At Risk (20 page)

Chapter Twenty

Everything inside Rafe went cold.

Before Holly finished speaking, he was already out of the truck, running.
Cumberland and a uniformed patrol officer were right behind him.”

He ran with the speed of desperation, but before he reached the front door of Holly’s house, he heard a shot.

When he tried to turn the knob, the door was locked.

Looking around for something to use as a battering ram, he picked up a cement planter on the porch and bashed it against the front door.

The barrier flew open and all three men charged into the house, following the sounds of a scuffle.

In the parlor, Eugenia was on the floor, struggling with Holly.
The gun went off again, and Holly grunted.

Rafe grabbed Eugenia and pulled her away. Cumberland grabbed Holly.

When the two women were separated, he saw a red stain spreading across Holly’s side.

“She’s been hit.
Get an ambulance.”

“Already on the way,” Cumberland said as he knelt over the older woman.
He pulled up her blouse and looked at the blood that stained her ribs. “It’s not life threatening.”

Rafe turned Eugenia in his arms, holding on to her.

“Thank God you’re all right,” he breathed.

“I am, aren’t I?” she asked, sounding surprised.

“How did you keep her from shooting you?”

She hesitated for a moment.
I think it was harder for her to shoot me than poison her husband I figured I didn’t have anything to lose by going in low and tackling her.”

For the first time, Cumberland gave them a respectful look.

“And I guess you thought you had nothing to lose by letting us try for a confession,” Rafe said to him.

“Yeah.”
He cleared his throat. “All’s well that ends well.”

Rafe refrained from making any editorial comments, and Cumberland gave them a few minutes together before he hauled them downtown to make statements.

When they’d finished writing their accounts, Rafe and Eugenia met near the front door.

“He wanted to know what the voodoo charm had to do with any of this,” she said.

“What did you tell him.”

“That I didn’t know.
What did you say?”

“That I thought it was from someone who was trying to jinx your business.”

“As good an answer as any.”

She turned away to the desk clerk.
“Do we get a ride home?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

By the time a patrol car dropped them back at the restaurant, she was looking exhausted.

“Let the new staff you hired handle the restaurant tonight,” Rafe said.
“After the morning you’ve had, you’re entitled to a night off.”

She considered the suggestion and finally nodded.
Her kitchen staff was already working, and she took a few minutes to discuss the menu with her sous-chef. Rafe watched her, impressed with her professionalism but feeling his nerves buzzing. He walked into the courtyard and sat down, knowing they had to start communicating better, but he had no idea how it was going to come out.

He stood up as Eugenia came into the courtyard.

“I’m finished.” She cleared her throat. “We have to talk.”

“I was thinking the same thing.”

“You think we can have a productive conversation?”

He swallowed.
“Yes.”

She kept her gaze on him.
“I think I know what might have happened to us.”

“What?”

“Like you said when we saw Holly put the poison on the food, I can’t prove anything.”

“Maybe you can.”

They both whirled to see Calista step through the doorway from the street.

“I’m glad I caught you together,” she said.
She’d been upset the night before, then been forced to follow Cumberland’s game plan. Now she looked like her old self.

“I wasn’t prepared for the conversation when you came over to my house last night,” she said.

“Yeah,” Rafe answered. “Sorry to hit you with those photos like that, but we needed your help.”

She gave him a narrow-eyed look.
“You wanted to jolt me, and you wanted me to confront Holly.”

He spread his hands. “That was my plan.”

“Thanks for admitting it.” She paused a beat. “When you were starting to investigate the murders, you asked me who suggested doing Voodoo Night at a restaurant.”

Rafe nodded.

“I thought back over the crowd at that fundraiser where I asked for questions written on cards. I’m pretty sure now that Holly was there. It was probably her—getting the ball rolling.”

“Yeah.”

She tipped her head to the side, studying him. “You claimed that you took Eugenia back in time to the ceremony where Villars died.”

“It’s not a claim.
I did it.”

“If you have that talent, I believe I have something that can help you.”

“What?”

“A charm.”
She reached in her purse and took out a drawstring bag made of kente cloth. “See what the two of you can do with this.”

“What are we
supposed
to do?” Eugenia asked.

“Sit down.
Get comfortable and see where it takes you.”

She handed the bag to Eugenia, then turned and left.

Eugenia weighed the bag in her hand. “Let’s go up.”

“And what?”

“Take her advice. What do we have to lose?”

He gave her a penetrating look.
“I’m game if you are.”

They went up and sat together on the sofa. Rafe had no idea what was going to happen but he pulled open the drawstring and took Eugenia’s hand.

Then he gently shook the contents out onto the coffee table. They both studied the charm. It looked quite different from the evil thing that had been on Eugenia’s doorstep after the voodoo ceremony.

He eyed it without picking it up.
Perhaps its original purpose had been as a pincushion. It was a rounded silken mound, about three inches across, and it did appear to have short pins sticking in it. But each of them was topped with shiny beads and other baubles, some of which were heart-shaped. It had a jaunty, inviting appearance, although that could simply be a ruse.

“Interesting,” Eugenia said.
“Should we do it?”

“Yeah.”

She clasped his hand more tightly as he reached for the charm.

The moment his fingers closed around the silky fabric, Eugenia felt dizzy.

With a shocked gasp, she tried to pull away from Rafe, but he held her fast.

“No,” Eugenia cried out.
But it was like the thing had taken control of her body—through Rafe.

The room around her faded into the background.
She knew she was still sitting beside Rafe on the couch, but she was somewhere else, too. At first she felt like she was in an endless dark place where she couldn’t catch her breath. Then, suddenly, it was like when she’d been in the restaurant with Rafe. Only she wasn’t downstairs. She was standing in front of her house, the Victorian mansion in the Garden District where she’d grown up.

She knew she wasn’t really there.
She couldn’t be. But it felt amazingly real. The view seemed to be from the sidewalk, outside the wrought-iron fence.

It was summer, and flowers were blooming in the beds inside the fence—more than her mother planted these days.

oOo

As she watched, Mom came out, and Eugenia stared at her.
She was younger, with less gray in her hair and firmer skin. It took a moment for Eugenia to realize that this must be years ago.

Actually, she knew about how long it had been because her mom walked to the old mailbox, the one she’d replaced the year Eugenia had gone away to the culinary school.

In the vision, Eugenia felt as if she were standing only a few feet away.

“Mom,” she called out.

Her mother stopped short and looked around. She’d heard something, but it seemed that she saw no one.

“Who’s there?”

Rafe squeezed her hand, and she knew he was still with her. “Don’t try to interact with her. Just watch.”

Her mother shook her head as though to clear it. Then she opened the mailbox and took out the post—magazines, ads and envelopes.

Most of them were bills. One was clearly different, and when her mother came to it, her hand clenched.

Eugenia moved closer to have a look and froze when she saw it was addressed to her, and the name on the return address was Rafe Gascon.

She could hear Rafe’s muffled exclamation.

“I told you I wrote to you.”

Her mother paused and looked up, a wily expression on her face. She balled up the envelope and stuffed it into her pocket.

From the house, Eugenia heard herself call out anxiously, “Is there anything for me.”

“No, dear.”

When the scene around Eugenia started to fade, she tried to hold on to it.
She wanted to know what had happened when her mother had come back into the house.

But the vision snapped off.
Suddenly she was back in her own living room, blinking as the scene changed. And Rafe was beside her on the sofa, looking as shaken as she felt.

She saw his hand open and the charm drop to the table.
Rafe had picked up the thing, and it had transported them back in time.

“You saw my mother take your letter and crumple it?” she whispered.

“Yes.”

“And you heard her lie to me?”

“Yeah.”

“After we both thought the other one didn’t write, I started wondering if she might have done something like that, but there was no way to prove it.”
She clenched her fists. “I want a confession—like with Holly.”

“You think you can get it?”

“Maybe not. She’s tough, but I’m going over to talk to her.”

“Now?”

“Yes.”

“Then I’m going with you.”

“It’s between me and her.”

“If you want it that way, I’ll stay out of the conversation, but I’m not letting you go alone.” The way he said it left no room for argument.

She stood up, and Rafe escorted her down the steps. In the alley they climbed into his car, and headed for the Garden District, neither of them talking. Tension coursed through her, and she was sure it was the same for him.

He pulled to a stop in the driveway of the house where she’d grown up.
Now that she was here, she knew she couldn’t just barge in looking wild-eyed. On the porch, she pushed the button that activated the intercom.

“Mom.
Are you there?”

“Eugenia?”

“I need to come in and talk to you. Where are you?”

“In the breakfast room.”

She let herself and Rafe in, and they headed for the back of the house to the glassed-in room where her mother loved to sit and look out at her beautifully-landscaped backyard.

In the dining room, she turned to Rafe and said, “Wait here.”

Her mother sat in a comfortable wicker chair; the trees outside in the yard diffused the sunlight.

Mom’s hair had faded, but she kept a blond rinse on it. It hung loosely around her shoulders, in a style that had been basically the same for as long as Eugenia could remember.

She was wearing a simple A-line skirt, sandals, and an expensive white golf shirt. Not that she actually played golf.

When Mom had called after Villars’ death hit the news, it hadn’t been a very satisfactory conversation.
Eugenia knew this was going to be worse.

Her mother closed the copy of Vogue in her lap and studied her daughter with appraising eyes, apparently reading the distress on her face.

“That voodoo priestess got you into trouble. Did you come to me for help mending things with Bennett? Really, you’d do better cooking in his restaurant.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“You’d have an advantage as a family business.”

Right away, they’d gotten off on the wrong track, but she couldn’t stop herself from saying, “Mom, Bennett hates me for doing better than he has.”

“Of course not.”

“He tried to make people think it wasn’t safe to walk outside my restaurant at night.”

“I don’t believe it. He’s my brother’s son.”

Eugenia sighed.
Her mother had never been logical when she’d made up her mind about something.

“He was responsible for the muggings.”

“How do you know?”

“He signed a confession.”

“Under duress, I’m sure.”

“That was after Rafe Gascon caught him trying to burn the trash in back of my restaurant.”