“I know Auntie Tina used to pretend to practice magic arts. She would put on a big show every year for the Church’s Halloween carnival,” said Solange. “Maybe she’s got some tricks to scare people.”
“And she had live chickens living in the apartment next to hers!” said Amanda.
“If I told you that Auntie Tina had the live chickens because she had just had knee surgery and could not go out to do her shopping, would you believe me?” asked Solange.
“Not really,” replied Amanda.
“Okay. So I won’t tell you that,” replied Solange.
“But what is going on with you? Were you born under some kind of magical star? I have never met anyone like you before. You don’t get tired, you don’t get mad, you are never selfish, you just roll your eyes when Michael gets on your case and then you rip up a stage like Lady Gaga,” said Amanda. “My mother would love to have a daughter just like you. You don’t lie, well you did a bit tonight, you aren’t lazy…”
“I know your Mama is crazy about you. She would have to be,” said Solange.
“Yes, she is. But she really wishes I were a better person,” said Amanda.
“Well, sweetie, you are going to be changing all the time from now on. Who knows what you will be like the next time she sees you,” said Solange.
“Maybe I will spend some time lighting that incense,” said Amanda.
“Now you are making fun of me,” answered Solange.
Solange looked at Amanda and saw that she still had a questioning look on her face. “Maybe later on, when you are a little older, we can talk about this again.”
“Okay,” said Amanda and now she knew—there was something about those altars and Solange was not going to tell her, at least she wasn’t going to tell her now.
Solange paused for a moment and really looked at Amanda, “You’re a watcher, aren’t you?”
“A watcher?” asked Amanda.
“A watcher see everything, like you do. We’ll talk later but right now I need to go out there and sing,” said Solange as she got up from the dressing table. Just before she walked out to begin singing, she laughed and grabbed a black lace scarf and threw it over Amanda’s shoulders, “Here, this will give you an aura of mystery, like you practice the black arts too.”
“Funny,” answered Amanda.
Amanda sat out front at the jazz club, alone at her table, listening to Solange sing to the accompaniment of the piano player. The club was packed and as soon as Solange walked on the stage, the audience started clapping wildly. Amanda groaned. Supposedly no one knew that Solange would be singing tonight. Amanda looked around and saw that some of the people had flyers in their hands and overheard someone saying that they were on the email list for the club and had received an email and a twitter telling them that Solange would be singing tonight. Amanda thought that if Michael found out about this he would be so mad.
Solange sang a set of jazz classics like “My Funny Valentine,” “In the Still of the Night,” and “Begin the Beguine.” The audience was obviously filled with Solange fans. It was dark and Amanda could not see everyone in the club, but since she was sitting up front, Amanda was pretty sure everyone there could see her.
Amanda thought again how bizarre it was that she was hiding in the home of a budding celebrity. Here she was, a thirteen year old girl, wearing what looked like Brooks Brothers best, sitting in a New Orleans jazz club just like she belonged, while two thugs who would probably like to kill them were running through the city. They could even be in the back of the club right now and she would not know. Alice’s trip to Wonderland was a real tea party by comparison.
The audience was in love. Solange had this huge voice that seemed to appear out of nowhere, booming out of such a small girl. When she sang some of the ballads, her voice sounded husky like some old jazz singer who had smoked too much, but when she hit the high notes, her voice was clear and beautiful. Soon the set was over and after two encores and a demand for more, Solange walked back stage and Amanda followed her.
“I did not know you sang classics. You sang R & B at Lundi Gras,” said Amanda.
“Honey, I give them what they want, and this place wants Cole Porter,” said Solange. “Imagine that, it’s New Orleans and they want Cole Porter.”
“No, they want you. Everyone in the club knew you would be performing tonight,” said Amanda.
“I know, babe, and I’m sorry. Arnie lied to me. I told him not to publicize and he did,” said Solange. “But let’s go home and I will tell Michael what happened.”
“He will be furious,” said Amanda.
“I know. I know. My own mother never gets on my case about anything, so I guess Karma has arranged for me to get my share of being chewed out,” said Solange.
Amanda and Solange grabbed their coats and purses and opening the back door to the club, they walked into the alley to return to their car. As they were entering the street from the alley, Amanda heard something menacing from behind her and started to run. But as soon as she began running, a man grabbed her and looking over her shoulder she saw that another man had grabbed Solange. The man who grabbed her put one hand over Amanda’s mouth and used his other arm to wrap around her middle and pin her arms to her sides. The men quickly pulled Amanda and Solange down the street to a limousine and threw them in the backseat on the floor.
Solange had fallen on top of Amanda. Amanda looked up and saw that one of the men had pulled a gun and was pointing it at her and Solange. He was one of the tall, blonde guys who had been looking for them at the bar during the Zulu Parade. They had been found.
“Okay girls. You are going to tell us where Peter and Thibodeaux are and don’t tell us you don’t know. We saw all of you at Lundi Gras. You were idiotic enough to be on YouTube, and Facebook,” said one of the men.
“Facebook?” asked Amanda. “I’m not on Facebook.”
“But your friends are and we found you because of the facial recognition software. Did you really think you could get away, that we would not figure out who your friends were and track you?” said the thug. “Where are Peter and Thibodeaux?”
“The FBI has them. I was supposed to go with them too but I wanted to stay in New Orleans with my friend,” lied Amanda.
“Well, isn’t that convenient. Two days ago, they are standing with you in a park in New Orleans and now the FBI has them,” said the man. The man grabbed Amanda’s hair and pulled her head up from the floorboard and slapped her. “Where are Peter and Thibodeaux?”
“Don’t you think the FBI watches us? They probably saw you abduct us and are on their way to get us now,” said Amanda.
“Yes, they were supposed to pick us up tonight. I don’t know how you got by them, but they had the place under surveillance,” said Solange.
The man slapped Solange. “Tell us where the boys are.”
Amanda was lying on her side looking up at the man. She slipped her hand into her jacket pocket and pressed the her redial key on her phone, hoping that Thibodeaux would hear her voice before he spoke, but there was no such luck because after three rings, Thibodeaux said, “Hello.”
Amanda screamed, “The bad guys got us and they have us in a limousine.”
Solange just had time to scream that they had just left Bourbon Street when the man pointed the gun at their heads and said, “Give me your phones.”
The man pulled off their coats and went through their pocket. He found Amanda’s phone in her pocket and threw it out the window as Thibodeaux said, “Amanda! Amanda!
He emptied Solange and Amanda’s purses and found Solange’s phone in her purse and threw the purse and the phone out the window too.
The driver spoke. “Let’s take them to the dock. We have to find out where the others are.”
“We’ll lock them up on the boat. I’m not going to be the one to make them talk. They are just kids. Let Kilgairn do the wet work,” said the man in the back seat who was holding a gun on them.
Amanda did not know whe
ther to be relieved that the man holding the gun on them did not want to hit them anymore or scared that this guy Kilgairn seemed to be the kind of man who would do just that. What was wet work? Did that mean blood? And why had Kilgairn not been arrested when the other thieves were arrested? When she had recorded the voices of the thieves on her minicam last fall in Grand Central Station, they had spoken of someone named Kilgairn as their leader. After the FBI arrested the gang who blew up the city, Amanda had assumed that Kilgairn was just a code name and that one of the guys arrested was the leader, the one they called Kilgairn. But obviously that was not the case, because this Kilgairn was coming to beat them up and make them talk.
The driver parked the limousine at a dock and the men pulled Amanda and Solange out of the vehicle and walked them out on the dock. There was no one around. It must be close to midnight by now and it was a cold night. Mardi Gras or not, no one seemed to want to party on the waterfront in March. Amanda and Solange huddled in their coats which they had grabbed as they left the limousine.
The men walked them to a motorized dingy and made them climb into it and then they started the motor and headed out into the water. When they had cleared the docks and were about a thousand feet away, they pulled up next to a yacht that was anchored in the port and made Amanda and Solange climb up a ladder on the side onto the yacht. They pulled Amanda and Solange down some stairs and opened the door to a state room and pushed them in and locked the door.
Amanda looked around for a light in the room. She found a switch but when she turned it on, nothing happened. Whatever electrical system they had on this yacht, it was not working. When her parents were still married, her family had cruised on a yacht about the size of the one they were on. They had flown to the Bahamas and then boarded a small yacht that only had a married couple on board. The man was the captain and his wife did the crew work and cooking. The wife was really nice and she had told Amanda a lot about yachting.
Amanda could hear the men talking to Kilgairn on their cell phones, telling him that they had the girls and if he wanted to find out where the boys were, he would need to do it himself. Amanda looked around the state room frantically. What could they do? How could they escape? She ran to the window and pulled on it and it slid open. They were in luck. Instead of a stationary porthole, this cabin actually had a window that opened.
“We can’t stay here. We might die if we do,” whispered Amanda.
“But what can we do?” asked Solange.
Amanda knew that all boats had life preservers in every state room so she felt around in the dark until she found the life preservers at the bottom of a small closet. She pulled them out and putting her finger on Solange’s mouth, she gestured for Solange to put the life jacket over her coat. Solange pulled close to Amanda and whispered in her ear, “That water is freezing. If we try to swim, we will die before we get to shore.”
“No we won’t. We are going to zip up our down jackets and tie everything down with the life preserver. Even wet, the down will keep us warm enough to survive,” said Amanda.
“How do you know that?” asked Solange.
“Ever since the explosion, I have been reading survivor books and watching anything I can on TV about how to survive a disaster. Those shows are the only things I want to watch anymore. The life jackets on top of our down coats will help keep us warm. Make sure you make the life jacket tight,” said Amanda.
Solange and Amanda zipped up their jackets and tightened their life jackets.
Solange looked at Amanda and said, “I am not a very good swimmer and I am scared.”
Amanda looked at Solange and whispered, “Finally there is something where you are not wonderful—where I can help. I have won lots of swimming trophies and I passed my lifeguard training even though I am way too young to work as a lifeguard. So let’s go.”
“Don’t you think they will be looking for us to go out the window?” asked Solange.
“It is fifty degrees outside. No one in their right mind would go swimming,” said Amanda.
“But we are going to?” asked Solange.
“Right,” said Amanda.
Amanda and Solange opened the window in their room and looked out. There was about a ten foot drop to the water. Amanda looked at Solange and said, “There is room for both of us to go out and hang from the side of the window above the water. We need to drop into the water together. Point your toes and as soon as you let go. Put your hands flat together like this above your head as you fall so you won’t make a big splash. The life preservers and our coats will make a noise when they hit the water and there is nothing we can do about that. I can hear the guys talking at the front of the boat, so start swimming back and then we will circle around and go back to land.”
“It will be very cold, and I am not a very good swimmer, but if we have to, we have to” said Solange.
“I don’t know what those guys would do to keep from spending the rest of their lives in prison or getting the death penalty. Ten people died in those explosions so I think they will do just about anything to keep from being convicted,” said Amanda.
“I don’t believe in the death penalty,” said Solange.
“Me either. We’ll talk about that later. If we are going to do this, we need to do it now, before they come back here again,” said Amanda.
Amanda and Solange climbed out the window, feet first and hung by their hands from the edge of the window above the water. Amanda nodded and they dropped into the freezing water. As soon as they hit the water, Amanda could hear one of the men asking the other, “What was that?”
Amanda grabbed the strap from Solange’s life preserver and started pulling her away from the boat as quickly as she could swim. She whispered in Solange’s ear, “Start kicking under water so you will stay warm, but not make noise.”
Amanda could hear the men shouting as they ran into the stateroom to see if they were still there and then the men ran back up on deck and grabbed a large electric lantern and began looking for them in the water.
But Amanda had pulled Solange out away from the boat and out to sea, the opposite way from the way anyone would expect her to swim and quickly pulled Solange behind another yacht that was anchored farther out in the water and continued swimming away from shore. After she had swum out twenty feet or so, still holding onto a strap from Solange’s life preserver so they would not get separated, she swam perpendicular to the shore and then turned to swim back to shore. Amanda could hear the men screaming into their cell phones and then getting into the dinghy and starting the motor to go find them. Swimming in the freezing cold water was absolutely the hardest thing Amanda had ever done and if Solange had not been with her, Amanda was sure she would be both swimming and crying, but she knew she had to be brave. It took them fifteen minutes to swim back to shore. They had to move quietly, hiding behind the other boats that were anchored in the water. When they reached shore, they were so cold their teeth would not quit chattering. But Amanda and Solange still had on their strappy high heels (due to the straps) so they could walk.
Amanda could hear the men climbing onto the dock from the dinghy. Solange grabbed Amanda’s hand and said, “Let’s head this way. I see an all night convenience store up the street and we can call Michael.”
Amanda and Solange ran up the street and entered the store. There was an older South Asian man behind the counter and he looked at them with an open mouth. “We fell into the water by accident. Can we use your phone?” said Solange.
Solange was still stunningly beautiful even when she was sopping wet and frozen so the man said, “Of course.”
Solange quickly dialed Michael’s cell and when he answered and she said, “It’s Solange,” Amanda could hear Michael yelling through the phone.
Thibodeaux had obviously called Michael so he already knew they were in serious trouble. Solange quickly told Michael what had happened and where they were so he could come get them. Solange hung up and then turned to the man behind the counter and said,
“Some really bad men tried to hurt us so we jumped in the water to get away from them. They may come looking for us. I called a friend to pick us up, but it may take about ten minutes for him to get here. Do you have a place we can hide until he arrives?”
“I’m not supposed to let anyone in the back…..but of course you can go back there. Here are two sweatshirts. Why don’t you put these on and get out of those wet clothes?” said the man. “I wish I had something more. Here is a trash bag for your clothes.”
The man handed them two men’s extra large sweatshirts that were for sale in the store and showed them where the storeroom and restroom were. Amanda and Solange walked into the restroom and were thrilled to see both paper towels and one of those awful electric hand dryers.
They quickly pulled off their clothes and put them in the trash bag. Then quickly drying themselves the best they could with the paper towels and the electric hand dryer, they each pulled the sweatshirts over their heads and onto their still wet bodies. The sweatshirts hit them mid thigh. They looked ridiculous in a sweatshirt and sopping wet strappy black sandals. But Amanda was so glad to be sort of dry and warm, she did not care.
They were waiting in the storeroom when they heard two men come into the store asking if the man behind the counter had seen two girls. Amanda heard him say, “Well, if you have not seen them, why do you have a trail of water going to your storeroom?”
Amanda heard the men fighting with their new friend who had tried to help them and felt bad because she was not out there to help him. But she did not have to feel bad for long because soon the men came through the door to the storeroom and pulled them out to the front of the store.
The men were furious because Amanda and Solange had escaped and one of them quickly hit them so hard they fell to the floor. Their new friend tried to protest but they quickly knocked him down again. The two men pulled Amanda and Solange up off the floor and were pulling them out of the door when suddenly Michael and Terrence/DJ True arrived. They both had their guns out.
The Big Apple Posse Trilogy Page 26