Once again he rang the shop doorbell.
He saw Ellie’s forearm and the way Daisy scratched the floor. Ellie was keeping Daisy quiet.
Joe took out the door key and looked at it. He had never meant to use it unless Ellie needed him to. Well, she needed him right now.
He opened the door as quietly as possible and slipped inside, grimacing at the squelch of his soaked thongs.
“Who’s there?” Ellie’s voice rose too high. “Get out, now.”
“It’s Joe. Stop behavin’ like a scared kid, Ellie. We need to talk.”
He heard a chair turn over as she got up, then realized she was making a dash to leave the shop and run upstairs. He was faster and stood in front of the door leading to a square hallway at the bottom of her stairs.
Daisy led Ellie in what the dog thought was a joyful charge. Panting and tossing her head, she saw Joe and skidded to a stop in front of him, grinning her pleasure.
“I want us to talk,” Joe said to Ellie, stroking Daisy and holding the paw she offered. “Here or upstairs?”
“Nowhere. And I want you to stop encouraging Daisy. She shouldn’t trust other people.”
Looking steadily back into Ellie’s shocked bright blue eyes wasn’t easy. He took a step toward her and she threw up a forearm to cover her face.
“Oh, my God.” Joe retreated to the door again. “What’s happened to you? Do you think I would hurt you?”
She lowered her arm and said, “No.” Ellie didn’t spend time sitting around in the sun and her skin was pale, but never as pale as it looked now. “I’m sorry you walked into the middle of what happened but it’s over now.”
“Is it? Do you really want to deal with this alone? Cyrus and I saw the piece about the Royal Street killin’ online. So did Madge. You can bet Spike will be on the case shortly, and he won’t be the last to come to your aid. If you want to hide—” He stopped himself. “Let us help you through this.”
“If I want to hide what?” she said.
He ran a hand into his hair. “I don’t know. I’m about as muddled up as you. But I’m not too muddled up to know you need help. I haven’t had breakfast. I haven’t even had coffee. Okay if I make us somethin’?”
“Whatever.” She made a listless gesture.
As soon as he moved, she opened the door and said, “Come on up. If someone sees us in here they’ll want in, too. Bring whatever you want to eat. I’ve got coffee already made upstairs.”
He took a couple of plates and put two sweet rolls from the bakery case on top before going through and taking the stairs two at a time.
Daisy wasn’t in evidence, which meant Ellie had shut her away. A gust of relief hit Joe. She wasn’t afraid of him after all.
He put the rolls on a brass-topped table, where an ivy plant in a red lacquer pot trailed its vines in all directions. Ellie had looped lengths of tapestry, in a mostly light burgundy color, at the upper corners of her windows and allowed them to puddle on the floor. She had two good Chinese rugs, one under the table and chairs in the dining area near the windows, the other covering most of the living room floor.
“Sit down,” Ellie said. “I’ll just pour the coffee.” She darted glances at him, never for long enough to let him smile at her.
The open kitchen stood to the left of the living and dining areas. Joe sat on a rust-colored corduroy couch where he had a good view of Ellie. She had puzzled him—and intrigued him—from the day they met. She kept her brown curls short and wore mostly loose clothes, as if she didn’t want to draw attention to a voluptuous figure. Beautiful Ellie, who could not be more than twenty-eight or so. He didn’t think anyone in town knew her age.
She approached, watching the mugs which she had overfilled. Joe rose and accepted his before sitting again. Ellie chose a seat at the far end of the couch and sipped her coffee in silence.
“Charles Penn doesn’t know where you live,” Joe said.
“You can find anyone. Try it. See how long it takes you to find someone on the computer.”
“It’s not always that simple,” he said, thinking of the way Ellie’s trail had narrowed and disappeared as it went into the past. “What makes you think he’d hang around just because you’re here? You couldn’t identify him during the trial.”
Ellie set her mug down, laced her fingers tightly in her lap and gave him one of her disconcertingly brilliant stares. “He hung around long enough to murder another woman in New Orleans. I think he was partly letting me know he’s out there. And I don’t believe he’s convinced I told the truth when I said I couldn’t recognize him.”
“Did you tell the truth?” He hadn’t intended to ask her. “Forget I said that, I was thinkin’ out loud.”
“Which amounts to the same thing,” she said. “You think I lied because I was afraid to tell the truth.”
Joe flexed his shoulders and rolled his head from side to side. Maybe that was what he did think. He looked down at his muddy feet. Now, what would make him come to a conclusion like that? Even halfway to it?
“You’re not saying anything, Joe.”
“Okay. Ellie, did you see Charles Penn at Mardi Gras that day?”
“No, I said I didn’t and I meant it.” She paused and looked distant, as if she were watching the scene in her head. “The whole horrible thing was over in minutes and my mind was on Stephanie Gray. I didn’t see him…I don’t think I did….” Her voice faltered. “Only the woman falling with her arms and legs limp. The bottoms of her feet as the weight of the crowd stopped her from falling to the ground. There were faces turned up. They heard me scream, even with all the other noise going on.” She stopped and Joe felt what he’d felt before; Ellie had something otherworldly about her, something distant and intriguing.
She did have a point, it made sense that she’d be watching what happened to the Gray woman, not sightseeing in the crowd.
“Look, I don’t want to upset you again—” this said, he could hardly swallow, he was so tense “—but you let that detective into the shop. Why?”
“He showed his badge.”
“You didn’t think you should call Spike to see about verifyin’ the man was who he said he was?”
She raised her chin. “No.”
“When I got here the door was locked. Did he ask you to do that?”
Red washed over her cheeks. “He did it himself.”
Joe sat on his hands. He had to calm down. Racing to find Gautreaux and punching him out sure as hell wouldn’t help Ellie. Gautreaux’s indolence didn’t hide a tall, strong body Joe was certain the man knew how to use when he had to. Any fight between Gautreaux and Joe wouldn’t be pretty. “So you opened the door, he explained he was there because of a second murder they thought was linked to Stephanie Gray’s and then locked the door behind him.”
“Stop it!” Ellie shot to her feet, hitting the brass table with her leg and sending coffee everywhere. “What does it matter exactly what he said and when he said it? No, if you must know. No, that’s not how it went. You heard him talk about the Royal Street murder. Why would he say it twice?”
She got a cloth from the kitchen and mopped the table.
“What did he say when he got here?” Joe said, feeling his control gradually slide away.
“He asked me where I was yesterday morning and the night before. That’s all he asked, questions about that and who might have seen me.”
“Goddammit.” He pushed forcefully to his feet. “How could you be so stupid? You don’t trust me enough to let me more than a fingernail’s width into your life, but I trust you nevertheless. I trust and care about you the way…friends should, the way they do. I try to look out for you, Ellie.”
She scrambled up. Only inches separated them, and he realized as he had before that she wasn’t a big woman, just well built and with a face that melted his resolve every time. Well, that wasn’t going to happen now.
Her lips parted and he waited. “I got shocked,” she said. “Scared, I suppose. I’d just re
ad the online news about the case and I’d gone down and locked the shop again and come up here. I didn’t know what to do. Then this man came to the door and I couldn’t think anymore. I couldn’t call you when you have a practice to run. Anyway, I wouldn’t want to drag you into my problems.”
“You should have called me. I would have wanted you to. And what do you mean, drag me into your problems? I already know about them and I want to be here helping you solve them.”
She looked at the floor, then turned her head away.
“The first thing Gautreaux will do is track Spike down and start givin’ orders. Cyrus mentioned Spike was goin’ over there after mass because they’re puttin’ their heads together over somethin’. That means before you know it Spike and Cyrus will be on your doorstep. Probably Madge, too.”
“But why?” Ellie looked trapped.
“You have to ask that after we’ve all come through some narrow spaces together? They’ll want to be here to do what they can. Whether you like it or not, we’re goin’ to watch out for you until you can feel safe again. You are never goin’ to be alone until that happens.”
5
Reb Girard, Toussaint’s only doctor, arrived at Pappy’s Dancehall a few minutes after Ellie. Holding twenty-month-old William in one arm, she slid onto a seat in the booth where Ellie waited. Their table stood beneath a skylight vista of a purple evening. The room grew crowded with couples, groups and folks with children; laughter and shouting from the tables around Pappy’s dance floor swelled in anticipation of good food and music to come.
Three miles or so north of Toussaint, Pappy’s was an institution. Everyone came here—friends, neighbors, relatives—laughing and talking.
“Heartbreak Hotel” blared from the jukebox, turning conversation into code.
“Smells as great as usual,” Reb said. Sniffing the scents of spicy gumbo from another table, she eyed bowls of grillades in the hands of a passing waitress. Steam rose from the beef in tomato gravy and Ellie’s mouth watered.
Reb continued, “I’m sorry I’m late. I meant to be here first to greet you. Young Wally Hibbs managed to lay a finger open with a fishhook so I had a little job to deal with before I came.”
Thirteen-year-old Wally, son of Doll and Gator Hibbs, who ran the Majestic Hotel close to the center of town, found his refuge and often his home with Cyrus, who had accepted the boy as his shadow some years earlier. Cyrus and Madge even helped Wally with his homework and employed him around the rectory in the summer and on Saturdays during school.
“Poor Wally, he’s still accident prone,” Ellie said. “But I was early. I had to get away before someone tried to stop me.”
Reb sighed. She shook her head at Ellie and looked around for a waitress. “I need a booster chair for William. He thinks he’s too grown-up for high chairs.”
William, dark-haired and dark-eyed like his father, squirmed on his mother’s lap and gave Ellie a dimpled, slightly drooly grin. She scooted closer and nuzzled his face. Babies were so soft. That was about as much as she knew about them, not that holding a baby in her arms didn’t appeal. She just didn’t feel confident enough to ask.
Reb asked for the booster seat and said, “Marc’s on his way in. He ran into Ozaire Dupre outside. Ozaire’s got some flea in his ear about Cyrus not appreciating his custodial efforts at St. Cécile’s—and he was saying somethin’ about how Lil isn’t feelin’ Cyrus values her as his housekeeper.”
“Nothing changes in this town,” Ellie said. “Always a new drama. I wonder what set them off this time?”
“Ozaire’s gym,” Reb said, rocking William, who puffed up his cheeks and practiced spitting skills.
Ellie didn’t know about any gym and shook her head. She picked up a corner of the red-and-white-checked tablecloth and tried not to draw attention to the way she peered at Daisy. The dog had scooched behind Ellie’s legs so she had to sit on the edge of her seat. She didn’t go anywhere without Daisy anymore. She had persuaded Carmen, the bouncer at Pappy’s, to leave his favorite spot beside the flashing neon jukebox and bring Daisy in by a side door. Devoted to Elvis, Carmen had been known to show up in a fringed white jacket and black wig. He chose most of what played on the box.
“You didn’t know about the gym?” Reb asked, pretending she had no idea a large German shepherd lay inches from her feet.
“No. First I heard of it.”
The booster arrived and Reb plopped William into it. The baby said something that sounded like “help,” and Reb made short work of unwrapping crackers and spreading them before him on the paper tablecloth.
Pappy’s regular band, Swamp Doggies, moved into place at one end of the dance floor and children soon left their parents and held hands to go through their two-step paces while the Doggies warmed up. Colored lights flashed from the facets of a revolving silver ball and the children shrieked.
“Ozaire’s been sulking because he thinks Spike’s dad has stolen all his boiling-and-barbecuing business. What he really doesn’t like is competition. So his new idea is to open a gym—in the church hall.”
Ellie wrinkled her nose and laughed. She couldn’t stop laughing. She loved Toussaint and all—make that most—of its citizens. “Surely Cyrus didn’t say no?” She giggled some more.
“What do you think?” Reb’s red eyebrows rose. “Imagine the bingo folks trying to play around Exercycles and treadmills—and sweatin’ guys bench-pressing. Or the quilting group yackin’ away and tryin’ to get their lunch together.”
“I can’t,” Ellie said. “Didn’t there used to be a gym in Toussaint?”
“Uh-huh. Went out of business for lack of customers.”
“But Ozaire thinks he can do better.” Ellie sat back while the waitress placed glasses of Pappy’s red house wine—the only wine in the house—in front of them. An overflowing basket of hush puppies followed, with sweet butter and honey. “Reb, it was nice of you and Marc to invite me here tonight, but…” She couldn’t quite bring herself to say she didn’t know why they had asked her.
“But why did we?” Reb said. “I should wait for Marc but I’ll tell you now, anyway. It’s been four days since you found out Charles Penn’s on the loose, and you’ve already made a good job of letting most of your friends know you don’t want them around. You’re worrying all of us.”
“I love my friends.” She did, but she didn’t want them feeling responsible, or sorry for her.
“You love them, so you open late and close early and won’t let any of them stay in that spare flat of yours at night? All they want, all any of us wants, is to be there for you.”
“I know. It’s not necessary. I’m fine.”
Reb watched while William’s small, plump fists beat crackers to powdery heaps on the table. “No, you’re not. Look at you—everyone’s noticed. You haven’t slept since it happened.”
The lights lowered and the Swamp Doggies swung into their signature number, “Toussaint Nights”; yells went up from the crowd. Dancers made a dash for the floor.
“You don’t know if I’ve slept or not,” Ellie said. “I appreciate your concern, but I have to do this my own way. I’m sorry I’m worrying people, but they should trust me to do what’s right.”
“Did you know Joe’s had a crew in to clean and paint the rooms over his offices and he’s using a sleeping bag on the floor until some furniture gets delivered?”
Ellie couldn’t look away from Reb’s green eyes. “Why would he do that? What about his sister? Jilly will be alone.” Her heart beat faster. No man in her life had ever been reliable, except her brother, and he probably thought she was dead, or married with children and uninterested in revisiting the life she’d been in such a hurry to escape. Joe Gable could be one more of those men who meant what he said and really did want to help her. The risk of disappointment was too great to allow herself to give in to what she really wanted and give him a chance—and herself a chance.
She came out of her struggling thoughts to find Reb studying her sp
eculatively. “Ellie, try to focus. I can almost see you arguing yourself out of letting your friends be in this with you. Don’t worry about Jilly. She’s got a lot going on in her love life and she isn’t being threatened by anyone. And they’ve both been talking about Joe moving out.”
“Who says I’m being threatened?” Ellie said, surprised by her own anger. “You’re all making assumptions. There was a terrible, horrible crime in New Orleans. That man Penn got away not long before and they haven’t found him. That doesn’t have to mean he’s the killer this time and it doesn’t mean he’s interested in me.”
“You had a visitor from NOPD who told you to be careful.” Reb’s very red hair glimmered in the light of a candle on a shelf behind her. “He wanted Spike to make sure the square was patrolled regularly.”
“I know, I’ve seen the cars. Thanks for making me feel better.” Ellie put her face in her hands and shook her head. “Forget I said that. It was childish.”
“Here comes Marc,” Reb said. “Try not to get mad when he starts telling you what you’re going to do. William, here comes Daddy.”
Carrying a blanket over his arm, Marc Girard—an architect who also happened to own a good deal of the property in town—wound his way between tables, smiling toward Reb and Ellie, pausing to talk to people who stopped him along the way. One day William’s black hair would be as thick and curly as his father’s, but it was too soon to know if his eyes might become as dark.
“Hello again, cher,” Marc said to Reb, kissing her long enough to make Ellie smile. He leaned over Reb to accept a soggy-cracker offering from William, then sat down with the blanket on his lap. “Good to see you, Ellie. There are rumors you’ve left town. I’m glad they’re wrong.”
For Reb’s sake she wouldn’t snap at him. “Thank you for inviting me to dinner.”
The blankets wiggled and Marc glanced around. Reb leaned to whisper in his ear and he looked down.
“Gaston?” Ellie said. She should have remembered Marc and Reb took the precocious apricot poodle everywhere. “This isn’t going to work. I’d better put Daisy in the van.”
Now You See Him Page 3