“What?”
Kathy bit her lip. “I don’t know. But I want to help you find out if I can.”
Evangeline hesitated. What if her questions about Johnny’s shooting really had gotten Nathan killed? The last thing she wanted was to drag his widow into danger.
“There’s something I need to tell you,” she said. “I saw Nathan last night at the cemetery.”
Kathy’s head snapped up. “Last night? When?”
“It was early evening. Around seven-thirty or eight. I went out there to see him.”
“How did you know he’d be there?”
Too late, Evangeline remembered the reason Nathan had gone to Mount Olive—to visit his first wife’s tomb.
“I know why he was there,” Kathy said softly. “I know all about his visits to Teri’s grave. I’m just surprised…” She broke off, her gaze dropping to her hands. “I’m a little surprised that he went out there before coming here.”
Evangeline didn’t know what to say to that. “I’m sorry. We only spoke briefly.”
“Was he able to tell you anything about Johnny?”
“Yes.” Evangeline’s gaze fell away. “He told me Johnny had gone to that parking garage to see a woman.”
“Do you believe that?”
Evangeline shrugged. “I don’t want to believe. But I just don’t know anymore.”
Kathy got up and walked back over to the window. “Since we talked last week, I’ve been thinking a lot about what happened. Things went south in my marriage right after Johnny’s shooting. Nathan started acting really strange. I thought at first he was just upset about Johnny’s death. But after a while, I realized it was more than that. He was scared of something.”
“Do you have any idea what it was?”
“No, but I overheard something one night that scared me, too. Nathan was on the phone in the living room. He thought I was taking a bath, but I picked up the extension in here not realizing he’d already answered. I heard a man tell him that he needed to keep his head and not do anything stupid. As long as they stayed cool, they were home free.”
“Do you know who this man was?”
“I couldn’t place the voice. It sounded like he was on a cell phone, and wherever he was, the signal was really weak. The call kept breaking up. But right after that phone call is when Nathan decided to go stay with his uncle in New Iberia.”
“What reason did he give you?”
“He didn’t. He just walked out. Which wasn’t like Nathan. He had problems and plenty of them. But he wasn’t a cruel man.”
“Do you think he may have come back last night to see the person who called him that night?”
“Maybe.” Kathy turned from the window, her face pale and drawn. “But there may have been another reason he came back.” She went over to the closet, slid back the door and rummaged through the boxes stacked on the floor. Pulling out a large manila envelope, she came back to the bed. “I found this one day when I was cleaning out the attic. I’m sure Nathan never expected that I would come across it.”
“What is it?”
She undid the fastener, then upended the contents on the bed. Several wads of hundred-dollar bills tumbled out, along with a passport and a snapshot of someplace tropical.
“There’s twenty-five thousand dollars here,” she said. “We’ve never even had that much in our savings account at any given time. Where did he get so much cash? And take a look at this.”
She handed Evangeline the passport. The booklet contained Nathan’s photograph, but it had been issued to someone named Todd Jamison.
“It looks like Nathan was preparing for a time when he might have to leave the country quickly,” Evangeline said.
“That’s what I thought, too,” Kathy said. “But I can’t figure out why he didn’t take it with him when he moved to New Iberia.”
“Maybe he thought it would be safer here.” Evangeline picked up the photograph. “What’s this?”
“It was in the envelope with the money and the passport.”
Evangeline scrutinized the snapshot. It looked as if it had been taken from a boat off the shore of some tropical island. The focus was a crowded marketplace filled with tourists in loud shirts and Bermuda shorts. Between the lens of the camera and land was an expanse of azure sky and turquoise water.
“Looks like someplace in the Caribbean,” Evangeline said.
“Maybe that’s where he was planning on going with the money and the new identity,” Kathy said with a quiver in her voice.
There was something about the photograph that bothered Evangeline, though she had no idea why. Maybe it was the idea that Nathan’s plans for a quick getaway might have had something to do with Johnny’s shooting, and now she would never know the whole truth about that night.
She held up the photograph. “Would you mind if I borrow this for a little while? I’d like to see if I can figure out where it was taken.”
Kathy shrugged. “That’s why I showed you all this stuff. I thought you’d want to know. Like I said, we’re in the same boat now. If Johnny and Nathan were shot because of something they knew…then you and I could be in danger, too, I suppose.”
After Evangeline left Kathy’s house, she called Mitchell to find out if there’d been a break in Nathan’s case. Then, as an afterthought, she called her mother to ask about the mobile in J.D.’s room.
“I’ve ordered a lot of stuff lately,” Lynette said with a sigh. “But no mobile. Do you remember the store it came from?”
“No, not offhand. I may still have the box at home if Jessie hasn’t thrown it away.”
“I bought the baby a few things from Dillard’s,” Lynette said. “Maybe they got the order mixed up.”
“This didn’t come from Dillard’s. And anyway, it doesn’t matter.” Evangeline didn’t want to worry her mother. She had enough on her mind. “I was just wondering who I need to thank.”
“Check with your dad. Although that doesn’t sound like something he’d do.” Lynette’s voice was surprisingly devoid of the bitter edge that Evangeline had grown accustomed to lately.
“Are you okay, Mom?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “I’ve decided to have another go at spring cleaning. There’s a lot of junk I want to get rid of around here. I’ve been thinking about doing some painting, too. How do you think the living room would look in chartreuse? They use it a lot on HGTV. Your father would hate it, of course, but his opinion isn’t something I have to worry about anymore, is it?”
“Mom…”
“I’m fine, Evangeline.”
“Okay. Look, I have to go. I’ll call you later.”
So she was no closer to solving the mystery of the origami cranes.
As Evangeline ended the call with her mother, she thought about the scarred man at the cemetery. Given her suspicion that he’d dropped the bird on the pathway for her to find, she was starting to get a little freaked out.
She thought about J.D. and Jessie all alone in the house. They were perfectly safe. Jessie was very good about keeping the doors locked. Evangeline knew she was letting her imagination get the better of her, but she called home just to check anyway. When she didn’t get an answer on the landline, she called Jessie’s cell.
“Hey, it’s me. Everything okay there? I just called the house and didn’t get an answer.”
“We’re sitting out on the porch,” Jessie said. “Sorry. I didn’t hear the phone. Is everything okay with you? You sound a little worried.”
“I’m just checking in. I’ll be home in a little while.”
“That’s odd,” Jessie murmured.
“What is?”
“The car that just went by…the driver keeps circling the block. That’s the third time I’ve seen him. I wonder if he’s lost.”
“Why kind of car is it?”
“Some old Cadillac. Looks about a hundred years old.”
“It’s probably nothing, but why don’t you go ahead and take the baby inside. Make s
ure all the doors are locked,” Evangeline said. “Watch out the window and if you see the car again, try to get a license plate number. I’m heading home right now to check things out. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
But by the time she arrived, the car was long gone. After checking in with Jessie, Evangeline spent several minutes driving around the neighborhood. She even stopped and asked a couple of neighbors if they’d noticed the car, but, of course, no one had.
She was still overreacting, Evangeline decided later as she sat out on the front porch with her gun. The house was locked up tight and the baby monitor beside her was so sensitive, she could hear J.D.’s soft breathing from his crib.
Still, she was uneasy. A strange car in the neighborhood was only one of a number of things preying on her mind tonight.
Sometime after she’d met with Nathan Mallet at the cemetery, he’d turned up dead. Shot three times. Once in the face and twice in the chest. Just like Johnny.
And on the day before her meeting with Lena Saunders, Evangeline had learned that Paul Courtland had suspected he was being followed by a strange blond woman a few days before he went missing.
According to Lena Saunders, Paul Courtland and his brother were related to Mary Alice Lemay, a woman who had killed all her male children because she feared they’d inherited their father’s evil gene.
Also according to Lena, Mary Alice’s youngest daughter, Rebecca, had not only helped in the execution of at least one of her brothers, but she might also be responsible for the slaying of Paul and David Courtland.
To call Lena’s theory bizarre was an understatement, but Evangeline had done enough research that afternoon to know that the gist of what the writer had told her was true.
Whether Nathan Mallet’s death was somehow connected to Paul Courtland’s, she couldn’t yet say. But one thing was certain. Something strange was going on. And for whatever reason, Evangeline seemed to be a part of it.
The night was hot and humid, but she found herself shivering as she got up and went inside. The house was secure and she had her weapon nearby. There was no real reason for her to be so on edge, Evangeline told herself as she got ready for bed.
Besides, she knew how to defend herself. Anyone trying to break in would find themselves on the wrong end of her .38. She was a crack shot, too, with a steady hand and a firm resolve. And she was fully prepared to do whatever was necessary to protect her home and her child.
Too wired to sleep, she stayed up for a long time watching an old movie, but exhaustion finally claimed her and she fell asleep to the flickering screen.
When she woke up sometime later, she thought the noise from the television had awakened her, even though the volume was turned low.
She clicked off the power, and it took her a moment to realize that the sound she’d heard wasn’t coming from the TV.
It was coming from the baby monitor.
Evangeline shot upright in bed. The tinkle of music through the speaker was as clear as if the mobile were in the same room with her. In her mind’s eye, she saw the tiny paper cranes circling over her baby, and a dark chill crept over her.
Reaching for her weapon, Evangeline quietly swung her legs over the bed and got up. Wincing at the squeak of the old hardwood floors, she padded across the room and slipped out into the hallway. Gun gripped in both hands and pointed downward, she eased along the wall, eyes and ears alert for any movement or sound.
The door to the nursery was open, and the night-light revealed a peaceful scene. J.D. was asleep in his crib, undisturbed by the soft jingle of the music box as the mobile circled slowly, the cranes barely adrift.
Standing beside the crib, Evangeline felt the cool gush of air from the air-conditioner vent. She put up a hand to still the mobile. The music stopped. The room fell silent. There was no sound at all in the house except for J.D.’s breathing.
Evangeline waited, and a moment later, the draft from the vent stirred the cranes again, the movement activating the music box. A few bars of the tune played out before the room fell silent once more.
Mystery solved, Evangeline thought with a breath of relief. She felt a bit foolish clutching the gun, but she didn’t return it to her nightstand until she’d made a complete round through her house.
Satisfied that nothing was amiss, she settled back down to sleep. But every little noise, every movement of shadow and light, brought a new shiver, and she couldn’t seem to shake the notion that out there in the dark, someone was watching.
Evil had slithered into her life and now lay coiled and waiting.
Nineteen
Ellis Cooper squatted on the slick, mossy bank and watched moonlight glisten off the bayou. He loved coming out here at night. The swamp was the playground of the nighttime predator.
Like him, he thought as he kept his eyes trained on the water.
Amidst the trills and croaks and chirps of the small, harmless creatures came the occasional bellow of a bull gator. All around him, he could sense the scurry of tiny feet through dead leaves, the watchful eyes deep within the shadows.
After a while, his patient vigil was rewarded, and he spotted the telltale ribbon of silver in the water. A snake swam, head up, toward the bank and a moment later, the thick body glided through the moss and underbrush mere inches from where Ellis perched.
The serpent must have sensed his presence for it stopped, hidden in the shadow of a rotting log. Ellis had a stick in one hand, and, rising, he struck it against the ground where the reptile lay concealed.
Most snakes would have slithered even farther under the log for protection, but not the cottonmouth. Water moccasins were stubborn and aggressive, and Ellis knew only too well that they would sometimes come at you if you weren’t careful.
The snake reared up out of the shadows, mouth wide open, fangs bared and ready. It sprang forward, whether to strike or to frighten, Ellis didn’t know. Or care. He was ready for it. His hand shot out, grasping the moccasin behind the fist-sized head. Laughing softly, he lifted the serpent up high.
In the moonlight, Ellis could see the thick bulge of the poison sacs beneath the gleaming eyes. The odor emitted from the open mouth was dank and foul, like stagnated water, but Ellis didn’t mind it.
The thick body curled and writhed, and he laughed again. “You’ll not get away from me,” he said. “I have big plans for you.”
He’d brought a burlap sack from home, and with one hand, he shoved the snake inside, then with the other hand, he drew the drawstring tight. The sides of the bag moved and shivered as the snake searched for a way out.
Careful to hold the bag above the drawstring, Ellis set off through the woods.
He emerged half a mile downstream where a brush arbor had been erected on the bank of the swamp. An old-timey revival meeting was in full swing, and he moved in closer to watch, though he had no intention of participating.
She was there. He could see her blond hair glistening underneath the string of lights powered by a nearby generator. While the congregation swayed and clapped and some members even passed out cold as the rapture overcame them, she remained as still as a statue.
Ellis moved to the side of the arbor so that he could see her profile. Bathed in all that light, she looked like an angel, and his heart raced as he watched her. Ellis had all the confidence in the world, but truth be told, he was still a little in awe of her.
Which was why, up until now, he’d been content to remain her follower. But over the past few days, he’d been getting antsy. All this plotting and planning…Why not just snatch the kid and be done with it?
He knew the answer, of course. The sword of God had to be wielded with both valor and discretion.
On the makeshift stage, two men held snakes high above their heads as the preacher, eyes closed, hands lifted to heaven, spoke in an unknown tongue.
His rich, baritone voice echoed through the darkness, across the swamp, and stirred something deep and primitive inside Ellis’s soul.
Moving to the
back of the arbor, he felt his control slip away as the power of the moment swept over him.
Against his will, he began to quiver and shake all over, and his knees turned to jelly. When he collapsed to the ground, he lay in the dirt, eyes rolled back in his head, tongue flicking in and out as he began to writhe and twist like the moccasin in the burlap bag beside him.
The spell lasted only a moment, but when he came to himself and sat up, his heart pounded in elation because he knew without a doubt that his seizure had been a sign.
Ellis Cooper was, indeed, one of the chosen. A warrior, a prophet, a demon chaser with the power of God behind him.
Twenty
As soon as she could get away the next day, Evangeline drove over to see Lena Saunders. Josh opened the door, showing not the slightest bit of surprise at her unannounced visit.
“Nice to see you again, Detective. I’ll go get Lena.”
This time he merely waved her into the living room as he continued down the hallway toward the back of the house.
Lena Saunders appeared a few minutes later. Today she was dressed all in white and her blond hair fell in thick, gleaming waves to her shoulders.
“Hello,” she said as she glided into the room. “I wasn’t expecting to see you again so soon. I’m delighted, of course.” She waved toward the chair Evangeline had occupied the day before. “Please have a seat.”
“I don’t need to sit,” Evangeline said. “This won’t take long.”
“What’s on your mind?”
“I’ve made some calls, done some background research,” Evangeline said. “I don’t have anything to report yet on Rebecca Lemay’s whereabouts, but I’m working on it. I spoke to the administrator at Pinehurst Manor and he’s agreed to see me. I’m driving up there as soon as I can get away. It’s possible the hospital will have a forwarding address for Rebecca.”
“What about the old Lemay house?” Lena asked. “I’m convinced someone saw Rebecca there a few days ago.”
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