Kingsley Baby Trilogy: The Hero's Son\The Brother's Wife\The Long-Lost Heir (10 page)

He'd lost a lot of weight since his illness, and the shadows and angles that slanted across his features gave him an almost-skeletal appearance.

Shaken, Brant crossed the room to his father's bedside and stood staring down at him. They'd never been close—more like adversaries than father and son—and Brant felt the gulf between them more strongly now than ever. He'd heard about the exploits of Judd Colter, the legendary cop, all of his life, but Brant suddenly realized that he knew very little about his father, the man.

Brant turned away from the bed, and as he did so, something on the floor caught his eye. His mother had always kept their home spotless. She had a real thing for cleanliness. The bits of caked mud on the floor would have driven her crazy if she'd seen them.

As Brant knelt, he saw more mud near the sliding glass door that led outside. The tiny clumps blazed a trail straight to his father's bedside.

Raising the blanket that draped over the side, Brant
peered under the bed. A pair of shoes had been shoved out of sight, the soles of which were lightly caked with mud and pine needles.

D
USK HAD FALLEN
the next day by the time Valerie checked into the Hotel Royale in New Orleans, dumped her luggage in her room, and then headed back out. The streets were crowded, but not as heavily as they would be later. The French Quarter would come alive after dark, and Valerie knew that it would not be wise to be caught there alone. She'd never been to New Orleans, but she'd heard stories from some of her friends who had.

As a reporter, however, she'd been in tough situations before. She knew how to take care of herself, and her innate sense of urgency wouldn't allow her to sit around in the safety of her room and wait for morning. She would go crazy, and besides, if she called first, Naomi Gillum, aka Marie LaPierre, might not agree to see her.

Valerie decided the best course of action would be to drop in on the woman unannounced. Surprise her. Give her no opportunity to run.

But what if she didn't live at the same address anymore? What if Harry Blackman had gotten the wrong woman? Or what if Naomi had gotten wind of Valerie's investigation and moved on? Changed her name so that locating her again would be next to impossible? What then?

Valerie didn't want to speculate as to what her next
step would be if that turned out to be the case. She'd counted on finding Naomi Gillum ever since she'd begun her crusade. Ever since she'd found the woman's name in her mother's diary. She wouldn't let herself imagine the worst-case scenario now.

The street was hot and muggy, but a breeze from the river drifted through the oak trees that lined the sidewalk, making the evening bearable. The buildings along the street were old, some of them crumbling, and all had the signature grillwork and tiny balconies for which the Quarter was so famous.

As Valerie walked along, she could hear laughter and music coming from some of the apartments located above stores and restaurants, and the sound, for some reason, made her lonely. New Orleans was a city for lovers, and as Valerie passed several couples strolling arm in arm along the street, she suddenly thought, inexplicably, about Brant.

New Orleans would be his kind of city. It was not unlike Memphis in some ways, except perhaps, for being a shade more worldly. A touch more decadent. But Brant would like that. He would appreciate the city's darker side, because he had one as well, Valerie reflected, shivering a bit as she conjured up an image of his dark hair and black, probing eyes.

She was finding it harder and harder to remember that the two of them were on opposite sides. That because of their fathers, they were natural-born enemies.

She found it harder and harder to forget the way he'd made her blood race when he'd kissed her last night. The way he'd made her heart pound when he'd held her in his arms.

He was right. The attraction between them couldn't
be denied, but Valerie had to try anyway. She reminded herself of what she'd overheard last night in the Kingsley mansion. If Brant was part of the threat to her, just how far would he be willing to go to protect his family, his father? As far as pushing her in front of a bus? Shooting her?

We Colters stick together.
His own words rang in her ears, forcing Valerie to accept the reality of the situation. Brant Colter wasn't to be trusted.

She hurried her steps, knowing that the sooner she found Naomi Gillum, the sooner she would have the proof she needed to free her father, and the sooner they could both get back to the semblance of a normal life.

She turned off Royale onto Dumaine and walked a few more blocks. After about twenty minutes or so, she located the address Harry Blackman had given her. Like many of the buildings in the Quarter, the shop was located on the bottom floor with an apartment above it. A balcony jutted over the street and the door was open. Valerie could hear a song, something soft and mournful, playing on the radio inside the apartment.

There was no sign for the shop, no advertisement of any kind, just the street number painted discreetly on the black door. Valerie had never been in anything remotely resembling a voodoo shop, and she experienced a faint prickling of anxiety as she twisted the doorknob and stepped inside.

The shop was so dimly lit that she thought for a moment it might be closed and the owner had neglected to lock up. But then she realized the dusky interior was intentional. Part of the ambience. Candles burned in wall sconces and in holders on the counter, and the scent of sandalwood and frangipani permeated the air.

The shelves behind the counter were lined with yet more candles, in all sizes and colors, along with an assortment of strange-looking roots and herbs bottled in colored liquid.

Another shelf contained brass incense burners, and yet another, straw dolls. Voodoo dolls, Valerie realized, and the candles and herbs were standard fare for the voodoo practitioner.

No one was about, but a beaded curtain covering a doorway that led to the back fluttered briefly, as if someone had been peering out.

Alarm snaked through Valerie. Ever since she'd arrived in New Orleans, she'd had the feeling she was being watched. She'd told herself she was being foolish. No one knew she was here except Julian. She hadn't told another living soul, but in a voodoo shop, that knowledge was hardly comforting.

Taking a deep breath to steady her nerves, Valerie stepped up to the counter and rang a small, brass bell. She kept her eyes on the curtain at the rear of the shop, and within moments, a hand with scarlet-painted nails and ornate silver rings parted the beads. A woman stepped through.

She looked to be about sixty, tall and very thin. Her hair was dyed coal black, as were the fine brows that arched over faded blue eyes. She was heavily made up, with dark blue eye shadow and ruby lipstick that seeped into the deep crevices surrounding her mouth. Tiny silver snakes dangled from her earlobes, and the black silk caftan she wore gave her the illusion of floating as she glided through the beads.

“How may I help you?” she inquired in a deep,
raspy voice that attested to years and years of cigarette smoking.

“I'm looking for Marie LaPierre.”

“You've found her.” The woman smiled mysteriously as she made a sweeping gesture with both hands. “Do you wish a Tarot-card reading? A gris-gris to ward off bad luck? A love potion, perhaps?” she added with a sly grin as she took in Valerie's slim form.

Valerie suppressed another shiver. She had to give the woman credit. Marie LaPierre knew how to put on a show. But what about Naomi Gillum? “I want to talk to you about Cletus Brown.”

An exploding bomb could not have shattered the quiet more dramatically. Fear flashed in the woman's eyes before she quickly buried the emotion behind indifference. She picked up a crystal from the counter and began to polish the stone. “I don't know anyone by that name. I'm afraid you have the wrong shop. Now, if you'll excuse me, I was just about to close for the evening.”

Not exactly true, Valerie thought. A sign at the counter advertised Tarot-card readings twenty-four hours a day. It was clear the woman wanted to get rid of her. “I've waited a long time to meet you, Miss Gillum.”

The crystal crashed to the floor. There was no masking the fear in the woman's eyes now. “Who are you?” she whispered.

“My name is Valerie Snow. I'm a reporter with the
Memphis Journal,
and I'm doing a series of articles on the Kingsley kidnapping.”

Naomi Gillum seemed to age twenty years before Valerie's eyes. The lines in her face deepened against the blanched skin, and her body slumped forward, as if the weight of the world suddenly rested on her frail
shoulders. She no longer looked mysterious and intriguing. Before Valerie's eyes, Marie LaPierre vanished, and the woman who emerged was a very old and very frightened Naomi Gillum. Tears glistened in her eyes as she stared up at Valerie.

“Why?” she whispered. “Why now?”

“You, of all people, should know why. Cletus Brown has spent the last thirty-one years of his life in prison for a crime he didn't commit. It's time for the truth to come out.”

“Please.” The woman clutched a silver crucifix she wore around her neck. “I can't help you. Go away and leave me alone.”

Valerie shook her head. “I can't do that. You're the only one who can help me. The only one who can help
him.
I know the truth about the night Adam Kingsley was kidnapped, Miss Gillum.”

“Don't call me that,” she rasped. “I haven't been Naomi Gillum in a long time.”

“You can change your name, but you can't run away from who you are.” Valerie knew only too well how the past could come back to haunt you—suddenly, without warning. “The truth always has a way of finding you. I know you were with Cletus Brown the night Adam Kingsley was kidnapped.”

“You don't know anything,” the woman said bitterly. “You
can't
know.”

Valerie felt a flash of anger at the woman's stubbornness. “I know you were the only one who could have cleared him back then. Why didn't you come forward?”

“For reasons you couldn't begin to understand,” Naomi said defiantly.

“Why don't you try me? Why don't you tell me about that night? Why don't you tell me why you've let an innocent man sit in prison all these years while the real kidnapper has gone free?”

Naomi's knuckles whitened around the crucifix. “You don't know what you're asking.”

She crossed the floor to the front door, no longer floating, but walking with the shuffling steps of a very tired old woman. She pulled down the blind, locked the door and motioned for Valerie to follow her through the beaded curtain.

A narrow, dimly-lit stairway led to the apartment above the shop. The door opened directly into a bedroom, and they walked through to the living area. The room was decorated with red silk piano scarves, fringed lampshades, and yet more candles. French doors opened onto the balcony, and a ceiling fan whirled lazily over head, barely stirring the warm, musty air. The radio Valerie had heard earlier still played softly, and Naomi walked over and snapped it off.

She sat down on the worn velvet sofa and lit up a cigarette, exhaling a cloud of smoke as she motioned to the chair across from her. As Valerie took her seat, she noticed a deck of Tarot cards lying on the coffee table between them.

Following her gaze, Naomi reached forward and picked the top card off the deck.

“Do you believe in the Tarot, Miss Snow?” She tapped ashes into a crystal ashtray. Her hands were steady now. The cigarette seemed to have calmed her nerves, and yet another personality emerged, one that was a cross between the mysterious Marie LaPierre and
the very frightened Naomi Gillum. This woman made Valerie extremely uncomfortable.

She moistened her lips. “Not really. I believe one makes his or her own fortune.”

One thin brow arched to a sharp peak. “But if we could know the future, wouldn't it be easier to chart our course? Wouldn't it be easier to know which path to follow?” Naomi turned over the card. “
Le Chariot,
reversed, signifies vengeance. Does this card mean anything to you?”

Valerie swallowed uneasily. “No,” she said. “And I really didn't come here to have my fortune told. I told you what I want.”

Naomi turned over another card.
La Justice.
Even Valerie could interpret the meaning of that card.

This was ridiculous, she thought. It was almost as if the woman had known she was coming and had stacked the deck. But Naomi Gillum couldn't have known about Valerie. No one did. She'd kept her trip secret from everyone but Julian.

To her relief, Naomi didn't comment further. Neither did she turn any more cards. Instead, she sat back against the sofa and took a long drag on her cigarette as she studied Valerie carefully. But her intense scrutiny was almost as unnerving as the cards.

“How did you find out about me?” she finally asked.

Valerie took a deep breath. She'd rehearsed her story countless times in her head. “Cletus Brown's wife kept a diary. I ran across it in my research, and your name was mentioned several times. In fact, she knew all about you and her husband. She knew you'd been with him the night of the kidnapping. Evidently, Cletus confessed to
her after he was arrested. He knew that when you came forward, everything would be out in the open, and he wanted to tell his wife about his…indiscretion before she heard about it from someone else. Only, you never did come forward. You disappeared a few days after he was arrested. No one knew what happened to you.”

“How did you know where to find me?”

“After I found Grace Brown's diary, I hired a private investigator to track you down.”

“As easy as that,” Naomi murmured, studying the glowing tip of her cigarette.

“No one else has contacted you in all these years?” Valerie asked skeptically. “I'm not the first reporter to write about this story.”

Naomi shrugged her frail shoulders. “No one else knew of my connection to Cletus Brown. As long as I remained silent, no one was interested in me.”

Valerie leaned forward. “Why
did
you remain silent?”

“Why did Cletus Brown's wife remain silent?” Naomi challenged. “If she knew about me, why did she never come forward? Why did she not talk to the police?”

“Because she was convinced the local authorities framed her husband, and that her life and her daughter's life would be in danger if she came forward. In her diary, she said she'd received threatening phone calls. She was terrified for her child's safety, and for her husband's. As long as he was in prison, he was safe. But if she talked, if she tried to get him released, he would be killed.”

Valerie found that her own hands were shaking now as everything came rushing back to her. The phone calls that had left her mother terrified. Fleeing town in the
middle of the night. The years and years of waiting for their past to catch up with them.