Old Black Magic Page 6

  Soap worked its way into my eyes. I raised my face to the water, then quickly cupped the showerhead with my hand. I’d heard a sound in the other room. Shit. I blinked hard, the soap still burning. Cursing Hitchcock for a lifetime of Psycho redux, I tore a towel from the steel rack on the other end of bath enclosure.

  K.T.’s voice came as a relief. For about five seconds. “What the hell is all this blood?” she shouted through the door. She must have seen my clothes and backpack. I peeked out as the bathroom door slammed open. “Are you okay?” she demanded. Her skin was flushed. The veins in her neck pulsed visibly. I could tell that her emotions were swinging wildly from fury to fear to relief.

  “I’m sorry, baby.” I reached out a hand. “I wanted to call you, I really did, but things got…rough.”

  “Oh, damn you.” She covered her eyes and shook her head. For a moment, I thought she was about to retreat, then she burst out, “You bastard! I can’t lose you again, don’t you know that? Damn.” All of a sudden she was crying.

  “Aw, K.T.” I pushed aside the shower curtain, but before I could step out, she was inside with me, fully clothed.

  “Damn you, damn you,” she cried, pounding my shoulder with her fist.

  My lips burrowed into her hair. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. When her sobs had quieted, I murmured into her ear, “You do know you’re supposed to be naked, don’t you?”

  Hands slapped my clavicle. She cursed me again. Meanwhile, I started stripping her, tossing the sopping clothes over the curtain rod. A twinkle returned to her eyes and all at once it was my turn to cry. We stood there, clinging to each other like estranged lovers united after too many years. Had only a few hours passed since we held each other like this? My mouth found hers and my kiss demanded response. K.T. pressed against me, her flesh at last exposed and against me. I clasped her waist, her buttocks, yet no matter how firmly I pulled her to me, my body needed more. I sank to my knees, her swollen belly pillowing my head. She eased back, lowering my head, gently tugging my hair. My tongue found her, drank her in. The quickening of her breath transported me. The world collapsed around us and all that mattered were my hands, her smell, the water pouring over us, her sounds, the pounding of her pulse against my mouth. Later we both sank into the tub, rocking against each other, calling each other’s names over and over, an incantation.

  After we had wrung out K.T.’s clothes and strung them on the dryer line, while we were toweling off I noticed K.T.’s eyes shift to the bruises on my breasts. With a lift of her eyebrows she asked me if she’d caused them. I reassured her, then reluctantly told her about the day. She shook her head and walked out.

  “If you want me to drop this, I will,” I said, surprising myself.

  She looked quizzically at me. “You can’t be serious.”

  “I am.” She watched me apply the fresh bandages.

  “Oh great.” She threw her arms up. “So now what do I do? Tell you to give up your work, let some other idiot try to save unknown lives, or just say, fine darling, go get yourself killed, I’m so proud.”

  “Those aren’t the only choices, K.T.”

  The key to the mini-fridge stuck. K.T. bumped me out of the way and opened it with a flick of the wrist, then grabbed a carton of milk. She tore the container open from the wrong end.

  I patted down the bandage, then reached over and grabbed another Yoo-hoo, though the temptation to guzzle something stronger crossed my mind. New Orleans does that to me.

  Apparently, K.T. considered the same thing. She said, “God, what I wouldn’t do for a beer,” and grimaced as the milk went down. “Okay, Rob, tell me what you want me to do.”

  “I’m not sure. This morning, you made a crack about me making up for murdering my sister.”

  “It was a stupid, mean—”

  “Yeah, it was, but you were right. It doesn’t matter if I was a kid. Or maybe it’s worse, ’cause every second of her death is hardwired into my brain. Every sound, every scent, every drop of blood. She haunts me and the only thing that’s helped me make peace is this damn job. Is that really so horrible?”

  “The thought of something happening to you is what I find horrible. Can’t you at least take this time off, while we’re here? I promise to spend more time with you than I have so far. Winnie will have to understand.”

  The plaintive tone made me ache. I reached for her, but she wasn’t ready to be held again, not unless she got what she wanted from me, what I wanted to give but couldn’t. “I wish it was that easy, K.T., I do. But this isn’t just any murder. Rubin’s killing is connected to Mary Ryan’s murder.”

  Her head whipped in my direction, fear exploding it her eyes. “The man Tony calls the eggshell maniac? That one? Oh, Christ, I can’t take this.” I watched her flutter nervously around the room, stuffing her bag until it looked ready to pop.

  “K.T., I’m playing back-up on this investigation. Theo Sweeney is the one with all the exposure.”

  Her eyes flared. She flung a finger in the direction of my bandages. “Yes, I can see that.”

  “I don’t want to let Ryan down—”

  “Hey, we both missed out on having fathers—”

  “K.T.—” The warning in my voice made her jaw muscles jump. We stared at each other for at least ten full seconds before she broke off eye contact.

  “Okay, okay. Enough.” She flung her bag on the floor. “So do it. Investigate away” She fell back on the bed and kicked off her shoes. “Look, Robin, I’m really wiped. We’ll talk more later, but right now I need to crash. I told Winnie earlier that I’d stick it out to closing tomorrow, but tonight I need to sleep. I was kind of hoping we could spend the time together. Guess I was wrong.”

  The guilt alarm pinged. “I’ll get back as fast as I can,” I said. “Believe me, Sweeney is not my idea of a fun night on the town.” I pulled out a pair of black jeans and a black cut-sleeve T-shirt. Preparation for a butch night. When I was fully dressed, I plopped down next to her on the bed. “Honey, if you don’t want me to go, I won’t. Just say the word.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Oh, no I am not falling into that trap. It’s your call, Rob. If you need to do this, then go ahead. If you want to stay here, with me, believe me, you are more than welcome.”

  “You’re not making this easy.”

  “I don’t intend to.”

  I should’ve stopped right there, crawled next to her and swept her into my arms. If I’d known what was coming, nothing could’ve driven me from her side. Instead, I said, “Well, if I do decide to go, you’ll be okay, right? I mean, we’ll be okay?”

  “We’re great, Robin,” she said, a little coldly. She must have seen me bristle because she added quickly, “Hon, I’m not trying to be difficult. Earlier tonight, I talked to Winston about our fight. He’s the one who insisted I come back here. As far as I was concerned, if you didn’t care enough about me to be where you were supposed to be, when you were supposed to be, you weren’t worth my worry. Of course, worry may have been the reason my crème brûlée was more brûlée than crème. Honestly, Rob, when you get involved in a case—” With a karate chop to the air, she cut off her words. “I promised myself not to do that. What I was going to say was that Winnie gave me one of his twelve-step lectures. At first, I wanted to toss a pound of flour at him, but after a while, he made sense. I can’t control what you do, all I can do is tell you how I feel. I hate your job. I hate watching you get hurt. But I’m not going anywhere.”

  “You’re too damned healthy.”

  “Tell me that when Babboo’s not making me feel so sick.” She edged back onto the bed. “My damn feet are swollen.”

  “Guess it’s my turn for caretaking.” I fluffed a pillow behind her, removed her socks and rubbed her feet. “By the way, the Eggs Sardou was great.”

  She blinked at me. “You had Eggs Sardou in the bayou?”

  “No, silly, from room service. Remember?” One of the things I’ve learned about pregnancy is that it wreaks havoc on the memory
bank. “You ordered the eggs after you left. Anything coming back yet?”

  She looked me full in the face. “Honey, I was so angry this morning, the last thing I would’ve done was order you some fancy-ass brunch.”

  I averted my gaze, but it was too late.

  “What is it?” she asked, although I could tell she knew exactly what I was thinking. “Couldn’t it be a simple mistake?”

  “Whoever ordered the meal gave this room number and my name.”

  “So what. How many hotels have you stayed in? Are you saying it can’t be a screwup?”

  Shimmying up next to her, I asked, “When you talked to the victim—”

  “You mean Lisa Rubin?” she corrected me, her eyes flashing.

  “Yes, Lisa. Did you notice who was standing nearby?”

  “Are you joking? It was our opening night. Winston and I did the calculations today. We topped two-hundred-fifty customers by nine o’clock. We were surrounded by people.”

  “But you remember Lisa?” A unexpected twinge of jealousy snuck in.

  “Yes. We talked for twenty minutes or so. She was there with a friend, a local food critic. Dreyer Carr. A chubby man in his forties. Gay as they come. She told me about her husband’s death and said she couldn’t believe he’d left her as executor. The breakup was pretty bad, I gathered.”

  “You guys got personal real fast. Impressive.”

  She picked up on my tone and flared her nostrils at me. “Okay, Robin. She was a little drunk and, well, I guess maybe she was trying to impress me.”

  “Why would she do that?”

  A flutter of eyelashes came in response.

  “Rubin was gay?”

  “Bisexual.”

  “And she hit on you?”

  “Robin, remember she was murdered last night? I think your interrogation is going off course.”

  I wiped my nose like a boxer. Off course, my ass. “Fine, fine.” Aw, shoot. My mouth wouldn’t stop. “You’re telling me that during the thirty minutes or so when the two of us weren’t hip-to-hip in that overgrown playground you call a restaurant, you decided to cruise?”

  “Oh Lawd. From distance to domination in one run-on sentence. Honey, I needed air. She just happened to be outside smoking.”

  “Who started the conversation?”

  “I did. Winston had pointed Dreyer out to me earlier. I was hardly pleased to see one of the town’s better-known food critics outside the restaurant.” She noticed my quick smile. “Baby all better now?” She lifted my hand and kissed the palm.

  “Do you have his phone number?”

  She stared at me, wide-eyed. “Now?”

  “Please.”

  K.T. rolled off the side of the bed, rummaged through her purse and withdrew a business card. Her movements were stiff and exaggerated. I took the card with one hand and leaned in for a kiss. My lips found air.

  “You better get going, Robin.”

  I glanced at my watch. “Guess you’re right.”

  We stared at each other like gunfighters waiting for the first draw.

  K.T. said, “You look like a cast member for West Side Story, or maybe Grease.” Her index finger flexed. I grabbed it with mine.

  “Then I must be ready to rumble.” This time, I landed the kiss and said, “Love you.”

  “And I love you, too, Robin. So much it scares me.” K.T. stared at me with her doe eyes.

  I knew what she meant, but couldn’t admit it right then. The show had to go on. And vulnerability was not in the script. “Get some sleep.” I smooched her palm, winked and sauntered out.

  As soon as I exited the lobby, the heat smacked me in the face, followed by a swarm of flying termites. I batted them off and headed up to Bourbon Street.

  New Orleans ran in reverse time. At ten, the town was just starting to stretch its limbs. Strolling along the main drag was like listening to a schizophrenic spin the dial on a too-loud radio. Music crashed out of bars and restaurants in tidal waves of blues, zydeco and rock. The air stank of stale whiskey and overly sweet frozen drinks, which spilled over as drunken conventioneers weaved down Bourbon. Sticky puddles slushed under my feet as I bumped through a crowd of kids attempting some bizarre dance that consisted of severe jerking motions. I’d long ago decided that teenagers come to New Orleans to learn how to guzzle, walk and conjugate fuck at the same time.

  The Dock of the Bay was at the far end of Bourbon, where the crowds thinned and turned rougher with every passing hour. Sweeney had once again taken me to the edge of my comfort zone.

  The French doors of the bar, were thrown open to the street and a line of red-vested waiters streamed outside, where they instantly strutted through a dance routine keyed into Otis Redding’s classic hit. I was a full thirty minutes late. Trying to find Sweeney in the bar was a little less difficult than trying to retrieve a lost ring from the local junkyard. Bodies pressed together to form an impenetrable wall. I elbowed my way through the front line and stopped cold. A bruiser of a man crashed by me, almost knocking me to my knees. I caught a glimpse of a tattoo on the back of his bristly scalp. Egghead. How appropriate.

  “Take it easy, honey. Let’s get you to a table. Hey, Bobby!” I was handed off from one prep school boy to another. Someone took a swipe at my derriere before it landed on a chair. What fun.

  The pheromone level in the place was downright atomic. Men and women who couldn’t get laid in any other state of the union had turned into sexual panthers in heat. The bar seethed with over-ripe heterosexuality. A few Midwestern John-Boys garbed in khakis and button-down shirts had stumbled on this hell-hole. They pumped their groins alongside emaciated women in their twenties, garbed in black leather, hair dyed Adams family black, noses pierced. Businessmen, drunk and horny, spat seductions at over-done colleagues with poofed hair. In less than five minutes, I counted five possible convention affairs. They seemed oblivious to the scowls the locals were throwing them.

  I checked out the other end of the dance floor. A tall, paunchy guy with a striped Land’s End shirt and pressed blue jeans grabbed his crotch like Michael Jackson and did a neck roll I’d only seen in the offices of chiropractors. His yowl reminded me of the sound my cats make at dinner time. Next to him was a peroxide blonde, clad in a too-tight devil-red dress with a plunging back. She licked her lips and started stripping another deranged businessman of his jacket and tie. I’d lay odds she, was an elementary school teacher.

  “Turns you on, doesn’t it?”

  I didn’t bother answering. “How the hell did you find me in here?”

  Sweeney rubbed his nose. “I caught your scent.”

  I sniffed my underarm. “Damn that deodorant.”

  He squeezed my knee. “Funny girl.”

  “Hands off, Sweeney.”

  “I understand your type tends to swing both ways.”

  “The only thing I’m likely to swing is my fist.”

  “True confessions. You ever been with a man?”

  I scraped back my chair.

  “Is that a no?”

  “Why the cross examination, Sweeney?”

  “I like to know what waters I’m swimming in.”

  “Still, deep and dangerous. I’d strongly suggest you keep your feet on soil.”

  “Ha. Firewater, pure firewater. Which reminds me…” He flagged down a waiter. “Whatcha drinking?”

  “Dixie.”

  He placed the order and then slammed a briefcase on the table. “Down to business.”

  “Great place for it. Could you have picked someplace noisier?” I shouted into his left ear.

  “Nope. This is it. Loud and ugly. You could kill someone in here and no one’d know it until broom time.”

  “Lovely thought.” He wasn’t wrong, though. The place smelled of sweat and rot. Papering the walls were dollar bills with names scrawled on them and yellowed business cards with lipstick prints. I noticed a roach crawling leisurely toward Sweeney. Dante’s Inferno had nothing on the Dock of the Bay. I slid the file
s toward me.

  “Start with the summary,” Sweeney hollered.

  I started by wiping his spit off my ear. Damn. He’d really nailed me. I stuck a hand in my back pocket. The tissue I expected to find there was gone. Instead my fingers closed on something hard.

  “What you got there, Miller?”

  My hand shook.

  “Holy shit.” His words, not mine.

  I held it up to the candlelight. The enamel took on the color of ripe cantaloupe. Sure enough, the two of us were staring at a human tooth.

  Chapter Five

  “Describe the guy that bumped you again.”

  “Damn it. I told you three times. Besides, it could’ve been one of the prep boys. Or anyone else, for that matter. These streets make New York look like Bedford Falls.”

  “But the tattoo. That can’t be a coincidence.”

  “Oh, hell, Sweeney, egghead doesn’t have to mean shit. Ninety percent of the jerks in this room qualify for that tattoo.”

  “You can’t be this stupid. Come on, give me the tooth.” He wiggled his fingers at me.

  “And what do you plan to do with it?”

  “Give it to my mama for Christmas. What do you think? I’ll pass it on to the N.O.P.D. Maybe it’s from Rubin. Better yet, maybe it’s from one of the earlier victims. You too shook to read the files?”

  I grunted no, flipped open the file folder and planted my elbows on the table. The bruiser who’d bumped me had skipped out at a pretty brisk pace. Sweeney thought the description matched a pal of NeVille’s, though the tattoo detail didn’t fit. I cupped my palms around my eyes. My heart was racing, but I wasn’t about to let Sweeney know.

  Reading the files didn’t help. I spread out four photographs with handwritten Post-it notes stuck to the corners.

  Eileen Anderson: 33 years old, Irish Catholic, certified social worker. Murdered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Friday, August 23, 1985.