by Opal Carew
I recognized Anne’s voice and considered hanging up, but that would be childish. “Is Marie there?”
Silence came over the line. I didn’t like the sound of that silence.
“Who is this?”
“Diana Malone. I visited the other day.”
“She’s dead,” Anne said flatly.
My fingers tightened on the phone. “How?”
“She was old. Heart attack.”
I frowned. “Didn’t Arianna have a heart attack?”
“This wasn’t the same.”
“How was it different?”
“Mother wasn’t attacked. She just... died.”
“Where?”
I didn’t much care for the way people were dropping like flies not long after I talked with them.
“In the garden. She likes to sit outside and watch the stars.”
And the moon, too, I’d bet.
“There weren’t any bite marks?”
“She’s gone.” Anne made a disgusted sound. “Can’t she rest in peace?”
“I hope so. Did you happen to stuff her mouth with wolfsbane and draw a pentagram on her chest? Maybe shoot her with silver, just to be sure?”
Anne slammed down the phone hard enough to damage my eardrum. I couldn’t say I blamed her.
Marie’s death disturbed me. The old woman’s heart might have given out. Then again, she could have been confronted by a werewolf and gotten a little help.
The way people were dying around here they’d be dubbing me Typhoid Diana soon. I was tempted to call Cassandra, make sure she had no plans to stand outside and stare at the moon. Ask if she owned any silver jewelry. Tell her to put some on and save a piece for me. Maybe I’d just tell her in person.
I began to gather my things, but a soft footfall on the porch made me lift the pistol. The door slid open, creaking loudly. I had an instant to think, Wolves can’t open doors, before a figure darted inside.
A figure too small to be a man and too human to be a wolf.
Chapter 30
Luc Ruelle blinked at the gun. I shifted the weapon away. This was why I didn’t like to use them. More often than not, the wrong person got shot.
“Guns are dangerous,” he said solemnly.
“Damn straight.”
“Curse word.”
“Sorry.”
He shrugged. “Heard it before.”
I bet he had.
“Just not from a lady.”
He still hadn’t but I wasn’t going to point that out.
“What are you doing here?” I craned my neck. “Did your dad bring you?”
I heard the hope in my voice and wanted to curse again. If Adam had brought Luc, then maybe he’d changed his mind about me seeing the boy. And if Adam had changed his mind about that then what?
He’d buy me an engagement ring, fix up the mansion, we’d move in and start playing Ozzie and Harriet?
Doubtful.
At any rate, I needed a reference a little more up-to- date. Was there an example of a happily married couple on TV these days? For the life of me, I couldn’t think of one.
“My dad doesn’t know I’m here.”
“Uh-oh,” I said before I could stop myself.
Luc Drew his toe across the floor in an “aw shucks” gesture. Only then did I realize he was barefoot. On closer examination, his shirt was inside out and his shorts weren’t zipped.
“Were you in a big hurry to leave?” I asked.
“Huh?” He stared at me with innocent Adam-eyes.
“Your... um—” I waved vaguely. “Barn door.”
He glanced down, then presented me with his back. “I forgot to X-Y-Z.” The sound of the zipper being zipped punctuated his words.
“What’s X-Y-Z?”
“Examine your zipper. Duh.”
As I said, I knew nothing about kids, particularly male ones, having never been one myself. I felt pretty “duh” all around.
“I should call your dad,” I said.
“No phone.”
“No phone?”
“Don’t need one.”
Everyone needed a phone. Didn’t they?
Luc wandered around the mansion, glancing at my stuff, peering into corners, then staring upstairs.
He saw me watching him and shrugged. “Never been here.”
This was the family home—despite its disarray. Why hadn’t Adam brought him?
I hate that place. I wish it would rot, but the damn thing never will.
Oh, yeah.
“I cut through the swamp,” Luc said. “Wasn’t far.”
“Do you walk around the swamp a lot?”
“Uh-huh.”
I wasn’t sure that was such a good idea. He was so little, the things out there so big. Or at least they’d seemed big while chasing me.
“Did you see anything strange?” I asked.
“No.”
That was informative.
“Did you see anything?”
“Trees, gators, water, snakes. Critters.”
“What kind of critters?”
“I didn’t really see any. Just heard ’em scratchin’ around.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t go in the swamp for a while.”
His face creased into a mulish expression that resembled a dried-apple doll. “I’ve been playing in the swamp since I could walk.”
“And your dad doesn’t care?”
“He says I need to know how to survive there. Someday I might have to.”
What a bizarre thing to say to a child.
The two of us stared at each other. I smiled uneasily. What was I going to do with him until Adam showed up? He would show up. Wouldn’t he?
I’d wait a half an hour, then I’d take Luc back myself and head into town as I’d planned.
“Are you hungry?”
“Always.”
I smiled. “I’ve got crackers.”
“That’s not food.”
“Cookies?”
“Okay.”
I dug out the package, handed it over.
“How many can I have?” he asked.
“Go nuts.”
Which was probably the wrong thing to say to a kid, but he wasn’t my kid, and Adam had made it clear he never would be. If Luc went home on a sugar high, that was no more than the man deserved. What kind of father allowed a child to roam the swamp?
What did I know about it? Maybe down here, or anywhere for that matter, a four-year-old was plenty old to swamp-wander.
I eyed Luc’s size, then thought of his speech, his behavior. Maybe he was older than four. Regardless, he wasn’t twenty-four. Which is how old I thought he should be before he went into the swamp alone again.
“How old are you?” I asked.
“How old are you?”
“It isn’t polite to ask a woman her age.”
“How come? Don’t you know?”
God, he was cute.
“I’m thirty.”
‘That’s old.”
“Is not.”
“You’re older than my dad.”
Well, wasn’t that special?
“How much older?”
“A year.”
In my opinion, that didn’t count.
“Okay, your turn.”
I took a cookie myself, earning a scowl of reproof from Luc. Did he plan to eat them all? From the way he was wolfing them down—stupid question.
“I’m seven.”
“Really?”
“I’m little, but I’m quick. And smart.”
“I bet you are.”
“My mom was little. And Dad said he didn’t grow until he was twelve. Then he grew five inches in one year.”
“That must’ve hurt.”
“Hurt?” His eyes went wide and his lip trembled.
Hell. I had no idea how to talk to kids.
“I meant helped. That must have helped. With... basketball.”
From his expression he didn’t buy the excuse. He was quick.
“Dad didn’t play basketball.”
“No? What did he play?”
“Nothin’.” His lip stuck out “He says life isn’t a game, it’s a responsibility.”
“Well, yippee.”
Luc grinned. “Yeah.”
That gap in his teeth just did me in.
“Shouldn’t you be in school?” I asked.
“Dad teaches me.”
Mobile residence. Multiple babysitters. Home-schooling. But why?
Another question for Adam, if he ever spoke to me again.
“You wanna play cards?” Luc asked.
“I don’t have any cards.”
He reached into the pocket of his shorts and pulled out a deck.
“Just one game,” I allowed. “What do you play?”
“Hold ’em.”
I put my hand out to take the cards, and he stared at my palm, confused.
“You don’t want me to hold them?” I asked.
“I meant Texas hold ’em.”
“Like on TV?”
“That’s where I learned it.”
He started shuffling with card-shark precision, which was both adorable and scary. Also sad. The child had to learn games from TV?
“How often do you see your father?”
“Every day.”
“Then why the babysitters?”
“They stay all night.”
“Where’s your dad at night?”
“Workin’, I guess.”
“Working at what?”
“Dunno.”
Stranger and stranger. I’d slept with the man, shared intimacies untold, yet I didn’t know what he did for a living. But, to be fair, neither did his son.
Luc beat me at hold ’em. Badly. Several times. I forgot about “just one game.” I forgot about leaving in a half an hour. An hour later we were still playing; I was still losing.
“I think that’s enough.” I tossed in another hand of junk.
“That’s what they all say when I win.”
I contemplated his tangled hair, his gappy teeth, his familiar eyes. “Why did you come here, Luc?”
He pocketed the cards and crawled into my lap. I was so surprised, I let him.
“Dad likes you.” He shifted his butt, snuggled his head under my chin, and put his arms around my waist. “I can tell.”
“I don’t think he does.” Not enough. Not anymore.
“He’s never mumbled a girl’s name in his sleep before. That’s gotta mean somethin’.”
I knew what it meant, and I wasn’t going to tell Luc.
“I thought he worked all night,” I said, wondering how Luc could have heard Adam mumbling in his sleep.
“Then he sleeps most of the day. That’s when I watch hold ’em.”
What was Adam up to all night that made him sleep when the sun shone? I had a feeling I didn’t want to know.
While we’d been talking, my arms had automatically circled the child. My cheek rested on his hair. His body was warm, both bony and soft. His hair smelled like summertime in the rain.
“If Dad likes you,” he murmured, his voice slurred with sleep, “I like you.”
I didn’t say anything until his breathing evened out and he went slack. I wasn’t going to be taking Luc home anytime soon. He might be little, but he was probably too big for me to carry. Besides, I didn’t want to wake him.
I stretched out on the bedroll, letting his body tumble onto the cover next to me. When he mumbled and shifted, I stroked his hair and whispered, “I like you, too.”
He fell back to sleep, his hand resting in mine. I found myself fascinated by that tiny, soft hand. He had a scrape on one knuckle, a scab on the palm; his fingernails were encrusted in dirt. Had he been digging with them? I suspected that might be something little boys did, but I wasn’t sure.
Luc looked so much like Adam. From the blue eyes, to the dark hair, to the skin that turned bronze beneath the sun. Was there anything of Luc’s mother in him at all?
I’d never had a maternal yearning in my life. Never heard the biological clock ticking. Never went gaga over babies. I didn’t drool over sunsuits and tiny shoes. So why did holding Luc Ruelle’s hand make my stomach flutter?
A movement at the corner of my vision made me glance up. I wasn’t surprised to find Adam watching from the window.
From his expression, Luc was wrong. His father didn’t like me very much at all.
Chapter 31
Adam came into the house as I sat up, careful not to disturb the sleeping child. Without a word, Adam bent and lifted Luc into his arms. Equally silent he walked out of the house. I expected he’d walked out of my life forever.
What was it about the Ruelles that made me feel things I never had before and never expected to again? What was it about a silent man and a chatty boy that made a foolish, lonely cryptozoologist long for a life she’d never wanted?
This wasn’t me, to ache for a child. To contemplate loving again with the same depth I’d once loved before. To consider a future so far gone from the one I’d planned as to be unfathomable. I had to be under a spell.
Was I behaving so oddly, thinking so strangely, longing so deeply because of magic? The very idea should make me laugh, but after what I’d seen since coming to the Crescent City, laughing was the farthest thing from my mind.
There was only one person I trusted here, and conveniently that person knew magic. I grabbed my bag and my keys and drove to town.
Bourbon Street was hopping. I heard the music, saw the lights, from several blocks away. I was tempted to take a detour and soothe my problems with a zombie. But I figured the way things were going, I’d actually run into a zombie.
Cassandra opened the door before I even knocked.
“How did you know I was here?”
“I peeked through the window.”
“Oh.” I stepped inside.
“Lock the door. You need a drink.”
Right again. Sometimes I thought she was more than a little psychic.
Within minutes I sat across from her at the kitchen table, sipping from a glass of something complete with a tiny umbrella. I took a big swig. “Fruity.”
Probably had twelve types of alcohol--just what I needed. I took another glug. “What do you know about love potions? Maybe a charm or a spell?”
Cassandra took a ladylike sip and set down her glass. “More than you, I suspect. Why?”
I wasn’t sure. Adam had insisted he couldn’t love me, didn’t want me to love him. What good would a love spell do? But Luc was another matter. The child wanted a mother. If I fell hopelessly in love with him, wouldn’t I take the job?
I couldn’t bring myself to tell Cassandra about the boy. Adam didn’t want anyone to know. And while I trusted Cassandra with my life—had on several occasions already—it wasn’t right for me to trust her with Luc’s. He wasn’t mine to give.
“You’re talking about Adam. You love him?”
“I something him,” I muttered. “I don’t like it.”
“Just because you don’t want to love the man doesn’t mean you’ve been put under a spell. In truth, if you had been, you’d be thrilled about it. That’s part of the magic.”
I took a huge slurp, and the end of the paper umbrella went up my nose. Sneezing, I tossed it aside.
“You better slow down,” Cassandra said. “You’re going to be smashed.”
“Okay.”
I’d been right about the twelve kinds of alcohol. Right now, every one of them zipped through my bloodstream, both relaxing and revving me. My cheeks felt on fire.
“I love my husband.”
“Shouldn’t you say loved?”
“I don’t know how to stop. He still feels alive to me.” I touched my chest “Right here.”
“Maybe that’s why you saw him in your dream. In your heart he’s still alive. You need to let him go.”
“No.”
The idea of letting Simon go, of giving up, giving in, going on, was too much for me. Maybe that was why I had come up with the notion that my feelings for Adam had been induced by voodoo. They couldn’t be real, because if they were, I didn’t love Simon anymore. And if my love for him died, then so did he.
I know, I know, he already had. But when was love ever rational?
I took another swig of courage before blurting what I’d been wondering since I’d seen Simon at the window? I stared at my fingers, clutched together in my lap. “Could you raise him?”
Cassandra took a quick, sharp breath and held it. Afraid she’d pass out if she didn’t breathe, afraid I’d panic if she didn’t speak, or maybe if she did, I glanced up, then right back down again. The sorrow, the pity in her eyes made me want to crawl under the table and stay there.
“I’m not that powerful,” she said softly. “Not yet.”
Something in her voice made me tense—hope and fear at war. “But you might be soon?”
“Someday perhaps. But even if I was, I couldn’t raise Simon.”
“Why not?”
“How long has he been gone?’
“Four years.”
She reached across the table and took my hand. “He wouldn’t be the same, Diana.”
“I don’t care.”
“You would care. Dead is dead; there’s no going back.”
“There is—you said so yourself. There are zombies. They’re real.”
“But they aren’t alive. They aren’t the same people. They aren’t even people. You want to rip Simon out of the afterlife, reanimate his disintegrating body, have him look at you with hollow, lifeless eyes? Wonder why he’s here? Ask who you are?”
“He’d know me.”
“Maybe.”
“I miss him.”
“I know.”
She squeezed my hand, and I met her gaze once more. “Simon didn’t have to die. I could have saved him.”
Cassandra stared at me for several seconds. “That’s what this is about? Guilt?”
Now that I’d started talking, I couldn’t seem to stop. “I didn’t believe him when he said he’d found a werewolf. I was so sick of his wild-goose chases. We went here; we went there. He saw something and every single time, when I got there, there was nothing. Everyone thought he was crazy.”
I took a deep breath and admitted my secret shame. “I started to think so, too. Then that last night, I lost my temper and we fought. He stormed out alone. The next thing I knew, he was dead.”
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