Blood on the Bayou

by Stacey Jay

  So he’s being tested, too. It eases my mind. A little.

  At least this isn’t an Annabelle-only policy. They must be cracking down on all the people they suspect of having a habit. Jin-Sang thinks I drink too much and knows I occasionally take more Restalin per night than recommended by medical professionals. If he put that in his monthly report, it could have been enough to get me on the drug-abuse radar. But I’m cutting back on the Restalin and alcohol isn’t going to show up in a test. Unless I’m drunk at the time, which doesn’t happen during the day anymore.

  At least . . . not as often.

  Still, there’s no way I’m going to turn down Ferret Face’s tea bags. I might need them, and besides, drug abuse is bringing us together.

  I lift my hip and tuck the bags into my back pocket. “So is that why you met me with a gun? You decided to shoot the next asshole who comes looking for a pee sample?”

  He grunt-laughs again. “We just don’t like unexpected company. You know how it is.”

  “Sure. I heard there were highwaymen on this road.”

  “Fuck them. I ain’t scared of them.”

  “Then what are you scared of?” The second the question’s out, I know I’ve pushed too hard. Ferret Face’s mouth hardens and his eyes start to glaze over.

  He shrugs. “Nothing.”

  “So this is a safe place to work?” I ask, trying to steer us back into lighter territory. “I’m serious about that transfer. You seem cool.” I gesture to the pocket where his tea is snuggled in tight. “I could use a change. Sample collecting sucks it and the money is shit.”

  “Oh, the money’s good out here.”

  “How good? Like FCC good, or like . . . serious cash good?”

  “I don’t get you.”

  “I’ve got debt. I had some problems a few months back,” I say vaguely. “I owe a few different people. I’m not going to be able to pay unless I get a better job.” I sigh and pick at a frayed seam on my jeans. “At this point I don’t even know if I can stay with the FCC. I’m thinking about going downriver, seeing if the guy running the cotton plantation needs a pair of hands.”

  “I heard his people do pretty good.”

  “Yeah. It just stinks. I feel like I should stay with the FCC, but how do they expect us to make a living?” I ask with a tortured bat of my eyelashes. “They don’t pay us half what we’re worth. I swear, this is why people turn to a life of crime.”

  Ferret Face smiles an ugly, yellow smile. “Don’t try it.”

  “Try what?”

  “Don’t try to work me.”

  “What?” I lift my eyebrows and feign innocence.

  “I know why you’re here, and it ain’t because you want a transfer.” He leans back in his chair, hand drifting closer to his rifle. “I don’t like being fucked with.”

  “Okay.” I let my eyes go as cold as his. “I know you’re skimming the shipments. I want in.”

  “Fuck you,” he says with a laugh.

  “Fuck you,” I say, finding it easy to take offense with his dismissal. “I’m immune, I’ve got connections in this parish, and I’m a hell of a lot more motivated than the homeless men you’ve got selling your shit right now. I could help you expand your business.”

  “Is that right?”

  “That’s right, Ferret Face.”

  He grins again, less ugly than before. “Lance.”

  “Annabelle.”

  “Annabelle.” Recognition flashes in his eyes. “I’ve heard of you. You’re the one who left the Breeze head tied up in the bayou.”

  “I did. I’m a total badass.” I don’t wait for him to finish laughing. “You should let me in on this. I’ll transport product to Donaldsonville or wherever you need it delivered and I’ll only ask for thirty percent of the cut.”

  He stares at me down the long slop of his rodent nose for a minute. Maybe two. Maybe three. All I know is the eye contact goes on way too long and I’m starting to feel uncomfortable in an I-could-be-dying-soon kind of way when he finally says, “Fifteen percent.”

  “Twenty-five,” I counter, not wanting to betray how relieved I am.

  He grunts. “We’ll see. I gotta talk to Jose. He’s the one with the major connections. I mostly do purses, designer clothes, shit like that.”

  “Okay.” I shrug. “So Jose’s in charge.”

  “I didn’t say that. He works out the deals, but I know who he’s working with and what she wants. She’s the one who gets the biggest deliveries so . . . maybe that could be something we talk about. If we decide we can trust you.”

  “Don’t I look trustworthy?”

  “You look like trouble,” he says in a way that leaves little doubt he has a thing for trouble. “But we’ll see.” He flicks a pen over to my side of the desk. “Give me a number and I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  I scribble my cell number on a Post-it, and rack my brain for some way to keep the conversation going. What I’ve managed to learn so far only eliminates 48 percent of the population as a suspect. I need more. “So it’s a woman I’d be delivering to? Is she cool?”

  “She’s a bitch. Even Jose doesn’t fuck with her.”

  “Oh.” I take a moment to look appropriately intimidated and second-thought-filled. “But I could handle it, right? She wouldn’t like . . . shoot me or something?”

  “I don’t know what she’d do. I don’t talk to her. I watch the meetings on the computer to make sure Jose doesn’t end up dead while that bitch takes her needles without paying.”

  Needles. Score. And I could score even bigger. “You watch them on the computer. So you film them?” He nods. “Do you keep any of the footage?” I ask, hurrying on before the suspicion in his expression can fully flower. “It would be nice to see who I’d be dealing with. Right now I’m imagining someone with laser vision and fangs and flaming farts.”

  He laughs. Fart jokes. Gets ’em every time.

  “Yeah. I’ve got video. I don’t care if you get a look at her.” He leans over and stirs the computer to life with a wiggle of the mouse. He clicks a folder and scrolls down through a long list of files. If they’re all of this woman, she’s a regular customer. “The camera Jose wears is small so the footage is grainy, but . . .” He clicks once more and swivels the screen my way. “There she is.”

  He’s right. The picture quality is crap and if I weren’t very familiar with the woman in question there’s no way I’d be able to place her.

  But, I am familiar. Gut-twistingly familiar. It’s Marcy, my sweet, loving, takes-groceries-to-shut-ins second mama. She’s the bitch buying black-market medical supplies, and this investigation just got a hell of a lot more personal.

  I park the Rover behind the bank at the end of Railroad Street and head toward Swallows on foot. Most people in D’Ville walk or bicycle around town, so I probably could have scored a closer parking spot, but I need time to pull myself together. I need to walk, put one foot in front of the other until I talk myself into my lying headspace.

  I’ll have to be at the top of my game. Hitch can smell a fib at twenty paces. Just thinking about his narrow, I’m-looking-through-your-skin-and-see-your-filthy-lies look makes me feel vaguely ill. I don’t want to lie. But I can’t tell him about Marcy. I can’t. Not until I know for sure what’s going on. She’s like family to me. No matter how bad this looks, I can’t throw her to the FBI wolves until I give her a chance to explain.

  Hopefully Lance will convince Jose I’m the woman for the delivery jobs, and I’ll be able to have a long conversation with Marcy. In person. Until then, I’ll stick to my cover story: I talked with Lance, got confirmation on the skimming, but nothing solid. I’ll tell Hitch I’ll have to go back again and keep trying. He’ll understand.

  No he won’t. He’s risking his life and his future. He’s going to be devastated, his investigation will be quagmired, and it’ll be all your fault.

  Anxiety prickles along my nerve endings, making me itch. Shit. I could really use a beer. Too bad Hitch sugges
ted Swallows for our meeting place again this afternoon. If we were meeting somewhere else I could sneak in for a quick Blue Moon before facing the music. Beer is a well-known lying-effectiveness enhancer. And maybe it would calm me the fuck down. Between the fairy attack and watching Marcy broker a black-market deal, I feel like I’m about to crawl out of my skin.

  And I’m thirsty, dammit. Really thirsty. I can just imagine how good that first explosion of cold, carbonated hops will feel as it swishes through my mouth.

  Without conscious agreement from my brain, my feet veer sharply to the right, heading for the entrance to the Quik Mart. They have beer. And they sell it by the can—a lot of people around here don’t have enough loose change lying around for a six-pack. I’ll grab a Sapporo, duck into the alley behind the store, and chug some liquid courage before meeting Hitch. As long as I pop a stick of gum after, I should be fine. It’s not like he’s going to get close enough to smell my breath.

  The bell above the door tinkles as I shove inside. Even with the window air-conditioner chugging away, it’s only a few degrees cooler in here than it is out on the sweltering sidewalk. I can tell J.J. isn’t thrilled to be working behind the counter. He greets me with a limp wave and a drowsy “S’up?” as I grab a pack of gum.

  “Same old, same old.”

  “Hear that,” he mumbles as I head to the coolers at the back of the store. I go straight to the single can beer section, tug open the sticky door, and am about to pluck my beverage of choice from the bottom shelf when I’m attacked.

  Tiny arms wrap around my waist and squeeze hard enough that my “Holy shit!” comes out more grunt than scream. I have a full-body startle-spasm and barely resist the instinctive urge to shove my attacker into the CornNuts display. Luckily, I see the carefully plaited braids with their collection of white bows, and pull my hands back to my chest in time.

  “Shit, Deedee! You scared the shit out of me,” I gasp, forgetting to watch my language. But it’s not like Deedee hasn’t heard me say worse. On several occasions.

  Child friendly, I am not.

  Deedee tips her head back to give me a crooked grin. “I snuck up on you. Like a spy.”

  I take another breath and will my heart to stop racing. “Yes. Just like a spy. But don’t do that again. You almost made me wet my pants.”

  She giggles, and I can tell she’s going to pounce me again as soon as she gets the opportunity, on the off chance that she might make a grown-up wet herself. “Where’s your cat?” she asks, still hugging on me. She’s been clingy lately. Not that I mind. Her small-person hugs are surprisingly nice.

  “Gimpy’s at my house.” I tuck a braid behind her ear, and worry about the dark circles under her eyes. “I had work to do today.”

  “He’s home all by himself? With no one to watch him?”

  “He’s a big boy. He’ll be fine.”

  “You know,” Deedee says, propping her fists at her waist and throwing out a hip. “I know a few things about cats.”

  “You do?”

  “They’ve got six cats at Sweet Haven. They live in the barn with Mrs. Malky’s goats. I go out and pet ’em all the time, and I only got bit twice and it didn’t bleed very much and I didn’t even cry for more than a minute.”

  “Wow.” Only Deedee would think that story was something to brag about. “You’re such a little weirdo.”

  She grins. “Just like you.”

  “No. You’re a much cuter weirdo.”

  “You’re cute, too. I like you,” she says, with such a sweet blinky look that I see her coming a mile away.

  Still, I say, “I like you, too.”

  “Then why don’t you take me home with you?” She drops the sugary act with a stomp of her foot. “I can help you out. I can watch Gimpy while you’re at work and when school starts I’ll do all my homework by myself without asking for help. I’m smart. I can do it by myself.”

  “Deedee—”

  “And I can cook for you, too,” she hurries on. “I know how to make Macaroni and Cheese in the microwave. And hot dogs. And bologna and cheese sandwiches. Those are really good. If you heat ’em up just a little the bologna gets all puffy around the edges like a spaceship.”

  “That sounds awesome.”

  “It is. All you need is bologna and you can get it right here at the Quik Mart! We could go make spaceship sandwiches right now!”

  “Listen, Dee. I want to have you over for spaceship sandwiches, and I promise we’ll do that soon,” I say, summoning up my firmest big-person voice. “But you can’t come live with me.”

  “Why not?” Her face scrunches, but thankfully she looks more angry than sad. If she starts crying the way she did the last time we had this conversation, I might have to chug my Sapporo right here in front of the cooler. “You took Gimpy home for keeps. Why not me?”

  “You’re not a stray cat. You’re a kid, and you need things I can’t give you.”

  “No, I don’t. I’m low maintenance. Mrs. Malky said so.”

  Speaking of Mrs. Malky . . .

  “Does Mrs. Malky know you’re here? When I was at Sweet Haven, you had to be at least twelve to get an afternoon pass.”

  “I don’t need a pass.” She crosses her arms and lifts her stubborn chin. “Mrs. Malky’s always off doing her goat business. I climb the gate whenever I want.”

  “Deedee Jones! You can’t do that. You have to follow the rules.” Said the woman who has broken most of the rules and several federal laws in the past two months alone.

  “I don’t want to follow the rules. I hate it there,” she says, tears pooling in her big brown eyes. My hands ball into fists, fighting the urge to reach for liquid relief. “All the kids are mean to me. They make fun of my dresses and one of the girls peed on the fancy satin Mama got me for Christmas last year. Mrs. Klein helped me wash it, but I swear it still smells like pee and I hate Tonya Trace for putting her pee on my dress and I want to kill her every time I see her stupid skinny face!”

  “Well, sh—Sorry,” I correct at the last minute. “I’m really sorry, Dee.” Sweet Haven hasn’t changed much, then. I should have known better than to think that it had. I should have guessed the other girls would be jealous of Deedee’s nice things. Before her death, her mama worked for the richest family in Donaldsonville. They paid her well and she spent half her salary dressing up her baby girl. She loved Deedee so much.

  And now she’s dead, and Deedee is learning what it’s like to be a kid that nobody treasures.

  “Take me home, Miss Annabelle. Please.” Deedee leans her forehead into my stomach, all the fight going out of her in a rush of breath. I put my arm around her thinner-than-they-used-to-be shoulders, feel her exhaustion and desperation seep into my skin, and for a second I think about it.

  Maybe it could work. Maybe Deedee and Gimpy and I could be a team.

  Maybe even a family.

  And then I look over her shoulder at the cooler door. It’s still open, ready for me to snag that two o’clock beer I was planning to chug in the alley before I lie to my ex-boyfriend about a murder investigation I’ve somehow become a part of and then go looking for an invisible man—who is no doubt a killer himself—to ask him why a fairy army is determined to get me out of town. Or kill me if they get another chance.

  I can’t be there for Deedee. I can’t handle my own life, let alone take responsibility for hers.

  “I’ll come visit you tomorrow,” I whisper. “I promise.”

  She sighs. Doesn’t move her forehead from my stomach. Sighs again. “Okay.”

  “I’ll bring you anything you want to eat, too,” I say, even though I feel lousy about bribing her to accept her shitty lot in life with junk food. “How about a cheeseburger and fries from Swallows?”

  She stands up, expression brighter than it was before. “How about a dozen buffalo wings with extra spicy sauce and blue cheese on the side and a triple order of celery?”

  “We’ll make it three dozen wings and six orders of celery and we
’ll both pig out until we’re sick.” I reach out and close the cooler door. There’s no time for a beer now. Which is probably a good thing. Probably. “But I’ve got to run. You go sneak back into Sweet Haven and follow the rules and I’ll call for a visitor’s appointment tomorrow afternoon.”

  “You could call now.” She digs in her dress pocket. “I’ve still got minutes on the phone you gave me.”

  “I’ve got a business meeting in like two minutes,” I say, edging toward the front of the store. “I’ll call as soon as I get home. Okay?”

  “Okay.” She stands still, watching me go.

  I think about ordering her out the door in front of me and watching until I see she’s headed back in the right direction, but that would be acting like I have authority over her behavior. Like a guardian or a foster parent or a fully functional adult. Which I obviously am not.

  So I just give one last wave, toss J.J. a couple of dollars for the gum, and hurry out into the glaring sun. It is hellishly hot. Again. It feels like this stupid summer is never going to end. By the time I reach the entrance to the back alley behind Swallows, my armpits are fighting through their protective deodorant shield and sweat pools between my bra-free breasts. It’s too hot to be outside unless you’re submerged in water. Or naked.

  Naked. Holy. Christ.

  Not fifteen feet away, outside the back entrance to Swallows, my ex-boyfriend is pulling his faded red T-shirt over his head, revealing ebony skin and his ruthlessly chiseled eight-pack. (Cane has a habit of taking things to extremes, and his body is no exception.) I freeze at the end of the alley and step quickly to the side, pressing myself into the shadows behind the big blue recycling bins. I don’t want to see Cane right now. I’m on my way to meet Hitch, and I know that won’t go over well. I wouldn’t want to see him if he were alone, and I especially don’t want to interrupt him while he’s stripping down with another woman.