Dark Lily: Shadows, Book 4 (15 page)

Chapter Seventeen

She froze. With sharp eyes, she scoured the underbrush. Then her senses engaged, and her fingers curled into fists. “Honest to God, Ryder, you are so lucky to be in possession of undamaged balls at this moment.”

Rising from his crouch in the trees, he handed her one of two backpacks. “Hey to you too, cousin. Care to tell me what I’ve done, other than bring you and Mitchell dry clothes, to warrant potential emasculation?”

“You scared the living hell out of me, pal. What frightens me can injure you.” She pressed the canvas pack between her palms, felt her hiking boots and softened. “Anyway, thanks for this. Word of warning though, don’t think so loud next time—if there is a next time, I hope not. It’s unnerving.”

“So’s the idea of having my nuts squashed for helping a former co-worker and a really spooky family member.”

Gaby discovered rain gear in the pack and smiled at him. “Okay, truce. Now tell me how it is that you’re Johnny-on-this-particular spot.”

“I’ve been following the Delta Belle. Mitchell wired himself with a tracking device. He contacted me when the first engine blew, told me you were going down. Leshad’s orders will be Delacroix’s loss.”

“And Phoebe’s.” Still battling with the pain of that, Gaby raised her voice above the rain and approaching thunder. “Mitchell?”

Ryder frowned. “Jesus, can you hear pins drop too?”

She pulled out her boots. “I can’t actually hear him yet. It’s the thing in my head.”

“How exactly does that work?”

“No idea. And the more I try to figure it out, the harder it is to do it. Mitchell?”

“Behind you.” He collapsed on the ground. “Some guy grabbed my ankle in the river and turned octopus. Any trouble?” he asked Ryder.

“Not so far.” Her cousin motioned inland. “Let’s keep it that way and move. My truck’s in the bushes.”

“Where’s my Jeep?”

“Parked out of sight at the boat dock. Morgan’s idling around the first bend.”

Gaby found a tree with thick limbs and enough Spanish moss to be both an umbrella and a curtain. While Mitchell and Ryder talked strategy, she dried off, changed into jeans, a cotton top, her boots and a dark brown rain jacket. As she tugged her ponytail through the back of an LA Dodgers cap, she recalled a long-ago train platform, and a beautiful woman with long red hair.

Except for the hair, which she thought might have changed color, she and Phoebe looked very much alike. Evidently they sounded alike and had similar body types. Making it all too easy for Phoebe to impersonate her.

Guilt sliced swift and keen. She couldn’t afford to dwell. Gaby understood that, but suppressing strong emotions was difficult for her. She’d learned how to do it. In fact, she’d been doing it for most of her life. Another gift from Phoebe, she supposed, and sighed over what she couldn’t recapture.

“Time to go.” Back in his customary jeans and too-cool black jacket, Mitchell joined her. He stowed the pair of guns Ryder must have brought along in his waistband. Then he gestured northward, where lightning flashed and Morgan’s boat waited. “We’re heading back to Bokur. They’ll pick up our trail, no problem.”

“They.” Gaby shouldered her pack. “More of Leshad’s men?”

Mitchell’s smile was faint. “He’ll always send a backup contingent, Gaby. But I caught a glimpse of the guy holding Phoebe’s right arm. She knocked his mask with her elbow. Pretty sure one of her captors was Senator Best himself.”

“You think Best will come to Bokur?”

“Thinking Best. Hoping for Leshad.” His tone grew malicious. “And dreaming of feeding both of them to a pair of grinning gators.”

* * * * *

Phoebe dragged her feet for as long as she could. She swore at the men who pulled her along, and did her utmost to be Gaby.

Mitchell was here, she warned them. And Crucible. She knew all about Madeleine Lessard’s second sight. She also knew what Leshad wanted, but no way would he get it from her.

“Quiet.” CJ squeezed her arm. “Stop fighting us, Gabrielle. A little cooperation is all that’s required. Then you’ll be free to go.”

Did he—? He couldn’t believe that. Could he? Dumbfounded, Phoebe stilled her struggles. Dear God, the man was a moron. Senator Moron.

Her feet slipped on the deck. CJ’s ape-like companion firmed up his grip until it cut off her circulation. “There.” The ape nodded at a man who, like every other man, wore black pants and a cape. Except this man’s mask covered his entire face, and he stood in the darkest spot left to him on the wounded riverboat.

Leshad. He gave off nothing, not the slightest hint of psychic energy. But Phoebe knew what she was looking at.

Leshad motioned for the ape to release her. “Not you, Caleb,” he warned in a horrible, computer-altered voice. “You keep a tight grip, and have your knife ready.”

Phoebe spied a glint of metal in her peripheral vision. As the master ordered, so would his puppet senator do.

She tugged on the arm CJ held because that was what Gaby would do. “You want the impossible, Leshad.” She made herself sound defiant with only the faintest trace of fear. “Madeleine’s curse can’t be lifted. That’s not the way voodoo works.”

“Then I’ll have to content myself with a counter curse. And don’t tell me that can’t be done either. I’ve studied the practice. Much more is possible than most people realize. Sadly—” he drew an air circle around her mask, “—I sense very little magic in you.”

Phoebe jerked her chin. “You sense what I allow you to sense, Leshad.”

The deck beneath their feet groaned. “This ship’s ready to go, Caleb.” A smile crept into the altered tone. “Kill the bitch.”

CJ’s fingers sank into Phoebe’s flesh. “But you haven’t—”

“I said kill her. No buts.”

The knife rose. However, CJ still seemed mystified. “If I kill her, you’ll lose your blood connection to Madeleine.”

“Will I?”

“Unless Gaby’s a twin. Phoebe and I only had one child.”

“That may be true, Caleb. But the child you made isn’t here.” Before Phoebe could evade him, Leshad snaked out his hand and slapped her mask away.

“Phoebe!” The knife in CJ’s hand stilled. Everything went still, except Leshad’s heaving chest and the sparks that crackled in the air between them.

The boat vibrated a few more degrees to port. In a single stride, Leshad grasped CJ’s wrist and forced him to turn the knife. “Goodbye, whore. You’re welcome to hang around as an ineffectual ghost and wait for your daughter to join you. But you and I are done.”

With his gloved fingers wrapped around CJ’s wrist, he shoved the knife between her ribs. Then he laughed in that hideous, twisted voice. A card appeared in front of her face. “We wouldn’t want Crucible to be disappointed. On the off chance he or anyone finds your body.”

Phoebe’s vision dimmed. The knife blade came out, the card went onto the tip, and the blade went back in. But Phoebe felt nothing. She simply stared past Leshad into the night and whispered to an apparition no one else could see. “I did my best for her, Mama. I pray it was enough.”

* * * * *

She’d taken less than ten steps away from the cypress trees when pain, an agonizing slash of it, cut through Gaby’s core. Gasping, unable to catch her breath, she fell to her knees, doubled over.

“Shit. Shit!” She sucked in air, but it didn’t help. Pain oozed, black and viscous, from her heart to her brain.

“What is it?” Mitchell kept her from pitching face-first into the mud. “Gaby, what’s wrong?”

It came to her in smudged red snatches. A knife. A man’s hand. Another hand clamped to the knife holder’s wrist. She felt strength and power in the gloved fingers. She sensed cruelty in the iron grip.

“He killed her.”

“Who killed her?” Mitchell let Gaby huddle on the path, but he didn’t let her curl into a ball as she wanted to.

Gaby’s blood turned to ice-water. “Leshad forced CJ Best to stab Phoebe. He grabbed CJ’s wrist and shoved a knife in. Here.” She brought her hands away from her ribs. Her palms were red and shaking.

“Is that—fuck, is that blood?”

“Phoebe’s, I think.” Her stomach pitched. Her head spun. “I’ve never had a nightmare this grisly.” She closed her eyes as rain diluted the blood. “It’s nothing—for me anyway. Leshad’s livid.”

“Livid or terrified?” Ryder asked from her other side.

“I can’t tell. I can’t read him. Or CJ. Not really. But I got Phoebe’s dying thought.” Gaby raised her eyes to Mitchell’s. “She believes—believed—we scored a direct hit tonight. Leshad won’t be sending any more hired guns to do his dirty work. I’m CJ’s natural daughter. It’s CJ’s job to find me and hold me. Until the moon is full tomorrow.”

* * * * *

Now they had a full moon to worry about. Although, Mitchell figured that could be Leshad’s superstitious nature creeping into the mix and nothing of any true import in the voodoo realm.

Gaby agreed. She thought the lunar phase was more likely to affect the island’s residents than Leshad. “We’re talking about the lunacy of a lunatic,” she maintained. “Full moon, new moon, no moon, he is what he’s been for a very long time. A homicidal phantom who’s terrified of something he can’t begin to understand.”

“Does anyone understand it?” Mitchell sure as hell didn’t. Although, for reasons he didn’t care to examine right then, he was glad to be back on the island, even if he hadn’t managed to get more than a few hours of sleep since they’d returned.

“I think Madeleine understood.” Gaby pivoted. “Mitchell, why are we staying at the hotel? No offense to Annie, but it’s not exactly home sweet home. And there are people here. Couples, singles, no families at the moment, but—ah. Right. That’s the point, isn’t it? There are people here.”

“And five separate escape routes should we need them. Annie dug up an old site map for me. I looked it over this afternoon while you were resting.”

Gaby paced the room like a caged feline. Mitchell knew where her mind had stalled, but there was little he could say or do to help her get past it. Phoebe was dead, and CJ Best was undoubtedly en route. Leshad too, if you liked lunatic long shots.

Careful to keep away from the window, she rubbed her bare arms. “Do you think Ryder can divert Crucible and his team?”

“If he can’t, he’ll warn us.”

“And the reason we don’t want Crucible involved in this part of whatever the hell we’re doing is?”

Mitchell checked his guns for the umpteenth time since night had fallen. “Too many chefs. Cliché’s old, but it’s applicable. Also, I only trust his team so far.”

She almost smiled. “You know Fred’s a bundle of nerves, right? Until this thing with Leshad started on Bokur, his biggest worry was whose storage shed his cousin might set fire to next.”

“Or whose cash box Harley might decide to rifle?”

Gaby resumed her pacing. “Harley’s mother was bipolar. ‘Tetched’ is the term they use in these parts. Harley’s that with a side of ADHD. It’s not his fault.”

“Guy’s still a firebug with sticky fingers.”

“Better that than a homicidal phantom looking for someone to release him from a curse that’s probably… Well, no, I imagine the curse is real enough. After all, I’ve seen ghosts my whole life. That ability has to spring from some kind of power.”

When she shivered, Mitchell came up behind and put his arms around her. “I know it feels like we’re sitting on a landmine, Gaby, but it’s not that bad. We let ourselves be seen in New Orleans. Leshad should be plenty pissed that he still hasn’t caught you. So now we’re back in your safe place. Rain’s stopped, ground fog’s moving in and Leshad will know that Bokur has a reputation as a haunted island. For all we know, he might get partway here and panic.”

“Gee, why can’t I picture that?” But she rested her head on his shoulder. “Maybe it’s because I know he’s too obsessed to be cautious at this point.”

They heard a knock. “Gaby? Mitchell?” Emily Dillard, the ghost-hunting professor from Tulane, called through the door. “I hope you don’t mind. I brought you some tea.”

Mitchell regarded Gaby in mild amusement. “Guests deliver nighttime tea in this hotel?”

“You stay for more than three nights, you’re family,” she said. “Come in, Emily.”

The woman entered, awkwardly balancing a large tray. “Annie’s little girl has red spots. It’s probably heat rash, but Annie’s gone home to check just in case. Old Joe’s asleep, and on those nights when I can’t do the same, I brew a pot of sassafras tea. I heard your voices when I went down, so I brought extra cups.”

“That’s very kind of you.” Gaby smiled. “Thank you.”

Mitchell took the tray, leaving Emily to sit and offer Gaby an expectant look. “If you don’t mind satisfying the curiosity of an aging professor who loves ghosts, legends and anything out of the ordinary, might I inquire why you’re staying in the hotel when I know for a fact you have an apartment above your wonderfully atmospheric shop?”

If that was a question, Mitchell lost it early on. The tea didn’t interest him much either. At least not until Emily poured it.

“Sassafras with a stiff shot of local moonshine.” She winked and handed him a cup. “That’ll grow hair. In all the wrong places, I suspect, but bottoms up in any case.”

She sent Gaby, who appeared preoccupied, a reassuring look. “No need to scramble around for an answer, dear. I’m a nosy creature, everyone tells me so. Now, you drink that down. It’s an excellent balm for the nerves if you’re nervous, which I think you must be, otherwise why would you be here rather than across the street? Unless you’re having plumbing problems.” She rolled her eyes and patted her chest as Gaby sat down. “Heavens, just saying those words reminds me of a dreadful story.”

Rocking forward, she laughed like a woman who’d already downed several cups of the doctored tea. Mitchell took a sampling taste, hissed in a breath and upped the
doctored
part to ninety proof.

Emily tapped Gaby’s knee. “I can promise you instant results, my dear. You drink, you relax.”

“I’m not tense,” Gaby said, but she took an absent sip. And another. A few seconds later, she frowned. “Not sure why I’m seeing spotted elephants, though. Or…Celia?”

“Celia? Where?” Mitchell followed her gaze.

So did Emily. “Is there a ghost here with us, dear?”