”

  He nodded slowly, seemingly unconvinced, and she figured she must look as shaky as she felt. “I’ll prepare the bill for you and I’ll play cashier for you when you’re ready. No rush.”

  Rowan thanked him again as he walked off to grab the check for her half-eaten, now unwanted lunch.

  ****

  Luke glanced down at his watch before he turned to draw a beer on tap for the tired man in the rumpled suit slumped at the bar.

  The woman had been gone for hours and he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing any longer. When she’d called, he’d felt peevish, snappy, and had done nothing to hide it. Her tone indicated animosity was not just on his end, but that could have been a reflection on him, too. He didn’t think what he felt was guilt, at least not exactly, but a newcomer wandering the city on her own could be cause for concern, no matter who it was.

  Liar.

  Sighing heavily, Luke swiped the bar with his towel. He’d been trying not to think about Rowan O’Herley all day and had almost succeeded when she’d called and thrown him off balance. It irritated him all the more when he realized he was, in fact, worried about her.

  She didn’t need to ever know it though. She might get the wrong idea.

  “Bon après-midi, Lukas.” Henry slid onto a stool and grinned hard enough to split his walnut face in half.

  “Almost evening, Henry.”

  The old man cast a frown. “Don’t hurry things along. Days go by fast enough.” He made a drama of looking around, the frown replaced by a smirk. “Where your new boss?”

  “Out.” Her face pressed into his brain and he remembered the fragrance of orange blossoms. Luke shook his head to dispel the image. “Where are your boys?”

  “Ah, they be around soon.” Henry narrowed his already narrow eyes, the glint of brown peeking though. A smile played around his mouth. “You run her out already, or did this old place do it?”

  “She’s out getting her bearings.” Luke delivered the man’s light beer without being asked, knowing it would soon lead to something with a little more punch.

  Henry pursed his lips and took a sip, swiping suds away with his tongue. “You think that’s a good idea? Little girl wandering around N’awlins on her own?”

  “She’s a grown woman. If she’s from L.A., chances are she knows how to handle herself or at least has a tiny bit of common sense. Maybe.” Hopefully.

  Shrugging, Henry looked unconvinced. Luke could tell he disapproved, but the woman wasn’t his problem, or his responsibility.

  Both looked up and over when a sliver of sunlight cut between the door and jam of the front entrance. The small figure pushed in and Luke caught the glint of auburn in her hair before the low light of the bar stubbed it out. “See. Safe and sound.”

  Henry grunted.

  “Hey, boss. Glad to see you didn’t get yourself lost.” He was careful to keep his tone a little sharp, unnerved to realize his heart beat a little faster.

  Rowan approached them, greeting the few early-bird customers, glaring at Luke with those smoky eyes simmering.

  “How you enjoy our city?” Henry smiled at her instead. “Love at first sight or she gonna grow on you?”

  “I had fun.” Her gaze latched onto the old man as Luke studied her, weighing how she appeared that morning against her appearance now. A little uneasy, maybe? Impossible to say at this point. He didn’t know her.

  And he didn’t want to know her. His inner voice snapped at him, cool and collected. Interest could lead to caring and caring was the last thing he ever wanted to do again. It was better to avoid the possibility altogether.

  “Definitely merits more exploration, but for now, there’s a few things I need to see to. You enjoy your drink, Henry.” She swiveled to weed her way through tables and head for the back hallway.

  Luke watched her exit, noting the grace of her step and how her hair swayed against her shoulders. It was a little tousled, slightly curling up at the ends, no doubt from late summer humidity. Blinking with annoyance at himself, he pulled his gaze away only to look into Henry’s face.

  A hint of amusement lit the man’s eyes and Luke concentrated to keep his expression blank. He raised one eyebrow. “What?”

  “That girl look peaked to you?” Henry’s smile bled into a frown and he shifted on his stool.

  “Probably just a hazard of having red hair.”

  “Aren’t you the wise one?” The old man shook his head. “Always playing everything down.”

  “Hazard of being a bartender.”

  “Gonna cuff you one, boy.” A laugh erupted deep from within, shifting into a snort. Shaking his head in amazement, he jabbed a finger toward Luke. “My own boy that cynical, I’d cuff him one.”

  Chapter Six

  Rowan didn’t sleep.

  After an hour of shifting, turning, and sighing, she got up to fix a cup of tea. Her mind wouldn’t settle, stuck between the tense excitement of a new situation and the weirdness haunting her since she’d arrived in New Orleans.

  The man in the restaurant had left her disturbed, agitated, but worse, she couldn’t seem to remember what he even looked like now. It was as if he’d been a figment of a dream or more likely, a nightmare, sliding between her fingers as she’d awakened. And now the more she thought about it, the more she wondered if that hadn’t been the case.

  The kettle whistled and she steeped her tea bag for several minutes before adding a little honey and a splash of milk. She hoped it would relax her enough so she could grab at least a few hours of solid sleep.

  Sipping the hot drink, Rowan felt a little more grounded, steady. This was reality, sitting here in the little apartment. The weirdness had to be a result of change and patchy sleep. Nothing more. Taking another sip, she contemplated plans for the tavern, doing her best to fill her mind with future possibilities and push back any semblance of nightmares.

  Tomorrow she was meeting with an inspector, and depending on what she learned, she had already started to research local contractors. Even if the place was up to code, she still had a few changes in mind. They wouldn’t be huge, more of a polishing than anything else, but The Galloping Goose would be all the better for it. At least that was the hope.

  The sound of breaking glass downstairs made her jump, spilling her tea. She hissed at the hot liquid against her skin, but forgot about it the next instant.

  Rising to her feet, she stared at the door leading out onto the landing, for the briefest moment wondering if she imagined it.

  A second crash had her reaching for her cell phone, staring at it in dismay.

  Dead.

  Hadn’t she recently charged it? She could have sworn she had.

  The house phone was dow
nstairs. It didn’t seem like Jimmy had ever bothered to put an extension or private line in the apartment. Rowan made a hasty mental note to remedy that first thing in the morning.

  She hurried into the bedroom, removing the large flashlight from the bottom drawer of the dresser. The thing held about 157 batteries and had the heft of a baseball bat. Her father had gifted it to her before she’d headed east, citing dual purpose. At the time she’d thought he was crazy. Now she wasn’t so sure.

  The wimp in her jabbered about staying upstairs and barring the door, but the pigheaded side promised hell to pay. This was her place now and no one was going to screw it up for her.

  She considered turning on the flashlight but didn’t want to expose herself. Holding it tight enough to cramp her fingers, she crossed to the door, throwing back all three locks, and stepped out onto the landing. She waited, listening, wincing when another window exploded.

  Pulling in a breath, Rowan descended the stairs, careful to stick to the edges to avoid the inevitable loud creaks from the middle. Darkness wasn’t complete, but it was close. Using one hand to glide over the bannister, she clutched the flashlight with the other, fingers already complaining.

  Listening at the door for footsteps, she judged her distance to the phone in the office. Not far, just the second door on the left, right after—

  Luke. Where the hell was he? There’s no way he could sleep through that racket. But then again, maybe he could. Her ex-fiancé could sleep through the apocalypse.

  Heart racing to the tune of a hummingbird’s, she pushed open the stairwell door, pausing for a moment to see if she could make out light from another flashlight. When she saw nothing, she crept forward, clutching the Maglite like a club. There were only a few more steps to the office, phone, and 911.

  Movement to her right had her swinging around as the hall lights flashed on to blind her.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Luke caught the end of the flashlight in his hand before she could club him. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “What the hell are you doing?” Rowan hissed back, panic and anger congealing in a nauseating mess in the pit of her belly. “Didn’t you hear that?”

  He stood before her in a long-sleeved crewneck and sweats, gazing at her, brow furrowing. “What are you talking about?”

  “Someone’s breaking in, you idiot. Didn’t you hear the glass?” Blinking, she darted glances around her and beyond him.

  The ghost of a smile pulled at his lips. “No one’s breaking in, ma chère.”

  “I know what I heard.” She stepped around him toward the office door, but he caught her by the arm with a brief shake of his head. Rowan pulled free and stumbled back a step. “Are you crazy?”

  He pulled in a deep breath and let it out in a slow leak. “Go check if you’d like. There won’t be any broken glass.”

  Narrowing her eyes at him, she hefted the flashlight back into a batting position and crept up the hallway. It occurred to her she was wearing the same long t-shirt she’d slept in, and when she glanced back at Luke, his gaze was, sure enough, affixed to her legs. She bared her teeth and he raised a brow.

  Dismissing the “rampant chicken asshole,” she pushed through the double doors, expecting to see the block glass flanking the front entry shattered.

  Nothing.

  No, that couldn’t be right. The sound she heard was higher, like thin glass breaking.

  It had to be the small windows off the kitchen.

  Rowan backtracked past the bar and turned left into the small kitchen. She stepped carefully, unwilling to shred her bare feet on shattered glass but still prepared to concuss a prowler.

  Not only were the two windows intact, but she’d forgotten how long and narrow they were, maybe large enough to admit a kid or very determined squirrel, but not the average adult.

  Confused, she let the flashlight swing down next to her leg.

  Luke stepped up beside her and she briefly considered braining him with the Maglite, but knew she was too tired for bloodshed. Even his.

  “There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

  Rowan narrowed her eyes. “Is there a reason you’re quoting Shakespeare at me?”

  “Look, I’m not sure how open-minded you are, but you’re going to hear, see, and smell lots of oddness in this old building.”

  Rowan turned to look up into his face, expecting a smirk, but not finding one. “What? You’re saying this place is haunted or something?”

  When he just looked at her, she chuckled. “Are you kidding me?”

  “A lot of history here. Leaves a mark.”

  She thought about what the cabbie had said that very first night. Dismissed it. But words Luke said boomeranged back into her head and a niggling doubt crept from the base of her brain. “Smell?”

  “Occasionally. At the top of the stairs, sometimes you get a waft of roses. She seems benign. Well, to be honest, I think the majority here are. Jimmy dubbed that one ‘Mavis.’ The glass breaker is ‘Robert.’ He seems most active when there’s someone new around. Seems to agitate him. Or maybe it’s his odd way of welcoming you. The last time he acted up was just after we hired Taylor.”

  Rowan stared at him, her brain trying to interpret and then reinterpret what he’d told her, but failing. This was nuts. She nibbled on her lower lip, noticing when he followed the motion, forgetting it the next instant. “So, Uncle Jimmy named his ghosts.”

  “He was peculiar that way.”

  “This is peculiar. You’re peculiar. I’m going back to bed. Hopefully this is all some figment of a whacked-out dream.”

  “Say ‘hi’ to Mavis on the way up.”

  She shot him a glare, slitting her eyes when his mouth twisted into a quick smirk.

  Chapter Seven

  She hadn’t set foot in any of New Orleans’s historic cemeteries since her arrival, but she stepped through this one as if she’d grown up playing hide-and-seek among this city of the dead. Tall mausoleums topped with crucifixes or somber angels blocked light sifting from the half-moon above, while stone benches and open vases awaited quiet reflection and flowers from the living. Magnolia trees spread their branches, offering shade during the day and crooked shadows in the dead of the night.

  Rowan walked softly, careful not to crunch dead leaves under her tennis shoes or trip over the uneven pavement. Terror brought a metallic taste to her mouth and tremors that threatened to bring her to her knees. There was no way to know if she’d even hear what stalked her. The thundering of her heart and the ragged breath in her ears overwhelmed and isolated her.

  She took a long moment to rein in her panic before slipping down the narrow space between two concrete graves, looking over her shoulder, but trying to see before her as well. Extreme vigilance would soon leave her exhausted and helpless. She couldn’t allow that to happen.

  The slide of a footstep against loose gravel reached her, but the sound echoed and she couldn’t make out a direction. Stilling, she held her breath and waited.

  Again. Closer.

  Fight or flight, her body held in indecision and she worried she’d taken the choice behind door number three: freeze.

  No, no, no. That choice would be the one to get her killed. If she fought, maybe, just maybe, she’d at least hurt them, leave evidence under her nails. Something, anything.

  A heavy sigh whooshed into the air a bare few feet from where she hid.

  Her freeze broke and she shoved her way out from between crypts, tripped in a thick tuft of grass, and sprawled forward. Recovering, she got her feet beneath her. Flight was her best choice. She was fast, her wind exemplary. She could beat this.

  “Rowan…”

  The sigh breathed her name and she pushed harder toward the perimeter gate. From there, she’d hit the street, her mind foolishly convincing her of safety beyond the cemetery.

  She wove through tombs, innate sense guiding her. When the locked gate loomed, she bit back a cry but didn’
t reduce her manic pace. Despite the wicked spires at the top, she decided in mid-flight to hurdle herself forward and try to scramble over the top. It would be better than facing the vile presence pushing at her back.

  When powerful claws dug into her shoulders, her screams scorched her throat and tore through the night.

  ****

  “Hey! Hey!”

  Rowan scrambled backward and would have tipped back in the chair if the office had been larger. It thudded against the wall and she looked around, wild in her panic.

  Midnight-blue eyes stared down at her, Luke’s expression inscrutable around them. It took her a moment to realize his hand was clamped down on her shoulder, large and warm. His words were cold water against the gentleness of his touch and she blinked hard up at him in confusion.

  “You fell asleep. Good thing we’re closed, otherwise that scream would have scared all the customers out.”

  Words wouldn’t come for several seconds as she listened to her pulse rage in her ears. Her heart had become rabid as it thrashed itself against her ribs, and breath burned her lungs as she fought to catch it.

  Luke crouched before her so they were eye to eye and his voice gentled. “Rowan?”

  “I’m fine.”

  He pulled his hand off her shoulder quickly, straightened, and stepped back as if the contact stung. Its warmth was replaced by a sudden chill and a shudder ran though her. She curled forward and ran her palms across her face to hide it. “What time is it?”

  “A bit after 1:00.”

  Rowan pulled in a quivering breath. She’d been sitting at Jimmy’s computer, scanning business files, and the next second she was in the cemetery. Jesus. “I just closed my eyes for a second.”

  “It happens. Maybe it’s time to go upstairs and shut them a little longer. I have books to do.”

  She did a quick scrub of her face and glared up at him. Irritation forced out any tendrils of lingering fear from the nightmare. “Are you always such a dick?”

  “Usually. Depends what day of the week it is.”

  Sonny appeared behind him, big eyes seeking and finding hers. “You okay, miss?”