Bayou Born, page 4
“You okay?” The corners of his eyes were pinched. “I saw her arms . . . ” He trailed off when he noticed the men flanking me. “Gentlemen.”
“I’m good,” I said, cutting him off quick. “We’ll talk later. I’m heading to the hospital.”
“No.” He blocked my exit. “You don’t want them connecting the dots any faster than they already will.” He stuck out his arms when I tried dodging him. “Let me go. I’ll keep you updated.”
I seesawed between shoving him in the muck then bolting for my Bronco, and thanking him for having my back even though things in Luceville just got more bizarre. “Fine,” I grated out. “We’ll try it your way, but I want to know the instant she wakes.”
Rixton tipped his chin at the White Horse Security guys. “Thanks for the assist.”
“No problem.” Miller spoke over my shoulder. “We’ll be in the area until the situation is resolved.” He reached into the box under his seat and produced a business card from the freezer bag where he kept his paperwork. “Call if you need anything.”
I took the card, running my thumb over the embossed lettering. “I might take you up on that.” I tapped the card against my palm. “Keep in touch. We all want the same thing, but Canton PD has jurisdiction. We don’t need to step on each other’s toes when we can learn to dance. Got me?”
“I’d be happy to keep you in the loop,” Santiago piped up, “but fair warning. I’ve got two left feet.”
“Night, guys.” I cast them a wave then turned, pulling up short when Thom eased between me and Rixton. “Something to add?”
“No.” He took a wet wipe from a packet Miller tossed him and cleaned the hand Rixton had used to pull me to my feet. “Just thought you might want one of these. Antibacterial. Don’t want to get amoebas.”
I accepted the wipe from the peculiar man and finished the job myself, tucking away the trash. Uncle Harold took my hands and helped me to shore, and Rixton landed beside me. The three-man security team reclaimed their original positions and motored back into the dark heart of the swamp.
“There’s something off about those guys.” Rixton stared after them.
“You caught that too?” The dynamic between the three men had been peculiar, the whole experience surreal.
“That one guy sniffed you.” He cocked an eyebrow at me. “That’s not normal.”
“They told me he was a tracker.”
“Trackers can be peculiar folk,” Uncle Harold allowed. “We’ve got one in town that won’t hang doors in his house because they make him feel confined.”
I mulled that over, unable to put my finger on what bothered me about those guys. Other than their timing. They must have been listening to a police scanner, picked up the radio chatter then decided to announce their involvement by offering us assistance.
“I called your dad,” Harold admitted after a pause. “Considering the girl . . . you don’t need to be alone tonight. I know how protective you are of your privacy, so I figured you’d rather have him at the house with you than you join him at ours.”
Gratitude welled in me. Thankfully it didn’t leak out over my cheeks. “You’re the best uncle, you know that?”
“I have the best niece.” He chucked me under the chin. “She makes it easy.”
“I’ve checked in with Sherry and told her where I’ll be.” Rixton glanced up from a string of texts on his phone. “I’m going to head on up to the hospital. I’ll call when I’ve got an update.”
“Keep Jane safe.” Until she told us otherwise, that’s who she was. Jane Doe. The urge to go after her, to be there when she woke, was a magnetic tug in my gut. But Rixton was right. Me showing up now was like inviting the circus to town. “I don’t want her to vanish until I can question her.”
“We’ll get to the bottom of this.” The strobelike effect of a camera flash had him shielding me with his broad back. “Go home before they scent blood in the water.”
I nibbled my bottom lip. “I just . . . ”
“I know,” he said, and I knew he understood. “I’ll ping some guys I trust, and work out a security detail so we have eyes on her at all times.”
“Thanks.” I ducked my head and wended my way through the dwindling crowd.
Sleep was off the menu for tonight, but first things first. I stank from the muck weighing down my clothes, and I wanted to scrub away the memory of those putrid chickens. As soon as I got home, showering off the sludge was my first priority. After that, I’d lock the doors and windows, turn on the security system and check the motion-sensor floodlights.
Rixton had made his point. It was the only reason why I’d let him go and agreed to stay behind when every instinct I had urged me to hold vigil at Jane’s bedside. Once people got a look at her markings, they would start digging, and I was the first and only name they would find. My origin was about to be examined under a microscope. Again. Privacy would be a thing of the past. Not that I’d ever had much to begin with.
Happy birthday to me.
CHAPTER FOUR
Morning found me curled up on our battered leather couch under a light blanket. A Discovery Channel special on dinosaurs played on the flat screen television mounted on the opposite wall, providing me with ambient noise to drown out Dad’s muffled snoring. Piles of scrapbooks, spiral notebooks and medical records documenting my first remembered year of life fanned across the cushions to either side of me and spilled over onto the coffee table where my laptop slumbered. I had spent the last several hours thumbing through my personal archives in the hopes some clue might jump at out me that explained my connection to Jane, but all I got for my trouble was the pinch of a stress headache.
Four hours ago, Rixton had checked in to assure me she was stable but had yet to regain consciousness. Again he reiterated there was no reason for me to put in an appearance, not until she woke ready to answer questions. And again, I heeded his advice. I didn’t want to kick an anthill that left Jane to the swarm.
Heaving a groan at its weight, I hefted one of the fatter scrapbooks onto my lap and cracked the cover. A fifteen-yearold Luce stared up at me from the first page, her softball jersey smeared with red clay and her hair tucked under a cap. She balanced a trophy on her hip and wore three medals hung around her neck. Okay, so I might have been a tad competitive back in high school. I spared a wince for the boxes in the attic stuffed with plaques, medals, trophies and framed certificates. Fine, so maybe I had been a lot competitive back in the day. The high of victory had been slightly addictive to a kid without a past who was desperate to make her mark on the future.
I almost spit out my tea when the doorbell rang. None of the perimeter alarms had tripped to warn me company was coming. I leaned over the open book on my lap to peck at the keys on my laptop. Once the screen woke, I tapped into the live video feeds from various cross sections of the property and selected the front door camera. I half-expected the vultures to have landed earlier than expected, but the man dressed in a tight black T-shirt and tactical pants was no journalist. In fact, I was pretty sure a hunk of Woodall Mountain had chipped off during the night and rolled like a boulder onto my doorstep.
I pulled up the security app on my phone and pressed the intercom button, which activated a speaker mounted beside the front door. “Can I help you?”
“I’m here to speak with Luce Boudreau,” he rumbled in a deep tenor befitting a half-man, half-mountain. A mantain?
Of course he was. “And you are?”
“Cole Heaton.” His muscular shoulders bunched when he reached into a pocket. “I own White Horse Security Firm.” He raised his ID to the hidden camera lens. He was good. Very good. Most people didn’t notice it snug in the weathered molding framing the door. “I’d like to talk to you about last night.”
Seeing as how I still felt a skosh guilty for not telling his guys upfront the woman in the water wasn’t the girl they had been searching for, I figured I owed him. “Give me a second.”
I slid the scrapbook off my lap and thunked it on the coffee table before stacking the rest of my mess on its bulging cover. My phone was the cherry on top. This way I wouldn’t miss an update, and its presence discouraged sticky fingers. Folks might not think twice about flipping through scrapbooks left out in the open, but our society had evolved stringent hands-off cellphone etiquette. With my living room tidied, I stood and straightened my pinstripe pajamas. Cole had invited himself to my home. He deserved my limp ponytail and the fuzz of my unbrushed teeth. I opened the door and had to tilt my head back to meet his piercing blue eyes. He was taller in person. Really tall. And built like a freaking tank.
Black stubble covered his head, and his square jaw bulged as he ground his teeth. I suppressed a grimace at the state of his nose, which had been broken and reset badly multiple times. His left ear was worse. The top of it was missing, the shell ragged as though someone had gnawed on the cartilage. His hand, when he offered it to me, engulfed mine up to the wrist. His scarred knuckles resembled a losing tic-tac-toe board, and I had brushed my thumb across one of the raised marks before the impulse even registered.
“Ms. Boudreau.” Glacier melt ran warmer than his voice, but a faint good ol’ boy drawl gave it the potential for sweetness. Iced tea. That’s what he reminded me of. Delicious but cold. And always satisfying, another supremely unhelpful part of my brain supplied. “Have I come at a bad time?”
Those frosty eyes slid over me from head to toe. I’d bought my pajamas in the tall department to get the longest sleeves possible, so the top was baggy but the bottoms fit. He couldn’t seem to take his eyes off them. Was the contradiction of swaddling myself in yards of fabric while he sweated on the porch so odd? I kept our house subzero to compensate for my propensity toward wearing long-sleeved tops. Dad and I had long since acclimatized to the perpetual chill, but company often left early and with their teeth chattering.
I wasn’t easily intimidated, every Goliath had his David, but this guy . . . The weight of his stare as it lingered on the top button of my shirt, the pearly disc held on by a single ragged string, caused my stomach to flip like a stack of flapjacks and my nipples to harden against the soft fabric. I folded my arms across my chest, but he’d noticed my response to him. How could he not when I’d almost poked out his eyes?
“Now’s as good a time as any.” I nudged the door open wider in invitation, but I had to step back or risk him squashing my toes to fit in the entryway. I retreated until he was inside then bumped the door shut with my hip and flipped the locks. More than one person had invited themselves in when they’d met with no resistance. “Pardon the PJs. I’m off today.”
“Your house, your rules.” He prowled into the living room and planted his feet in front of what I jokingly referred to as my lifetime achievement wall. It was a collage of school portraits, team photos and some of my more impressive awards, including my state certification. “Your father must be very proud of you.”
“Dad has never met an order form he didn’t like.” I insinuated myself between him and a reminder of the year my braces required so many rubber bands that I drank meals to avoid removing them. “But you didn’t come here to talk about his Luce memorabilia collection.” I herded him toward Dad’s recliner. “What can I do for you?”
“What can you tell me about last night?” The springs groaned, and the wood base creaked while he settled. I hoped he didn’t break anything. Dad loved that ratty old chair. “I’ve read Miller’s report, but I’d like to hear your version of events.”
“Your men aren’t in trouble for lending a hand, are they?” I perched on the edge of my favorite couch cushion. “Our Jane Doe isn’t the Claremont girl, but we couldn’t have saved her without their help.”
“Jane could have just as easily been our clients’ daughter.” He rolled his massive shoulders, fidgeting with a wide, leather, watch band that encircled one wrist, and even that casual movement made his seat groan. I noticed he wore a matching band without the timepiece on the other wrist, but it was none of my business if the guy enjoyed accessorizing. “I won’t dock their pay for the supplies or the hours, and I won’t bill the department either.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” Any lingering guilt at using them to further my own agenda evaporated. “So, about last night.” I clasped my hands together. “My partner called and told me a body had been reported in the water. We’re assigned to the Claremont case, so he got pinged.” I summarized the rest, a shiver coasting up my spine at the mention of what the news had dubbed Super Gator, but I could have been reciting the alphabet for all the interest he showed. “That’s about it. Jane was taken to the hospital, and I came home.”
“MDWFP sent in a team to relocate the gator.” A hint of amusement thawed his expression as his gaze touched on the television where the dinosaur documentary still played. “One of the witnesses claims it was a deinosuchus and wants the swamp declared a protected area.”
“I was too busy not getting my head bitten off to get a good look at it.” I rubbed the base of my throat. “From what I saw, I’d believe it was an actual dinosaur rather than the descendant of one before I agreed it was a standard American Alligator.”
“It attacked you?” A growl pumped from his chest. “Miller’s report didn’t mention that.”
“It happened before your men arrived.” I curled my legs under me and closed one hand over the can of pepper spray I kept tucked between the cushion and the arm of the couch for emergencies. Cole, it seemed, had a bit of a temper. “I got so worked up when I realized Jane was—” like me “—alive, that I leaned out over the water. I understand the aggression, and I should have respected it more. The creature was protecting a potential food source.”
“Call me if your investigation sends you back there.” He made it an order. “That creature is dangerous.”
“I appreciate your concern.” That he assumed he had the right to boss me around rankled, but I wasn’t about to snub a man willing to lend me his airboat. “I’ll consider your offer if the time comes.”
A chime filled the air, and I lunged at my phone. “This might be my partner.” The text was indeed from Rixton, the message two words: Call me. “I need a minute.”
“Take all the time you need.”
I left him seated, then ducked into the kitchen, dialing Rixton as I paced. “Hey, what’s up?”
“Got some updates for you.” The rasp in his voice left me picturing him knuckling his eyes the way he did after long nights fueled by too much coffee. “Jane is stable, but her lids remain firmly in the down position. Buck relieved me at the hospital thirty minutes ago, and we’ve drafted Donaldson for third shift. They’ve both got your number, and they’ll call at the first sign of trouble. Or the first hint of good news.” His bleating yawn had me holding the phone away from my ear. “And lastly, though I’d hate for you to question my stamina, I’m not up for our birthday foursome today. Would you sew a voodoo doll in my likeness and stab it with needles if I wrote you a raincheck for tomorrow?”
“I can’t sew, and I hate needles.” They gave me the heebiejeebies. “Besides, I would never do that to a doll. Put your face on it? That would just be cruel.”
“Note to self.” He spoke in a loud, clear voice that mocked mine when I used the recorder. “Ask Momma Ethel to sew Luce a Rixton doll for Christmas. It’ll be the gift that keeps on giving. Anatomical correctness is a must. See previous statement about giving.”
“You wouldn’t dare.” The nightmare image of a normal-sized doll with a life-sized penis attached set my eyelid twitching. “Your grandmother-in-law would have a coronary.”
“She’s been married five times and has her eye on the German widower who moved in next door.” He chuckled. “Momma Ethel has seen more action than downtown Canton during a film shoot. Felt isn’t going to be the vehicle of her demise. I predict it will be a younger man, and by younger I mean nearer the half-century mark, and the fistful of blue pills she spiked his drink with at dinner.”
I turned my head against my shoulder to muffle my laughter before it escaped and encouraged him. Nothing stopped him once he got on a roll.
“Okay, I’ve got a warm bed and a hot woman waiting on me. See you tomorrow, Bou-Bou.”
“Rixton—”
The call ended mid-cackle as he hung up on me.
“One of these days . . . ” Shaking my head, I tossed my phone on the table and strolled back into the living room. “Sorry about the interruption. Did you need anything else, Mr. Heaton?”
“Just Cole, and no.” He rose in a fluid motion that should have been impossible for a man of his size, and Dad’s chair creaked with relief. “That’s all I needed.”
After ushering him out the door, I moseyed back to the table and dialed Maggie. She answered on the third ring. “Rixton can’t make it today.”
“Aww, shucks.” She sniffled. “You can’t see my face right now, but I’m tearing up at the idea of a girls’ day out with my bestie.”
I padded back into the living room, scissored my fingers through the blinds and watched Cole prowl to his vehicle, a massive SUV that would give other drivers on our backroads palpitations sharing the road with the gleaming beast.
“Unless . . . ” She sucked in a sharp breath. “Is Sherry okay?”
Cole whipped around, perhaps sensing my eyes on him, and our gazes clashed. The smile that slit his mouth was grim and expectant, as though he had known I would be unable to resist spying, and all he’d had to do was wait for my curiosity to get the better of me.
“Luce.”
The volume of Maggie’s shriek jarred me to attention, and I let the blinds snap back into place. “What?”
“Sherry,” she enunciated clearly. “Is she okay?”
“Oh. Yes. She’s fine.” I shook my head to free it from thoughts of Cole. “Rixton’s just tired. He put in sixteen last night.”
“Hmm.” Maggie drew out the sound into ominousness. “So, it’s just us chickens.”
