by C. J. Parker
“The fellowship needs your expertise on a little matter.”
“Who?” His heart began to pound in anticipation at the very thought of the hunt, his body reacting to the adrenaline racing through his system. Ah, epinephrine, the perfect after dinner cocktail.
Phelps waved her inside, closed the door then led his visitor into the private office. Phelps strutted behind his desk and sat. “Who? When?”
“The who is Rhonda Meads. We don’t give a shit when. But no body this time. Went out for a pack of cigarettes kind of thing.” She paused as if rethinking her next comment. “I hired your stepson to do the job, but he screwed it up. Dumb bastard didn’t have sense enough not to do it in broad daylight and in the residential area of Bourbon Street.”
The top of Phelps’ skull nearly blew from the pressure inside his head.
He hated being lied to, even by omission. Brian hadn’t told him anything about the Bourbon Street mishap, only about not being able to get into the house Phelps had sent him to rob. “I’d watch your mouth if I were you.” He reached into the box of cigars on the desk and offered one to his guest. “Why are you so afraid of this girl? What’s so special about her?”
The woman paced in front of Phelps’ desk, rubbing her arms as if chilled in the air-conditioned room. “She’s dangerous. Got information she shouldn’t.” She leaned in close. “Two other girls with her. A girl named Bobbie. Don’t know her last name. And Tabatha Gray. Leave the Gray girl to me.”
Phelps straightened in his chair and leaned forward. He narrowed his eyes and frowned. He didn’t like the bitch’s tone. “What did the Gray girl do? And what do you mean leave her to you?”
“She’s hooking up with that cop, Bainbridge. And she’s mine.”
“Hooking up? And I didn’t know you swung that way.” Phelps lit a cigar and blew the smoke in the woman’s face.
“You got a dirty mind, Phelps.” The visitor frowned and waved the offending haze away. “One of my informants told me that whore was all over Bainbridge. You know about her power?”
“Power? You know I don’t believe in that hoodoo shit. I believe in brute strength and the element of surprise.” Phelps took a slow, long draw on the cigar. “Now, give me the particulars. Description? Where does she live? Where does she work? Why do you give a damn that she’s interested in Bainbridge?”
She tossed a folded piece of paper onto Phelps’ desk. “That’s Tabatha Gray’s address and where they’re staying.” She handed him two photographs. He ran his gaze over the snapshots but instantly came back to look closer at the blond. His mind snapped to attention. Her cold blue eyes, and shapely curves sent a thrill down to his growing erection. No smile, but her lips tipped up at the corners in a perpetual look of satisfaction. He’d not leave that one to the old bitch. That one he wanted to keep for a while. “The one on the right is Rhonda. The one in the center is Tabatha. They don’t work right now. And we don’t need that damned detective sniffing around. Maybe you could use your charms on Rhonda.”
He stretched out his legs and rubbed his crotch. He’d used more than his charms on her. “Is that what I use, darlin’?”
Phelps tugged at his chin trying to hide the laugh hiding just beyond his grin as the woman stood abruptly, stormed out of the office and out to her car. The sound of the car door slamming, was followed a few minutes later by that of screeching tires.
After glancing at the paper, he refolded it and placed the note in an inside pocket of his jacket.
“Tabatha Gray,” he whispered and gazed down at the photograph. “Such perfection. Too beautiful for your own good, I fear. Why would you want Bainbridge?” He remembered meeting the detective during the holidays, but hadn’t been impressed. He’d come off as humorless and cold. Late Thirties. “I could give you the world, Ms. Gray. I could give you life.”
Chapter Sixteen
When Derek veered the car toward the gate off City Park Avenue, Tabatha reached over the seat and grasped Derek’s shoulder. “No. Go around to the Canal Boulevard entrance.” His warmth seeped though the material of his jacket and into her skin. The warmth traveled up her arm and eased into her heart.
“Why?” He pulled back into the lane and turned at the next corner.
“Park by the office. More seclusion.” She pulled her hand away and glanced out the back window. The rush hour traffic was heavy as everyone jostled for a position. Bobbie shifted in her seat to look out the back window. “What are you looking for?”
“She’s looking for the forest-green pickup truck that has been behind us since we pulled into traffic at the South Claiborne Avenue Overpass.” Derek maneuvered his way around the cemetery’s borders. After a quick visual survey of the area, he parked the car at the rear of the building and out of sight of the street.
Tabatha laid her hand on Rhonda’s shoulder. Tabatha’s chest tightened with pity for her friend. Rhonda was scared out of her wits and trying so hard to be brave for them. “Last chance. Sure you want to do this?”
Rhonda swallowed hard, the sound loud in the quiet car. She turned to face Tabatha, then Bobbie. Tabatha gave Rhonda a hard look over. Rhonda’s complexion had lost its color, and her eyes were round with fear. “I’m okay. Let’s get this done.”
They managed to get twenty feet away from the car when a man opened the door of the office building and shouted, “Hey! You can’t park here.”
Derek drew his wallet from his jacket and flashed his badge. “Police business.”
The man glanced at the badge and then backed up. He stared at Tabatha for a few seconds and smiled. “Oh, Ms. Gray. Good to see you again.”
Tabatha smiled and waved. She remembered him from when she used to visit her grandfather and dad before she’d been sent away. “Hi. I can’t believe you still work here. Mr. Blossman, right? What has it been? Ten years?”
“Pretty close, yeah. You have a good visit, Ms. Gray.” Blossman waved and closed the door without another word of protest.
“Shit. Forgot the damned chicken.” Derek trotted back to the trunk of the car and pulled out the cage, before walking back to join them.
Tabatha inhaled deeply. The lawns had been cut recently, leaving behind the familiar scent of freshly cut grass and mower exhaust. It was all so familiar. She’d been here so many times before. The rows of tombs were set back a hundred feet from the business office, separated by a concrete parking area and walkways. It resembled a miniature metropolis filled with row after row of windowless skyscrapers. Instead of gargoyles topping the buildings, chubby little angels watched over the population of this city of the dead.
Bobbie walked up beside her and ran a wide-eyed gaze over the cemetery. “How on earth do you people not get lost in this maze of white?”
Tabatha eyed the area as they passed each crosswalk, reaching out for any sense of being followed. “I used to take a bus here when I was a kid. I’d come after school and stay until Bertha would come find me.” The painful memory still drew a sense of loneliness from deep within her soul.
Rhonda reached up and brushed a strand of bright red hair out of her face. “Why? I’d think the last thing you’d want to do is come to a cemetery. I mean being able to hear the dead.”
“I missed Daddy and Paw-Paw.” Derek’s fingers brushed against
Tabatha’s hand, and her heart picked up its pace. She allowed herself one quick glance to discover his gaze upon her. She grasped tightly to the warmth in his smile of encouragement.
The hum of nearby traffic and the occasional cluck of the chicken, were the only sounds left as all conversation faded away. Their footsteps echoed from one crypt to another, like voices of the dead vocalizing in rhythmic whispers of warning to Tabatha’s ears alone.
“Anyone talking to you now?” Rhonda’s voice blended with the haunting murmurs.
“No.” Tabatha rolled her eyes. “Ghosts don’t actually talk, Rhonda, I meant it as a metaphor. I can only talk to them when they rise or to their souls within three days of them dy
ing. And before you ask, souls and ghosts are not the same thing.”
Bobbie released a sigh. “Thank God. This place has its own kind of beauty, but still, it gives me the creeps.”
Derek stopped at a marble crypt topped with a prone sculptured angel. He sat the animal carrier at his feet. The chicken clucked and pecked at the side of its cubical. “Don’t be in such a hurry to get out of there, chicken.”
Tabatha nodded, a moment of guilt burning a whole in her stomach. “I’m hoping I don’t have to kill the chicken.”
“Where’s your family buried, Bobbie?” Rhonda came up to walk at her Bobbie shoved her hands into her jeans’ pockets and glanced to her right then left. “My kind are cremated and our ashes scattered on sacred ground. We wouldn’t have space to put up these ‘wasn’t I grand’ monuments.”
“Why cremated?” Rhonda tripped over a buckled section of walkway and stumbled against Bobbie.
“Well.” Bobbie caught Rhonda by the arm until she regained her footing. “If we aren’t cremated, we can return, and we aren’t very nice our second time around.” Bobbie crunched up her face before continuing. “We turn into soulless monsters. Sacred ground because that’s how it’s been done for eons.”
Soulless monsters? Tabatha decided to store that away for a later conversation. “I’m ready,” Tabatha whispered to no one in particular. “I need you girls to get away from here.” She pointed to her left. “Don’t come any closer than three rows away until I call for you.”
Rhonda and Bobbie nodded. Their gazes darted about the cemetery in what Tabatha prayed were healthy doses of fear and caution. She turned to Derek, hoping she’d frightened him enough that he’d leave, also. Unfortunately, there was a determined set to his jaw.
He crossed his arms over his chest and jutted his chin forward. “I’m staying.”
She couldn’t think of anything she could do to change his mind. “Then you have to promise to stay inside the circle. No matter what happens, you must not leave the protective area.”
He released a heavy sigh. “Whatever you say.”
She looked him in the eyes, trying to judge if he was patronizing her. Deciding she had to trust him, she turned her head slowly to find Rhonda and Bobbie still next to her. Their images began to blur and falter. Colorful auras surrounded the tombs behind and beside them. A bone-chilling cold crept into her feet, before working its way up her body until she was engulfed in its grip. “Go. Do not come until I call you. Spirits can harm you if you get too close.”
“Wait.” Bobbie’s head snapped around to face Tabatha. “What spirits?”
“When I call the dead, restless spirits come to the beckoning as well. Evil within a person does not always die with them. They don’t want to be dead, so they search for a conduit, a person to live through. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
They stared wide-eyed, but said nothing.
“If you hear someone coming, warn Derek and run, but do not run toward us.” Tabatha faced Derek. “Do not speak to me until I acknowledge you. Do not break my thoughts. I’ll try to call her without blood. She’s been dead such a short time, and I can already feel my power drawing her to me.”
“You’re the boss.” Though he spoke to her, his eyes never stopped their searching sweep of the cemetery. He moved two steps back.
“Go.” Tabatha’s skin tingled as the magic crept up her spine. The world grew quiet and still. The gray of the tombs took on a blue hue as the ghosts of those within came to watch. Tabatha chanted and formed a circle with the salt and ash from a slender glass vial.
Rhonda and Bobbie ran until they reached the area Tabatha pointed out earlier.
“Spirits beyond, listen to my plea. I call for only one, and only she. Do not interfere with the living, for fear of my wrath. Within this circle of sacrifice you will be banned. Outside its boundaries, you must not tread.” She drew a deep breath and closed the link. A sensation of cold washed over her skin, and the hair on the nape of her neck stood at attention. A rush of humid air blew around the crypts. Slowly an aura of blue and green blended with silver. It swirled and vibrated like a living being before settling on the tomb of Selma Fortier.
Tabatha drew a pocketknife and a second vial from her jeans’ pocket and slowly let the dry gray ash fall to form three circles within themselves. She opened the knife and nicked the index finger of her left hand. One drop of blood for each circle, and the world outside the main circle vanished from her view.
The power grew, pressing against her whole body and mind. The sighs of wandering spirits called out to her, seeming to choke the life from the air. Drumbeats thundered inside her ears, and she realized the sound was Derek’s heartbeat reaching out to hers, slowing its rhythm to meet her own steady pace. Never had she experienced this kind of joining, but she gladly accepted the calming effect if offered.
Tabatha settled her gaze on the crypt, its gray concrete mass pulsated with a life of its own. The crying angel sitting on the edge of the top stair looked pleadingly at her, hand outstretched, as if beckoning for Tabatha’s own soul. “Selma Fortier, live. Come to me.”
The locks of the wrought iron gate leading into the tomb clicked open and the grating sounds of metal against metal joined in harmony with stone against stone.
“Come, Selma Fortier.” Tabatha inhaled slowly. Her throat tightened, nearly cutting off the air she desperately needed. A cold sweat moistened her skin. The smell of chloroform burned her nostrils. Her mouth lost all moisture. “Selma Fortier, I command you to live.”
With a moan the doors swung open, and a child stepped into the dying sunlight. The elaborate marble entryway to the crypt radiated with light like the fabled tunnel to Heaven. The golden scarf wrapped around Selma’s head glowed like a halo. She wore a white dress that fluttered in the slight breeze, brushing against her thin legs. One arm held a Teddy Bear tightly against her chest, the other hung at her side. Her eyes were nothing more than black holes.
She’s so young, so little. How could anyone do such a thing to her? A war of emotions fought for control inside Tabatha—the heat of anger to the depths of despair. She forced herself to move, making her feet take each step to join Selma on the small marble entryway beyond the gate. Tabatha lowered herself to her knees. “Selma, I need to ask you a few questions. Is that all right with you?”
Selma tilted her head. “Why is it so dark?”
Tabatha bit the inside of her cheek to keep from crying out the soul-deep sorrow trying to swallow her whole. “It’s night time, honey.”
Derek reached out to touch her but Tabatha snapped her head around to face him. He jumped back, his face a mask of shock. She could only imagine what he saw in her face if she were transmitting half the emotions beating the hell out of her soul. She turned away from him. “Selma, who hurt you?”
“I don’t know.” Her voice, so childlike and innocent, was nearly Tabatha’s undoing.
Tabatha nodded forgetting the child couldn’t see the movement. “Can you tell me what happened?”
“I was playing with my new doll in the yard. Someone put a smelly rag on my face. I felt sick. I tried to call my momma, but I went to sleep.”
Tabatha heard Derek’s gut deep sigh behind her. “Do you remember anything else?”
“I tried to wake up, but my head hurt. My tummy burned. Then I smelled the bad rag again.”
Tabatha turned her head to look at Derek, saw his Adam’s apple bob in his throat and knew he was fighting the tears glistening in his eyes. “Anything else you can think to ask?”
“No. I think you asked them all.” His voice shook, as if he fought for some semblance of control.
“Someone is coming,” Rhonda hissed.
Tabatha reached out to touch Selma’s arm and tell her to return. Her fingertips brushed against the child’s ice-cold arm, and as if tossed through the air, Tabatha found herself transported to a backyard. The scene wavered like she was under water for a few moments before the vision cleared. She gla
nced to her right then her left. Where was Derek? Where the hell was she? How did she get here?
Footsteps sounded behind her and she turned to see who was there. A rough-fibered chloroform-soaked cloth pressed against her mouth. Her lips stung as the strong chemical smell choked her, and she struggled to cry out, to breathe. Her heart raced. Her head spun. She tried to call out but her mouth refused to work. She fought against the darkness overtaking her. She glanced down and noticed the arm that captured her—and a wristwatch.
“Tabatha.” Derek’s voice jerked her away from Selma and back into the present. “Send her back. Someone is coming.”
Tabatha gasped for air she’d been denied those last few seconds. “Return to your resting place, Selma Fortier.” Her voice ripped at her throat, abrasive against the already raw skin. “Rise again only when God calls for you.” Tabatha wanted to reach out and grab the child, go back once again and stop this from happening. But she couldn’t. It didn’t work that way.
Selma’s expression turned from serene to blank. She turned away, returning to the elaborate crypt, the doors swung closed with a slow creak. Once again the stone grated against the opening, closing Selma into her resting place.
She was dead again.
Tabatha’s stomach lurched. She swallowed hard to keep from losing its contents. She refused to let Derek know how much this had upset her. She said a silent prayer for Selma and then stood on shaky knees.
Traffic sounds drifted into the cemetery, along with voices in the distance calling back and forth.
Derek drew his gun and moved to leave the circle.
“Stop!” Tabatha rushed to destroy the protective circle, scattering salt and ash to end the spell. “Ashes scattered to the wind, spirits to their realm. The door between us is closed, no more to open to you.” One by one, Tabatha ground the symbols into the soil with the soul of her shoes. The spell broke and fresh air rushed into the circle. With a wave of her hand she called Rhonda and Bobbie over and whispered one word. “Run.” Tabatha reached down and grabbed the chicken, then waited until Rhonda and Bobbie passed her. She turned to face Derek.