Vieux Carré Voodoo (29 page)

“You are backed by evil men,” I replied, not caring if he
got angry. “Evil men who want to plunder the natural resources of your country
in order to destroy the rest of the world.”

“Bah.” He waved his hand. “We take their money, but once we
are back in control of our country we will then decide which the right path to
take. For our country, and for Kali.”

“So, you’re telling me you’re one of the good guys?” I
couldn’t help but laugh. “I find that rather hard to believe.”

“It is immaterial to me what you, an unbeliever, believe.”
He gave me a sad smile. “What do you think happened when those men originally
stole the Eye and defiled Kali? Do you think that the transition was peaceful
and bloodless?” He shrugged. “Pleshiwar swam in blood for years.”

“And now you propose to drown the country in blood again.” I
shook my head. “The Great Mother may be the Destroyer, but She is also the
Creator. She cares not for the follies of humans, Mr. Rajneesh. She is eternal.
She wants Her defilement avenged—but doesn’t care who rules Pleshiwar.”

“What do you know of the Great Mother?” he snapped.

“She has spoken to me.” I leaned forward. “I have seen Her
sacred shrine in Pleshiwar. She came to me in a vision. Your mission will fail,
Mr. Rajneesh.” I kept my voice steady as I formed the lie in my mind. “She told
me so Herself. She has threatened to destroy the world if Her Eye is not
returned. But if it is returned, She will again become Durga, the Creator, and
all will be harmony.”

“Then it matters not who brings the Eye back to Pleshiwar,
does it not?” His eyes burned into mine. He gestured to the paper. “Find the
Eye, and bring it to me.” He slid a card across the table to me. “My number is
on that card. Find the Eye, and your parents will go free. There will also be a
reward.” He stood up. “Kali can be most generous when the mood strikes Her.”

He walked out of the coffee shop.

I sat there and looked at the items on the table, finally
folding the paper back up and pocketing the phony eye. I walked out the back
door and up the stairs. I let myself into the apartment. I could hear Frank
talking on his phone in the living room. I walked in, and he gestured to me to
sit down. “Okay, keep me posted,” he said into the phone and turned it off.
“Well?”

“I have to find the Eye,” I said, my voice hushed. “He says
he won’t harm Mom and Dad, but he won’t let them go until I do and turn it over
to him.” I buried my face in my hands.

“What was in the box we found?”

“A phony stone.” I pulled it out and placed it on the table.
“And this.” I tossed the paper next to it. Frank picked it up and read it. He
put it back down.

“That doesn’t make any sense to me,” Frank said.

“Me, either. Where’s Colin? Or should I ask what you did
with the body?”

Frank had the decency to blush. “Okay, I shouldn’t have hit
him, but when he walked in, like he still lived here—I kind of lost my head.” He
hung his head down. “But he went down and is following the guy you met with. He
made a call, too—to the people who were supposed to be watching your parents.”
He made a face. “He called them the Ninja Lesbians.”

“Oh, Rhoda and Lindy.” I picked up the paper and started
reading it again. “What did they say?”

“He didn’t get them—just their voicemails.”

I looked at him. “Neither one of them answered their
phones?” That wasn’t good.

“No.” He looked at me. “Seriously, Scotty? Ninja Lesbians?”

“It’s true,” I replied. “They work for the Mossad. He
trained them. They’re supposed to be on our side. Israel doesn’t want terrorists
having access to that uranium any more than Uncle Sam does.” I waved at the
broken French doors. “They did that when they announced themselves.”

“Oh.”

My cell phone started ringing. I answered. “Hello?”

“Scotty, this is Lindy.”

I glanced at Frank. “We were just talking about you.”

“We just got Colin’s messages. But he isn’t picking up.” She
went on. “His message doesn’t make any sense, Scotty. We’re watching your
parents’ building right now.”

“What?”

“You heard me,” she said patiently. “I am telling you. No
one has gone in or out of your parents’ apartment since we took up our
positions. We are on the balcony across the street. We have a very clear view of
the entrance. No one has gone in or out.”

I could feel a headache starting. “I thought you two were
supposed to be crack agents,” I snapped. “Are you watching the staircase in the
back?”

“Yes.”

I struggled to control my temper. “Didn’t you know there is
an entrance to my parents’ apartment from inside the store?”

“Yes, Scotty, we know that,” Lindy responded. “I am telling
you, your parents have not left their building. If they are being held—they are
being held
inside
.”

“I’m on my way.” I hung up the phone. I picked up the note
and folded it, placing it in my jeans pocket. “Come on, Frank. We’re going over
to Mom and Dad’s.”

Frank grabbed his gun. “Let’s go.”

It was starting to get dark as we walked quickly over to the
corner of Royal and Dumaine. Rhoda and Lindy were waiting for us across the
street in their black outfits. I introduced them to Frank, and they quickly
filled me in. They’d been in position since they’d left my apartment. Colin had
instructed them to keep an eye on my parents—he was afraid the bad guys would
try to use them somehow to get the Eye from us once we found it. “He didn’t tell
you because he didn’t want you to worry,” Rhoda explained in her thick accent.

“I’m really really tired of not being told things for my own
good,” I said, giving Frank a pointed look. He blushed. “So, you’re saying no
one went in or out since you got here?”

“No,” Lindy said. “Some customers came into the store, but
they were all accounted for—they all left. Your parents—we saw them right after
we took up position, but we haven’t seen them since. They went up the back
stairs with some bags—like they’d been shopping. No one else has gone up those
stairs.”

“Then how did they get in?” I shook my head. None of this
made sense.

“Over the roofs?” Frank asked.

We all looked up.

“Please tell me you watched the roofs,” I said quietly.

Rhoda and Lindy looked at each other.

The headache was coming back. “You mean to tell me,” I said,
trying to keep my voice level, “that after someone killed Levi and dropped his
body off of
my
roof, it never occurred to either of you that they might come after my parents
the same way?” I wanted to scream at them.

“Of course we watched the roofs,” Rhoda said, her voice
showing her offense. “No one came onto the balconies. Isn’t that the only way
into their apartment from the roofs? Onto the balconies?”

I sighed. “I’m afraid not.”

“There is a door?”

“There’s a deck in the very center.” I groaned. It was in
the middle of the second floor, and was completely invisible from the street.
Mom had turned it into a little garden area, complete with misters for the
summer since it was blocked from breezes on every side. “Didn’t Colin tell you?”

“Oh,” Lindy said softly. “We did not know.”

“If Colin didn’t tell you, it’s not your fault.” I shook my
head. I’d get mad about it later. Now we had to rescue Mom and Dad. “Okay, it’s
pretty safe to assume that they’re being held inside their apartment. We don’t
know how many men are watching them, or how heavily armed they are.”

I pulled my phone out and looked at the image of my parents
again. The chairs were pushed up against a wall. As I looked, I saw details I’d
missed earlier in my shock. The chairs were from my parents’ kitchen table. The
look in Mom’s eyes was pure fury. Dad just looked resigned. I felt another surge
of anger.

“We can’t rule out the possibility they aren’t being held in
their apartment,” Frank said. “Maybe they took them out over the roofs?”

“Only if Mom was completely unconscious. She would have
fought them tooth and nail, you know that,” I disagreed, trying to think. I
looked at the image again. “Besides, those are their kitchen chairs. They’re
inside the apartment, all right.

“We can go up the stairs from the store,” I said. “If they
didn’t search the house—and they came over the roofs—”

“Then they might think the only way in or out is the back
stairs,” Frank said. “Makes sense. The door to the stairs in the hallway looks
like just another door—if they didn’t look…”

“We cannot assume that.” Rhoda’s lips set in a tight line.
“Assuming is the first step into the grave.”

“If they came in over the roofs,” Lindy said, a smile
starting to spread across her pretty face, “they won’t expect us to come in from
the balcony.” She winked. “Rhoda and I can get up there easily.”

“Without attracting attention?”

“Posh.” She shrugged. “If someone calls the police, all the
better.”

Rhoda grinned. “Yes, the plan makes sense. Lindy and I go
over the balcony, we can move like ghosts—they will never hear us.”

“And Frank and I can go up the stairs.” It was starting to
come together in my mind. “The shutters are all closed, but you can see through
them—there’s enough room. Check all the windows and send me a text message.”

“Agreed.”

Frank and I went into the store. It was weird how normal
everything in the store seemed, given that just upstairs my parents might be
held hostage. Emily was working behind the counter. She looked up when the bell
rang, and grinned. “Hey, guys!”

“Hey, sweetie,” I said, as Frank moved over to the door to
the stairs. “Talked to Mom and Dad today?”

She shook her head. “No, but I know they’re home.” She went
back to her
Vanity Fair.
“I’ve heard them moving around up there.”

“Great.” I unlocked the door, and Frank and I moved up the
stairs in the dark. When we reached the top, we paused and listened, not hearing
anything inside.

My phone vibrated. I flipped it open. The screen lit up.

Two men, main room. Two minutes go in.

I watched the clock on my phone, sweat running down my face.
The seconds seemed to last an eternity.

Finally, two minutes passed. I turned the key in the lock
and kicked the door open just as there was the sound of breaking glass in the
living room. Frank and I flew into the living room just as I heard the muffled
spit of silenced gunshots.

I turned on the lights.

Mom and Dad were in chairs, up against the wall.

Two men lay on the floor in pools of spreading blood.

Lindy and Rhoda were grinning.

I ran to Mom and Dad. I took off Mom’s gag as Frank took off
Dad’s.

“It’s about time.” Mom said. “What took you so damned long?”

I gave her a big kiss as I checked to make sure she wasn’t
injured. Relief flooded through me. “You know,” I said, giving her a hug once
Lindy cut her ropes off and she stood up, “we really need to have a talk about
your tendency to be taken hostage.”

THE CHARIOT

Victory, success through hard work

Venus closed her notebook and stood up. “Seems like old
times, doesn’t it?” she said with a vague smile as she stood up. “Bodies at the
Bradleys’.” She shook her head. “No offense, but I’d kind of hoped that wasn’t
ever going to happen again.” Her phone rang, and she moved away from us.

We were all sitting around in the Devil’s Weed. Emily had
closed and locked the doors a few moments after we all trooped downstairs, while
I called Venus. The Crime Lab was upstairs, doing their job, and the coroner’s
van was just outside, parked on the sidewalk. We’d closed all the shutters after
we got tired of being gawked at by passersby.

We still hadn’t heard from Colin, which gave me a weird
feeling of déjà vu. This was how that horrible Mardi Gras case had wound up—Mom
and Dad being held hostage, a shoot-out in their apartment, and then no word
from Colin after the police arrived. He’d been long gone, and that had been the
last we’d seen of him until I walked into Mom and Dad’s last night—
was it
just last night?—
and saw him sitting there in his bloody bandage.

I took Frank’s hand and squeezed it just as Venus walked
back in. “We’ve picked up Abhwesar,” she said. “He’s claiming diplomatic
immunity, of course—apparently he’s somehow attached to the Pleshiwarian
embassy—but the State Department is contacting the ambassador, and he’s safely
behind bars.” She whistled. “The two men upstairs are apparently the only thugs
he had left in the country, so it looks like you’re all safe.”

I let out my breath in a sigh of relief.

“You think Colin’s already on his way out of the country?”
Frank whispered to me.

“I don’t know,” I replied. “I mean, who knows? They didn’t
get the Eye, and if that was his objective, his work here is done.”

“Where is the Eye?” Mom asked. “I don’t get it. Why did Doc
go to the trouble of making that riddle that led to a phony stone?”

“I don’t think we’ll ever know, Mom.” I reached into my
pocket and pulled out the piece of paper Abhwesar had given me. “Abhwesar said
this was in there with it.” I handed it over to her and Dad. “Can you make any
sense out of it?”

Mom read it and shook her head. “No, it doesn’t really seem
to say anything.”

“Maybe he never had it here in New Orleans,” Rhoda said
slowly. “No offense, but that never made any sense to me. Why would he do that?
Why wouldn’t Blackledge take it and keep it safe somewhere?”

That had been bothering me all along. When it just seemed
that three American GIs had decided to steal it, it sort of made sense that one
of them would keep it. But now that we knew they had been Blackledge agents, it
didn’t.

“Probably the only person who can answer that is Angela
Blackledge herself,” I said slowly, “and I think it is pretty safe to assume
we’ll never know.”