by Jana DeLeon
“I’m really sorry,” Jadyn said. “I spent most of the afternoon reading online news reports because I didn’t want to ask you and Mildred to revisit bad times, but they didn’t mention anything like that.”
Mildred nodded. “Everyone tried to keep the worst of the details out of the news. There was already too much focus on the town, and Maryse had enough to deal with. It’s one of those times you’re really happy to be part of a small community that still has that desire to insulate their own.”
Jadyn checked her face and hair and dropped the mascara into her makeup bag. When she’d read the articles, she hadn’t considered the small-town workings that would come into play. That people would hedge the truth to protect what was left of their reputation or to provide a tiny amount of relief for the person who’d taken the brunt of it all.
From a personal standpoint, it was nice to know people would close ranks to protect you. From an investigative standpoint, it meant Jadyn was going to have to ask Maryse and Mildred to relive everything that had happened the year before. Somewhere in that complicated mess may be a clue to what was happening now. Asking these two nice women to relive the most horrifying time of their life was the last thing in the world Jadyn wanted to do, but given what Mildred had just revealed, she didn’t see another option.
She fluffed her hair and pushed all thoughts of what would have to come out of her mind. It didn’t have to be dealt with now. Tonight already held enough challenges. She grabbed her shoes and began the lengthy process of winding the straps around her ankles.
“What do you think?” Jadyn asked as she strolled into the bedroom, then did a model turn.
Maryse whistled and Mildred beamed.
“I would totally hit on you,” Maryse said. “In fact, please don’t ever dress like that around my husband.”
Mildred laughed. “Luc is totally devoted to you and you know it.”
“I know,” Maryse said, “but I don’t want him to get any ideas about how I should dress. You know I wouldn’t make it across the room in those shoes without breaking an ankle.”
“There is that,” Mildred agreed.
“Don’t worry,” Jadyn said. “This is hardly going to become a habit, and it’s the only hooker outfit I own.”
Maryse scrunched her brow. “You look great but I have to ask—why do you have even one hooker outfit?”
Jadyn smiled. “Because men are already halfway to foolish just existing, but they get all the way there around a hot woman. If anyone at that bar knows something about the cash, they’ll be falling all over each other to tell me about it before the night is out. It’s worked before.”
“Even though you’re the game warden?” Maryse asked.
Mildred patted Maryse’s shoulder and gave her a motherly look. “Honey, they won’t be thinking about her profession—just what other abilities she may possess.”
Maryse brightened. “I get it. Like how I walk around the house naked to get out of doing laundry. Luc never complains that it takes me weeks when I say I have to be naked because I have nothing to wear.”
Jadyn grinned. With a little effort, her cousin could be quite a looker herself, but Maryse was every bit the nerdy scientist she claimed to be, spending most of her day in jeans and rubber boots. Even so, Jadyn could clearly see what had captured Luc’s attention.
“Now you’re catching on,” Jadyn said. “Well, if you have no last-minute advice, I’m going to go get this over with.”
“Helena!” Maryse jumped up from the bed and banged on the wall of the adjoining room. “Hurry up. It’s time to get this show on the road.”
Jadyn held back a frown, still not completely adjusted to having a ghostly bodyguard, but Maryse and Mildred had insisted. Given Maryse’s past with the original bar owner, Jadyn now understood why it would look strange for her to go into the bar, and Mildred, who preferred to drink in close proximity of her own bed, couldn’t remember the last time she’d been in the bar for socializing purposes. That left Helena as the logical choice. At least if Jadyn ran into trouble, the ghost could fetch Maryse and Mildred to help.
“I’m coming!” Helena yelled back. “You can’t rush perfection.”
“She waves a hand and changes clothes,” Jadyn said. “Why does it take her longer to get ready than me?”
“Helena’s wardrobe doesn’t always cooperate,” Mildred said, “but she’s getting better at it.”
“Unfortunately,” Maryse chimed in, “I’d bet a year’s salary that Helena’s delay has nothing to do with a wardrobe malfunction and everything to do with a wardrobe miscalculation.”
“There is nothing miscalculated about my appearance,” Helena said as she stepped through the wall. “I look hot.”
“God help us,” Maryse said as Mildred’s hand flew over her mouth.
Jadyn turned around to look at the ghost and almost fell off her heels.
Helena was clad head to toe in bright pink spandex, except for the random—and extraordinarily ill-placed—holes covered with lime-green lace. Her shoes matched the lace and were at least an inch taller than Jadyn’s. Her hair was bright pink to match her spandex, and looked like it had been blown out around huge rollers. Fake diamonds glittered across the top of her eyes.
She looked like an old, fat, even skankier Peggy Bundy.
“You are not wearing that,” Jadyn said.
“Yes, I am. It’s not like anyone can see me.”
“I can see you. That’s bad enough.”
Maryse, who’d clenched her eyes shut as soon as Helena entered the room, nodded. “I may never be able to look at pink again without blanching.”
Mildred’s face wrinkled up as though she’d smelled shrimp rotting in the hot summer sun. “This is absolutely the second-worst thing I have ever seen you wear.”
Jadyn stared at Mildred. “What was the first?”
“There was this Boogie Nights theme—”
Before her mind exploded, Jadyn waved a hand to stop her. “I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want to know.”
Helena put her hands on her hips. “You get me like this or not at all.”
Maryse bit her lower lip and glanced over at Mildred, who looked as conflicted about the options as Jadyn felt. Death or the Helena the Hippo Hooker. On the surface, it seemed like such an easy choice, but when faced with the spandex wall of doom, things got blurry.
Apparently sensing her quandary, Maryse rose from the bed, still looking sideways at Helena, as if afraid she’d turn into a pillar of salt if she took in the entire spectacle. “Here’s the problem, Helena. You have no place to hold a cell phone. You can’t carry it. A floating cell phone will attract the wrong kind of attention and is certain to clear out the bar.”
“Hmmm.” Helena scrunched her brow for a moment. “You have the phone?”
Maryse pulled the prepaid cell phone from her pocket and handed it to Helena. She attempted to take it but it fell to the floor.
“Damn it!” Helena ranted then reached for the phone, her hand swiping through it every time. Finally, her fingers latched on and the phone came up in Helena’s hand.
“The phone isn’t going to do any good if you can’t be consistent with touching things,” Maryse said. “Concentrate like you did earlier today.”
“You think I’m trying to fail?” Helena asked. “I assure you, failure is not something I’m fond of.”
“Well, maybe,” Maryse shot back, “if you spent more time practicing touching things and less time trying to cross MTV with porno, you’d be better at it.”
Helena glared at Maryse, then shoved the phone down the spandex in between her breasts. Jadyn covered her mouth with her hand and hoped that if the time came for Helena to get help, she could locate the phone in all that smashed-together flesh.
“Well, if you all are done complaining,” Helena said, “we have a bar to work.”
Helena walked through the wall and into the hallway. Mildred rose from the bed and patted Jadyn on the back. “Don’t wo
rry. Maryse and I will be downstairs in the lobby. If anything looks odd, we’ll head over.”
“Something already looks odd,” Jadyn pointed out.
“Heard that!” Helena shouted from the hall.
Maryse sighed. “Just concentrate on your investigation and try not to look at her. Helena and alcohol are not a great mix.”
Famous last words.
###
As Jadyn had expected, Bill’s was nothing special to look at. A solid wood bar stretched in a U shape on one side, a row of kegs and shelves full of whiskey bottles spanning the back wall. Scarred metal tables covered the remaining floor space, and the cracked, vinyl-cushioned chairs completed the seating areas. The floor was constructed of rough wooden planks, definitely not Jadyn’s first choice for a heel-walking surface.
The lighting was dim, but not dim enough that Jadyn couldn’t assess her prospects. It was especially easy as all conversation had ceased and every man in the bar had turned to stare when she’d walked inside. For a split second, she pictured how different the scene in front of her would look if they could all see Helena stomping in behind her, and she held in a laugh.
She recognized a man at the south end of the bar as Junior, the one who had taken a swing at her. He was the only one scowling, so probably not a good place to start. Two men at the north end of the bar looked familiar, so she’d start with them. As she made her way over, a flash of pink crossed in her periphery and she figured Helena was going to eavesdrop on the table-sitters as they’d discussed before leaving the hotel.
Jadyn perched on a barstool and crossed her legs, well aware that the tight black dress she wore slid up past her mid-thigh. At one of the tables to her left, she heard an intake of breath and held in a smile.
The bartender, an older man with silver hair and a stocky build, lumbered across and gave her the once-over. “Get you something?”
“Beer, please. Whatever you have on tap.”
He gave her a single nod and turned around to pour a mug of beer from the keg. When he pushed the mug across the counter, he studied her again.
“You’re not from around here,” he said.
“Not until a couple of days ago,” she agreed. “I’m Jadyn.”
His eyes widened and he started to grin. “The new game warden? The one that shot up bags of money?”
She nodded. “I see my reputation precedes me.”
“It’s not preceding. It’s running ahead of you yelling. Hell, that’s the funniest and saddest story I’ve ever heard. Figures they all left out the part where you’re a looker. First beer’s on me. A woman who looks good and can fire a weapon shouldn’t have to pay for drinks in this town.”
He gave her a wink and headed to the south end of the bar where Junior was waving his beer mug and grumbling.
“That was a pretty smooth move yesterday” the guy to her right said. “When you ducked Junior’s punch.”
She turned to look at the man and smiled. “Thanks.”
He was probably in his midthirties, but summers out in the hot Louisiana sun tended to age people more than their chronological years. His buddy was around the same age and neither looked like they worked desk jobs. Their shoulders and forearms were rippled and scarred, indicating a lot of regular manual labor.
“I’m Bart,” the first man said, “and this is Tyler.”
“I’m Jadyn. It’s nice to meet you.”
Bart nodded. “Where’d you learn to fight that way?”
“Martial arts training. Sometimes the best way to win a fight is to avoid it altogether.”
Tyler laughed. “Hell, what’s the fun in that?”
Jadyn laughed too and glanced around the bar before looking back at Bart and Tyler. “Are you guys going to catch crap for talking to me? Some of the other patrons don’t look very happy.”
Bart waved a hand in dismissal. “Piss on ’em. At least ten of them assholes claim to be my friends, but not a one put out a CB call to us about that money. If Tyler and I hadn’t been headed to the pond already, we’d never have known.”
“Really? Then how did the rest of them find out? Don’t tell me you were all headed to the same fishing hole?”
“No. Some of ’em didn’t even have fishing tackle. My guess is Junior sent out the call on his channel, and Junior and I are the opposite of friends. But you’d think one of my buddies on Junior’s channel would have switched over and filled us in.”
“That seems the polite thing to do,” Jadyn said. “Explain this channel thing to me—who decides which channel to use?”
“There’s only a handful of channels that get decent reception in the swamp. Law enforcement uses one of them, and those of us that’s been here forever have divvied them up based on the type of fishing we like to do. If you’re into largemouth bass, you don’t care if speckled trout are biting.”
“I see. So someone on Junior’s channel found the money first, but no one bothered to broadcast it to other channels.”
“Exactly. Greedy bastards.”
“Makes you wonder if the first guy out there told everyone not to. Because I can’t imagine that many people making the independent decision to keep quiet.”
Bart frowned. “You’ve got a point there.”
Seeing her opening, Jadyn moved in for the kill. “Then I guess you just have to figure out who was first and that’s the guy who tried to cut the rest of you out.”
Bart looked back at Tyler, whose expression moved from relaxed to perturbed. Obviously, Bart had a clear idea of who had tried to cut him out.
“Excuse me for a minute,” Bart said and jumped off his stool before strolling across the bar to where Junior sat.
Tyler slid off his stool but remained standing next to Jadyn. “If Junior’s the one who called for silence, this isn’t going to be pretty. He and Bart have a long-standing feud—the Hatfields and McCoys kind.”
“Really?” Jadyn perked up, feeling only slightly guilty that the prospect of the seemingly affable Bart stomping the clearly disturbed Junior into the floor until it splintered caused her a bit of excitement.
“Yep,” Tyler said. “Junior’s mom wasn’t exactly the kind of stuff housewives were made of. She set her sights on Bart’s dad almost as soon as Junior’s dad dragged her to Mudbug. One weekend, both of them disappeared and ain’t no one heard from either of them since.”
“Okay, that just sucks,” Jadyn said, feeling bad for Bart, trying to feel bad for Junior. After all, it wasn’t his fault his mom had turned out to be a husband-stealing slut. His obvious anger issues with women made a lot more sense now.
“Yeah, it was one of the shittiest things I ever seen, and I seen a lot of shitty things.”
Suddenly, the guilt that had been pushed aside came creeping in, reminding Jadyn that she was a law enforcement officer, even if her authority didn’t extend to the bar.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything,” she said.
“It would have happened eventually, anyway. Bart may not get around to things as quickly as you do, but sooner or later, that same thought would have struck him. Besides, the ambulance can get to them easier here than in the swamp.”
Tyler downed a big gulp of beer, a smile hovering on his lips, and Jadyn realized he hadn’t stood up because he was worried he’d need to intervene—he was waiting for the first blows so that he could jump into the fight.
The voices at the end of the bar grew louder and Jadyn hopped off her stool. She’d started this mess and needed to end it before things got out of hand. As she walked toward the two yelling men, something pink moved in the corner of her eye. Apparently figuring something was up, Helena had left her corner to move toward the bar. With the way she teetered on the ridiculous heels she wore, Jadyn doubted she’d make it halfway across the bar before falling.
“I don’t like what you’re accusing me of,” Junior said. He puffed his chest out, but it still didn’t reach farther than his stomach.
Bart didn’t appear any more impressed
than Jadyn. “You don’t like it because I caught you being the sneaky bastard you are. Guess it’s in your genes.”
Junior turned beet red and clenched his fists. “I done told you it wasn’t me, and even if it was, what are you gonna do about it?”
“Gentlemen,” Jadyn said, even though she was fairly sure the moniker wasn’t applicable. “I can’t let you start a fight in here, so I’m going to ask you both to cool it.”
Junior snorted. “That’s big words considering you ain’t got the sheriff here to protect you this time.”
“The way I remember it, I didn’t need him last time.”
“You troublemaking bitch. All this is your fault.” Junior shoved Bart to the side and launched at Jadyn, who neatly sidestepped out of his path and sent him crashing into a table.
Junior struggled to get up from the floor, glaring at her the entire time. She had no doubt that as soon as he got upright, he was going for tackle number two. Jadyn shifted her weight to the left, ready to spin out of his way, but her right foot remained fixed in place. She glanced down and her pulse spiked.
Holy crap!
Her heel was caught in one of the wide cracks in the plank floor and it wasn’t budging. If she’d been wearing pumps, she would have simply stepped out of them and completed her move, but the leather laces were wrapped firmly up her calf, keeping her foot firmly affixed to the shoe.
So not good.
Chapter Eight
The door to the bar swung open and someone walked in, but Jadyn was too busy trying to work her heel out of the floorboard to worry about who was witnessing the spectacle. Helena had made it halfway across the bar and was huffing like a train. Of even more concern, she was picking up speed.
Junior had made it up from the floor, and even worse, had seen Jadyn’s shoe caught in the crack. “You’re not getting away with it this time,” he said.
Bart and Tyler, who’d moved to stand on each side of Junior, both grabbed an arm to prevent him from charging, but the angry man’s adrenaline and hatred outweighed the two lighter men trying to hold him back. He shook them both off like rag dolls, lowered his head, and charged.
