Client Trap (Nick Teffinger Thriller)
Page 17
But that’s not what grabbed Teffinger’s attention.
What grabbed his attention was the woman behind the counter—black, old, a thin frame draped in dark clothes, a touch of yellow jaundice in her eyes.
She didn’t even look at Venzelle.
She looked only at Teffinger.
Teffinger said, “How you doing?”
She gave no response.
He wandered through the crowded aisles, occasionally picking something up and trying to figure out what it was. Nothing was labeled; nothing had a price.
“You don’t belong here,” the woman said.
Teffinger turned his eyes to her.
“Why not?”
“You should leave.”
Teffinger walked over and set a photograph of Ryan Ripley on the counter.
“Do you know this man?”
She looked at the picture, then at him.
“You should leave.”
Before Teffinger could get his next question out, the woman pushed through the beads and disappeared into the back room. Ten seconds later, the sound of a voice wove out the doorway. The woman was clearly talking to someone, but too muted to make out any of the words.
Venzelle tugged Teffinger’s arm and said, “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
“Give me a second.”
HE PUSHED THROUGH THE BEADS into the back room. The woman was pacing, talking to herself or chanting or something, with a snake draped around her neck. Teffinger recoiled when he saw the reptile.
“You have no right,” the woman said. “Leave now.”
“I want to ask you a few questions.”
“About what?”
“Voodoo,” he said.
“Voodoo?”
“I want to put a death curse on someone,” he said. “Where can I go to get that done? Here?”
“Here?”
“Yes.”
“You think I’m a voodoo priestess?”
“I don’t know,” Teffinger said. “Are you?”
The woman laughed and then walked over until she was only a foot away. She was a full twelve inches shorter than him and couldn’t have weighed more than 95 pounds. Without warning, she flung the snake and it wrapped its muscular body around his neck. The reptile bobbed its head nervously; it could bite Teffinger ten times in the face before he’d be able to pull it off. The woman put her face as close to his as she could.
“I’m going to give you the best advice anyone has ever given you in your life,” she said. “Get out of New Orleans and do it now.”
She grabbed the snake behind its head and gently tugged. The reptile unwound itself from Teffinger’s neck. The woman draped it over her shoulder. It coiled and darted a forked tongue at Teffinger.
He knew he should leave, right now, this second, but the answers to his questions were right here in this room. He was thinking of the next thing to say when the woman’s eyes flashed and she squeezed the snake.
It immediately lashed out and sunk its fangs into Teffinger’s neck.
Chapter Sixty-Six
Day Four—July 15
Thursday Afternoon
______________
THE AFTERNOON SUN GOT RELENTLESS. The marina felt like a hamburger patty that someone put on the grill and forgot to take off. So when Dakota called to see if Raven wanted to get an iced tea at the Rock Bottom Brewery—and bill her time—she jumped in the 4Runner, turned the AC on full blast, and headed downtown.
She parked at 20th and Broadway.
The walk from there to the Rock Bottom was short but brutal.
Heat radiated from every pore of the city.
Dakota was already there when Raven arrived, sitting in a nice booth with two large iced teas on the table. The woman looked classy and professional in expensive beige pants and a crisp white sleeveless blouse. Her makeup was minimal but effective. She pushed a check across the table as Raven slipped in.
“Your retainer,” she said.
The check interested Raven, but not as much as the look of excitement on Dakota’s face.
Raven took a long sip of tea and said, “It’s hotter than hell out there.”
Agreed.
“We need rain.”
True.
“So you think Salter was doing the nasty with Whitney White, huh?”
Dakota nodded.
“I know it for a fact,” Dakota said.
“How?”
“Florence Fletcher.”
RAVEN KNEW THE NAME WELL. Florence was Jeff Salter’s personal secretary; hired more for her Betty Boop body and her people skills than her office proficiencies. Susan Salter—Jeff’s wife—had a standing joke at law firm parties that if Jeff ever cheated on her, at least she knew who it would be with.
“Why? What did Florence say?” Raven asked.
Dakota rolled her eyes.
“She left the firm. Did you know that?”
Raven didn’t.
“That’s a whole separate story and no one knows exactly why,” Dakota said. “But there’s a rumor going around that there was no love lost between her and Salter. So I called her up to see if she had any goodies for me. At first she didn’t want to talk, but after I got her warmed up, she told me that she walked in on Salter and Whitney White one day by accident.”
“And by walked in on, do you mean what I think you mean?”
Dakota nodded.
“Whitney was on her knees, apparently, going for it like a maniac.”
Raven pictured it.
“She never struck me as that kind.”
“You mean the kind to get on her knees?”
“No, I’m talking about the kind to fool around with a married man.”
Dakota shrugged.
“Salter’s got that surfer-boy charm, when he wants to use it. If he decided to turn it loose on someone like Whitney, I could see how she would go for it,” Dakota said. “Oh, by the way, Florence made me promise not to tell anyone, so you need to keep it between us.”
Raven pulled an imaginary zipper across her lips.
“So are you ready now to hear my theory?” Dakota asked.
Raven took a swallow of iced tea.
“Shoot.”
“It’s pretty simple,” Dakota said. “Jeff Salter killed Whitney White.”
RAVEN LAUGHED.
“Why? Just because they had a relationship of some sort and then she ended up dead?”
“Right.”
“That’s not just a big leap in logic, it’s a quantum one.”
“I’m going to fill in the missing pieces,” Dakota said. “We know that their relationship ended on a bad note. Maybe Salter dumped her, or was cheating on her with a second mistress, or promised to marry her but kept making excuses—something like that. Maybe Whitney ended up pissed off and threatened to tell Salter’s wife. So Salter decided to shut her up.”
“That’s nothing more than a long chain of speculation,” Raven said.
“That’s how proof starts.”
RAVEN WAS DRIVING TO THE MARINA, southbound on I-25, when Dakota called.
“I had another thought after you left,” she said. “We were thinking that Salter’s the one who turned his surfer-boy charms on Whitney. Maybe it was the other way around. Maybe she turned her charms on him and made a videotape of them doing the nasty. Then she blackmailed him with it. Rather than pay, he decided to shut her up.”
“So you’re saying that she set the whole thing up, as a preconceived way to extort money or something?”
“Exactly,” Dakota said. “Maybe someone helped her, also—you know, shot the videotape and all that.”
Raven chuckled.
“I need to start using you as a consultant for my books,” she said. “Your imagination is way better than mine.”
Chapter Sixty-Seven
Day Four—July 15
Thursday Noon
______________
THE NOISE CAME FROM THE MASTER CLOSET. Dalton opened the door, wondering how h
e had been too stupid to check there before, and flicked on the lights.
Lindsay Vail laid on the floor.
Hogtied.
Gagged.
She twisted her face up and stared at him with terrified eyes.
“Lindsay,” he said. “We meet again.”
He removed the gag and she gasped for air.
“Are you okay?” Dalton asked.
“No,” she said. “Untie me, please!”
He did.
Then he let her shower while he sat on the bed and waited.
He felt good.
No, not good.
GOOD.
Lindsay Vail had been the one thing that could have destroyed his life. The dark, helpless feeling of not knowing where she was, and not knowing if she had made her way to the cops, and not knowing whether twenty armed uniforms were on their way at this very moment to grab him, was gone.
In its place was sunshine and hope and that incredibly grateful feeling of experiencing a close call of terrible proportions and managing to somehow miraculously escape totally unscathed.
HE PULLED A FRESH, LONG-SLEEVED SHIRT off a hanger in the master closet, set it on the sink and then waited for her in the bedroom with the door half closed while she dried off. When she finally emerged, he took her to the kitchen and said, “Sit on that bar stool.”
She did.
“If you try anything, I’m going to retie you.”
“I won’t.”
“I hope not,” he said. “I’m being nice, so don’t make me change my mind.”
“I won’t.”
He fed her—cereal, fruit, a Lean Pocket, a turkey sandwich and two diet root beers. It didn’t matter if the owner noticed the food was gone. He would just assume Malcolm ate it.
He leaned against the stainless steel dishwasher and asked, “You know that my name’s not Sean, like I told you before, don’t you.”
“Yes.”
“Do you know what my name is? Did Malcolm tell you?”
She nodded.
“What is it?”
“Dalton Wrey.”
“Good.”
“Just let me go,” she said. “I’ll never tell anything to anyone. I swear.”
“We’ll see,” Dalton said. “I haven’t totally ruled that out yet.”
“Please.”
“WHAT I NEED TO KNOW RIGHT NOW IS THIS,” he said. “You overheard Malcolm talking to people on his cell phone, right?”
She had.
“Did you hear him talk to someone by the name of Jason Lynch, who is the owner of this house?”
“I don’t know who he talked to.”
“Think.”
“He never called them by proper names,” she said. “He just called them dude and guy and things like that.”
“But you heard him talk to people, right?”
“Right.”
“Did he ever mention my name to anyone?”
She darted her eyes.
“Not that I heard.”
“Did he ever mention the machine shop to anyone?”
She looked puzzled as if searching her memory.
“Not that I can think of.” She wrung her hands together. “I’m really cooperating as much as I can. You should just let me go. I promise I’ll never tell anyone anything.”
“You swear?”
“Yes, absolutely. I just want to go home.”
“We’ll see.”
Suddenly the front doorbell rang.
LINDSAY VAIL IMMEDIATELY JUMPED OFF the barstool and darted for the front door. A bloodcurdling scream ripped from her lungs; one that would be heard even outside the house. Dalton charged after her.
His left hip suddenly exploded in pain.
A terrible hurt took him straight to the floor.
He knew what happened—he clipped his hipbone on the corner of the granite.
His forehead bounced off the hardwood floor and blood filled his nose.
“Lindsay!”
Chapter Sixty-Eight
Day Four—July 15
Thursday Afternoon
______________
AFTER THE SNAKE SUNK ITS FANGS into Teffinger’s neck, it recoiled just as fast and poised to strike again. Teffinger jerked his head back, out of the attack zone, and brought a hand to his neck to assess the damage.
There was blood, but not a lot.
“You won’t die,” the woman said. “Now go on and get out of here.”
A shape appeared behind him.
Venzelle.
She grabbed his arm and said, “Let’s go.”
Outside in the car he said, “I swear she had that damn thing trained.”
“You can’t train a snake,” Venzelle said.
“I don’t think the snake knows that.”
“It is ironic, though.”
“What?”
“The place is called The Serpent’s Kiss, and you end up getting kissed.”
He groaned.
The sun was high and the humidity was thick. Teffinger cranked over the engine and turned the AC on full blast. Air blew out of the vents, hot at first, but cooling almost immediately.
“If this next place has snakes, I’m going to let you do the talking,” he said.
She chuckled.
“Thanks, you’re so nice.”
“It doesn’t come easy,” he said. “I have to work at it.”
THE NEXT PLACE—Rituals—and an even darker and more ominous feel than The Serpent’s Kiss. A black girl no more than thirteen or fourteen sat behind the counter, busy making something. She followed Teffinger briefly with her eyes and then went back to what she was doing. After wandering around, Teffinger headed over and leaned on the counter.
“Hi,” he said. “What are you making?”
She showed him.
“This.”
“Is that a voodoo doll?”
She nodded.
“It’s Ryan Green,” she said. “He’s been spending time where he shouldn’t be.”
“With another girl?”
She nodded.
“So you’re going to put a curse on him?”
“Not a curse,” she said. “I’m just going to make him stop.”
“Do you think it will work?”
She didn’t hesitate.
“It’ll work.”
“When you see Ryan Green again, tell him I think he’s crazy if he looks at anyone besides you,” he said.
She smiled.
“What’s your name?”
“Seven.”
Teffinger shook her hand. “It was nice to meet you, Seven. If Ryan Green doesn’t work out, just go get someone else. You deserve someone nice. There are nice guys out there, if you keep looking around.”
Someone in the back room coughed, deep and rough.
Teffinger looked that way.
The door was open a slit.
Eyes watched him and disappeared as soon as he made contact.
Teffinger looked back at the girl. “You see this woman here?” he asked, referring to Venzelle. “Can you put a spell on her and make her like me?”
The girl laughed.
Then she studied Venzelle.
“She’d be tough.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, she just feels strong,” she said. “Why don’t you just treat her nice and see if that works.”
Venzelle punched Teffinger in the arm.
“Did you hear that?” she asked. “Treat me nice and see if that works.”
OUTSIDE, WALKING BACK TO THE CAR, Teffinger raked his hair back with his fingers. The humidity was so thick that it didn’t flop back down. “There was a man in the back room,” he said.
“I know,” Venzelle said. “But here’s the more important thing—I’m starved. Feed me.”
Five minutes later, Teffinger spotted a McDonald’s and pulled into the drive-thru lane.
“She said to be nice to me,” Venzelle said.
“This is nice.”
She rolled her eyes.
“You said feed me,” he added. “That’s what I’m doing. If you want something nicer, you need to say dine me.”
“So this is my fault?”
He nodded.
“You need to be precise with your language.”
“Okay,” she said. “Dine me.”
The speaker crackled.
Can I take your order please?
Teffinger looked at Venzelle.
“Too late,” he said.
AS HE WAS PAYING at the window, his cell phone rang and Sydney Heatherwood’s voice came through.
“Got some big news,” she said.
Chapter Sixty-Nine
Day Four—July 15
Thursday Afternoon
______________
WHITNEY WHITE HAD BEEN STABBED through the eye. That wasn’t too different from the tattoo that Dawn Hooker put on the mysterious pirate, Robert, years earlier. The more Raven thought about it, the more she wondered if the two were connected.
But how?
There was nothing concrete to suggest that Robert and Whitney White knew each other.
She looked at her watch—3:42 p.m.
Time was moving forward.
Right now, she needed to run the nineteen Roberts to ground and didn’t have time to get sidetracked by a new theory. She jotted it down on a yellow Post-It—Did Robert kill Whitney?—and stuck it on the side of the microwave, just to be sure she didn’t forget, and then set about the task at hand.
Unfortunately, Google proved to be useless.
The searches generated too many hits, especially for the Roberts with common last names. Even the less common names generated an unwieldy number of strikes. After a frustrating hour, she closed the computer and headed topside.
The sun was ferocious.
HALFWAY UP THE STEPS she remembered she was in her panties and bra. A quick survey of the marina didn’t show anyone in the immediate vicinity, so she kept going. She opened a patio umbrella and bungeed it in place for shade, something she should have done hours ago. Then she tied a rope to a bucket, lowered it into the lake, pulled up cold water and drenched the cushions.