Authors: Amanda Stevens
I was going crazy, that could be the only possible explanation. Images on photographs didn’t change. Pictures didn’t burn flesh. No. The only rational answer was my own insanity.
And for that very reason I didn’t mention the incident to Mrs. DuPrae when I saw her a short while later in the kitchen of the main house. Dementia was not something I wanted to advertise, especially when my credibility might make a difference to my father’s safety.
Because whatever I’d
imagined
earlier, my father’s disappearance was very much a reality. I
had
to make people listen to me, especially Reid. Whether I liked it or not, I needed his help to find my father.
“How long do you think you’ll remain in Columbé, Christine?” Mrs. DuPrae asked as she poured our tea. It was a sweet-smelling herbal brew that was wonderfully comforting. We were seated at the cozy round table in the kitchen, and the sunshine streaming in through the curtained window was a welcome respite from the gloom of my own creepy thoughts.
I smiled vaguely. “I certainly can’t leave until I hear from my father. I have to know he’s all right before I go back to Chicago.”
“Perhaps you’ll hear something today,” she said, lifting her cup of tea. She examined the contents for a moment,
as though momentarily lapsing into deep thought. Then she lifted the cup to her lips and sipped.
“I met a woman named Vinnia earlier,” I remarked casually, “Mama Vinnia, she called herself.”
A shadow of annoyance moved in the housekeeper’s brown eyes. “What in the world was
she
doing here?”
“She brought me a
gris-gris.
”
Mrs. DuPrae’s tongue clucked in disgust. “I hope you threw the smelly old thing away. No doubt she tried to upset you with her prattle about voodoo and spells and powers and God knows what else. You can’t take that old woman seriously. She used to work for the St. Pierres years ago, and she still hangs around here from time to time, I think because the poor old thing’s lonely. She has no family, nothing with which to occupy her time except her potions and whatnot. She calls herself a
mambo,
a voodoo priestess, of all things. She’s a bit senile, but I don’t expect she’s actually dangerous. Only if you start to believe her,” she added, smiling.
At this point, I wasn’t sure what I believed anymore. But I returned Mrs. DuPrae’s smile and asked with casual interest, “How long have you and Rachel lived in Columbé?”
“Oh, it’s a long story,” she said dismissively. “Christopher brought us over here after my husband died. They’d been good friends in Chicago, and Christopher knew that Martin had left me—well, in dire financial straits. He offered me a job and a home for my daughter. Now Rachel works at the hotel. We’re both deeply indebted to your father.”
Her expression changed when she spoke of my father. Her eyes seemed to glow with an inner light, and the austere lines of her mouth softened. She looked very much like a woman in love, I thought with a start. No wonder she seemed as worried about him as I was.
Faint color tinged her cheeks as our eyes met. “Let’s
hope he returns soon,” she said, taking a hurried sip of her tea.
“I plan to file a missing person’s report with the police today,” I informed her. “I hope Reid will go with me.”
Mrs. DuPrae set her cup down with a little clatter and looked away.
“Did I say something wrong?”
The eyes—full of worry—swept back to me. She tugged at the top button of her dark brown dress. “Oh, no. Of course not. It’s just…Well, Reid may be a little preoccupied at the moment.”
“With what?”
“Things are not going well at the hotel.”
“Are he and my father having financial difficulties?”
Mrs. DuPrae hesitated, pulling so furiously on the button I thought she might snap it loose. “They’re having…difficulties.”
“Reid doesn’t seem in the least concerned about my father’s disappearance,” I confided. “I can’t help wondering why.”
“You’re very perceptive. He and Christopher had a bitter argument the night before Christopher disappeared. You could hear them shouting at one another all over the house. It was very…disturbing.”
“What was the argument about?”
Her lips thinned into a rigid line. “I’ve said too much. I don’t like gossip.”
“But I have a right to know,” I argued. “I’m terribly worried about my father.”
“Then take care yourself,” she said ominously.
Her words echoed Vinnia’s, but I couldn’t imagine someone as practical as Mrs. DuPrae believing in voodoo. I said almost fearfully, “What on earth do you mean?”
She was nearly whispering now, glancing over her shoulder as though making sure we were alone. “Reid
is a very determined young man, Christine. He’s very ambitious. That hotel means everything to him, just as it did his father and his grandfather. In some strange way, his identity as a St. Pierre is all tied up in that pile of mortar and bricks. I suspect it has something to do with the family having lost everything at one time. Reid has a lot of pride, you know.”
So I’d noticed. “What do you mean, they ‘lost everything’?”
“Well,” she said, looking uneasy, “I’m not one to carry tales, but in a way you
are
family…. Years ago, Reid and Angelique’s father lost everything—the hotel, this house, their money—by gambling. The family was destitute. They had to sell all their personal valuables and belongings to meet the rest of the debt. I’ve heard some of the older employees talking about how Reid—he was only twelve or thirteen at the time—stayed at the auction all day and well into the night, watching the family’s possessions being sold one by one. It made a very deep impression on him.”
I had a sudden mental image of an adolescent Reid, standing alone from the crowd, watching his heritage being dismantled piece by piece. In some strange way, it made me feel a little closer to him.
“Afterward they moved to the States, to Chicago,” Mrs. DuPrae continued. “But I don’t think Reid has ever gotten over the humiliation. From what I understand, he blamed his father. They had a terrible falling-out. It may be hard for you and me to comprehend, but when a family like the St. Pierres loses all their worldly possessions, as well as their dignity, it affects them in…a lot of ways. It sometimes changes them.”
“I suppose that’s why Reid seems so protective of the hotel,” I murmured.
“Oh, yes. It’s his heritage, you see. God help anyone who threatens it.”
* * *
“How did you sleep last night?”
I was standing in the living room, gazing at the portrait of Claudine St. Pierre Greggory which adorned the wall over the mantel. Reid’s voice cut through the silence of the room, but he didn’t startle me. I’d been aware of his presence ever since he’d entered the room moments earlier. Now, as he spoke, I made a concentrated effort to appear calm and casual as I turned to greet him, but my heart was pounding so loudly, I thought Reid must surely hear it.
“I slept well, thank you,” I lied. There was a glint in his eyes, and I suspected he knew what I was trying to do. I turned my attention back to the portrait. “Your mother was a beautiful woman, wasn’t she?”
“Yes, she was.” He crossed the room and came to stand beside me. My breath caught in my throat. He was standing so near, I could smell the deep, provocative scent of his cologne.
I could see him out of the corner of my eye, studying me as I pretended to study the painting, and my knees began to tremble. He was dressed for work in a dark, double-breasted suit. He would have looked more at home on Wall Street than on a tropical island. But, then, dressing for success was the same anywhere, I guessed. And I had a feeling everything Reid did was calculated for success.
“Angelique looks very much like her,” he remarked. “Though she wouldn’t appreciate my saying so.”
“Why not?” Why wouldn’t anyone want to look like this beautiful creature? I thought enviously.
“She and Mother never got along very well. Angelique never forgave her for marrying your father.”
“But I thought—”
“You thought we were all one big happy family.” His tone grew slightly acerbic. “I thought it might interest you to know that you and Angelique have more
in common than you might think. Old grudges die hard, don’t they, Christine?”
“Sometimes they do,” I agreed, remembering what Mrs. DuPrae had told me about Reid and his father. “Our parents’ mistakes have a way of haunting us. Your mother’s and my father’s actions have affected a great many lives.”
“But there are always two sides to every story,” Reid said. “Besides, humans have a weakness where passion is concerned. They can behave irrationally. But then, you probably already know that. After all, you did marry young—and hastily, from what I heard. You must have been swept off your feet.”
“Yes,” I said. “I was swept off my feet.” But not by my husband.
I gazed up at him, and the look in his eyes made memories of last night come rushing back. I’d tried to keep them at bay all morning, but standing so near him now, hearing his voice, seeing the passion reflected in his eyes, and remembering…
“About last night…” I cleared my throat. My face flamed. I cleared my throat again. “I’m afraid I’m not used to drinking. The wine…and…everything…” I gestured vaguely with my hands, avoiding his gaze.
“Oh, that’s right. You
never
drink.”
His words taunted me, mocked my pitiful attempt at an explanation for my actions.
Why, oh why, did he always make me feel so inexperienced, so…unworthy?
“But we were talking about our parents, weren’t we? Something you and I also have in common.” He paused, then said, “I take it by your visit here that you and Christopher have mended fences, so to speak.”
“It’s a start.”
“Meaning you still have reservations?”
“Of course I do. I don’t really know him, after all.
Until he got in touch with me a few weeks ago, we’d hardly spoken in years.”
“I still find it strange that he would have contacted you out of the blue like that,” Reid murmured, almost to himself.
“Why is that strange?” We’d reversed positions all of a sudden. He was studying the portrait of his mother, and I was studying him. He had a marvelous profile, I decided. All the lines of his face were clean and sharp. Very handsome—I felt my mouth grow dry at the thought of his lips on mine, at the image of his arms holding me so close we almost seemed one.
His gaze shifted suddenly, and I found myself staring into those incredible eyes. My stomach fluttered with awareness, with nerves, and the memory of last night was almost a physical presence in the room with us.
I wished I had Vinnia’s
gris-gris
with me, for if ever I needed protection, it was now, with Reid.
He was thinking about the kiss, too. I just knew it. I could tell by the way he was looking at me, and I could also tell—or hope?—that he was thinking about doing it again.
The intensity in his eyes deepened.
The butterflies in my stomach went crazy.
He took a step toward me, and I think I took a step back, away from him. The blood pounded in my head….
“Christine—”
“Reid?” The sound of Angelique’s voice from the doorway startled us both. I jumped; Reid frowned.
“Why haven’t you left for work yet?” she asked, her gaze cool with accusation as it darted from one to the other of us.
Reid shrugged, his voice as normal as sunshine. “I’m running late today.”
Her black-lined eyes narrowed as she walked into the room. “You’re never late. In fact, you rarely spend the night here at this house anymore. He has a suite of rooms
at the hotel.” This she said to me, not for clarification, but for emphasis on her next bon mot. “That’s where he
usually
does his entertaining.”
“I don’t see you scurrying anxiously off to work, either,” Reid said with an annoyed scowl.
“Yes, but my interest in the St. Pierre is hardly the same as yours. I’m only an employee, after all,” she said with a very brief but very obvious flash of bitterness. Her eyes turned toward me. “Then, again,” she said slowly, “maybe you
are
looking out for your interests.”
My face blazed under her smirking stare, and I had the mortifying impression that she could see right through me, could read every one of my deep, dark secrets.
“How long do you plan to stay with us, Christine?” she asked as she deliberately turned away from her mother’s painting.
She was wearing black again today, a tight, knit dress that seemed more suited for nightclub wear than an office. But I was hardly one to criticize Angelique’s fashion statement. My own simple yellow dress must have looked the very end in boring conservatism. At that moment, I fervently hoped the gold still shone in my brown hair, that my eyes still sparkled with green. But somehow, the longer I was around Angelique, the more ordinary I felt.
“How long I stay depends on how soon I hear from my father.”
Her cool eyes gave me an appraising stare. “Don’t you have to get back to your kiddies? You are a teacher, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I am.” Where was all this leading?
She smiled. “You know what they say. Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Or dream.”
It was as if she’d climbed into my head and read my thoughts. How could she know about my dreams? She
couldn’t. She’d guessed. Or perhaps, as she’d said, that was all she thought I was capable of doing.
I think at that moment I began to get angry. And determined. She and Reid had always had things their way. But not this time. If they wanted me gone, they were in for a huge disappointment.
I tilted my chin and looked her in the eye. “I’m on spring break. But if I need longer, I’ll take a leave of absence.”
“You may need to,” she said, her own eyes flickering in anger. “Christopher may turn up today, tomorrow, next week. Then again, if we’re lucky, he may never come back.”
“Angelique, I think you’ve said enough,” Reid said, scowling.
But his reprimand hardly registered with me. Angelique’s callous dismissal of my father shocked me. She didn’t even pretend to hide her dislike. “What have you got against him?” I asked coldly, not bothering to question my sudden defense of a man who had abandoned me years ago. “What did my father ever do to you?”