Lethal Affair

by Jean Thomas

  “It’s a village.”

  “A poor one, from the looks of it,” Casey said.

  Brenna could make out garden plots devoted to vegetables, banana plants at the sides of the houses and scrawny chickens scratching in the dust, but nowhere was there a sign of human life that would explain the drums. It was odd.

  The path divided here, the branch on the right curving around a blind corner. Casey nodded in that direction. “It’s coming from around there.”

  They followed the sound, turning with the path that brought them to the edge of another clearing, the origin of the drums and probably the strangest sight Brenna had ever seen.

  Kneeling on the ground in a wide circle was a collection of women, none of them old and none of them probably younger than their upper teens. There were only three men present. Two of them were seated back to back in the center of the clearing, slapping out an alternating rhythm on a pair of hip drums.

  Added to the beat was a shaking rattle in the hand of the third, older man wearing a fantastic headdress, his dark face streaked with white paint. In his other hand was a pot. Progressing slowly, regally around the circle from woman to woman, his forefinger dipping into the pot, he smeared a careful symbol on the forehead of each, his lips moving in what Brenna convinced herself was an incantation.

  “If I didn’t know any better,” Casey mumbled, “I’d say what we’re seeing here is an episode from Survivor.”

  “It isn’t funny, Casey. I think we’ve wandered into a private, and probably very sacred, ceremony of some kind, and maybe we’d better—”

  She got no further. There was a sudden, somber silence. The two men had abruptly stopped smacking their drums and were staring at the pair of intruders. The entire gathering had discovered them, including their leader, who was plainly unhappy with their presence.

  Glaring at them across the clearing, he stretched out his hand that gripped the rattle and shook it at them menacingly. Shouting out some dire threat Brenna didn’t understand, he started toward them.

  Casey didn’t wait. His hand closing on her wrist, he started to thrust Brenna protectively behind him. Another shout from a different source stopped him in midaction. The witch doctor, or whatever he was, never reached them. That second shout effectively halted him, too, in the middle of the clearing.

  Brenna was as startled as the rest of them when an attractive young woman, with skin the color of smooth milk chocolate, charged into the clearing from the direction of the village.

  “I’m guessing that’s our shouter,” Casey said.

  Whoever she was, she was fearless, Brenna thought. Without the least hesitation and no evidence of intimidation, she approached the glowering witch doctor.

  She had to stop thinking of him as that. Other than the apparent leader of this group, she didn’t know what he was exactly.

  As she and Casey watched, their savior began to lecture the fellow. Or so it seemed from the tone of her voice, because from their position they couldn’t make out her words. But whatever they were, her target was actually listening to them.

  “I knew it,” Casey insisted. “I just knew it. It’s a reality TV series. Has to be.”

  She wished he’d be serious. This was a serious situation. On the other hand, she had no right to complain about his attitude when he’d tried to prevent her from coming here. Although it seemed the bold young woman must have won them their exoneration since the leader, with the sulky look of a child, turned his back on them and retreated to the other side of the circle.

  Brenna watched the woman as she approached Casey and her, thinking, she’s different from the others. It’s something in her attitude.

  It wasn’t just her friendly smile either. It was her language when she reached them, an apology she expressed without any hint of the native dialect. “Sorry about that, folks.”

  “It looks like we owe you a vote of thanks,” Casey told her. “You know, the cavalry riding to the rescue at the last minute.”

  She received his gratitude with a laugh. “Oh, you weren’t in any danger. He was just upset because of that.” She nodded at the camera in Brenna’s hand.

  “I wouldn’t have photographed any of this,” Brenna hastened to assure her. “Certainly not without permission.”

  “I appreciate that. My people don’t mind having their pictures taken by the tourists, but they do like to be asked first. I’m guessing you came to see the falls and heard the drums.”

  “We did, yes.”

  Their deliverer glanced back over her shoulder. “Um, if you don’t mind, why don’t we leave the ceremony here to continue, and I’ll walk you back and try to explain.”

  Casey waited until they were out of sight of the clearing, where the drums had resumed beating, and on the path to the falls before asking, “What was that we were seeing? Voodoo?”

  “Not voodoo, no, though it is similar but with different rituals. Both of them originated from Africa, but this one is called obeah.”

  “And the guy in charge?”

  “Well, whatever you do, don’t call him a witch doctor. He hates that. He considers himself an obeah priest, and when he’s conducting a ceremony his name is Lubomba. And when he’s not,” she confided, following another melodic laugh, “he’s plain Frankie Wilson. Works on a melon farm outside a village below ours. Like most of our men do whenever the work is available.”

  Brenna stopped on the path, Casey and the young woman stopping with her. “Speaking of names, I’m thinking introductions are in order here. I’m Brenna Coleman, and this is Casey McBride.”

  She shook their offered hands. “And I’m Zena King.”

  “You, uh, live in the village then, Zena?”

  “I’m from the village, but just visiting family there right now. Why do you— Oh, I understand. It’s my English being so different from my people’s. There’s a reason for that.”

  They strolled on toward the falls, the sound of the drums fading behind them while Zena offered a second explanation.

  “My village is a poor one. Most of the villages are on the island. The only schooling here is not regular or very good. I was lucky. Because I was considered exceptionally bright, my parents had the opportunity to send me at a young age to a Catholic boarding school in Georgetown.”

  “And that’s where you learned to speak without an accent,” Brenna assumed.

  “The nuns were excellent teachers. Also very strict. I’ll always be grateful to them for preparing me for a higher education.”

  “In Georgetown?” Casey asked.

  Zena shook her head. “In Florida. I was able to earn a scholarship at a medical school in Miami. Like I said, I’m home for a couple of weeks to visit family.”

  “Ah, you’re studying to be a doctor maybe,” Casey said.

  “Nothing that grand. I’m training to be a nurse-practitioner. When I qualify, I’ll come back here to offer my people the kind of medical help they badly need. Right now, with the nearest doctor in Georgetown, they think it’s the obeah priest who can help them.”

  They were nearing the falls. Brenna could hear the waters pouring over the ledge. “Am I right in supposing that’s what the ceremony in the clearing was about?” she asked. “Some kind of medical crisis?”

  “In a way,” Zena said, leaving Brenna to wonder what this mystery was about.

  They had reached the falls. The three of them stopped in the middle of the bridge where they gazed for a silent moment at the flowing waters. Zena, who seemed to have reached a decision, spoke to them again.

  “It’s complicated. I don’t want you thinking my people are worshipping some primitive African god. Most of them, including Frankie Wilson when he’s in the mood, are actually devout Christians. But they’re also superstitious, and sometimes when the situation is desperate enough and their prayers aren’t answered, they’ll turn to the old religion, hoping for a solution.”

  “Desperate how?” Brenna questioned.

  Zena hesitated, as if searching
for the right words to enlighten them. “Did you notice the sad faces in the circle?”

  “I did. I also noticed that, except for the two drummers and the priest, all of them were women.”

  “There’s a reason for that. You have to understand that children aren’t just important to the islanders, they’re everything. The arrival of new babies is always celebrated. But—and I know this is hard to believe, because I can hardly believe it myself—there hasn’t been a single baby conceived in my village over the past eight months.”

  “You’re telling us,” Casey said in wonder, “that this is what the ceremony back there was all about? This obeah priest doing his thing to lift what the women are convinced is a curse?”

  Chapter 4

  “That’s exactly what you were seeing,” Zena told them. She went on to elaborate, “Of course, there are children in the village, some of them infants, but no pregnancies since last August.”

  “I’m supposing it wasn’t for want of trying,” Casey said.

  “You can trust me when I say the villagers have never had any problem in that department.”

  “But wasn’t there any effort to consult a doctor?” Brenna asked.

  “A doctor was persuaded to come up to the village. The women most eager to get pregnant, the youngest ones who have yet to have babies, were more than willing to be examined.”

  “And?”

  Zena shook her head. “Nothing. The doctor—and he’s a capable one—could find no reason for their infertility.”

  “What about the men?” Brenna wanted to know.

  Zena rolled her eyes. “You don’t know the St. Sebastian males if you think any of them would even consider himself incapable of fathering a child. Much too proud to submit to any test. I suppose it is unlikely at that that every husband, or for that matter, lover, would be sterile.”

  No more unlikely than the infertility of the women, Brenna thought, but she refrained from voicing it.

  Zena changed the subject. “Do you have a car nearby?”

  “Over in the parking lot,” Casey said.

  “Why don’t I walk you there before we say goodbye?”

  Casey waited until they reached the Toyota before he verbalized a consideration that must have occurred to him on the trail from the bridge. “This infertility thing...is it possible there was some kind of epidemic in the village that could be responsible?”

  “Nothing like that. In fact, the village has been healthy since it got itself a safe supply of drinking water last year. It wasn’t the case before then. I don’t know. It all seems a mystery with nothing to explain it.”

  “Where does the new supply come from?” Casey asked.

  “A deep well was drilled.”

  “And the village was able to afford that?”

  “Not the village, no. I wasn’t here then, but they tell me a wealthy benefactor who preferred to remain anonymous provided it.”

  Before saying their goodbyes to Zena, they thanked her for befriending them and wished her well in her training.

  They were on the road when Brenna expressed her sorrow. “What a tragedy. An entire village with its women suddenly barren. That’s got to be one for the medical records.”

  Casey agreed and was silent after that. Whatever his thoughts were, he didn’t share them with her.

  It wasn’t until they were descending the highlands that she realized she’d never gotten either her photographs or sketches of Braided Falls. It was too late to turn back. She’d have to wait for another day.

  They had reached the cyclone fence that enclosed the old sugar plantation when Casey slowed the Toyota.

  Now he slows down, she thought, when what she wanted him to do was speed on by. The place was too creepy for comfort.

  He not only slowed, he stopped the car altogether in front of the closed gates to the drive.

  “You see what I see, Rembrandt?”

  She couldn’t help noticing it. Parked outside the main door of the mansion was the dark green sedan that had followed them earlier.

  * * *

  When Brenna had no response for him, Casey turned to look at her. Was it his imagination, or had she turned pale under that golden tan that so became her?

  “No thought on the subject?” he asked her.

  “Please, can we just forget it and go on?”

  She doesn’t want to discuss the car, he realized, complying with her request. Probably doesn’t want to even think about it. Its presence, both earlier and now, seemed to scare her.

  But Casey couldn’t forget what they’d referred to as the green demon as he headed them toward the shore highway. His mind, trained by the best instruction Quantico had to offer its agents, examined the puzzle.

  The vehicle wouldn’t have followed them, as it had tried to do, without a reason. The obvious explanation was the driver had wanted to know just where they were going. But why? Casey’s FBI training had no answer for that. Couldn’t be expected to provide answers without the information he lacked.

  No sense in denying it. He had the questions, just not the solutions. Questions like why the clerk at the general store had been frightened by his discovery of the green sedan out front. And why it was now parked in front of the great house behind the locked gates. What connection did its driver have with that sinister plantation?

  Those thoughts alone were enough to keep Casey’s brain busy. Because it seemed to be a day for puzzles. He couldn’t forget the most significant of them. Zena King’s village. It just didn’t make sense that a whole village could go barren.

  It had to be a coincidence that he and Brenna had been confronted by two major mysteries, one following directly after the other. Casey resisted the urge to try to relate the plantation, the driver of the green demon and the village in any way. Much too unlikely to even consider such a possibility. Or was it?

  Managing to put the whole thing out of his mind, at least for now, he resumed paying attention to Brenna. She looked like she was recovered from her alarm over their second sighting of the green demon. They were on the shore highway now, and she was contentedly occupied with finding new flowers and birds outside her window.

  He was occupied with her. Hell, he would have been better off still worrying about puzzles than getting all bothered now by the woman beside him. Whatever their different moods of the day, shifting with the frequent events that had triggered them, Casey had never lost his awareness of the sexual tension that existed between Brenna and him. Nor did he think he’d be wrong in swearing she had been just as conscious of it, as well.

  This heat he was experiencing whenever his gaze drifted in her direction had him frustrated with need. And what could he do about it? Nothing. She had made it clear on more than one occasion that she was off-limits to him now.

  But he could look, even though it did raise his temperature with no possibility of release. And so he did, stealing frequent glances.

  Damn, but she was one alluring woman with that abundant, copper hair any healthy man would love to run his fingers through. Probably while longing next to get his hands on those breasts. Breasts that, without a bra, enabled him to fully appreciate their lushness. Even that smattering of freckles across her nose—

  “Watch!” she cried out. “You’re drifting across the center line!”

  Sweet Jesus, what was he doing? Trying to get them into an accident?

  Casey immediately corrected their position on the road. After that, he made a determined effort to keep his eyes off Brenna and on his driving.

  They had reached Georgetown when he managed to think of his stomach and not his libido. “I just remembered we missed lunch. It’s not too late. There’s this little seafood place on the harbor. My treat.”

  “Thanks, but I’ll just grab something up at the villa. I want to make use of what’s left of the day. I’ve been neglecting my work. I don’t need to be on location to finish the seascape in the corner of the guesthouse I’m using as a studio. The light is good there.”

>   Back to business, huh? Disappointed or not, he couldn’t argue with her. She’d only agreed to come with him this morning because she needed the transportation he offered and not his company.

  “So, I’ll deliver you to the villa.”

  She shook her head emphatically. “No, please drop me at the bottom of the hill. It’s an easy walk up from there.”

  He understood. She didn’t want to chance being seen with him by any of the staff and having one of them report it to Marcus Bradley. Bradley wouldn’t like it. It was a realization that soured him.

  Casey concentrated on dealing with the traffic as they crossed to the other side of the city, not speaking again until he stopped to let her off where she indicated.

  “What about tomorrow? The silver chariot here and I will be available to chauffeur you wherever you might want to go.”

  “I appreciate that, but I plan to stick close to town here on foot. The cab driver who drove me out to the airport this morning mentioned it was market day in the center of the city tomorrow. The stalls should offer some rich subjects.”

  “And you wouldn’t like an escort, either by car or on foot?”

  “Afraid not. I’ll be careful. I hope you understand.”

  “Oh, sure, I get it. You want to be alone.”

  We’ll see about that tomorrow, he promised himself.

  He watched her undo her seat belt, gather up her things and start to exit the car. But she hesitated with her hand on the door handle.

  “Forget something?” he asked.

  She didn’t answer him for a moment. Then, as if impulsively making up her mind, she twisted around to face him again. “I need to ask you something. It’s been bothering me ever since you landed on the island.”

  “Fire away.”

  Another pause from her. What was it this time? Summoning the courage for whatever it was she wanted to know? She must have found it, because she suddenly blurted out her question.