Caress (18 page)

On the plane, Michael leaned back and closed his eyes. As always, Nya Seymour formed in his imagination. He could see her in that brightly patterned dress at Cold and Hot’s. He had seen her bare chocolate arms, neck, and back. His palms itched to touch skin he knew was soft. His mind was dizzy with her perfume all over again. He felt his body responding to the mere thought of her. He had to have her.

h

He was kissing her. She could feel his tongue blaze hot trails all over her body, kissing her everywhere, sending chills up her spine. His hands moved over her, squeezing her arms, caressing her breasts as his lips forged a path down the center of her stomach and up again.

And then he was over her, kissing her deeply again, drugging her with the taste of him. His hands were clenched in her hair. She could feel her own desire mirrored in his eyes. Her body needed his, the release that only he could bring to her. “Oh, God, Michael,” she moaned in her dream world. And suddenly, her sensual haze was shattered.

She opened her eyes, numb and dazed. She tried to focus them, but it took several seconds for the dizziness and the blur to subside. She tried to rise, and sharp pain pounced on her like a lion in the night. She tried to speak. Her voice came in a low, guttural moan. She again tried to sit up, this time successfully. She saw Elphonse leaning over her and attempted to rise. Her head began to pound more vehemently, daring her to try again. “El?” she moaned.

“No, Nya, don’t talk.” He took her hand in one of his and pressed his other to her forehead. “You took a nasty bump on the head. I found you lying in the warehouse.”

“I-I,” she stuttered struggling through the dizzying pain.

“Shhh, let me get you some water and some painkillers. I think that’s safe,” he said, standing and pouring a glass of water from a pitcher on the bedside table. He lifted her head with his hand and fed her pills before pressing the rim of the glass to her lips. Sometimes El was just like her father, not asking, commanding. She drank in deeply, savoring the cool current flowing down her dry throat.

“What happened?” she queried.

“I’m guessing you have a slight concussion. You have a little bit of swelling and some bruising, but you’ll live.”

“Okay, but what happened?”

El froze where he stood. “You don’t remember?”

Nya’s brain felt as if it were coated in dryer lint; she couldn’t get a clear picture of anything. The harder she tried to remember, the more her head hurt. “I’m not sure.”

El studied her. Then he pulled a chair over to her bedside and rested his chin on his clasped hands. “What am I going to do with you?”

The question was soft and rhetorical. Something about it, though, prompted her to try to sit up to get a good look at him. “What do you mean?”

“This is important: what do you remember from tonight?”

She reached up and gingerly tested the base of her skull with her fingertips. Her hair felt sticky.

“Don’t worry. The cut you have is tiny. More like you got scraped with something. You can barely see it. I cleaned it as best I could and put some antibacterial gel on it.”

“Why did you bring me back to the house instead of the hospital?” she asked as her thoughts started to clear. “Wait a minute. El, I just left you at home this morning. You were in Charlotte Amalie with me yesterday.
What
are you doing here?”

“Your father sent me.”

“What?”

“Your father sent me here to look after you because he said you were going to get yourself into some trouble. Isabella called.”

Nya let out a string of curses. “That sneaky witch. I knew she was up to something.”

“You do realize,” he said, “that I found you bleeding on the warehouse floor. Sounds like she was right to call Nyron.”

Really, he couldn’t expect her to comment on that.

“Speaking of your father, I need to give him a call and let him know that you’re ready to travel.”

“Travel?” Nya asked. She pushed her elbows into the bed, levering herself up into a higher sitting position. “What do you mean, travel?”

“You’re going back to Birmingham tomorrow,” he said wearily. Nya noticed that he had heavy bags under his eyes and that he wore the same clothes he had worn the day before. Nya did not let his obvious concern divert her from the issue.

“El, I’m not going back to Birmingham. I’m going to call the police and I’m going to find out who did this to me.”

“You can’t do that,” El hissed.

“Why not?”

“You can’t. I took the liberty of letting the FBI know what happened. I’m sure they have officers posted outside right now to ensure your safety.”

“Won’t they want me to describe the man who did this?”

“Did you see him?” El crossed his arms over his chest.

“No, but surely they would still want to interview me.”

“I told them everything I saw.”

“Which was what, El? Remember, I’m a little fuzzy.”

“I came here looking for you and you weren’t here. I called Isabelle to ask if she knew where you were. When she told me about your exchange, I figured you would be just stubborn enough to go down to the warehouse afterhours to look for what you wanted.”

Nya lifted one shoulder.

“Are you sure you don’t remember anything?”

“I don’t know. I think I just need to wake up, clear my head, and I’ll remember something helpful. Do you mind making me some of my mom’s tea in the kitchen?”

“No, I don’t mind. I’ll get it for you. You just stay there.”

Nya watched him go. Then she closed her eyes and slid back down in the bed. She felt as if she were going to black out again. In fact, she would welcome sleep once she sipped a bit of her mother’s tea. The strong smell of it, sweet and floral, had already reached her. She inhaled and felt her muscles relax.

Behind her eyelids, she found herself in the warehouse basement again. She saw the pieces of art from Noah, Errol, and Lamonte. Her emotions stirred again at the images. And then, as her muscles turned to syrup and she felt the pleasant sensation of surrender, she saw a photo. It was the face of Rinaldo Mandolesi, only his face was a composite of hundreds of tiny photos. Hundreds of tiny photos of horrible things. Murders, drug deals, sexual perversion, torture. Rinaldo Mandolesi, a man who went to obsessive, almost maniacal lengths to prevent himself from being tied to any crime with hard evidence, had been featured prominently in several. Her eyes popped open.

“Nya, princess, your tea is ready,” El called.

“El, I remember.”

“What do you remember?”

She told him.

“Are you certain you saw photos? You really did take a nasty bump on your head. You were calling me Michael twenty minutes ago, so I’m not sure you can trust your memory.”

Nya blushed.
That
dream, she certainly remembered. “It’s not the same. I’m sure.”

Nya mulled that over. Her eyes crossed from the pain in her head. “Fine if you don’t believe me, but what did you see when you found me?”

El cleared his throat. “All I saw was you lying there with a few opened crates. I didn’t see any photo.”

“It was huge. You had to have seen it!”

“I didn’t. And I’m still not sure you saw what—”

“I saw it,” Nya said, feeling out of breath. “I told you I was coming here to check on the invoices. I saw it and it showed
evidence
of Rinaldo Mandolesi’s criminal activity. That boy
died
because of the photos he took, because of his art he made. El, you have to go back.”

“Sorry?”

“You have to go back to the warehouse and see if it’s there. Maybe you didn’t pay it any attention.”

“Or the person who rendered you unconscious took it. Has that not occurred to you?”

Nya blinked. No, she hadn’t thought of that.

“I see that it hasn’t. Nya, we need to leave this to the people who know what they are doing.”

“But—”

“Girl, don’t you understand that I can’t see another woman I love die?”

Nya winced as all the air seemed to be sucked from her lungs. He was scared for her. That was why he was hoping she didn’t remember and why he hadn’t called the police, why he’d brought her home instead of to a hospital. El was scared to draw any attention to her. She took a deep breath. “Listen, if there is a possibility that that photo is still there, one of us has to go back for it.”

“It wasn’t there. Can’t you just drop this?”

“No, I can’t. I get that you’re worried. I don’t
want
to worry you. But El, you have to see how important this is. Hiding won’t make me any safer. Not after what happened tonight. Can’t you see that?”

He stubbornly said nothing.

Nya made a move to get out of bed. “Fine, then.”

“Nya Sheranne Seymour! You get back into that bed now before I tie you down! You’re not going anywhere.”

Nya knew that it was no idle threat. She would have laughed had it not made her so angry. He was going to force his caretaking on her whether she liked it or not.

“Fine. I’ll go back. But no matter what I find, you are still going back to Birmingham and I will get to the bottom of this.” He said just as firmly.

“Thank you for caring, El, but I have to see this through.”

“Don’t make me call your parents,” he threatened.

Nya wilted. “Don’t do this to me,” she said, fighting the tea and the strong painkiller she’d been given.

“I’m not doing anything but saving your stubborn life,” he muttered to her as he smoothed the twists from her perspiring brow and she succumbed to a deep slumber.

h

Nya opened the door to her house, wishing that she hadn’t come home at all. Her father’s car was sitting in her driveway. She dreaded the confrontation. She’d already had a tough few days. Being assaulted, which El had made her swear not to report, was toxic icing on a poisoned cake. But none of that mattered just then. Her foremost worry at that moment was the man sitting at the dining room table with a fat Havana cigar between his teeth. She had never figured out how to ask her father not to smoke in her house or not to let himself in whenever he wanted just because he had a key. She probably never would.

Scowling through the smoke, Nyron Seymour watched his daughter’s step falter.

“Didn’t mean to surprise you,” he said, puffing out. “I called Elphonse to make sure he watched you get on the plane.”

“Why?”

“Because you are not supposed to be chasing down apparitions in Norfolk. You’re
supposed
to be handling this
Harrison Tribune
fiasco.”

“Where’s Ma?” Nya walked over and gave him a brief hug.

“She’s still down home working. She’ll be back in Birmingham soon, or I’m going to go down there and get her myself,” he said, squeezing her back. Nya thought of how much her parents loved each other and how lucky she was to have them. Yet her smile faded as Nyron’s did. She sat down beside him, waiting. The storm was coming. “Nya, I thought you were managing this
Harrison
Tribune
situation.”

“I am, Daddy,” she replied apprehensively.

“Then what is this?” For the first time, she noticed what lay on the table in front of him. It was a copy of that day’s paper. On the front page was a picture of Marshall Ellis at a benefit the year before. The headline read, “Ex-Hatsheput Exec Found Dead.” Nya let her breath rush past her lips as she pressed a hand to her forehead. “You had to know the media would find out he was dead. That’s not the sort of thing you can keep a secret. You can’t fault the Harrisons for—”

“Read it,” Nyron commanded.

Sometimes it surprised Nya how a sixty-five-year-old man could still be so grand and bearish, how he could still make her feel so small and fearful in his presence. She looked down, scanning the article, which detailed much of what Michael had already told her about Ellis’s death. As she read on, she saw in bold print the words, “In related news.” What followed was a brief piece discussing Nyron’s decision to retire. It concluded with a paragraph citing that “sources” were almost positive that Nya would be named president after Nyron stepped down. Nya held her breath and wondered if she could pay someone to whack Michael on the back of the head.

Nyron sucked in deep on his cigar, then took it out of his mouth and set it on the table. He released the thick smoke into the air and studied his daughter.

Though Nya had been reeling from the contents of the article, she was snapped into clarity by her father’s statement. “This is not my fault, Daddy. I asked Michael not to mention me in any articles or your plans to retire.”

“You confirmed my plans to retire?”

She gulped. “Everyone is aware that it’s an eventuality. But I promise you, I didn’t tell him I was going to follow you. ” She felt her temper starting to get the better of her. “And just so you know, I certainly didn’t kill Marshall Ellis, so I don’t see how you can blame that on me!”