Blood on the Bayou

  “Let’s go,” Quinn said.

  * * * *

  The rougarou picked up the cane and pointed it toward Danni.

  She stayed dead still. There was no way to escape. And the thing didn’t speak. It just stood there, impossibly tall with its giant wolf’s head, neck, and ears. A mask, of course. A man beneath.

  “You will be dead,” she said. “I swear it.”

  The man who’d taken her captive appeared from behind the rougarou. “You think you can curse the rougarou. I knew that you were the reincarnation of the witch. I knew it.”

  “I don’t curse people and I’m not a witch,” she said. “But I can tell you that Michael Quinn will be looking for me, and when he finds me, you two are going to pay.”

  She was sure that she heard the rougarou speak beneath his mask, and he seemed angry with the man who’d seized her. Seemed like threatening had bought her time, though how anyone would find her in the swamp, she didn’t know.

  She pointed at the man who’d seized her, deciding to play a hunch. “You’re the illegitimate son of a man named Jacob Devereaux, aren’t you?” Her guess got their attention, so she continued. “Why you would want to follow in the footsteps of a father who didn’t even recognize your existence, I don’t know. And why you would be subservient to another, when you’re the son of the last rougarou, that’s mind boggling.”

  “You are a witch, definitely a witch!” the man cried. “But I will be the next rougarou, whether your idiot friends hire me or not.”

  One more piece of the puzzle clicked. And with her only goal to keep him talking, she threw another accusation their way. “So is the rougarou Victoria? Did she get you to apply for a job with David and Julian so that you could find out more about what they were doing? Were you supposed to try to sabotage their tours? Guess what? You didn’t even impress them enough to remember your name.”

  “Shut up, witch! My name is Jim Novak and they damn well know it. You’re just stupid! You’re a stupid witch,” he said.

  The rougarou slammed the cane against the man and whispered something that Danni didn’t catch.

  Novak stepped toward her. She leapt at him, striking, clawing, screaming, using all of her strength. To no avail. He gave her a head-ringing pop atop her head and the world began to spin.

  He tossed her over his shoulder and headed outside.

  She struggled as he set her down and reached for ropes.

  She was being tied to a tree.

  In the time that he’d left her before the arrival of the rougarou, Jim Novak had been preparing for her death.

  She wasn’t going to be beaten or ripped to death.

  She was going to be burned alive.

  * * * *

  Selena Duarte brought Quinn out back, to the land side of her Honey Swamp shack, and pointed far to the west.

  “Through all those trees,” she said. “When I see him, it’s in that direction. I’ve seen him there many times. I don’t know what’s back there. It’s overgrown and dense. And there are potholes and swampy land in between. All kinds of critters. Gators, snakes. They leave the rougarou alone. But you may not make it through.”

  “I’ll make it,” Quinn told her. “And Selena. Thank you.”

  He headed in the direction she’d pointed. By his reckoning, there was a lot of marshy land between Selena’s, the main swamp, and the road. But there had to be something out there. Some kind of old camp or shack. As he walked, he called Larue and told him where he was and where he was going.

  “Find out,” he said. “There has to be something around these coordinates. Get some techs on it. Maybe there’s a way for cops to get there by a road of some kind before I can make it.”

  Larue promised he was on it.

  Quinn kept walking. Grass tangled around his feet. The mud was ankle-deep. He came upon a patch of bare land by a little pool. A gator, six or seven feet long, lay half in and out of the water.

  “Brother, leave me alone and I’ll leave you alone,” Quinn said.

  He skirted the alligator and kept going. Luckily, the beast continued bathing in what remained of the sunlight. He paused, looking ahead. For a moment, he thought that he saw smoke.

  Which quickly dissipated.

  He blinked but kept going, with a landmark now.

  Toward the smoke.

  * * * *

  “You can’t kill me,” Danni said. “I’m the Good Witch of Honey Swamp, remember? I can make it rain.”

  She so startled Jim Novak that, for a moment, he paused and looked up at the sky.

  “I call upon the rain,” she yelled, feeling ridiculous.

  But she had given him pause.

  The rougarou let out some impatient sound and Novak stepped forward again and lit the dried branches around Danni’s feet.

  She inhaled an odd smell.

  Gasoline.

  On the wood.

  “I call upon the rain,” she shouted again.

  And to her amazement, it began to rain.

  * * * *

  Quinn ran, tripping and stumbling.

  To make matters worse, it had begun to rain. Heavy. Almost blinding him. His phone rang. It nearly slipped from his fingers as he answered, still making his way through the mud and muck.

  Larue.

  “There’s an old shack out there. It’s been there for years and years. You’re not going to believe who originally held the property rights around it.”

  “Count D’Oro?” Quinn said.

  “Bingo. We’ve got a team heading there as quickly as possible.”

  “I’m almost there.”

  “Quinn, we found Victoria Miller and Gene Andre. I had them brought in. They did hire that guy, Jim Novak is his name, to harass David Fagin and Julian Henri. But they swear that’s all they did. They said that he found them and instigated it. He promised he’d find out what David and Julian were up to and that he’d do his best to make their new company miserable. Victoria paid him, but then he wanted more money. Of course, Gene says he was against it from the get-go and wanted to tell us.” The doubt was clear in Larue’s voice.

  “You have both of them?” Quinn asked.

  “In custody.”

  “Thanks. Gotta keep moving.”

  “Police are on the way.”

  “They may not be in time.”

  He hung up and renewed his efforts with a burst of speed. He was pretty sure he knew just who the rougarou might be.

  And he’d given him plenty of time.

  To set a trap.

  * * * *

  The rain doused the fire, despite the gasoline. But as the sudden deluge eased, Novak stepped forward to light it again.

  “I control the wind and the rain,” she yelled, praying that the Louisiana weather would not let her down. And, to her relief, it did not. The rain fell harder.

  Novak let out a cry of terror.

  The rougarou seemed undaunted and stepped forward. Tied to the tree, Danni could do nothing. The “creature” drew out a knife. But instead of planting it in her, he severed the ties binding her and drew her from the tree.

  Rain kept falling.

  The heavy wolf’s head cane was raised, ready to smash it down on her head. But a mammoth mud creature burst from the swamp and tackled the rougarou.

  She blinked away the rain.

  The mud creature was Quinn.

  Quinn straddled the costumed man, pinning him down, wrenching the cane from him and throwing it away. The rougarou struggled for the knife. Quinn backhanded him across the face so hard that his arms fell flat. Danni dived for the knife. She heard a howl. It was Novak, racing for her.

  She braced herself, ready to use the knife.

  An explosion pierced the air.

  Gunfire.

  From Quinn’s weapon.

  Novak was hit in the kneecap. He let out a howl of pain that seemed to tear through the swamp as if a beast had been brought down.

  “Get up,” Quinn shouted at the rougarou.

&
nbsp; As he did, the rain eased.

  Quinn ripped the mask off.

  To reveal Detective Hayden Beauchamp.

  Epilogue

  Detective Dirk Deerfield was the most stunned that the “rougarou” had been his own partner.

  He shook his head over and over again.

  Quinn felt badly for him. He’d thought his young partner an upright fellow and had been completely duped.

  “He asked me about the old case a lot,” Deerfield said. “I thought that sometimes it was just to remind me that while I might be the veteran and him the rookie, things had gotten by me. It never occurred to me that he was planning murders in the same way. Murders with the same details.”

  “How did Beauchamp and Jim Novak meet?” Father Ryan asked. “That has to be one of the most unlikely duos ever.”

  “It wasn’t surprising to me that Jim Novak is slightly crazy,” Natasha said. “Ignored by a father who died when he was a child. Not even given his name. His mother didn’t want him. He bounced through the system, went through all kinds of foster homes, unwanted. I guess a legacy as a rougarou was better than none.”

  They were all there, Natasha, Father Ryan, Billie, Bo Ray, Danni, Quinn, along with Jake Larue and Dirk Deerfield, gathered at a place called Wicked Times. Beauchamp and Novak had both been arraigned on murder charges. Danni had been cleared from the hospital, since Quinn had insisted she have the knot on her head looked at. Communication between all of them had been somewhat choppy, and they were all still trying to put the pieces together.

  It was also supposed to be a social night at Wicked Times. The place was new. It had just opened on Magazine Street, and in an hour or so, Quinn was going to play with the band and he was excited. They had a guy on rhythm guitar named Fats McGinnis, odd name since Fats was a tall, lean, twig of a man, one of the best in the city on guitar.

  Danni liked to compare the situation to that of Sherlock Holmes with his violin. But Quinn always assured her he was no Sherlock Holmes.

  As if she’d just read his mind, Danni asked, “How did you know? I mean, before you came after him, you knew that the rougarou was Hayden Beauchamp.”

  “Process of elimination, my dear Watson. It was the pieces all of you gave me. Larue was keeping in constant contact. I figured that Jim Novak had something to do with it. But, of course, I could see Novak when I came through the trees. We knew it wasn’t Byron Grayson, he was dead in the swamp. When Larue checked with Jane and Lana and found out that, yes, they’d been harassed in a bar on Bourbon, but the guy had disappeared, I figured it had to be Beauchamp. Someone young enough to head out into the bar scene and someone close to the investigation. He knew all the little details of the previous murders that the public might not have known. He’d seen all the crime scene pictures. He knew how the ‘rougarou’ had been killing. When we found Byron Grayson in the swamp, Deerfield had us all split up. Naturally, Beauchamp knew that Danni was missing. He knew about my communications with Larue. He had to figure then that Novak had taken Danni for him and that Novak would think that he had scored the win of the world. Apparently, Beauchamp found the silver wolf’s head cane years ago and had become obsessed with the story and its possibilities.”

  He paused.

  “We believe that he actually killed his first victim, an unknown young woman we found buried in the front of the shack, after he found the old property. As you surmised, Danni, people can be sick and cruel and perpetuate heinous crimes without props or legend. But he had the cane. And when he met Novak, he was able to convince him that he was the rougarou, and that a rougarou always had a man in training, ready to step up to the task. When Beauchamp wanted to get rid of someone or take revenge, he called on Novak, who brought him his victims, and, we believe, did most of the killing. Beauchamp met Mandy Matheson and Abel Denham somewhere in the city when they first arrived. I’m assuming that Beauchamp immediately had a thing for Mandy. When she didn’t respond, she was with another man, for God’s sake, Beauchamp decided they both deserved to die. But he thought he’d also have a little fun. He knew Victoria Miller. She’d been running tours for a long time. He knew she was furious with David Fagin and Julian Henri. So he sent Novak to befriend them, and then actually got them to pay him to torment Julian Henri.

  “When they talked, both Beauchamp and Novak decided that Julian’s father had been the bastard who’d somehow caused Jacob Devereaux’s death. Devereaux had tried and tried to get ahold of Julian’s property, but never did. He’d stolen the cane from Peter Henri, but he’d never managed to dislodge him. Making sure that David and Julian stumbled on the first victim, and then writing a threat in the mud, pretty much ruined their intended business. Though now, knowing that people do tend to like the gruesome, they may be able to start up again.”

  “We know a lot,” Deerfield added, “because Novak is talking a blue streak. He’s still convinced that he’ll be the rougarou one day.”

  “It’s still absolutely amazing that you found me in the middle of a swamp,” Danni said.

  “More amazing is that you made it rain.” Larue grinned.

  Father Ryan cleared his throat. “God made it rain. But who knows? Maybe, as the Good Witch that Danni can prove to be, her words went to God’s ear.”

  “It is Southern Louisiana,” Danni noted. “It rains all the time.”

  Everyone at the table turned toward Danni. She did have some powers. Sometimes it was in drawings she made while doodling or when she sleepwalked. This time?

  Rain.

  “Maybe the legend of the rougarou is a little bit true, and maybe the legend of the Good Witch is entirely true,” Quinn said.

  “Glad I’m on her side,” Bo Ray said, and they all laughed.

  “As far as finding you, I knew that Selena Duarte knew more than she was saying. I don’t think she was even being all that elusive on purpose, even though she was scared and believed that the rougarou would leave her alone as long as she kept quiet.” He shook his head. “Beauchamp actually made me really like him when we were with Selena. He reminded her that she’d die alone if she kept being so mean. I thought he cared about her. Now I realize that everything about his personality was a mask, just like the wolf’s head mask he wore.”

  “How did he manage to rip out throats the way that he did?” Bo Ray asked.

  “Novak did the throat ripping,” Deerfield said. “He’s had all his back teeth filed to a point. Beauchamp couldn’t do it. There were a few times when he had to be in uniform quickly. So being covered in blood wouldn’t work. Beauchamp told Jim Novak that honing his teeth was a way of preparing to be the rougarou himself.”

  They all sat in silence for a moment.

  “Something scared the ‘rougarou’ off the balcony when he came into the city. I’m sure he meant to take Jane Eagle and Lana Adair,” Deerfield said.

  “Probably someone in the street, or the fact that a scream would have drawn attention,” Larue said. “Those girls don’t know how lucky they are.”

  “But which one came into the city as a rougarou?” Natasha asked.

  “It was actually Hayden Beauchamp that night,” Larue said. “Which is probably why the girls are still alive. Beauchamp didn’t want to get caught. Novak saw himself as a rougarou in training. I don’t think he would have been scared away.”

  “Let’s hope that they’re both locked up forever,” Natasha said.

  “They could get the death penalty,” Father Ryan said, which brought everyone there to look at him.

  He lifted his hands. “Judgment isn’t mine. I’m just referring to the law in the state of Louisiana.”

  A moment later, Quinn was asked up to play with the group, which he did. And it felt wonderful. It reminded him that he was alive. That they were alive.

  Good times were what made up for the bad times. Now and then, Quinn glanced at the table. He was glad to see Danni smile at him. She was having fun. And she seemed to enjoy the fact that he was happy too. There was just something about a guitar,
something soothing, even when his playing was really anything but. But he loved who he was playing with, loved the night. And loved that he had kept his word to Selena Duarte and the rougarou had been caught.

  It was late when they all parted. Since Dirk Deerfield was still reeling, he was going to head out on vacation. That night, he was staying at Quinn’s family home in the Garden District. The next morning he was flying off for a long awaited trip to London. They bid one another goodnight. Larue headed off in his car, as did Father Ryan and Deerfield. The rest of them piled into Quinn’s car. They dropped Natasha off first, then parked in the garage at Danni’s house on Royal Street.

  Billie and Bo Ray headed up.

  Danni and Quinn greeted Wolf and gave him treats.

  Then Danni headed up.

  Quinn checked the door to the basement. The items there had no power over anyone anymore, but Quinn still kept the basement door locked. He called to Wolf and they headed upstairs. The dog curled up in his bed. Quinn walked into the bedroom he shared with Danni.

  She was waiting for him.

  He smiled. “Maybe you are a witch. A temptress, driving men to madness, seducing them.”

  She frowned, rising to meet him. “Quinn, I’ve never been like that.”

  He laughed, taking her into his arms, loving the sensation of holding her, feeling her against him, especially with the image of her in the power of the “rougarou” still lurking in the back of his mind. For a moment, he held her tenderly. Then he caught her chin with his forefinger and lifted it.

  “I mean nothing evil in that. Just teasing, my love. The cane is put away, far from the hands of those who might see it as an evil power. But your strength is entirely different and can’t be shut away. You are a witch, of course, of the best kind. You have the kind of magic that seduced my heart and soul. With your laughter, your vitality, your concern for others in the world around you, and then of course—”

  He paused.

  “I love you for your—”

  And he whispered in her ear.