A Christmas Kiss (4 page)

"Do you know how many times cops have promised to look into Kit's disappearance? Except they never look far enough to find his body." There was no fire in her words, and Cori knew she was near defeat. Had she really seen the man under the magnolia tree? Or had she dreamed him up because she wanted to find Kit so badly? Even a glimpse of Kit would feed her desperate fantasies for another few months. Until the retrial. Until she was moved and had to start all over again. And then? Would Kit suddenly come to visit her in another city with other tidbits from the past?

Joey took her elbow and ushered her out of the narrow alley ahead of him. At the sidewalk he eased her to the right, toward the parking lot where she had not wanted to go. Now, though, Cori did not resist. Her hard-edged facade had crumbled.

Instead of going to her Saturn, Joey steered her toward a racy black sports car and opened the passenger door. She got in without a word. For the moment, she didn't care where she went as long as she didn't have to make a choice. She felt herself slipping back into the lethargy that had marked the past two years of her life, since she'd joined the witness protection program. The only decisions she'd made had been professional—which artists to buy and show, what presentations, what dates and times. That work had been her lifeline from one day to the next.

Once behind the wheel, Joey cast a look at her, his eyebrows furrowed with worry. She seemed almost catatonic, as if by giving up on going down to NOPD headquarters she had given up on everything. He drove out of the Quarter and headed toward Lake Pontchartrain. In the heavy Christmas traffic, he had to pay strict attention to the road, but he had several moments where he glanced at Cori only to find her gaze distracted, her attention focused in a place so internal he worried that she had left reality behind.

"I'm okay," she finally said without even looking at him. "I just don't know what to do anymore."

They were in a neat neighborhood of white frame houses on a street lined with old oaks that canopied the road. Joey pulled into a driveway, relieved to see the red Mazda parked there. When Cori didn't move, he got out and walked around the car to open her door.

She looked at the house, then up at him, confusion apparent.

"We can talk here," he said, helping her from the car.

She followed him like a puppy, and Joey felt another spurt of worry. Would this woman be able to testify again? He'd heard her take the stand at the first DeCarlo double murder trial, and Cori St. John, then known as Brently Gleason, had been one of the strongest eyewitnesses he had ever heard. She had remembered acute detail, convincing detail, and he had been told she had a type of photographic memory that nailed down scraps of information with perfect recall. But looking at her, it seemed as if she might have trouble remembering how to dress.

When she stumbled on the brick steps because of her injured knee, he steadied her. Before he could say a word, the screen door flew open and a tall, slender woman with black curls that hung to her waist rocketed out onto the porch.

"Joey! What have you done? Look." She pointed at Cori's blood-soaked leg. "Why is she even walking? You're plenty strong enough to carry this woman. Why is she limping along, you big galoot?"

Dark eyes that exactly matched Joey's snapped onto him. "How did she get hurt in the first place, Joey?"

Instead of trying to answer the flood of questions, Joey put his hand on Cori's shoulder and gave her a little support. When the dark-haired woman paused to draw a breath, Joey finally spoke. "Cori St.

John, this is my sister, Laurette. Laurette, Cori is.. .she was in an accident over in the Quarter. She wasn't feeling well so I thought we could come here for a cup of coffee
and some privacy.
"

Laurette's dark eyes rolled. "The woman is bleeding, and you want privacy? The saints should walk beside you, Joey Tio. Your skull is as thick as dried swamp mud." She shook her head. "Sometimes I think you have moss for brains. If Mama could see this..."

"Laurette..." Joey's voice had a warning tone. He was already beginning to regret bringing Cori here, but it was the only truly safe place he knew. Safe from the prying eyes of anyone who might be watching Cori, and also safe from the intricate web of personnel and contacts that made up the witness protection program. Cori had indeed blown her cover. Legally, the U.S. Marshals could wash their hands of her and assume no further responsibility. But if he could get her out of town, maybe he could patch up her cover until the trial. And maybe she could be kept safely out of harm's way, if she cooperated. Then she could have a new identity and start again.

"Come inside." Laurette had her arm around Cori's shoulders and was half dragging, half carrying her inside. "My brother Joey was raised better than to leave a woman bleeding on the front porch. He was taught proper behavior. But he is a big man with his badge and his important business, and he has forgotten the courtesies and manners our mother taught him." She cast a dangerous look over her shoulder and muttered something in French.

"Laurette!" Joey warned.

"Don't speak to your older sister in that tone, Joey." Laurette never stopped as she assisted Cori past a massive fir tree that touched the ceiling and was decorated with multicolored lights, white crocheted snowflakes, angels and red glass ornaments. Beneath the tree the floor was covered with presents. The cool, spicy scent of the tree gave way to the warmth of a kitchen bubbling with the smell of gumbo and corn bread. "And just in time for something hot." She eased Cori into a chair at the red-checked tablecloth, and in less than twenty seconds she had placed a steaming bowl of gumbo and a hot piece of corn bread in front of her.

"Sit," she commanded her brother as she motioned to another chair. "Cliff isn't coming home for lunch, and Angela is Christmas shopping with the neighbors. As soon as this injured one eats, we'll look at her knee."

"I'm fine." Cori was surprised that she could manage to get a word in edgewise between the brother and sister. They were so alike, and yet so different. Where Joey's voice carried only a hint of the Cajun dialect, Laurette's was the voice of that unique region of Louisiana. Cori looked from one dark, worried pair of eyes to another. If they were not close in spirit, they were almost identical in looks. The arch of their eyebrows was perfectly matched, as was the widow's peak that marked their smooth, olive foreheads. Even the full cupid's bow of their upper lips, over a lush bottom lip, were exactly the same.

'' Joey is my younger brother,'' Laurette said as if she read Cori's mind. "People sometimes think we're twins, but I'm older, and therefore he has to
listen
to me." She got up and quickly placed gumbo in two more bowls. Before she took her seat they all had corn bread and butter, gumbo and big glasses of sweetened iced tea.

Cori had not intended to eat, but the spicy food tantalized her, making her mouth water. Joey and Laurette had no such reservations. Laurette mumbled a prayer and they began to eat. Cori lifted her spoon and let the delicate blend of spices and seafood invade her mouth. One spoonful followed the next until her bowl was empty, and she looked up to find duplicate expressions of satisfaction on the two faces across from her.

Patting Joey's arm, Laurette turned to Cori. "So, when is the wedding?"

The words stunned Cori. She looked up to find that Joey looked as shocked as she was.

Laurette saw the amazement and focused on her brother. "Surely this is a wedding. For ten years you live in New Orleans and never once do you bring a single girl anywhere near the doorstep of my house. Now you drag in this half-starved child with her leg bleeding. I was certain you'd asked her___"

At her brother's glower, Laurette finally fell silent. Her gaze fell on Cori's left hand where the wedding band and engagement ring sparkled. "Oh, my," she whispered. "I've made a terrible mistake."

Cori recovered first. "It's okay." Laurette was a warm-hearted woman, and her love for her brother was more than clear. "I, uh, sort of work with Joey. He saved me from getting run over, and I was a little.

..out of it. So he brought me here to talk." She looked up and saw gratitude in Joey's eyes. For the first time in a long time it felt good to be able to do something helpful for someone else.

"Here I make an issue of Joey's manners, and I had assumed..." Laurette couldn't look at her brother. When she did, the fire was back in her eyes. "But it's a natural thing to assume. He's thirty-four.

An old man by my family's standards. And no girl on the horizon. No one to hold in his arms and dance when the fiddle plays fast and sweet." She leaned forward. "No one to hold and start a family."

"Laurette!" Joey's face was darkened with what could either be embarrassment or anger. "This is not the time or place. This is business."

Laurette was totally unimpressed. She held up her hands and turned to Cori. "Business! Business!

That's all I hear from my little brother. Everything in his life is business, and all the while he grows old and shriveled and his juices will dry before he produces a single son to carry on the Tio name!" She stood up.

"Well, tend to your
business,
Joey. I'm going to decorate the front porch." She walked out of the room and let the swinging door to the kitchen flutter to and fro in her wake.

Joey looked down at his hands for a long moment before he stood and cleared the dishes from the table. At the sink he ran hot water and squeezed detergent over their bowls.

Cori had nothing to watch except him, even though the movement of his muscles beneath his cotton shirt made her slightly uncomfortable. When it was clear he could think of no way to get around the embarrassment his sister had caused, Cori spoke. "You're lucky to have a sister who loves you so much."

He turned the water off and turned around. "I know." His smile was sheepish and proud. "We're the only two children. My mother was sick for a long time and died when I was twelve. Laurette felt she had to step in and take over, even though by then I was mostly grown."

"I have a sister." Cori thought of Lane, the cool professional writer who lived in New York and worked as a producer on a network news show. Lane knew Cori was alive, and knew that in order for Cori to stay alive they could never be sisters again. That was how the WP program worked. Now, though, Cori felt as if it might be worth her life for one conversation with someone who loved her.

Joey nodded. He knew all about Cori's family. Her sister, married with two daughters. Cori's parents were dead. Her father was killed in a traffic accident and her mother had died of a heart attack shortly after the DeCarlo murders. It was one of the reasons Cori had agreed to go into WP. That and the fact that her fiance, Kit Wells, had agreed to go into the program with her. She had not thought she would be so very much alone.

"I've had enough of this," Cori said. Her decision was made.

Without asking, Joey knew what she meant. He'd seen witnesses fall out of the program many times before. The loneliness, the isolation from family, sometimes it was just more than a person could bear.

And a lot of times those people ended up dead.

"Cori, stick it out until Ben DeCarlo is retried."

She felt a flush of anger. She had nothing left of her life, while Joey Tio had a sister who worried about him, a niece, probably a hundred aunts and uncles and cousins. And all he was really worried about was having his witness available for the retrial.

"I can't," she said, starting to rise. "Please take me back to my car." She checked her watch. She'd missed her appointment with Captain Blake, but she could still demand to see the investigation file on Kit.

"Cori, you're not thinking about the danger."

Her smile was sad. "No, I suppose I'm not. I'm thinking about the fact that I don't care about the danger. Don't you see, Mr. Tio, I just can't do it another single day. Kit is alive." She reached into her handbag and withdrew the chocolate kisses. She lined them up on the table in a neat row. "He left these for me. Three in my locked studio. Three in my locked car.''

"Chocolate candy?" Joey picked them up and knew they could have been bought in any gas station or convenience store in the world.

"It was a signal between Kit and me. He would leave three kisses for me whenever he came by the shop and I wasn't in, or sometimes on the pillow in the morning___" Her voice broke and she turned away from him, her hands on her face to hold back the emotion that almost overwhelmed her.

Joey was beside her, his hands on her shoulders, bracing her, trying not to interfere with her grief but also trying to stop her from falling apart at the seams.

"Don't you see? Kit is out there. He's trying to tell me something. He wants to come back," she said, knowing she sounded desperate, stupid and horribly lonely.

"Ms. St. John..." Joey's voice was calm, soothing. "Anyone could have left that candy. You can't assume it was your husband."

Cori had no fight left. She stepped out of his hands and finally turned to face him, not even bothering to wipe the tears from her cheeks. "That's where you're wrong, Mr. Tio. I can assume anything I want. If it isn't Kit, then I am losing my mind. Either way, I can play by any rules I decide on."

Cori opened the car door and put her foot on the gravel pavement of the Riverwalk parking lot.

Around her was the constant motion of shoppers loading trunks, hunting for parking spaces, laughing in the cold December air that seemed to hum with the excitement of Christmas. Her knee had given up the terrible throb and settled for a dull whine of an ache. "Thanks for trying, Joey." She couldn't dispel the look of failure on his face, but he had tried to help her.

"Leaving the program isn't the solution, Cori."

"It is for me." She shrugged. Somehow the visit to Joey's sister's house had calmed her, had forced her to see clearly all that was missing from her world. "I don't have a life."

"Hunting for a man who disappeared from your life, deliberately or otherwise, isn't a great new beginning."