Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
Clamping her teeth on her inner cheek, she bit back a hysterical giggle.
As far as she could tell, there was no reality here, only slips of the mind and swirls of shadows in her consciousness. Everything she thought she knew had crumbled away, at least that was how it seemed.
A sudden outer chill flowed over her, persistent and pervasive.
She shuddered and closed her eyes.
****
Luke shoved through the door off the stairwell and stepped into the hall. Worry burned through his gut when his restless gaze tracked over to find Rowan puddled on the floor. Images from the previous evening had plagued his sleep throughout the night and he’d finally decided it had been nothing more than a mistake. Even as he continued to lie to himself, he deliberately approached, keeping his face cool, words clipped. “What are you doing?”
“It’s comfortable down here.” She didn’t look at him, just stared at the floor, forearms on knees, hands dangling. “Go away.”
He raised his brows, only to crinkle them as he studied her. Her pallor looked ashen, shadows etching deep half-moons under her eyes. Hair that had been pulled back into a ponytail, escaped in wispy strands to hang over her face, and a sheen of perspiration coated her brow.
A brief but intense memory struck him and a cold ball of fear began to weave its way to form a dense knot in his belly.
No. No way could history be repeating. It didn’t make sense.
Clenching his teeth, Luke left and returned a few seconds later to crouch down beside her. He offered the glass of iced water without comment.
Rowan stared at him for a long moment before accepting the glass with a murmured “thanks.” Her hand shook and she used the other to steady it. “Does, uh, Robert ever rearrange the furniture?”
“What?”
“Never mind.”
“Did something happen?” He frowned down at her, and after a moment, she shook her head.
“Don’t you have somewhere to be?” Her words should have held bite, but instead they lacked energy, closing in on monotone.
“I do, actually. But if you’re having some kind of issue, I’d rather hang out. I don’t want you screwing anything up.”
The slow turn of her head had her stare hardening. A muscle in her jaw throbbed.
There. That’s better.
“Piss off.”
Luke smirked to throw a little kerosene on the embers. Her lips tightened and a flush spread across her face to push out the gray pallor.
Satisfied, he straightened. “I’m going to go grab a shower. If you decide to have a breakdown in the next fifteen minutes, try to hold off.”
“Jerk.” She climbed to her feet, glaring at him, and without a word, pushed past him to walk toward the office.
****
Luke parked the bike, stripped off his gear, and began to walk.
He made the pilgrimage every few months, two lavender chrysanthemums and one tiny buff-colored teddy bear in hand.
It was still early, and aside from passing traffic, the grounds were quiet. Greenery met intricately carved stone, somber instead of infused with the peace they attempted to portray. Not that it was their fault. It was what it was.
He shoved one hand in the pocket of his jeans, unhurried in his pace, but his mind remained frenetic. He passed the fountain before weaving through catacombs into marble hallways.
Not far. Just at the end, conveniently near the wooden bench where his knees used to sometimes give out. It hadn’t happened in a while, but they’d still threaten to liquefy if memories overtook him.
He stopped before the etched names, reaching out to trace them with his fingers.
It was an old habit. Maybe it was still denial, but at his point he doubted it. It had turned into a comfort thing. Nothing more, nothing less.
Catherine Louise Meunier
McKenzie Lynn Meunier
Cate had always hated her middle name.
“They just had to name me after Uncle Louis. A sweet man with bulging eyes and a turkey wattle.”
Luke smiled at the memory. She’d been smiling at the time as well. She’d loved her uncle, poultry appendage and all.
He placed the two flowers in the vase, propping the teddy behind them. They’d be gone by his next visit, but each and every time, he hoped the bear found a loving home with another child.
“Almost three years now.” In one month and twenty-one days. He calculated it every single moment of his life. “I guess I’ll never understand why some spirits stay around and others move on. Is it about youth? Purity? Does fire cleanse? Or is it only the good ones that automatically move on?”
Silence sunk in around him, traffic too distant, any other unseen visitors stuck in their own contemplative meditation.
Luke sighed and dropped down on the bench, his gaze still on both names. “Jesus, Caty, I don’t even know what to do any more. I miss you so damned much, but I’m withering into nothing here.”
He shoved a hand through his hair and gave it a frustrated tug. “You probably wouldn’t even recognize me anymore. I live in a fucking bar, hide from everyone, even when I’m out there on display. None of the guys come around anymore. Brayden, John, Arnie, not even Russ. Not that I can blame them. Who wants to hang out with a husk? Can’t go back, even if I wanted to. Did I ever tell you that? The psychological bullshit ended it.”
Silence. No frigid breeze. No touch of her perfume in the air. No fragrance from Kenzie’s lavender baby bath.
He cupped his face, scrubbed his hands down. “It doesn’t really matter though. None of it. I thought I’d accepted it all, though, figuring there wasn’t anything left for me. I always figured I had one shot, you know? I always figured no one can ever replace you or our beautiful baby girl.
“And that still stands. Of course no one can take your place. I love you dearly. I’ll always love you, but now I’m wondering if I might have room for someone else in my life.” Luke leaned back, letting his hands drop between his knees. “It makes me feel like shit, and I guess it’s kind of fucked up to admit this to you, Cate, but I can’t keep this woman out of my head now. God, I try. So fucking hard. But there she is, always around, always, just there. Physically, sure, I mean I work with her, eh, actually, who the fuck am I kidding? I work for her. But even when she’s not there, I’m thinking about her. I even considered pulling up stakes and finally getting the hell out of New Orleans, but I can’t seem to do it. I think she might be having … some troubles and you know how I am about damsels in distress.”
He shook his head with a hesitant smile. “Not that she really fits that role. Too headstrong, temperamental, too much of a pain in the ass to consider herself in need of rescue. Or maybe she’s even here to rescue me. Go figure that one.”
“But you want to know the ironic part?” His smile melted away. “I doubt she even likes me. God knows I haven’t given her any reason to. To be honest, I’ve been a bastard to her from the second she stepped into The Goose. But when I’m with her, something, a tiny piece of me, unfreezes and comes back to life.”
Luke leaned back, tilting his head against the wall behind him. Tears seared his eyes, but didn’t fall.
“… and I don’t understand it.”
Chapter Thirteen
Rowan opted for a healthy serving of “screw that asshole” with a side dish of “I’m carrying pepper spray and would be delighted to use it.”
During the crystalline day with its cheerful, puffy white clouds, the memory of her stalker elicited anger instead of fear. She’d be damned if she’d be made a prisoner in her own place.
After getting sidetracked for weeks, she finally found her way to the closest library to satiate her curiosity and perhaps even gather some answers. With the help of an enthusiastic library page, she was able to dig out old records and information about the building she’d inherited.
Margie wasn’t too far off. It had been built in 1806, initially as a bank.
Slightly less than forty years later, it was sold and renovated into a high-end restaurant. After that, a mercantile.
There was nothing of interest or note until it was purchased by a wealthy Frenchman named Charles Le Gall, who refurbished the building specifically for his young creole bride. Josephine Le Gall moved in shortly after renovations and the couple moved in high-end social circles, appearing happy to all concerned. She gave birth to their first child, a boy, a year later. Two years after that, she bore Charles a daughter.
Rowan frowned as she read, a see-saw of nausea pitching low in her belly. It would seem the Le Galls weren’t destined for a happily-ever-after. The little boy contracted cholera, dying a couple days before his seventh birthday. Distraught, Charles fell into a deep depression, ignoring his wife and daughter, locking himself away in his office. On the evening on June 17, 1872, the man’s sanity snapped and he attempted to kill the little girl with a butcher knife. Josephine intervened, taking the blade in the heart to save her daughter.
Charles Le Gall came back to himself shortly after, horrified by what he’d done. He fled the house, made his way to the cemetery where his son was interred, and committed suicide by stabbing himself in the chest with the same knife he’d inadvertently killed his wife. The daughter, Amelia, was sent to live with Josephine’s sister. From everything Rowan read, the little girl lived a long and successful life as an artist and early feminist.
The building changed hands several more times over the years, becoming another restaurant, an art gallery, briefly even a brothel, before it landed as a bar sometime in the mid-twentieth century. Three more deaths occurred within that time span: two heart attacks and one shooting by a jealous husband.
And then Jimmy. But of course he wasn’t listed in the history.
Shuddering, Rowan pulled her gaze away. Sometimes ignorance really was bliss.
Determined to shake off the veil of unease, Rowan left the library on foot to catch the streetcar down to the Spanish Plaza by the river. She decided to spend the afternoon people watching, listening to live music, and poking through shops at the outlet mall. In light of the beauty around her, the darkness of her research and current existence gradually lifted.
Los Angeles carried its own energy, but the sprawl managed to mute it to white noise, whereas New Orleans held distinct spikes in its own unique flavor. Rowan loved it.
There was no sign of the green-eyed man, but she kept watch, almost hoping for an appearance. All her pent-up frustrations were looking for an outlet and she really wanted to hurt him if she could.
For several moments, she considered taking a tour on the paddle wheeler, but figured that would be for another time. Maybe a cruise at night would even be fun. Dixie, dinner, and dancing. Huh. It definitely had merit. The idea of taking a river boat down the Mississippi appealed to her romantic nature.
New thoughts threatened to intrude. Luke’s visage and new emotions she refused to entertain tried to torment, but she shook them off like a wet dog. It didn’t matter. Rowan had always enjoyed her own company. Now was no different.
She glanced at her watch and winced before deciding it might be time to head back. Luke would have already opened the tavern for lunch and the impending happy hour. There was no doubt in her mind he’d make a comment about her absence. But it wasn’t really his business. If she was going to be stuck with him anyway, he may as well do his job.
Dodging around and through clumps of other pedestrians, she headed past the Toulouse streetcar, in favor of the one that ran along Canal. Rowan felt a kindling of pride as her confidence in her navigation grew.
She climbed aboard, found a seat next to the window, and waited.
Too many other folks crammed on as well and Rowan found herself surrounded by a group of tourists. She still held too much in common and couldn’t imagine getting to the point where the streetcar would become blasé. Listening to the happy chatter around her, she eyeballed her watch again, figuring she had more than enough time to get back before the after-work shift started its nightly migration into The Galloping Goose.
“If you take this to the end, I think you get to see some of the local cemeteries,” a heavy-set woman in her early fifties, wearing a bright yellow sundress, informed her seat companion. “Remember, they don’t bury them here.”
“Well, that’s disturbing. Why not?” The other woman, of similar age and build, wore a velour jogging set. She pulled her digital camera from the depths of her purse and snapped a few of the car’s interior.
“Low sea level. They’d get flooded out. I read during Katrina there were caskets floating all over the place.”
“Oh, God.” Velour took a couple of photos of a palm tree before squishing her face together in disgust at her companion.
“I guess they call it one of the most haunted cities in the country for a reason.”
“Got that right,” Rowan muttered, watching a couple of kids on skateboards jump curbs as the streetcar passed.
One voice lowered in conspiracy, this one male. “I heard one was actually screaming.”
“Really? How could that be?” Velour woman gasped.
“Buried alive. I’ve read that happens here.”
“Those are just stories.” The woman’s voice betrayed her doubtful response. “I think you watch too many movies.”
Rowan shifted, uncomfortable. Too many films and books in her own right led a little credence to the discussion floating on either side of her.
“You know what I heard once?” Another male voice, New York thickening his accent. “Sometimes there’d be hits put on people and they’d turn them into real-life zombies.”
“Oh, c’mon, Carl! That’s ridiculous!”
“Honest. That’s what I heard. This voodoo hocus-pocus stuff has some serious followers.”
Ice slid into Rowan’s veins and she considered getting off at the next stop. In light of recent events, she knew her imagination would suck this information up and spit it out at her in her dreams. A shudder quaked through her and she figured it might be wise to bring ear buds and music for her next city excursion.
“Do you know what happens to little girls who don’t fulfill their family obligations?”
A strong hand grabbed her by the arm and she yanked away with a gasp. “What?”
For the flicker of a moment, the man leaning over from the seat before her flashed intense and angry green eyes. She blinked and his gaze melted into warm chocolate syrup. “Are you okay, miss?”
“What?” She repeated, staring. Sun-kissed fair skin instead of smooth mocha. The man before her was easily into his sixties with a shock of white hair combed back from his brow, and glasses perched on the end of his long nose.
“Honey?” One of the women behind her switched seats and pressed a gentle hand to shoulder. “Are you okay? Can we call someone for you?”
The streetcar came to a stop, and shaking her head, Rowan got up to push past. Too many people kept inquiring about her welfare of late. She knew they meant well, but she wanted the circumstances eliciting her well-wishes to stop. Enough already. Please.
Humidity wrapped around her and she tried to pull the warm soup into her lungs, but she couldn’t seem to manage. Short breaths didn’t allow enough oxygen in and she leaned against a lamppost, desperate to slow everything down or risk suffocation. Deep trembling in her muscles threatened to bring her to her knees.
People flowed around her, shooting her curious looks from under crinkled brows, but not slowing.
Taking careful steps, she walked across the brick of the sidewalk and shouldered through the glass door of a drugstore. The chill of the AC flowed over her skin and she closed her eyes for a moment. Cool air leaked into her lungs before finally easing into a steady flow.
On legs still shaking, she walked to the back of the store to grab a bottle of cola from the refrigerator and rolled it across her brow after paying.
Now what?
She had no idea what to do. Doctor? Shrink? A fucking e
xorcist?
The tavern already freaked her out, even more so in light of her new information, but it didn’t bother her nearly as much as these … hallucinations. Were they really figments of a teetering mind? Wait. Didn’t questioning it mean she wasn’t insane? She’d never been clear on that.
Rowan pressed a hand to her forehead. Perhaps this whole adventure was a mistake. She could have sold the tavern and stayed in her little apartment in Toluca Lake to figure the next move.
But after Craig, she was so done with L.A. Following her heart had let to blind stupidity. The Galloping Goose had offered her a fresh start.
Yeah, a nice smooth sail into a padded room. If she returned home, her parents might even foot the bill.
She peered outside, fixing her gaze on individuals and groups as a whole, but the brilliant late-afternoon sun betrayed nothing ominous.
Unwilling to box herself into a cab or another streetcar, Rowan took a deep breath and stepped back outside for the walk home.
****
Rowan arrived back at the Goose from her bi-weekly excursion and didn’t spare him a single glance. She walked right past and disappeared into the back hallway, her hands clenched at her sides.
He finished pulling a draft and set it before his customer, new urgency drawing up from low in his belly. Luke deliberated, stepped away from the bar and his responsibilities, decided ‘screw it’, and jerked his head at Christy when she buzzed by. “I’ll be back. Hold the fort.”
“Sure. Can do.”
He slid from behind the bar, his strides long to eat up distance but not to appear hurried. He passed the darkened office and pushed into the stairwell, wondering if she’d even let him into the apartment.
No worries there.
Gazing upward, Luke stopped to lean against the balustrade. He shoved his hands in his pockets.
Rowan sat at the top of the steps, sunglasses now hanging on the front of her V-neck. She’d been staring into nothing and now, with apparent difficulty, shifted her gaze to him. “Don’t you have a job to do?”
Soul Reckoning Page 8
