Cover Me (7 page)
Authors: Joanna Wayne Rita Herron and Mallory Kane
Chapter Eleven
Nicole’s insides quaked and nausea merged with dread. “What are you doing here?”
“About to give you what you’re begging for. Only it will be me instead of Remy inside you. Time you had a real man.”
“No. We’re friends, Lee. Please. Don’t make it be like this.”
“Friends don’t conspire with a man’s worst nemesis.”
“If you’re referring to Remy, you’re
wrong. I didn’t conspire with him. I stayed away from him, just as you ordered me to do.”
“You’re a lying bitch, but you should have listened to me. Then you wouldn’t have to die.”
She jumped from the bed and tried to run. He grabbed her and threw her back to the bed. He held her arm behind her back with one hand while he unzipped his jeans with the other.
Lee truly was a monster,
but she wouldn’t give up. She couldn’t. She’d gone through hell to get here. She couldn’t die now.
“I knew the moment you saw Remy it would all be over.”
“Nothing’s over between us, Lee. Why would seeing Remy make anything over between us?”
He shoved a fist into her stomach. “No more lies,
Carlotta.
You’ll take all the fun out of this for me.”
Carlotta? Was Lee totally losing
it? Was...
No. She had to be wrong. Even Lee couldn’t have been that heartless. But she knew that he could.
Images attacked her mind in no apparent order, like flashbacks from someone else’s life. If they were her memories, the timing couldn’t be worse. A day ago they might have saved her life. But now they wouldn’t let up. The doctor had said it might take a shock to trigger them.
“I’m Carlotta Worthington, aren’t I?”
“If you say so.”
“I am, and you knew it all along from my fingerprints. But why? Why keep my identity a secret?”
“You’re a smart woman. Figure it out. Remy was working with the FBI to take me down. He would have, had it not been for Katrina.”
“So you didn’t tell him I’d been found as a way of getting back at him?”
“And it worked—until
now.”
“You’re despicable.”
Lee slapped her hard across the face and started to climb on top of her.
She stretched and wound her fingers around the bedside lamp. While he shoved down his boxers, she got in one swing at him, hitting the top of his head with the metal base.
He jerked back, stunned by the blow. She brought a knee to his crotch and took off running while he writhed
in pain. She made it to the back door before he tackled her from behind, grabbing her ankles and yanking her to the floor.
That was when she saw the gun.
“You can’t shoot me and get away with this, Lee. Your career will be over.”
“My career was over the second you and Remy handed that film and my checkbooks over to the FBI.”
“But we haven’t. I promise. Remy still has them.
Please let me go and I’ll get them for you.”
“I don’t need your help. If Remy still has the video, I’ll get it from him. Then neither of you will ever be seen again. Just two lovers who disappeared together to start their lives all over again somewhere far from the town where they’d suffered such heartbreak. It’s a lovely story, really.”
She had to keep him talking. If he pulled that
trigger it would all be over. Just when she’d found out the truth about her identity. Just when her memories were starting to return.
Just when she had a chance to be with Remy, the love of her life.
“And if the video is already with the FBI?” she asked. “Then what?”
“Then I escape and retire in the Islands, somewhere even the FBI can’t track me down.”
Lee had it all worked
out. He had no conscience. He was corrupt to the core and he was about to get away with murder again.
“You might kill me, Lee, but you’ll never kill Remy. He’ll take you down, just like he told you he would.”
She tried to push away from him, but she was no match for his strength. When the pistol’s barrel pushed against her head, she closed her eyes and screamed.
* * *
N
ICOLE
WOULD
PROBABLY
think him crazy for showing up in the middle of a storm at 5:00 a.m. So be it. Remy turned onto her block. A second later his anticipation turned to a cold, choking knot in his stomach.
That was his pickup parked in her driveway. He’d know it anywhere. But Nicole wouldn’t have driven it home. She couldn’t have known where he’d parked it. She didn’t have the key. She’d said she’d
take a taxi.
Barnaby must have located his truck, or else someone had been following him when he’d parked it in the Quarter and walked to the apartment. He punched Redial on his phone, contacting the FBI agent he’d met with last night, to request emergency backup as he swerved into Nicole’s driveway. Gun in hand, he jumped out of her car and raced to her front door.
A chilling scream
punctuated a clap of thunder. The lock had already been pried open, so he turned the knob and rushed inside.
“Scream all you want. No one will hear you in this storm.”
Remy paused at Lee’s voice and backed against the wall, his finger on the trigger.
“Don’t shoot me. Please don’t shoot me. I can talk Remy into giving up the film. I know I can.”
Nicole was pleading for her life.
Damn Lee. Damn him to hell and back. Remy’s muscles strained to storm in there and put a bullet in his head. But he couldn’t act on instinct alone.
He had to play this smart. He couldn’t risk Nicole’s life.
“I wouldn’t dream of shooting you, sweetheart—unless you force me, of course. Bullet wounds to the head are much too messy to clean up. We’ll go back to the bedroom, this time for
a date with your pillow. No ligature marks. No blood. Just a nice, fast suffocation. See, I’m more humane than you give me credit for.”
Remy stayed out of sight, but he saw the gun at Nicole’s head as Lee led her to the bedroom. He’d have to time this perfectly, judge when both of Lee’s hands were off the gun and on the pillow before he made his move.
“Shoot me, you bastard. Clean up
your dirty mess yourself for a change.”
Remy’s heart almost stopped completely as he heard Nicole’s taunt, forcing Lee’s hand.
He reached the doorway just as Lee raised a fist to strike her.
Nicole saw Remy. She gave one hard kick and the gun went flying from Lee’s hand. His fist was in midswing.
“Hit her and you’re a dead man.”
Lee turned a ghostly shade of white and
then made a dash for the back door. Remy started to give chase, but stopped when he spotted an armed FBI agent he remembered from eight years ago outside the kitchen window. He heard the squeal of brakes as more reinforcements arrived. They could handle the chief’s arrest.
Nicole grabbed her heart as if holding it inside her chest. “Remy. Where on earth did you come from? How did you know
Lee was here?”
“I didn’t. For once, luck cut the deck my way.”
“I’m Carlotta,” she said. “Your Carlotta. Lee told me. He knew it all along. And now I remember you. From before. When we were falling in love.”
He held her close. “I think you may be delirious, but you don’t have to be Carlotta. Not for me. Not now.”
“But I am. I know it sounds bizarre, but truly I am. Only, I
think part of me is still Nicole.”
He was having a hard time buying this. But her being Carlotta would make sense of a few things. Like why he’d fallen in love with Nicole at first sight. Not that he’d admitted it then.
“I love you,” he said. “Whoever you are, I love you.”
“I love you, too, Remy. I always have, even when I didn’t remember who it was I loved.”
“There is one
problem. If you’re really Carlotta, you owe me a wedding.”
“Is tomorrow too soon?”
“Not as long as our forever after can start right now.”
* * * * *
Rita Herron
Bayou Jeopardy
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Mack Rivet—
He was a detective before Katrina but was arrested on false charges. Now he’s back to claim his freedom and the wife and child he lost, nothing will stop him, except death.
Lily Landry Rivet—
She thought she’d lost Mack in the floods and now has a new life with her son. Can she risk her son being exposed to the dangers of Mack’s job?
Winston
Mack Rivet—
He wants to know the truth about why his father was framed.
Melvin Landry
—
Lily’s father never thought Mack was good enough for Lily. Did he frame him to get him out of his daughter’s life?
Mayor Barrow—
He claims he’s helping rebuild the city. But is he stealing money from the rebuilding funds?
Tate Manning—
Landry’s lawyer and right-hand man wants Lily for himself. What
lengths would he go to in order to get Mack out of the way?
Remy Comeaux—
Private detective and former NOPD narcotics detective.
Ray Storm—
An FBI agent involved in investigating corruption in the NOPD before Hurricane Katrina.
To my beautiful and sweet daughter Elizabeth who lives in New Orleans and loves it!
Chapter One
Eight years ago when Katrina hit New Orleans and turned the city inside out, Mack Rivet had lost everything. His job as a detective. The woman he loved.
And the little boy she had been carrying.
He slid onto his usual bar stool at the Gator Saloon, shaking rain off his jacket as he made himself at home. Outside, the monsoon continued.
Cars were flooding.
The river rising. People frantically searching for backup generators in case they lost power.
The bartender, Cooter Willis, set a cold black-and-tan in front of him, and Mack nodded his thanks.
He sipped the beer, hoping the cold liquid would soothe his nerves. But that same soul-deep ache ate at him as the storm continued to rage. Every time it rained, the haunting memories returned.
Half of New Orleans’s residents probably shared them.
Images of Lily and their little boy flashed in his mind.
If his son had survived, he would be eight. Mack would be carrying him to Saints games, teaching him how to shuck oysters, taking him gator watching in his pirogue in the bayou.
And Lily...beautiful, sweet Lily. She’d been too good for a man like him, but that hadn’t seemed
to matter. If she’d lived, they’d be making love right now, maybe making a second baby.
He chugged the beer, then slammed the glass down on the bar.
Reading his mood, Cooter slid him another one.
He’d been nursing his wounds for so long he didn’t know how to do anything else. Hiding out in bayou country while the city rebuilt itself.
Grieving.
And waiting for the chance
to clear his name.
Eight years later, and he was no closer to that than the day Lee Barnaby had him hauled to jail. But he had been doing his research, keeping an eye on all the players.
He turned his second beer up and drank, the stench of his conversation with Barnaby still eating at him.
He hated most that Lily had died believing he was on the take.
“You’re just like your
old man,” Barnaby had said. “You’ll die in prison, too.”
Hell, his father might have been dirty. But Mack had worked hard to stay on the up-and-up.
It hadn’t mattered, though.
Sure, there had been corruption in the NOPD. The feds had known it and had enlisted him and his best friend, Remy Comeaux, into helping Special Agent Ray Storm with the investigation. The task force had been
close to breaking that corruption wide open when Katrina hit.
Then all their lives had gone to hell.
He and Remy had been arrested. Ray transferred to God knew where.
The bar grew noisy as Friday night patrons filed in, and Cooter flipped on the TV.
A special news report suddenly interrupted the commercial, and a photograph of the very man he hated flashed on the screen. Lee
Barnaby.
In handcuffs.
What the hell?
“In a shocking twist tonight, our city’s chief of police, Lee Barnaby, has been arrested on charges of corruption as well as assault and attempted murder.” The camera flashed onto Barnaby, who ducked his head, obviously trying to avoid being seen on camera.
“Private detective Remy Comeaux, who was once part of the NOPD himself, not only
found evidence of drug trafficking, but apparently he saved Carlotta Worthington’s life when Mr. Barnaby allegedly assaulted her.” The reporter took a breath, then continued, “NOPD officer Doyle Shriver was killed when he became suspicious, leading to Lee Barnaby’s arrest on corruption, tampering with evidence and the far more heinous crimes of the attempted murder of Carlotta Worthington. At this
point, detectives believe they are just beginning to uncover the truth as to Mr. Barnaby’s criminal activity. A full investigation is now under way.”
Mack’s pulse hammered. Remy had phoned him a couple of times this past week, but he hadn’t taken the call. He hadn’t known why Remy was back.
Did he wonder if Remy and Ray believed he was dirty?
Suddenly the beer burned like acid in
his belly. He motioned to Cooter to get him a shrimp po’boy so he could sober up.
If Remy proved Barnaby was dirty, maybe Mack could prove Barnaby had set him up. It wouldn’t bring back his wife and son, but clearing his name would be something.
* * *
L
ILY
L
ANDRY
R
IVET
LEANED
over to kiss her son good-night, her heart swelling with love. He might have been born on the worst night
in the history of New Orleans, but he was the best thing that had ever happened to her.
And every time she looked at him, she saw Mack Rivet, his father.
They shared the same coal-black hair, the same soul-deep brown eyes and the same bad-boy attitude.
It was a damn shame Mack hadn’t gotten to know him.
Winston gave her a surly look as if he knew it was bedtime but he wasn’t
ready, and she almost laughed.
Maybe it was better he hadn’t known his father. Especially after what she’d learned the night of Katrina...
“Do you have to go tonight, Mom?” Winston asked.
Lily ruffled his hair. “I told Grandpa I would, honey. But if you need anything, Anita will be here.”
“I’m too old for a babysitter,” Winston said with a pout.
“Anita is Grandpa’s cook
and maid and part of the family,” Lily said. “So be nice to her.”
Lily kissed him again. “Ten more minutes, then get some sleep. We’ll go to the parade tomorrow.”
His eyes lit up, and he crawled into bed with his computer. One of his favorite parts of living in New Orleans was the parades. And Mardi Gras had been an exciting experience.
The kid was obsessed with alligators, too.
She left the room, then grabbed her shawl.
She’d agreed to accompany her father to help him with the fundraiser. Gerard Barrow had been the deputy director of the Louisiana Disaster Avoidance Task Force, LDAT, before Katrina. Since the flooding, he’d worked hard to rebuild the city. Her father had been his right-hand man, and she had joined the efforts.
She checked her lipstick in
the mirror then descended the steps. Her father was waiting with his driver. He ushered her into the limo, and they headed toward the Quarter.
But loneliness settled into her as they drove down Saint Charles Avenue, and she fingered the emerald stone at her neck. It was smaller than the expensive jewelry her father had given her, but Mack had bought it for her the night after they’d first
made love, and she hadn’t been able to let go of it.
Even after NOPD officer Charles Gibbons had shown her proof that Mack was a dirty cop and that he had been cheating on her.
* * *
M
ACK
PULLED
HIS
JACKET
up to keep the rain from soaking his neck as he went to meet Remy.
A limo rolled by, spewing rain all over him, and he cursed. Damn rich people thought they owned the world.
Maybe that had been Barnaby’s problem. He’d wanted to be one of them.
Mack never had. Never would.
Even if he had wanted it, he wouldn’t have fit. Lily’s father had pointed that out repeatedly.
He ducked beneath an awning. The rain had finally stopped, but water stood in the alleys, dripping from the storefronts. A half-dozen patrons strolled in and out of the bars, and tourists
rushed by. A man and woman holding hands caught his eye as they stopped to window-shop at the jewelry store where he’d bought Lily an emerald, and his gut tightened.
But the sight of Remy Comeaux with his Saints hat on jerked Mack back to his mission. Remy visually searched the area. Maybe he was worried about repercussions from Barnaby’s arrest.
If Barnaby had cronies working for him,
they might seek revenge against Remy.
Mack walked toward him, his gaze tracking the area in case he was walking into a trap.
Once a cop, always a cop.
“Long time.” Remy gestured toward the fence behind them. “Last time I saw you we were leaving that jail.”
Mack chuckled. “Yeah, I heard your papers got lost.”
“Yours probably did, too,” Remy said.
“That doesn’t mean
that my name is clear.”
Remy nodded. “Barnaby’s in jail. That’s a start. But he’s just a small part of this game.”
“Go on.”
“Like Ray said eight years ago, the corruption runs about as deep and wide as Lake Pontchartrain.”
Mack shoved his hands in his pockets. “Any evidence?”
“Suspicions ranging from police corruption to financial plans for the city’s rebuilding efforts
to politics.”
“You’re talking about the mayor?” Mack asked.
“Yeah, maybe even higher.”
Remy removed a file from inside his jacket and handed it to him. “Look over that and see what you think.”
Mack opened the file. Charles Gibbons’s name was scrawled there, although Remy had made a note that Gibbons had led Remy to a drug dealer connected to Barnaby, so Gibbons was an ally.
Mayor Barrow was on the list. So was Melvin Landry.
His mind raced.
Landry had money and was buddies with Barrow. If there was corruption with the rebuilding funds, Barrow and Landry might be involved.
Suspicions rose. Landry had disliked him, hadn’t wanted him to marry his precious daughter, Lily.
Had Landry framed him to get him away from his daughter?
“What do you
think?” Remy asked. “Are you in?”
Mack’s gaze met Remy’s. “You want me to work with you? I thought—”
“That I believed the charges against you?” Remy’s low chuckle rumbled. “Did you believe them about me?”
Mack shook his head. “Not for a damn minute.”
A smile creased his friend’s face. “Me, neither.”
Emotions Mack hadn’t felt in a long time hit him. “Oh, yeah, I’m in. If
Lily’s father set me up, I’ll nail him.”
Remy pushed another piece of paper into his hand. “Landry’s at a dinner with the mayor now at this restaurant.”
He and Remy agreed to keep in touch, and Mack walked toward the restaurant, a pricey two-story establishment. The rain began to drizzle again, the sky dark with more clouds.
All he could think about was the fact that he might finally
find out who’d ruined his reputation and sent him to jail on trumped-up charges.
He stopped across the street from the place, the sounds of Bourbon Street echoing with partiers.
He people watched for a while, listening to the rhythmic blues and zydeco music, then finally the dinner party spilled onto the veranda overlooking the city.
Mayor Barrow. His wife, Genita. Three other men
he didn’t recognize.
Then Melvin Landry strode outside, a glass of champagne in his hand, a woman on his arm.
Mack squinted through the rain to see who was with him, but shadows hid the woman’s face. Still, she had blond hair piled on top of her head, blond hair that reminded him so much of Lily that his throat closed.
She said something to Landry, walked to the edge of the veranda
and looked out over the Quarter, a sliver of streetlight catching her face.
Mack staggered backward.
Dear God. It was Lily.
