The Unknown Woman

by Laurie Paige

  KERRY WOKE from a short afternoon nap in a lethargic haze. For a moment, she was disoriented.

  “Oh,” she murmured, rising and stretching muscles that felt as if she’d run a marathon. She’d walked a lot since arriving in New Orleans and working on the float, holding those wires over her head, had strained the muscles in her arms, legs and neck.

  After a tour of one of the famous plantations along the Mississippi, she and Matt had returned to the city via the steamboat. She’d opted for a nap while Matt went off on pursuits of his own without saying what they were.

  She’d started to ask what he was going to do, but fortunately had stopped herself in time. In her family, everyone knew everyone else’s business. They consulted and advised each other as a matter of course. Even though she felt she’d known Matt forever, he probably wouldn’t appreciate the loving closeness that allowed such liberties.

  She wondered if Matt had similar feelings about her. He had called her “honey” while stroking her cheek. But that might have been because he’d sensed her distress and was sympathetic.

  Maybe she was imagining things, but she felt she’d bonded with both Matt and Patti for reasons she couldn’t figure out. It was odd, this web of circumstances that had drawn them into the same circle.

  The charms on her bracelet tinkled loudly as she rose. As she looked at the three crossed bones, a sudden chill spread over her. Three intertwined lives, one of them already ended in tragedy. What would happen to her and Matt?

  Tears stung her eyes as she contemplated the possibility of something terrible happening to Matt. Pressing the heels of her hands against her eyelids, she shook her head as if defying fate and managed a soft laugh.

  When had she become so morbid?

  After slipping on a light sweater, she went out on her patio and peered across the courtyard. A couple of families were in the swimming pool. A bit cool for that, in her opinion. Others sat at the outdoor tables and chairs and chatted.

  She went to the courtyard bar, ordered a raspberry iced tea and returned to her room. The gate was open to the next-door patio suite, the one where Matt had first stayed. She looked in.

  “Detective Rothberg,” she said upon recognizing him.

  He turned from taking the yellow police tape off the door. “Hello,” he said. “I recognize your face, but the name escapes me at the moment.”

  “Kerry Johnston. I’m next door.” She pointed toward the middle suite.

  “Of course. From Minnesota.”

  “Yes. Uh, have you learned anything about Patti? Has the autopsy been done yet?”

  He nodded. “That’s why I’m taking down the tape. We’re through with the investigation.”

  Kerry was shocked. “But why?”

  “There was no crime. Miss Ruoui wasn’t murdered, which is what I first thought.”

  “So it was an overdose,” Kerry murmured. Patti’s voodoo friends had been wrong about her drug use.

  “You might say so.” The detective rolled the tape into a ball and stuck it in his jacket pocket. “But not from drugs. She had a severe allergic reaction to an ingredient in a love potion she drank.”

  “A love potion,” Kerry repeated and thought of handsome, angry, moody Jason Pichante.

  “Yes. My partner and I pieced the evening together. The bartender and a couple of the servers remembered seeing Miss Ruoui and her escort since they were dressed in black with white faces. It’s a common representation of Death during Mardi Gras.”

  “I see.”

  “They joined the crowd in the courtyard shortly before the electricity went off.”

  “Yes, I remember couples from the hotel’s Twelfth Night party coming out to the courtyard, plus others from the street.”

  He smiled grimly. “Yeah, that’s the Big Easy. There’re no boundaries. Everybody crashes. Anyway, an old woman circulated through the crowd selling voodoo spells. Apparently Miss Ruoui’s date bought two of the popular love potions. One of the servers recalled them teasing each other, then they both drank the potions.”

  “He didn’t die,” Kerry said, almost resentful of that fact.

  “He wasn’t allergic to the roots and herbs used in the potion. According to the medical examiner it was a common concoction, but the victim went into anaphylactic shock almost immediately. When she felt ill, she probably went searching for the ladies room. Instead she stumbled into this patio. When she saw the door was open, she went inside to lie down until she felt better.”

  “Wouldn’t she have been afraid the occupant might return at any moment?” Kerry asked.

  “People usually party until the wee hours,” he said with a shake of his head. “And I doubt she was thinking clearly by then. She was certainly in no shape to consider the consequences.”

  “Did she die quickly? And painlessly?”

  “Well, she would have known something was seriously wrong, but yes, she went quickly. The air passages close up so the person passes out pretty fast.”

  “That’s why the CPR didn’t work,” Kerry said. “I tried but it didn’t do any good.”

  Kerry knew about allergic reactions. One of her dental patients had had a severe reaction to a numbing compound the dentist had given her before drilling in a molar. Fortunately the paramedics had been able to save her.

  The detective checked the room before closing the door. “The investigation is closed as of now,” he told her with an air of finality.

  “What about Patti’s date? Did you talk to him?”

  Detective Rothberg hesitated before saying, “My partner handled that end of things. Since we know she voluntarily took the potion, there’ll be no further query into the case.”

  Kerry noted he didn’t answer her directly or mention a name. Was he covering for the powerful Pichante family? “Since she appears to have no next of kin, is a friend allowed to claim the remains?”

  “You can check with the medical examiner’s office on that.” He pulled out a card and wrote on the back. “Here’s the number. The woman who answers is the department executive assistant. She probably knows more about the rules and regulations than anyone. Ask her.”

  “Thank you.” Kerry tucked the card in her pocket.

  “Better wait until the morning. She’ll be gone by now. The office opens at eight.”

  “Right.”

  After he left, two maids entered the suite and started a thorough cleaning. Kerry hurried to her room. She could hardly wait until Matt returned so she could share this news. She left a message on his voice mail to call her.

  MATT LISTENED attentively as Kerry told him about the detective releasing his former quarters. Her hazel eyes flickered with the fire of indignation.

  “I know this is sadistic of me, but I hope Jason—assuming he’s the person who abandoned Patti, and I’m sure he is—was grilled by the cops the way they do in crime dramas on television. The detective never did say Jason was questioned, though, only that his partner had handled that part of the investigation.

  “According to witnesses, Patti drank the potion voluntarily,” Kerry continued. “So did her date. Since neither appeared to have been forced, that ended the matter as far as the police were concerned. It really was an accident. I’m glad to know that.”

  “Yes. It must have been terrible for Patti, though.”

  She told Matt of the dental patient who’d gone into anaphylactic shock so severe the emergency medical team had had to open the woman’s trachea right there in the dentist’s office before taking her to the hospital.

  “I remember how frightened she was when she couldn’t breathe,” Kerry said. “She clawed at her throat…”

  Matt laid a hand over Kerry’s, the need to comfort her too great to ignore.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I’m getting all emotional. Anyway, I hope Jason was scared. He deserves to feel as frightened as Patti must have been when she became ill.” She paused as if shocked at her words. “I didn’t realize I was so vindictive,” she said in a low voice.


  “Not vindictive,” Matt corrected, reluctantly removing his hand from hers. “You want justice.”

  It was strange how much he wanted to touch Kerry. Part of it was sensual, yes, but there was more to it than that. He felt a bond with her, and a need to comfort her. But most of all he felt pure pleasure at connecting with her.

  All these feelings were foreign to him. Usually he kept himself aloof from other people’s emotions. It was just that she was so real, so warm.

  He watched as she fingered the cool petal of a flower, her mood introspective. Something drew him to this lovely woman in ways he couldn’t fully explain. Was it her concern for others? Her down-to-earth approach to life? Her obvious love for her family and the closeness they seemed to share? These were aspects of her life that had been absent from his for a long, long time.

  Pushing the useless musing aside, he sternly reminded himself that they’d barely met. First impressions were often wrong, as he’d learned from his former fiancée. Things, or people, that seemed too good to be true often were.

  He focused on the situation at hand.

  “It’s sad that no one seems interested in what became of Patti,” Kerry said, her eyes so beautiful, so filled with pity, he wanted to take her in his arms.

  “We’re interested,” he assured her.

  “I have a number to call in the morning to find out about the body—what will happen to it,” she added when he raised his eyebrows in question.

  “I’ve been doing some investigating on my own,” he told her. “I went to Tulane University and checked their records for the past few years.”

  “I didn’t think of that. What did you find out?”

  “That she graduated four years ago and would have been twenty-six in June. That she was smart and had a full academic scholarship. That she worked in the registrar’s office to earn her spending money. If she had help with finances, it apparently wasn’t much.”

  “Was all that in her records?”

  “No, but the woman who worked there remembered Patti and was shocked at her death. She joined me for a break and we had a lengthy chat over coffee.”

  Kerry surprised him by leaning over and giving him a hug. “I’m so glad someone remembered Patti.”

  Her lips were just too close and too tempting. Matt took advantage of the moment and claimed the prize.

  Her mouth was soft beneath his. Just as he remembered. Her lips trembled a tiny bit. Just as he remembered. She opened to him when he stroked his tongue over the sweet line of her mouth. Just as he remembered.

  Although it was difficult not to become lost in passion, part of him was aware that they weren’t in the most private place in the world. There was a courtyard nearby where other guests chatted, read or swam in the pool. He pulled back from her.

  Their eyes met, and he was reminded of the green waters of the Caribbean, rocky pools tucked in among the sandy beaches. He looked away as memories flowed into his mind like waves.

  His family had been to the Virgin Islands many times for summer vacations. Left to their own devices, he and his sister had explored to their heart’s content. It had been fun…

  For the first time in years, he realized how much he missed their companionship. The two of them had been close as children and as adults, although she was four years older. Until she’d graduated from college and gone to Africa, she’d always been there for him.

  He covertly studied Kerry. Was she the one to fill the empty places in his life, to be the companion he hadn’t fully realized he missed until he met her?

  Hmm, maybe Romeo and Juliet had fallen in love at first sight, but he knew both he and Kerry were more cautious.

  However, the attraction between them was growing stronger with every hour of the day as they worked to solve the mystery of Patti’s past, this unknown woman who just might have changed their lives forever…

  Clearing his throat, he said, “I’ve been invited to dinner at a country club just outside the city tonight. There’ll be a wine tasting afterward. I was told to bring a guest if I wanted. I’d like to take you, if you’re interested?”

  She blinked as if caught off-guard by the question. “I’m not sure I should,” she said. “This is work for you. I don’t want to get in the way.”

  He chuckled. “You won’t. I’ll take notes and act as if you aren’t even in the room.”

  That made her smile. “I’ve been to some wineries in California so I’m familiar with the protocol of a wine tasting,” she assured him.

  A smile teased the corners of her mouth, so he was prepared as she continued on a droll note.

  “I do have one question. Do I swish the wine clockwise or counterclockwise before I spit it on the carpet?”

  “I believe I read a story about that when I took American literature in college,” he informed her.

  “Yeah, so did I, but it’s fun putting you on.”

  “Do you think I’m a stuffed shirt?” he demanded.

  She shook her head, her spiky hair gleaming in the dappled late-afternoon sun, making him want to touch it, to muss it up and smooth it out…

  “However, I do want to remind you that a small-town dental hygienist from the Midwest may be intimidated by those who live on a, shall we say, loftier plane.”

  “Ha,” he said to that.

  “Okay, I won’t be,” she admitted, “but if you see me trapped by some society matron telling me of all the Mardi Gras balls on her social calendar this season, I expect an immediate rescue.”

  “It’s a promise.” He held out his hand.

  When she put her hand in his, he did what seemed natural. He lifted it to his lips and kissed each slender knuckle.

  MATT HAD a startling revelation when he picked up Kerry for their gala evening—he was going to have a much harder time keeping his hands to himself than he’d thought.

  She was enchanting in a long black skirt, a camisole top in gold with bugle beads that shimmered with each breath she took, and an elegant silk scarf, black interwoven with gold, purple and green, draped casually around her neck.

  Her eyes seemed as large as the lanterns glowing on a nearby patio and were skillfully outlined in black with green-and-gold shadows highlighting them. A man could drown in those eyes and never regret it…

  “Is this okay?” she asked a trifle anxiously. “I bought the scarf the first day I arrived…”

  He realized he’d been staring too long. “Perfect,” he assured her, his voice dropping an octave.

  Other parts of his body also reacted. He couldn’t help that, but in every other way, he would exert control, he told his libido sternly.

  The town car he’d ordered was waiting in front of the hotel. He helped Kerry inside, making sure her skirt was tucked in before the driver closed the door. He held her hand as if they were a couple on a prom date. The trip was much too short.

  At the country club, he noted Kerry taking in her lush surroundings. He tried to see the place through her eyes, but it only reminded him of his youth. The lobby and dining room featured cream-colored marble columns and green-and-mauve carpets on granite floor tiles. Both rooms were decorated in different colors but in the same tastefully understated style as the country club his family belonged to.

  A man in a dark evening suit approached them, hand outstretched. He and Matt greeted each other, then Matt introduced Kerry. “Terrence Wilson is the president of the country club,” he explained. “He arranged the review of their cellar.”

  “How thoughtful,” Kerry said. “I’m looking forward to the evening.”

  “Glad you could join us,” the man replied in the friendly manner Matt had found throughout the city. He led the way to a table with a great view of the river.

  The moon cast a quicksilver path over the water’s black, ever shifting surface. Matt inhaled slowly, deeply. The river, the moonlight and the woman beside him were so lovely, it made his insides tighten up in a way he’d never experienced before.

  As he seated Kerry, he
noted there were three other people at the table, a man and two women.

  Terrence introduced his wife, Jessica, a woman in her fifties whose smile was friendly. The other woman was their daughter, a blonde with the glowing tan of a very expensive salon. Her name was Chandra. She had blue, predatory eyes.

  Matt could have given an instant profile of the woman. Around thirty. Divorced. Bored. She looked him over as if he were a morsel she might be tempted to sample.

  He gave an invisible shudder. No, thanks, he could have told her. He’d met her type in a hundred other cities.

  The other man was Terrence’s nephew, the male version of Chandra, who also had blue, restless eyes. Matt’s smile became genuine as Kerry shook hands and spoke to each person, her manner easy and charming. She was neither intimidated nor impressed.

  Over cocktails, he and Kerry answered questions about their activities in the city. With only a bit of exaggeration for effect, he described the healing ceremony and how spooky it was, right next door to the cemetery.

  The blonde touched his arm. “It’s nice that you’re having an adventure,” she said, her interest so obvious Matt found himself irritated by it.

  He laid a hand over Kerry’s, which rested on the table. “I’m glad Kerry was with me at the ritual. She had her picture taken with a python at one of the voodoo museums, so I knew she had lots of the good Ju-Ju.”

  “Oh, lots,” Kerry said, smiling ruefully as the others laughed.

  The older woman studied Kerry as if she took the discussion seriously. “That’s very good Ju-Ju indeed. The snake represents the Spirit of Wisdom. The python must have recognized a kindred spirit in you.”

  “I like that idea,” Kerry said. She held up her wrist with the bracelet. “I’ll have to get a snake charm before I leave New Orleans.”

  The soft light cast a glow over Kerry’s face. Matt decided she was the most beautiful woman in the room. He wished they were alone in a quiet private place to see where this attraction might lead.

  He also made a note to purchase the charm for her.

  The dinner, steak and the region’s famous crayfish, was a success. They sampled a variety of wines with each course, and Matt made notes on each. After the entree, he and Kerry accompanied their host on a tour of the cellars, located in a salt cave under the main building.