Midnight Bayou

  always believed the anticipation was as important as the gift.

  The bow and ribbon she tucked neatly back into the bag, and after she’d picked at the top, slid the box out, folded the paper precisely.

  “How long does it take you to open your presents Christmas morning?” he asked.

  “I like taking my time.” She opened the box, felt her lips twitch, but kept her expression sober as she took out the grinning crawfish salt and pepper shakers. “Well now, aren’t they a handsome pair?”

  “I thought so. They had alligators, too, but these guys seemed friendlier.”

  “Are these part of your charm campaign, cher?”

  “You bet. How’d they work?”

  “Not bad.” She traced a finger over one of the ugly grins. “Not bad at all.”

  “Good. Since I’ve interrupted you, and charmed you, why don’t you let me feed you? Pay you back for the eggs.”

  She eased back in her chair, swiveled it as she considered. “Why do I get the feeling, every time I see you, I should start walking fast in the opposite direction?”

  “Search me. Anyway, my legs are longer, so I’d just catch up with you.” He leaned over the desk, lifted his brows. She was wearing a skirt, a short one. His legs might’ve been longer, but they wouldn’t look half as good in sheer stockings. “But you could eat up some ground with those. How come you’re dressed up?”

  “I’m not dressed up. Church clothes. I’ve been to Mass.” Now she smiled. “Name like yours, I figure you for a Catholic boy.”

  “Guilty.”

  “You been to Mass today, Declan?”

  He could never explain why a question like that made him want to squirm. “I’m about half-lapsed.”

  “Oh.” She pursed her lips. “My grandmama’s going to be disappointed in you.”

  “I was an altar boy for three years. That ought to count.”

  “What’s your confirmation name?”

  “I’ll tell you if you come to lunch.” He reached over for the crawfish, made them dance over her desk. “Come on, Lena, come out and play with me. It’s turned into a nice day.”

  “All right.” Mistake, her practical mind said, but she got to her feet, picked up her purse. “You can buy me lunch. But a quick one.” She leaned over, saved her file, and closed down her computer.

  “It’s Michael,” he said, holding out a hand. “Declan Sullivan Michael Fitzgerald. If I was any more Irish, I’d bleed green.”

  “It’s Louisa. Angelina Marie Louisa Simone.”

  “Very French.”

  “Bien sûr. And I want Italian.” She put her hand in his. “Buy me some pasta.”

  From his previous visits Declan knew you had to work very hard to find a bad meal in New Orleans. When Lena led the way to a small, unpretentious restaurant, he didn’t worry. All he had to do was take one sniff of the air to know they were going to eat very well.

  She waved a hand at someone, pointed to an empty table, and apparently got the go-ahead.

  “This isn’t a date,” she said to him when he held her chair.

  He did his best to look absolutely innocent, and nearly succeeded. “It’s not?”

  “No.” She eased back, crossed her legs. “A date is when we have a time arranged and you pick me up at my house. This is a drop-on-by. So tomorrow, that’s our first date. Just in case you’re thinking of that three-date rule.”

  “We guys don’t like to think you women know about that.”

  Her lips curved. “There’s a lot y’all don’t like to think we know about.” She kept her eyes on his, but lifted up a hand to the dark-haired man who stopped at the table. “Hey there, Marco.”

  “Lena.” He kissed her fingers, then handed her a menu. “Good to see you.”

  “This is Remy’s college friend from Boston. Declan. I brought him by so he can see how we do Italian food here in the Vieux Carre.”

  “You won’t do better.” He shook Declan’s hand, gave him a menu. “My mama’s in the kitchen today.”

  “Then we’re in for a treat,” Lena said. “How’s your family, Marco?”

  Declan saw how it happened then. When she shifted in her chair, lifted her face, looked at Marco, it was as if the two of them were alone on a little island of intimacy. It was sexual, there was no question about it, but it was also . . . attentive, he decided.

  “Good as gold. My Sophie won a spelling bee on Friday.”

  “That’s some bright child you got.”

  They chatted for a few moments, but Declan entertained himself by watching her face. The way her eyebrows lifted, fell, drew together according to the sentiment. How her lips moved, punctuated by that tiny mole.

  When she turned her head, he shook his. “Sorry, did you say something to me? I was looking at you. I get lost.”

  “They got some smooth talkers up North,” Marco said.

  “Pretty, too, isn’t he?” Lena asked.

  “Very nice. Our Lena here’s having the seafood linguini. You know what you want, or you need some time to decide?”

  “You don’t get the same.” Lena tapped a finger on the menu Declan had yet to read. “Else it’s no fun for me picking off your plate. You try the stuffed shells, maybe. Mama makes them good.”

  “Stuffed shells, then.” He had a feeling he’d have tried crushed cardboard if she’d requested it. “Do you want wine?”

  “No, because you’re driving and I’m working.”

  “Strict. San Pellegrino?” He glanced at Marco.

  “I’ll bring you out a bottle.”

  “So . . .” She tucked her hair behind her ear as Marco left them. “What’re you up to today, cher?”

  “I thought I’d hit some of the antique stores. I’m looking for a display cabinet for the kitchen, and stuff to stick in it. I thought I might go by and see Miss Odette on the way back. What does she like? I want to take her something.”

  “You don’t have to take her anything.”

  “I’d like to.”

  Lena hooked an arm over the back of her chair, drummed her fingers on the table as she studied him. “You get her a bottle of wine, then. A good red. Tell me something, cher, you wouldn’t be using my grandmama to get to me, would you?”

  She saw the temper flash into his eyes—darker, hotter than she’d expected from him. Should’ve known, she thought, that all that easy manner covered something sharp, something jagged. It was impressive, but more impressive was the lightning snap from mild to fury, and back to mild again.

  A man who could rein himself in like that, she decided, had a will of iron. That was something else to consider.

  “You’ve got it backwards,” he told her. “I’m using you to get to Miss Odette. She’s the girl of my dreams.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Good, you should be.”

  Lena waited until their water and bread were served. His tone had raised her hackles. Mostly, she could admit, because she’d deserved the quick slap. Folding her arms on the table, she leaned toward him.

  “I am sorry, because that was nasty. I’m going to tell you something, Declan, nasty words have a habit of popping right out of my mouth. I don’t always regret saying them. I’m not a sweet-mannered, even-tempered sort of woman. I don’t have a trusting nature. I’ve got good points, but I’ve got just as many bad. I like it that way.”

  He mimicked her posture. “I’m single-minded, competitive and moody. I’ve got a mean temper. It takes a lot to get it going, which is a fortunate thing for the general population. I don’t have to have my way in the little things, but when I decide I want something, really want it, I find a way to get it. I want you. So I’ll have you.”

  She’d been wrong. He hadn’t snapped back to mild. Anger was still simmering behind his eyes. As the one person she tried to be honest with at all times was herself, she didn’t bother to pretend it didn’t excite her.

  “You’re saying that to make me mad.”

  “No, that’s just a side benefi
t.” He eased back, picked up the basket of bread and offered it. “You want to fight?”

  Feeling sulky, she picked out a piece. “Maybe later. Getting riled up spoils my appetite. Anyway.” She shrugged, bit into the bread. “You don’t want to go by Grandmama’s today. She’s over visiting her sister this afternoon.”

  “I’ll stop in later this week. I got the kitchen counters installed. Remy gave me a hand, so to speak, with the wall units yesterday. It should be finished in a couple of weeks.”

  “Good for you.” She wanted to brood, and could see by his amused expression that he knew it. “You been back up on the third floor?”

  “Yeah.” He’d had to prime himself with a good shot of Jim Beam first, but he’d gone back. “Didn’t fall on my face this time, but I had a major panic attack. I’m not prone to panic attacks. I found out more about the Manet family history, but there are pieces missing. Maybe you’ve got them.”

  “You want to know about Abigail Rouse.”

  “That’s right. How much do—” He broke off because she’d turned her attention away from him and back to Marco, who brought out their pasta. He reminded himself as they fell into a lazy discussion about the food, that the wheel turned more slowly in the South.

  “How much do you know about her?” he asked when they were alone again.

  Lena rolled up a forkful of pasta, slid it between her lips. She sighed deep, swallowed. “Mama Realdo. She’s a goddess in the kitchen. Try yours,” she ordered, and leaned over to sample from his plate.

  “It’s great. Best meal I’ve had since a microwave omelette.”

  She smiled at him, one long, slow smile that lodged in his belly. Then went back to eating. “I know the stories that came down in my family. Nobody can say for sure. Abigail, she was a maid in the big house. Some of the rich families, they hired Cajun girls to clean for them, to fetch and carry. Story is that Lucian Manet came home from Tulane and fell in love with her. They ran off and got married. Had to run off, because nobody’s going to approve of this. His family, hers.”

  She broke off a chunk of bread, nibbled on it as she studied him. “Mixing classes is an uneasy business. He moved her into the Hall after, and that was an uneasy business, too. People say Josephine Manet was a hard woman, proud and cold. People started counting on their fingers, but the baby, she don’t come for ten months.”

  “That room upstairs. It must’ve been the nursery. They’d have kept the baby there.”

  “Most like. There was a nursemaid. She married one of Abigail’s brothers later. Most of the stories about the Hall come from her. It seems a couple days before the end of the year, Lucian was off in New Orleans on business. When he came back, Abigail was gone. They said she’d run off with some bayou boy she’d been seeing on the side. But that doesn’t ring true. The nursemaid, her name was . . . Claudine, she said Abigail never would’ve left Lucian and the baby. She said something bad had to have happened, something terrible, and she blamed herself because she was off meeting her young man down by the river the night Abigail disappeared.”

  A dead girl on the tester bed in a cold room, Declan thought, and the pasta lodged in his throat like glue. He picked up the fizzy water, drank deep. “Did they look for her?”

  “Her family looked everywhere. It’s said Lucian haunted the bayou until the day he died. When he wasn’t looking there, he was in town trying to find a trace of her. He never did, and didn’t live long himself. With him gone, and the twin his mother favored by all accounts, dead as well, Miss Josephine had the baby taken to Abigail’s parents. You’ve gone pale, Declan.”

  “I feel pale. Go on.”

  This time, when she broke off a hunk of bread, she buttered it, handed it to him. Her grandmama was right, Lena thought, the man needed to eat.

  “The baby was my grandmama’s grandmama. The Manets cast her out, claiming she was a bastard and no blood of theirs. They brought her to the Rouses with the dress she had on, a small bag of crib toys. Only thing she had from the Hall was the watch pin Claudine gave to her, which had been Abigail’s.”

  Declan’s hand shot out to cover hers. “Is the pin still around?”

  “We hand such things down, daughter to daughter. My grandmama gave it to me on my sixteenth birthday. Why?”

  “Enameled watch, hanging from small, gold wings.”

  Color stained her cheeks. “How do you know?”

  “I saw it.” The chill danced up his spine. “Sitting on the dresser in the bedroom that must have been hers. An empty room,” he continued, “with phantom furniture. The room where Effie saw a dead girl laid out on the bed. They killed her, didn’t they?”

  Something in the way he said it, so flat, so cold, had her stomach dropping. “That’s what people think. People in my family.”

  “In the nursery.”

  “I don’t know. You’re spooking me some, Declan.”

  “You?” He passed a hand over his face. “Well, I guess I know who my ghost is. Poor Abigail, wandering the Hall and waiting for Lucian to come home.”

  “But if she did die in the Hall, who killed her?”

  “Maybe that’s what I’m supposed to find out, so she can . . . you know. Rest.”

  He wasn’t pale now, Lena thought. His face had toughened, hardened. That core of determination again. “Why should it be you?”

  “Why not? It had to be one of the Manets. The mother, the father, the brother. Then they buried her somewhere and claimed she ran away. I need to find out more about her.”

  “I imagine you will. You’ve got a mulish look about you, cher. Don’t know why that should be so appealing to me. Talk to my grandmama. She might know more, or she’ll know who does.”

  She nudged her empty plate back. “Now you buy us some cappuccino.”

  “Want dessert?”

  “No room for that.” She opened her purse, pulled out a pack of cigarettes.

  “I didn’t know you smoked.”

  “I get one pack a month.” She tapped one out, ran her fingers up and down its length.

  “One a month? What’s the point?”

  She put the cigarette between her lips, flicked the flame on a slim silver lighter. As she had with the first bite of pasta, she sighed over that first deep drag. “Pleasure, cher. There are twenty cigarettes in a pack, thirty or thirty-one days to a month. ’Cept for February. I dearly love the month of February. Now, I can smoke up the whole pack in a day, and just about lose my mind for the rest of the month. Or I can dole them out, slow and careful, and make them last. Because there’s no buying another pack before the first of the month.”

  “How many do you bum from other people during the month?”

  Her eyes glittered through the haze of smoke. “That would be cheating. I don’t cheat. Pleasure’s nothing, sugar, unless you got the willpower to hold off until you really appreciate it.”

  She trailed a fingertip over the back of his hand, and for the hell of it, rubbed the side of her foot against his leg under the table. “How are you on willpower?” she asked.

  “We’re going to find out.”

  It was dusk when he got back to the house. The back of his four-wheel was loaded with treasures he’d hunted up in antique shops. But the best was the kitchen cabinet he’d found, and had begged and bribed to have delivered the next day.

  He carried what he could on the first trip and, when he stepped inside, set everything down in the foyer. He closed the door behind him, then stood very still.

  “Abigail.” He said the name, listened to it echo through the house. And waited.

  But he felt no rush of cold air, no sudden shift in the silence.

  And standing at the base of the grand staircase, he couldn’t explain how he knew he wasn’t alone.

  8

  He woke to a crashing thunderstorm, but at least he woke in his own bed. Lightning slashed outside the windows and burst a nova of light through the room.

  A glance at the bedside clock showed him a minute to midnight.
But that had to be wrong, Declan thought. He hadn’t gone to bed until after one. Wondering if the storm had knocked out his power,