by Meghan March
“It sounds like there’s a story there too,” I said.
Vanessa’s smile widened. “Absolutely, but that’s for another day and another glass of wine. Let’s order some lunch for the guys. Con should be done with the books in a half hour, I hope, and you need to get in touch with Charlie about that apartment so you have somewhere to live.”
“Con’s working on the books?”
“Yes, his least favorite task of all.”
“I can help with that,” I offered. “I mean, if he needs or wants a bookkeeper.”
“I thought you said you were taking a job at Your Favorite Hole?”
“I can always be busier. It’s not like I’ve got a wild social life taking up a lot of my time.”
“You never know how quickly that could change.” Vanessa tapped her lips with two fingers. “But I’ll mention it. Con’s always grumpy as hell when he’s dreading, doing, or forgetting to do books. I wouldn’t be sad for that to disappear.”
“Let me know what he says. My offer stands.”
On the way back to Voodoo with the food, Vanessa pointed out more landmarks and things that weren’t to be missed, and I shocked myself by actually recognizing a few of them from my earlier wanderings. Without too much effort, New Orleans could feel more like home than New York.
But with that thought came the reminder of the burner phone sitting like a lead weight in my purse. All it would take was one text or call, and I’d be sucked back into the colorless life I’d led before. It solidified my resolve to soak up every moment of my time here.
Before we turned the last corner back to Voodoo, I saw a neon sign in an old window that looked like the panes were due for a wash and the frame had been painted dozens of times. It read Fortunes Told Here with a pair of hands beneath it. Goose bumps rose on my skin, and I slowed. Vanessa followed my gaze.
“Have you ever had your fortune told?”
I shook my head. “I’m not sure I even believe in that kind of stuff.”
“What’s the harm in hearing what she has to say then? Madame Laveau is practically a legend in the Quarter.” She lifted the bag of takeout she’d ordered. “I need to take this to the guys, but maybe you should step inside and see what happens.”
“Laveau? Like Marie Laveau? The voodoo queen?”
Vanessa smiled. “She claims to be a distant relation but there’s nothing to substantiate that. Personally, I think it’s just smart marketing.”
“Is it . . . safe?”
At my question, Vanessa’s laugh echoed. “Absolutely. You can meet me back at Voodoo when you’re done and tell me all about your future.”
With another genuine smile, she patted my hand and strode off down the sidewalk, leaving me to stare at the glossy black-painted doorway.
What could it really hurt?
I crossed the uneven pavement and climbed up the single uneven step. A shiver skipped down my spine, but I shook it off.
None of it was real anyway. Right?
I pushed open the door and tiny brass bells tinkled above my head as the wood floor creaked beneath my feet.
“Come on in, child. I could feel your curiosity from outside.” The woman, tall and thin with skin the color of café au lait, greeted me from behind the counter.
“Hi?” My greeting sounded more like a question than anything else.
“What can I do for you today?”
She folded her arms on the glass in front of her and studied me. I wondered if she could see everything.
No way. That would be impossible. I chided myself for letting my imagination get the better of me.
I cleared my throat and pulled myself together. “My fortune. I’d like to know what you see.”
“Ah. We all want to know our future, don’t we? Luckily, you came to the right place. Come on back.”
She pushed away from the counter and gestured to the gap between it and the wall. I followed her as I soaked up the ambience of the shop. The lower shelves were lined with books and boxes of tarot cards, and the upper shelves were filled with glass jars of different teas and herbs.
Rather than spooky, it felt only slightly unnerving. She led me to a table and indicated that I should sit. Hands folded tightly in my lap, I waited for her to speak.
“Do you have a preference? Tea or tarot?” She nodded to a cup and teapot. “I read the leaves at the bottom. My grandmother taught me when I was a child.”
I’d seen the fortune-tellers with their card tables and tarot decks near Jackson Square, but it hadn’t occurred to me to stop. But tea . . . that sounded intriguing. What could someone actually tell you from reading tea leaves?
Somehow, it seemed safer too.
“Tea.”
She nodded. “Very well.”
She set about brewing a fresh pot and placed the teacup on the table. I waited, wondering if this whole process was drawn out to give more authenticity to the supposed fortune-telling.
But my doubts drained away when she started to speak.
“You’ve felt trapped. Kept away from the things you truly want.” Her gaze flicked up to mine. “And now you’re finding freedom because that’s what your future holds. Freedom . . . but at a price. You face a very tangled web where nothing is as it truly appears, and when it untangles, you will have to make a choice.”
Although her words were generic and perhaps could have applied to anyone, they struck a chord inside me.
Trapped. Freedom. Tangled.
“What . . . what’s going to happen?”
“I can’t see specifics. I only know that you will be tested and when you think you have failed, you must look deeper.”
This last part was cryptic, and apprehension curled through me at the word failed.
Failed at what?
I wanted to continue to ask questions, but she rose from the table. “If you have more questions, come back and see me again, child. I’d be happy to tell you what the next cup says.”
I stood, with more questions than answers swirling through my brain.
When I followed her out to the front of the shop, I dug into my wallet and pulled out enough cash to pay for the reading and a tip. I knew I should be watching my finances more closely considering I only had cash to rely on now, but one indulgence wasn’t going to break me. I handed over the bills, and she tucked them in the register.
“Thank you,” I said before turning toward the door. I was already telling myself that the generic fortune she’d read me didn’t necessarily have anything to do with my future.
“Consider this my free advice. That inked man is more than what he appears. Guard your heart.”
My hand froze on the doorknob and I whipped around.
“Excuse me?”
Her smile took on a decidedly feline quality. “Ah. You were wondering if I could truly see anything. Now you know for certain. Take care now.”
My hand shook on the doorknob, but I managed to twist it hard and burst out of the shop onto the street.
How could she possibly know that? Inked man. There was no way. Fortune-tellers weren’t real. Were they?
A cold gust of wind sent more shivers racing across my skin.
This town was a way more eerie than I gave it credit for, and Madame Laveau was either a first-class guesser or she saw something when she looked at me.
I hugged my arms around myself and made my way back to Voodoo.
WHEN I PUSHED THROUGH THE door of the tattoo shop, everyone turned to stare at me. Immediately, I dropped my gaze to my shirt to see if I’d spilled food on it during lunch and Vanessa had failed to mention it.
Not seeing any stains, and after surreptitiously checking to make sure the zipper of my jeans was in place, I glanced back up at Con, Vanessa, Delilah, and a girl I remembered from Dirty Dog—JP.
Most notably absent was Bishop.
The inked man.
I tried to inject humor into my voice when I asked, “Did Bishop eat and run?”
Con’s elbows rested on the cou
nter with his fork hanging midair over his takeout container. He held off on shoveling the bite into his mouth before answering me.
“He had to take care of something. He’ll be back. He took your shit.”
Took my shit?
I bolted toward the counter and looked behind it. “He took my suitcase?”
It was quite literally the sum total of everything I had to my name at this moment, excluding my purse.
“Where did he go?” My tone crept up two octaves and Delilah held out a hand.
“Whoa, simma down, girl. He’s taking care of shit for you.”
“He’s got it bad for you. I see it now.” JP was back to her melodramatic self, looking heartbroken.
Delilah laughed. “JP, I told you that you needed to lose that schoolgirl crush. Bishop wasn’t ever gonna touch a girl ten years younger than him anyway.”
“Not even a full ten. I’m going to be twenty-three in a month.” Her pixie-like features narrowed. “Just let it be known that if you and Bishop get married, I’m not coming to the wedding and I’m sure as hell not going to be a bridesmaid. You’d pick some godawful dress in revenge for me having a crush on the groom and it would just be petty revenge, so let’s just get all that out in the open, m’kay?”
What. The. Hell?
“Wow, she skipped right to the wedding,” Vanessa whispered. “Did the fortune-teller mention a wedding? You might as well put JP out of her misery right now. She’s going to give up on ever finding herself an alpha of her own, and retreat to her apartment with seventeen cats and eight subscriptions to different wine-of-the-month clubs.”
My gaze darted from Vanessa to JP to Delilah to Con. None of them seemed fazed by JP and her crazy little monologue.
“There’s no wedding. There’s not going to be a wedding.”
“I wouldn’t speak so soon, sugar. I know Bishop doesn’t seem like the marrying type now, but then again . . . you never know.” Delilah winked at me. She needed to not do the winking thing anymore. It was starting to freak me out.
“You’re all crazy.” My voice was rising higher, but the clang of the door chime drowned out part of it.
Con nodded toward the door. “Thank fuck, man. Get in here before your bride decides to leave you at the altar before you’ve even proposed.”
I spun around to face Bishop in the doorway, and pressed the pads of my fingers to my temples. “They’re crazy. Certifiably crazy.”
He walked toward me slowly, his green gaze glued to mine rather than sliding to the nutty peanut gallery behind me. I expected him to demand an explanation or to tell everyone to stop acting so insane, but instead he shocked the crap out of me.
“You gonna leave me at the altar, cupcake?” He didn’t even crack a smile, and his tone was completely deadpan.
I shoved my fingers into my hair and barely resisted the urge to pull it out. “We’re not getting married. We’ve only kissed a couple times. I’m not sure if you actually saw me naked or if I imagined that, so yeah, definitely no wedding in our future.”
His lips twitched at that.
“Wait, you don’t know if he saw you naked?” JP asked. “How did that work?”
“Uh, yeah, you skipped over that minor detail with me too,” Vanessa said meaningfully.
“She wasn’t totally naked.” Bishop took another step toward me. “And I couldn’t give a fair opinion on the subject because I haven’t gotten the whole picture yet.”
Oh my God. The way his eyes burned over my body, all of a sudden I felt naked again. I had to change the subject before I completely lost my mind and did something insane, like throw myself at him. Again.
“How much is not totally naked?” JP asked.
Bishop didn’t release my gaze to answer her. “Not your business, JP.”
“Just asking.”
This time Bishop did look away, and I turned my head to watch the interaction. “Enough.”
From behind me, Vanessa’s heels clicked on the tile. “It’s okay. We’ll find you a big, bad tattooed guy too. There are plenty of them floating around in this town. Practically a dime a dozen.”
“Thanks, princess. That makes us feel so special.”
Vanessa crossed back to Con. “You’re one in a billion, babe, and you know it.”
The heat from Bishop’s side melted into my skin, and the fortune-teller’s words came back to me. Guard your heart.
“You ate?” his deep voice rumbled in my ear.
I nodded. “Vanessa brought yours back.”
Speaking of bringing stuff back, I needed to find out what the heck he did with my suitcase because he was empty-handed.
“Where’s my bag? I need my bag.” I reached out, closing my fingers around his forearm. “I can’t lose it. It has everything.”
Bishop stared down at me. “It’s in your new place that’s being aired out.”
New place?
“What are you talking about?”
He shrugged. “Called in that favor from Charlie. Got you set up a few blocks away. You’ll have to go talk to the landlord to get the final approval and pay the deposit, but the apartment is as good as yours, and she’s cutting you a sweet-as-hell deal and giving you time to come up with the money if you need it.”
“That place is fucking tiny. Barely qualifies as an apartment,” Con said.
“But it’s safe, and Harriet doesn’t want much more in rent than what the maintenance on it costs.”
They had to slow down because I wasn’t keeping up. Harriet? What apartment? I was so confused that I didn’t even know which questions to ask first. I started with the most basic of the lot.
“You got me an apartment?”
Bishop’s gaze dropped to mine. “You have somewhere else to stay for tonight?”
“You could’ve had her stay at your place.” There was a smile in Delilah’s voice.
“Low blow. Stop, I don’t want to hear any more.” JP held a hand over each ear like she was a toddler. “I have to go back to work anyway before y’all crush my hopes and dreams permanently.” She hurried to the door, not dropping her hands until she turned and said, “Remember, I’m not going to be a bridesmaid.”
The entire town had gone insane. I truly didn’t know what else to say.
“Your food’s got to be cold by now, but you can pop the po’boy into the microwave and warm it up if you want.” Vanessa nodded to the other takeout container on the counter beside the one that Con just emptied.
“Or I’ll fuckin’ eat it right now,” Con said. “I don’t care. That shit was awesome. Even the friggin’ cole slaw, and we all know I don’t eat that shit. You shoulda brought me two, princess.”
“I want to hear more about the fortune,” Delilah drawled. “Especially if there’s wedding bells involved.”
“She didn’t say anything about a wedding,” I blurted. “It’s not important. I need to get my stuff.” I had to get out of the craziness that seemed to pervade this entire shop.
But Delilah wasn’t done. “Did she say anything about tattoos? Because I don’t think I need a fortune-teller to see that in your future.”
The inked man.
This entire world was going crazy. I wrapped a hand around Bishop’s arm. “But my stuff is there? It’s safe?”
He looked down at my hand on his forearm for a long moment before replying. “Of course. Harriet’s place is solid. I wouldn’t let you go somewhere that wasn’t. Now, I’ve got an appointment coming. Can you hang tight for a while?”
“Yes. Thank you. I . . . I really appreciate it. But I would’ve figured out something for tonight.”
He pulled his arm from my grip. “You needed a place, and I knew of a place. It’s no big deal.”
But it was a big deal. And as much as I knew I should have solved this problem on my own because I was done letting people call the shots in my life, the help Bishop offered didn’t seem to come with strings. He just did it, and did it in a way that didn’t make me feel caged.
Guard your heart. I’d definitely have to take the fortune-teller’s advice.
“OH MY GOD. THIS IS amazing.” Eden’s eyes went wide as she turned in a circle in the courtyard.
“Charlie called it her garden oasis, and she and Huck were very happy here.” Harriet sounded wistful about missing her one-time tenant. Her normally steel-gray hair was teal, pink, and purple, like that mermaid look girls who came into Voodoo rocked. It wasn’t exactly what you expected on a woman heading toward seventy. But then again, Harriet was one of a kind.
“Huck?” Eden asked.
“Charlie’s dog. He’s a big bastard. You’ll have to meet him one of these days,” Harriet explained. “Well, I guess you’ll do, girl. If you have any questions, just let me know. I’m downstairs most of the time, and I’ll leave a note on the back door if I leave the country unexpectedly.”
She leaned in closer and added in a whisper, “Sometimes I have to dodge the Feds. They’re always watching.”
Eden’s face paled, and Harriet laughed. “Just kidding. Mostly. You can slide the rent under the door whenever you feel like it. I’m not too fussy on what day you get it to me.”
“Thank you so much. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this.” Eden’s voice was quiet, but Harriet waved off the thanks.
“Ha. You need to thank this guy here. Probably owe him a few sexual favors too.”
She sent me a wicked grin, and I choked out a cough when the sheet-white color of Eden’s face was replaced with burning red. This was Harriet being true-to-filterless form.
“I don’t just open up this place for everyone,” she said, “especially on short notice. I’ve been having the cleaning girl keep it up just in case Charlie needed to run away from Simon for a night. But that hasn’t happened, so someone might as well enjoy it.”
“Well, thank you all the same.”
“No problem, dear. Now, I’m off to the opera tonight. I’ll be going home with a certain gentleman who knows his way around the clitoris, so don’t wait up.” Harriet turned away and readjusted the champagne bottle cradled in her arm before disappearing inside.