Ghost Walk

  “Hey!” said one, almost falling into her.

  “Hi, there, babe,” another slurred. He cast an arm sloppily around her shoulder.

  “Hey, get your hands off her,” Julian demanded forcefully.

  Nikki was barely aware of their exchange.

  “He…he was here,” she said, puzzled.

  “Who was here, honey? I’m available,” a blond kid with a New York accent said, smiling stupidly and coming up on her other side.

  “Leave her alone,” Julian said angrily.

  “Yeah? And who are you? Her daddy…pimp daddy, something like that?”

  Julian hauled off, catching the young man beneath the jaw. He sucked in his breath, staggered back and fell.

  “Julian…shit!” Nikki breathed, her attention wrenched back to their current situation.

  “Hey, asshole, there was no call for that,” the blonde from New York said. He dropped his plastic drink cup and strode menacingly toward Julian.

  Others began to follow suit, circling him as their friend staggered to his feet.

  “Everyone!” Nikki announced loudly. “Stop it right now. I’m going to scream, I’ll get the police. Just calm down.”

  No one seemed to hear her. The first kid reached Julian. He dodged that blow, but another one of the youths was to his right, and he took a swing.

  “Stop!” Nikki jumped onto the back of one of them. He didn’t even seem to notice her weight. She banged a fist on the top of his head. “Stop it right now!”

  He still didn’t seem to notice her. She slid off his back, landing on her rump.

  In a fair fight, Julian could handle himself. Against ten or so…

  He didn’t stand a chance.

  Nikki opened her mouth to start screaming. The police had to come, and come quickly.

  “Hey!”

  The voice that suddenly thundered through the crowd was deep and resonant, and had a note of such pure authority that everyone, including Nikki, suddenly went dead still.

  A man came striding into the frozen tableau. From her position on her butt in the street, he seemed extraordinarily tall, dark, broad shouldered and well muscled beneath a casual knit polo shirt and jeans. He caught hold of the kid who was about to deck Julian.

  “What the hell is going on here?”

  “He started it.” The college boy sounded like a grade-school kid in trouble.

  “They were coming on to Nikki,” Julian said.

  “Just break it up, all of you,” the man said irritably.

  “Or what?” ventured one of the drunker college boys.

  The man stared at him. That was it; he just stared.

  “Just asking,” the boy muttered. He turned and started down the street. “Come on, guys, let’s get out of here.”

  They all followed suit, heading down the street.

  The man turned toward where Nikki was still sitting on the street. He strode toward her, offering her a hand up.

  She saw his face.

  His complexion was a deep tan, almost bronze, his eyes a startling, brilliant green. The hard chiseled angles and planes clearly denoted a Native American background somewhere. His hair was pitch dark and dead straight, just a little long. It wasn’t so much that he was typically handsome, but he was one of the most arresting individuals she had ever seen. He seemed to emit confidence and authority, and not just because of his imposing height or the breadth of his shoulders. There was a sleek agility about him for a man of his size, and his features were hard cut, seeming to exude an essentially masculine sensuality mixed with stark assurance.

  His hand, outstretched to her, was large, the fingers long, nails neatly clipped, clean—and powerful, she quickly discovered.

  But it wasn’t the strength of his grip, bringing her easily to her feet that so disturbed her.

  It was his touch.

  Energy, almost like a fire, or a current, streaking from him to her.

  And then…

  His eyes.

  They looked into hers.

  And they saw something.

  What, she didn’t know. He released her instantly, stepping back, surveying her, not in a sexual way, and not with disdain or disinterest.

  As if he recognized her.

  “Are you all right?” he asked politely.

  “Um…fine,” she murmured.

  He nodded. “You?” he asked Julian.

  “Yeah, thanks to you,” Julian told him, eyeing the stranger curiously. “Hey, we kind of owe you. Can we buy you a drink or something?”

  The man shook his head. “You don’t owe me anything.” He cracked a slight smile, which transformed his face. He was suddenly striking. Still hard, but striking.

  “I just wouldn’t mess with large crowds in the future, huh?” he suggested.

  With a wave, he turned and left them.

  6

  Brent walked down the street, shaking his head.

  New Orleans.

  America’s most European city. A mixture of architecture and mood, sultry heat and shifting shadows. It was as if time had cast a mood over the city that had sunk into the very bones of its man-made structures. History piled upon the passions of those who had lived before.

  It held the remnants of days gone by, mixed with the new, the lively, the present-day city, with its love of gardens, jazz, good times and voodoo.

  There was unbelievable talent to be found with the turn of a corner, like the old black man two streets over who had played a banjo better than he’d ever heard before. The man had just been sitting there, playing and smiling and, Brent hoped, making a fair amount of money from the passersby who were dropping bills in his instrument case.

  Brent passed a closed shop with a storefront announcing “Dolly’s Dolls,” and next to it was a neon light advertising “Girls, Girls, Naked Girls.”

  People laughing, drinking, admiring artists, musicians, mimes…

  People drinking themselves silly, picking fights.

  The encounter he’d just had was disturbing, and he didn’t want to think about it.

  He could still feel her hand in his.

  And he’d walked away. Which had been smart. Still, he couldn’t help but wonder about the woman. She had the biggest, brightest eyes he’d ever seen. Green. Blue. Aqua. Something like the sea, somewhere in between. Fairly tall, nice figure, obvious even in the long black dress she’d been wearing.

  A Goth? Hell, everybody in this city seemed to think they were a voodoo queen, a long-dead duchess, a vampire or a tarot reader.

  No, maybe not. The guy with her had been wearing a somber black suit.

  Funeral, he realized suddenly.

  He shook his head, stopped in the street. From the corner to his right, a rock band hammered out a Stones tune. From the other corner, he could hear jazz. Somewhere down the street, a blues guitar was belting out an indiscernible tune.

  He swore softly.

  New Orleans.

  Hell, welcome home.

  Oh, yeah. It was just great to be here.

  “You’re going off the deep end, Nikki,” Julian said. “That was just great. Throwing yourself into a group of drunks. What were you expecting? And don’t even think about giving me a lecture on how no one deserves to be attacked. You went flying into a sludge of inebriated testosterone in its sweet young prime, so what were you expecting?”

  “I saw him!” she said, finding the catch on the gate and pushing it open herself. Julian’s words made her feel guilty—he was a good friend, and he would have defended her to the death, which, considering the drunken mood of the rowdy gang, just might have been the sad finale if it hadn’t been for their strange savior—but he couldn’t begin to understand how she was feeling. “Julian, I’m sorry, but…I saw him,” she repeated.

  “Yeah, and I saw him, too, whoever the hell he was, and I have to admit, it was a damn good thing he showed up when he did. I’m not much brighter than you are, apparently, since I got it into my head to defend you from a pack of wolves.?
??

  She waved a hand in the air. “Not him,” she said, though the “him” to whom Julian was referring had been almost as disturbing as the man she had first seen. “Not…not the guy who came along and broke the whole thing up. I mean, I saw the man who was in the coffee shop that day. The day before Andy was killed.”

  “Okay, okay, so you saw him,” Julian said, hurrying behind her to the door. “Some bum who was in the coffee shop. You saw him. Great. But…so what? Nikki, I’m sorry to say that we have tons of drunks and addicts in this city. You saw a loser in a coffee shop, and tonight you saw him again. Hell, I run into the same people I don’t really know day after day. And as to this guy—you can’t really think that he followed you all day, through a tour, into the night…and then went after Andy?”

  She had reached her door and was suddenly so irritated that she nearly twisted her key in half unlocking the door. Before letting Julian in, she spun on him. “You don’t understand. Julian, Andy said something about him.”

  “When? At Madame’s?” he demanded. “Was he someone she knew? What exactly did she say?”

  Fiercely, she shook her head. “She didn’t know him, or at least I don’t think she did. And she didn’t say anything about him in the café. It was…in the dream. Julian, she said something about him being dead. And I…I think it’s important somehow.”

  He stared at her wide-eyed for a moment, then caught her by the shoulders and pushed her forward, into the parlor of her apartment. Once they were inside, he closed and locked the door, then looked at her sternly. “Nikki, you had a dream. A nightmare. Weird? Yes. The mind plays tricks, but I think you’re just feeling guilty about the fact that Andrea was murdered. People do feel that way—why her, why not me? Nikki, what happened was terrible, tragic things happen on a daily basis. It’s just that usually bad things don’t occur so close to us. So think about it—under these circumstances, it’s a very normal thing that your mind might play tricks. People don’t remember their dreams in detail, so you don’t really know what you dreamed. Listen to yourself. You’re telling me that Andy said the guy was dead, but now you’re certain you saw him on the street. It’s one or the other, Nikki. You’ve got to get a grip.”

  “Julian, what if—”

  “I know a doctor, Nikki. A good one.”

  She stared back at him, her mouth open, no sound coming out. At last she found her voice. “I don’t need a doctor, Julian. I need some faith here.”

  “Nikki, I’m sorry, but…” He stopped with a sigh, then walked into the living room, hit the light switch and sat down on the Victorian sofa. “Okay, you really believe that you had a dream, and Andy was in it—right when she was dying.”

  “Or being killed.”

  Julian sighed. “Or being killed. She was talking about the guy you’d seen at Madame’s. Now, tonight, you saw the guy. What you need to do, logically, is go to the police. I think you’ll feel better if you stress to Detective Massey the fact that you’ve seen this guy, this kind of scary bum or junkie, on the street again. Massey can hunt him down and question him.”

  She had been standing angrily, her arms crossed over her chest, frowning. But his words made sense.

  “Well?” he demanded.

  “All right. I’ll go see Detective Massey. I think I can describe the man fairly well. Maybe they can do a sketch of him. And if they find him and question him…well, I’ll feel better.”

  She was startled to realize that Julian was frowning.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  He shook his head, stared at her. “Nikki…say that the guy in the coffee shop was a junkie. Hard up. And maybe a psycho to boot. And…what if he did follow us around all day?”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “Nothing,” he replied quickly.

  “What do you mean, nothing?” she demanded. “Dammit, Julian, I know you. Tell me what you were going to say.”

  “I’ll only worry you.”

  “I’m worried now.”

  Still, Julian hesitated. She didn’t intend to let him off the hook. “Julian, what?”

  He sighed. “All right, you saw this guy…and who knows, maybe he did know Andy from before.”

  “No, she didn’t recognize him.”

  “She didn’t admit that she recognized him.”

  “No, I really don’t think she recognized him.”

  “But he might have recognized her.”

  “You mean…from sometime before in her life?”

  “Or even from the flyers.”

  “You mean, the business flyers we hand out?”

  He nodded. “The minute you saw Andy, you called Max about using her for a new flyer, remember?”

  “I’m at fault in this somehow,” Nikki whispered, sinking down on the sofa beside him.

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Julian said firmly. “Only the killer is at fault. What I’m saying is…well, we might have a psychotic who had a thing for Andy and had been watching her. Or knew about her past. And maybe he knows that you’re suspicious and won’t stop hunting. And if so…well, you could be in danger, too.”

  She glared at him, feeling as if her flesh were beginning to crawl.

  “I told you, I didn’t want to worry you. And it’s not like you were ever a junkie, but still, you should be careful.”

  She groaned, leaning back. Then she jumped up and ran around the house, checking every window to see that it was latched, and making doubly certain that the glass doors that led to the balcony from her bedroom were secured.

  Julian followed her, double-checking everything.

  They met in the living room and stared at one another.

  “I told you I shouldn’t have said anything,” he told her.

  “No…no, it’s good to be careful,” she said.

  “I’m really sorry, Nikki,” Julian said, running his fingers through his hair. “Most likely what happened to Andy was…random. I mean, seriously, think about it. All that’s happened is that you saw a guy the day before she died, and you’ve seen him again. That doesn’t mean anything at all. The police will probably just humor us when we go in—I mean, it’s so far from any concrete evidence that anyone could base anything on. You’d have to suspect just about everyone in the city.”

  Nikki nodded. “Right.” But she didn’t agree. She couldn’t shake the dream. “All right, well, it seems that we’re locked up tight for the night. I’m going to bed,” she told him.

  She leaned over and kissed his cheek, and started for the stairs.

  “You want to leave the lights on down here?” Julian asked.

  “Hell, yes,” she told him.

  Upstairs, he headed toward the guest bedroom, and she headed toward her own. She paused at the door. “Hey, Julian.”

  “Um?”

  “Thanks for staying.”

  “Not a problem,” he assured her.

  In her room, Nikki quickly changed for bed. No sooner was she under the covers, with the light out, than she jumped up and turned it back on. She was angry with herself, and maybe even a little angry with Julian. The first nights after Andy’s death, he’d stayed with her. But she hadn’t been afraid.

  She hadn’t thought that she might be stalked.

  Now…

  She turned the television on. The first show that popped up was about forensic files. She switched stations. The next show was about cold cases that investigators were going back into.

  She tried the news, but it was no better. There was a local politician on, the man with the improbable name of Billy Banks, and he was crusading against violent crime in New Orleans, swearing that he would clean it up. He was young, in his early thirties, with the kind of personal charisma a politician prayed for. He talked about cleaning up the image of New Orleans, making it a better destination for families. The man had something, Nikki thought. Not the kind of self-righteousness that people would find offensive, but a determination to make the city better. He might well win the election, she thought;
he seemed to have what it would take to breathe excitement into city government. He was a good speaker, and Nikki found herself intrigued by his speech. But then he went on to say that if he were elected, he would see to it that drugs were taken off their local streets, and then they wouldn’t have tragic deaths, like that of the young woman Andrea Ciello.

  Nikki hit the button on the remote and changed the channel.

  The next channel she came to was playing a biography of Ted Bundy.

  She swore, and at last found a kids’ channel that ran old sitcoms at night.

  Topper came on, and she groaned, but it was just ending. Next up was Leave it to Beaver. That would do. With the lights and television on, she closed her eyes.

  She didn’t know how much time passed, but she dozed. Then she woke again as June Cleaver said something to Ward. The sound of a soft laugh alerted her to the presence of someone in her room, and she opened her eyes, blinking.

  A scream rose in her throat, but she was so completely terrified that sound wouldn’t come.

  Andy was there again.

  Now she was wearing the handsome black pantsuit in which she had been buried that afternoon.

  Her hair was brushed back, shimmering, as it had been…in her coffin.

  But her face was pale. Horribly pale, ashen…gray.

  Dead gray.

  Nighttime, prime time.

  Whether he liked it or not, it was his city, and Brent knew it well.

  The main problem with New Orleans was…

  …the ghosts. The damn ghosts.

  He hadn’t been many other places where he felt such a barrage of sensation, the presence of the dead but undead, or the dead but unaccepting. The cemeteries were far more alive at night than most people could imagine, and the grievances that moved the spirits ranged from bitterness left over from Civil War days to prostitutes who had been done wrong in old Storyville. Victims of more recent murders sought ways to avenge the gang members who had put them in their graves. One old black man in St. Louis Cemetery Number 1 was still seeking the cruel master who had beaten him into an early grave. Years ago, Brent had tried to assure the man that his master was long gone, as well. It hadn’t stopped the old man from seeking his revenge, and Brent had to admit that neither had he done very well in convincing the haunt, who he knew only as Huey, that the times, they were a-changing.