Wish Hunter (The Savannah River Series Book 1)

by Hero Bowen

  Nadia nodded.

  “And what time should I meet this woman?” the buyer asked.

  “Val will be expecting you tomorrow morning—exactly at nine twenty. You’ll have to go through that whole process I explained earlier.” Nadia heard Croak slide a piece of paper across the table. “This is the address, and you’ll need that other info on there. Don’t lose it.”

  A button clicked open. The buyer had put the slip of paper in her purse. Nadia exchanged a conspiratorial look with Miles. In order to get the intel they needed, they’d have to pickpocket the buyer for that slip of paper.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Nadia had assumed Croak would leave after handing off the address to the buyer, but instead he slouched back in his chair, taking a swig of his drink. His eyes were fixed on the stage. Clearly, he was sticking around for the show, and the older woman next to him was pinned in by chairs on all sides, so she was forced to stay too.

  “I need you to distract him while I talk to the buyer,” Nadia whispered to Miles. “Can you manage that? Knowing him, he’s probably wearing something expensive, so spill some beer on him.”

  “I don’t have a drink.”

  “Then mock him—he’ll hate that.”

  The crowd’s raucous cheers nearly drowned out her words. Nadia’s gaze shifted toward the stage as a tall, beautiful Black woman wielding an impressive mother-of-pearl guitar took hold of the mic. Gold eyeliner highlighted the almond shape of her eyes, while another gold line down the center of her lips added to the rock goddess vibes.

  “How are we all doing tonight?” Her silky voice reverberated around the club, followed by a squeal of feedback. “You going to get on that, Jim? The only feedback I want tonight is cheers and hollers.”

  The crowd whooped and started up a chant. “Monique, Monique, Monique!”

  “Aw, y’all remember me. I’m touched.” The singer smiled, her eyes twinkling. “Here I was thinking I’d be six songs in before y’all knew who you were here to see.”

  The slightly tipsy crowd erupted in a cacophony of whistles, howls, and bawdy cheers.

  Nadia nudged Miles hard. “What’s up with you? Get focused! You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “Yeah, ghost of lovers past,” Miles muttered. “Remember the high school girlfriend I mentioned?” He nodded to the stage. “That’s Monique. I had no idea she was still doing shows here.”

  Nadia looked back at the singer. “If she sings anything like she holds the attention of a room, you never should’ve let her go.”

  He cast her a withering glare. “My mom always said the same thing.”

  “Take me home, Monique!” one man called out, no doubt emboldened with liquid courage.

  Monique flashed him a grin. “Aw, honey, you know that ain’t one of my songs. There ain’t no country roads, and this ain’t West Virginia.”

  The crowd laughed, and the man ducked down behind his friend, chastened.

  “Are you ready to scream your lungs out and dance like y’all have got no bones?” Monique shouted. “Don’t be making any jokes there, sugar—I got my eye on you.” She pointed to the man who’d called out, and the crowd lost their minds. “Make some noise for Monique and the Cosmos Mariners!”

  Nadia smiled at the undeniably Savannahian name, thinking of the poet Conrad Aiken and the inscription on his stone bench tombstone from which they’d clearly taken inspiration.

  After a compulsory “one, two, three” from the band’s drummer, the music kicked in, and it became twice as hard to hear anything. Nadia fought to keep her ears attuned to Croak and the buyer. Monique’s fingertips danced across the frets, and she bit her bottom lip in concentration before lunging toward the mic and breaking into the first lines of the song. The sound that came out proved to be as silky and rich as Monique’s speaking voice and bolstered by one hell of a powerful belt.

  “Wow.” Nadia gaped at the woman despite herself. “You really shouldn’t have let her go.”

  Miles huffed. “Well, I’m still focused on the mission.”

  He got up and plucked an abandoned drink from beside a Street Fighter arcade machine. With surprisingly convincing fake-drunk accuracy, he toppled into Croak and spilled the rancid drink all over him, including the discarded ball of chewed-up gum that had been floating in it. Croak shrieked and jolted to his feet like he’d been challenged to a duel.

  “Hey, asshole, do you have any idea how much this cost?” Croak jabbed a finger into Miles’s chest, probably not realizing that Miles was wearing a small fortune.

  Miles drunk-snickered. “Polyester cleans easy, my man. No harm, no foul.”

  “P-Polyester!” Croak’s cheeks flushed. “This is hand-sewn silk, you moron! Limited edition Dolce & Gabbana. It cost me fifteen hundred bucks, and I’m going to get every dime out of you.”

  Miles shrugged, blinking both eyes at different times like a true inebriate. “I’ve got, like, thirty bucks on me. But ain’t no way that cost no fifteen hundred dollars.”

  Nadia had to admit that Miles was doing a mighty fine job of distracting the intermediary. Croak hadn’t even given his buyer a second glance; he was too panicked about his precious shirt.

  “Asshole!” Croak looked about ready to start throwing fists, but a bouncer moving through the crowd nearby seemed to make him think better of it. Instead, he stormed toward the bathrooms.

  Nadia twisted around and slid into the seat that Croak had vacated. The buyer gave a startled yelp and clutched her hands to her chest like she thought Nadia might steal the rings off her fingers. In fairness, after all that had gone on this evening, Nadia probably looked in need of a shower.

  “Sorry about my friend. He gets so clumsy when he’s had too much,” Nadia began, her tone remorseful. “That’s a lovely blouse, and I’d feel terrible if your jacket was ruined. Is it an original Chanel? I saw one just like that when my husband and I were in Paris a few years ago.” Hopefully, the touch of emotional truth would encourage the woman to open up more herself. It was just like in Nadia’s office, except here they were having the conversation at a near yell to be heard over the music.

  “Oh . . . He didn’t spill any on me,” the woman said. “And thank you for saying that about my blouse. My granddaughter called it hideous a few weeks ago, so I wasn’t sure if I should wear it again.”

  The buyer’s hands relaxed back onto the table, one placed elegantly over the other. Nadia imagined that this woman had been a debutante in her day, which meant her purse would be to the side of her chair, a short distance from her daintily folded legs. Those were the protocols—always keep one’s purse within reach, but not in a place that would be in anyone’s way.

  Nadia smiled warmly. “It suits your complexion. I’m always telling my grandma she needs to wear brighter colors.”

  It pained her to talk about Basha, even in an imaginary sense. In reality, her grandmother loved pairing a bold print with her favorite black clothing. Kaleena used to wear Basha’s fancy jackets around as a kid and pretend she was a fashion designer, bossing the family cat around. Back before the days of wish debts.

  “Aren’t you a dear.” The buyer’s eyes shone, making Nadia feel doubly guilty about what she was going to do. “And you have a very keen eye, spotting my jacket. I bought it many moons ago when I was in Paris, actually. I don’t travel so much anymore.”

  Nadia put on a sad expression. “How come?”

  She probed her foot toward the older woman and wiggled the toe of her shoe until she found the handbag strap. Fortunately, with Monique and the Cosmos Mariners bringing the house down, there was no way the buyer could’ve heard the handbag dragging in Nadia’s direction.

  “Oh, I have no one to adventure with these days,” the woman admitted. “My husband passed a few years ago, and my children and grandchildren have their own busy lives to attend to. They don’t want to be escorting around an old coot like me, and I wouldn’t want to slow them down.”

  Nadia nodded sympathetically. �
��My husband died too. A year ago.”

  The buyer gasped. “Oh no, that’s . . . terrible! You’re much too young to be a widow.”

  While pulling the handbag closer with her foot, Nadia took out her necklace and showed the woman her rings. “I can’t even bring myself to wear mine anymore, so I just put his and mine on this chain where they can be close to my heart.” She gestured to the buyer’s hand, empty of that circle of holy matrimony. “You feel the same?”

  “For years, I kept meaning to get it resized.” The buyer rubbed the ringless finger. “Then, after he passed, I didn’t see the point anymore. Why wear a wedding ring when it will only be a constant reminder of what has been lost?”

  Real tears stung Nadia’s eyes. “I couldn’t have put it better myself.”

  “That really is tragic, dear.” The older woman shook her head sadly. “What was he like, if you don’t mind me asking? My Frankie was handsome until the day he died. A great bear of a man, he was. So big and strong I always thought it was impossible that he’d be the first to go.”

  Nadia lifted her foot and brought the bag into her lap, keeping everything under the table. Tilting her head to one side as though contemplating the woman’s question, she unclicked the magnetic button fastening and dipped her hand inside. Rifling through the contents of a—thankfully—meticulously clean bag, she found the slip of paper in no time and palmed it underneath her thigh.

  “He was everything to me,” Nadia said as she reversed the bag-stealing procedure. “I’m not sure there’s any other way I can put it. He was my husband, my best friend, my therapist, and everything in between. Though he was a pretty terrible chef.”

  The woman laughed. “I’m sorry, I don’t think I caught your name.”

  “Rebecca Aiken.” Nadia put out her hand.

  “Dolores Lea,” the buyer replied in kind. She shook Nadia’s hand, her grip surprisingly firm.

  Nadia should’ve felt bad for abusing the woman’s trust, and in several ways she did. But she figured she was doing Mrs. Lea a favor. Obviously, the older woman was seeking to change her life through this exchange with Croak, but Nadia doubted Mrs. Lea was prepared for the consequences of any wish she might make. She was too green, too trusting, too sweet.

  And because of that same naïveté, Mrs. Lea would probably think she’d lost the slip of paper and call up Croak, who would undoubtedly switch the drop-off location for security purposes. Nadia cursed inwardly. That would put Nadia and Miles back at square one. She’d have to take a photo of the paper and return it to Mrs. Lea’s purse before she was any the wiser.

  Mrs. Lea put her hand on Nadia’s shoulder. “I wish I had a grandchild like you, Rebecca. I wish I could be noticed. I used to be celebrated as a rare beauty and was on every party list in half of Georgia. But now it feels as though I have been left to rot before my time, and . . . I wish I could relive some of that youth and feel seen again, instead of being a nuisance that nobody wants to deal with.”

  “I’m sure that’s not how your family feels.” Nadia patted the woman’s hand. “I’ll probably have to take my friend home in a moment, but can I get you a drink before I go? One for the road, if you’re not staying?”

  Mrs. Lea chuckled. “This is Savannah, dear. It’d be rude not to accept a drink.”

  “What’s your poison?” Nadia took the paper from under her thigh and stood, slipping it into her pocket as though she was adjusting her jeans.

  “I’ll have a bourbon if you don’t mind. Neat.”

  Nadia hesitated. “Can I say something?”

  “Of course, dear.” Mrs. Lea nodded.

  “Why don’t you tell your family how you feel?” Nadia sighed. “I know that probably sounds patronizing, but sometimes we get scared to ask people to keep us company, in case we’re rejected. So we avoid it, even if it means being lonely.”

  Mrs. Lea looked uncertain. “I’m not sure I should burden them.”

  “It won’t be a quick fix, but . . . face your fears. Your family won’t know you need support until you tell them.” Nadia put on a grin, though it came with a jab to her heart, thinking of Basha. “And if they act like brats, you take every dime of their inheritance and you spend it on yourself. All of it.”

  She turned and weaved through the crowd toward the bar. After catching the attention of a bartender, she ordered a bourbon for Mrs. Lea and then shifted her focus to the slip of paper. She set it on the bar, whipped out her phone, and took a picture.

  As she waited for the drink to arrive, she read the words that Croak had written, to double up on committing it to her memory. It included an address that seemed vaguely familiar, as well as the words “rain/basketball.” Nadia had enough experience in the world of wishmongers to know a password when she saw one.

  Maybe it was the latest password into Mata Hari’s Speakeasy, which changed weekly so only those “in the know” would have the means to get in. A gimmick, but an effective one. The only problem was, the address didn’t match up. She’d have to look into it when she had better cell service.

  “Is that everything?” The bartender pushed a red plastic cup at Nadia.

  She nodded. “Yeah, thanks.”

  Taking the drink, Nadia headed back to the table. All the while, her mind whirred, trying to figure out how she could put the paper back in Mrs. Lea’s purse without the woman realizing anything was amiss.

  Inspiration struck just as she approached the table.

  “Oh, I think you dropped a receipt or something.” Nadia bent down and pretended to snatch the piece of paper from the floor. “My husband was a tax accountant, so I’ve had it seared into my brain that you’ve got to keep every last one of these suckers.”

  Mrs. Lea pressed a hand to her chest. “Oh, my dear, thank you! I would’ve been lost without that.”

  “A big purchase?” Nadia asked as she handed the folded piece of paper back to its original owner.

  “Yes, you could say that.” Mrs. Lea quickly picked up her purse and put the note into a zipped inside pocket. “You know, I’m so very glad I met you tonight. I should thank your friend for spilling that beer over my . . . associate.”

  Nadia put the bourbon on the table. “Does this mean you’ll think about confronting your fears?”

  “I daresay I will.” Mrs. Lea raised the red cup to Nadia and downed the contents in one go without even flinching. “Ooh, I needed that as well.”

  Nadia patted Mrs. Lea on the shoulder. “Good luck to you, and thank you for taking a moment to talk to me. I’d say we both feel better for it.”

  “I wholeheartedly agree.” Mrs. Lea already looked more cheerful.

  Nadia nodded. “I better get my friend home. Good night, Mrs. Lea.”

  “And to you.”

  Praying the older woman took her advice so she wouldn’t feel like a colossally terrible person, Nadia headed for the bar’s entrance. She was almost there when Miles appeared at the end of the bathroom hallway, waving a frantic hand—a signal that Croak was coming. A moment later, the man himself stepped out of the men’s room, still wiping his jacket. Scowling, Croak leaned against the wall and surveyed the crowd, probably looking for Miles. For his part, Miles darted to the side and pulled his hoodie tight. Nadia froze. There was no way she could leave now without crossing Croak’s line of sight, and Kaleena probably had an APB out on her. She couldn’t risk it.

  “That was ‘Whiskey in a Teacup,’ and I love all of y’all for dancing along with me!” Monique’s voice boomed through the club. “There ain’t nothing sadder than dancing alone, especially when you’re under a spotlight!” She stooped to pick up a plastic cup of beer and took a swig.

  The room thrummed with energy, the crowd getting rowdier by the second, cheering on their Mistress of Ceremonies as she took another gulp of her beer.

  “I ain’t downing this for no one. You want me to wreck this velvety voice? Anyway, I ain’t planning to be carried out of here. When I leave, I’m going to be crowd-surfing out!” Monique teased,
and the crowd erupted in agreement.

  Nadia sank back against the wall, wedging herself between Donkey Kong and The House of the Dead. She cursed under her breath, knowing just how close she was to freedom.

  “Hold the music, hold the music, hold the music!” Monique shouted, waving her hand at the crowd to quiet them. “Is that Miles Hunter I see, or am I more liquored up than I thought? Hey, Jim, get that spotlight on the door!”

  The technician did her bidding without delay. Nadia cowered further into the wall in case the spotlight’s glow bled into where she was hiding.

  Fortunately, Croak seemed too fixated on the surprising developments to notice Nadia. She figured he was wondering if he could actually get his money back, now that he knew who’d spilled the drink. Miles tried to hide his face in the edge of his hood, his expression horrified.

  “It is Savannah’s golden boy!” Monique crowed, lapping up the crowd’s attention. “I heard you were in town, but I never got your call. Let me guess—you lost my number again?”

  The crowd booed at Miles’s expense.

  Monique cackled. “Aw, don’t be too hard on the guy. He’s a bona fide celebrity, don’t you know? And he definitely doesn’t charge five dollars for his concerts, so you’ve got yourselves a bargain tonight.” She opened her arms wide. “That being said, my fine ladies, gentlemen, and nonbinary beauties, take in this moment, ’cause it’s probably the only time you’ll see Mr. Miles Hunter without having to glimpse him through a sea of black suits!”

  The crowd cheered and laughed, their heads twisting back to see if Monique was telling the truth or yanking their chain. Gasps and whispers spread through the club.

  “Is that really him? Damn, he looks as good as his pictures,” someone in a group of women said.

  Monique whipped her mic cord around like a lasso. “But what you might not know, and what the tabloids won’t tell you, is that this Rolling Stone–gracing, supermodel-chasing, music chart–effacing rock star is my ex-boyfriend.”

  The crowd transformed into a herd of lowing cattle, directing their low “oohs” at a mortified Miles.