by Robin Caroll
“We’re sending the feds the print off the beer bottle. Maybe that’ll give us a lead.”
“Do the prints from the cup match the ones from the bottle?” He needed a break in this case.
“Not that we can tell.” Anderson shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “But we’re not trained in this kind of stuff, Sheriff.”
“I know that.” He let out a long sigh. Snapping at his deputy wouldn’t help. Anderson didn’t deserve such treatment. Bubba controlled his tone. “Maybe they’ll be able to find a match for that print. I wish the parish would give us more funding to have all the computer equipment we needed. Then we wouldn’t have to wait so long for results.”
“I sent the prints express, so maybe the results will come quicker.”
“Good thinking.” Bubba tossed the report on the desk. “Anything else in here I should know about?”
“The tox results.”
“The what?” Bubba reached for the papers and thumbed through them.
“You’d asked the lab to run tests on the residue inside the cups. The report came back as inconclusive.”
He didn’t bother to ask as his gaze lit on the report in question. Scanning the preliminary results, he stopped at the actual findings.
RESIDUAL FINDINGS: TRACE COMPONENTS FOUND INSIDE CUP. COFFEE DETECTED ALONG WITH SUGAR AND CREAM. UNIDENTIFIED COMPONENT WITH TRACES OF PARALDEHYDE. ADDITIONAL TESTING ON THIS COMPONENT NEEDS APPROVAL.
He glanced at his deputy. “Have we granted approval for this additional testing?”
“You have to authorize that, Sheriff.”
Frustration built behind the acid burning his throat. “Fine. I authorize. Call the lab, fax them, whatever we need to do to get them to figure out what that unidentified component is.”
“Yes, sir.” Anderson spun on his heel and charged from the room. A man with a mission.
Bubba shook his head and stared at the report. Paraldehyde. What was that? He laid the papers on his desk and rubbed the back of his neck. He’d never heard of such a word, and he’d been trained in various street drugs and their scientific names. Whatever-hyde didn’t ring any bells.
Unless it was something Tara used in her voodoo stuff. An herb, maybe? Like those swamp plants his aunt was always out digging up?
He needed to find out.
Lifting the receiver, Bubba flipped open his notebook and retrieved Tara’s cell phone number. Maybe he’d catch her in a good mood.
“Hello.”
Didn’t exactly sound like she was in the best mood. Never the mind, he had a case to work.
“Tara? Sheriff Theriot here.”
“What can I help you with?”
“I need to ask you about the cups I took from your sink,” he said.
“Yes?”
Oh, how could he word this without angering her? She already sounded a bit on the testy side. “Well, the initial lab results have come back.”
“And? Did you find something?”
“They’ve found traces of coffee, sugar, milk and—”
“Grandmere drinks more of a café au lait than coffee.”
“Yes, well…”
She wasn’t going to make this any easier on him.
“Just spit it out, Sheriff. What else?”
“Traces of an unknown chemical.”
He could make out her quick intake of air, even over the bad reception of the cell phone. “I knew it.”
Knew what? “Tara, did you put any herbs or anything in y’alls coffee? Even for medicinal purposes?” Please say no.
“What?” Indignation filled her voice. “You think I poisoned my grandmother? Are you daft, Sheriff?”
“I didn’t mean intentionally. And there’s no proof that what they found is what caused her illness.”
“Don’t be stupid. I didn’t put anything in the coffee—never have. I wasn’t even home then. Plus, Grandmere trained me, and we never mixed potions with ordinary substances. Tanty’s the same way.”
At the mention of his aunt’s name in relation to potions, Bubba’s stomach twisted. “I didn’t know. I had to ask.”
“Are you having tests run to find out what it is?” Accusation dripped over the connection.
“Of course.” Great, now he’d made her mad. He could just picture her, too, flipping her hair over her shoulder, eyes shimmering with flames. A spicy one, for sure, she could be as hot as the cayenne pepper that liberally laced most Cajun dishes.
“Good. Glad to hear you’re at least following up.”
He let the dig slide. He’d just insulted her in an offhand, unintentional manner. “I just wanted to check with you.”
“Well, you have.”
Although her tone was bitter, and slightly rude, he remembered she was hurting. And he didn’t want to get off the phone with her yet, no matter how illogical his budding attraction was. “We found a print on the cup, as well as one on the beer bottle.”
“And?”
Just as snappy as ever. “We’ve ruled out one set of prints as they’re your grandmother’s.”
“It is her house, you know.”
He chose to let that one slide, too. “A different one popped up on the cup. We sent it to the FBI to run through their database. No results matched.”
“Wait a minute. The FBI’s database couldn’t find a match?”
“No.” He waited for the tirade to come. Even braced himself by pressing his back deep into the chair.
A long pause and then, “So whoever visited Grandmere and poisoned her doesn’t have a criminal record.”
“We don’t know she was poisoned, Tara.”
“I do. I’ve known someone was responsible. You just haven’t gotten enough concrete evidence to convince yourself. Meanwhile, my grandmother’s sick and your aunt’s still in a coma. Why don’t you wake up and face the fact that someone’s behind this?”
He wanted to, desperately, but there were no facts to support such a claim. Yet.
“Now you’ve found traces of something unknown that she drank. How much more concrete do you need? But instead of investigating that angle and trying to find out who visited my grandmother that morning, you’d rather call me and insinuate I had something to do with her getting sick.”
“I never said you had any—”
“I’m not finished, Sheriff. Have you sent the report to the hospital to have them run tests on Grandmere and Tanty to see if any of this unknown stuff is in their systems? Have you ordered further testing to identify what it is?” She murmured under her breath, her words unidentifiable to him, but the tone clear. Mad as a gator stuck in a trap.
“Tara, we’re looking at every piec—”
“Why don’t you just out-and-out accuse me, Sheriff? I am the voodoo woman, remember? Much easier just to blame me rather than actually having to work a case, yes?” Her words tumbled over each other. “Well, I’m not to blame and if you can’t figure that out, then you’re more of a cooyon than I thought!”
He opened his mouth to interrupt just as a click sounded. Was her cell cutting out? Four seconds later, another click. She’d hung up on him!
He could almost understand. She felt as if he’d accused her of harming two of the people closest to her. He didn’t believe she’d do that for even a minute.
But his training whispered in his ear. Sometimes the guilty went on the offense to throw the scent off them. No, that couldn’t apply to Tara LeBlanc.
Could it?
NINE
The gumption of the man! All but accusing her of poisoning Grandmere. Sheriff René “Bubba” Theriot had really pushed her to the limit this time. Why did the man continue to get under her skin?
Tara shoved the broom in the closet and surveyed the workhouse. It’d taken a couple of hours and lots of elbow grease, but the room was now back in order. She let out a slow breath. Released the anger. Drew in the fresh air. She had to get her anger under control or she couldn’t gather plants, and she really needed to make another healing
potion for Tanty. One dose hadn’t done the trick with Grandmere, and Tanty’d been in a coma longer. She’d probably require at least three.
Continuing to take deep cleansing breaths, Tara hummed a Cajun tune. If only CoCo and Luc weren’t still at the hospital, Luc could play his sax for her. Zydeco music always lifted her mood. For now she’d just have to make do with humming.
The adrenaline at last subsided, she grabbed her bag and slipped her feet into the rubber boots, then took off for the water’s edge deep in the woods. Cicadas cried in the afternoon heat. Birds rustled the dry leaves of the trees. An isolated breeze stirred the Spanish moss hanging from the cypress trees. Lagniappe was in for a long hot summer.
Tara quickly gathered foliage, filling her bag to overflowing, and returned to the shed. She pulled off the boots and wiggled her toes. Footwear was a necessary evil, in her humble opinion. If given the choice, she’d be barefoot forever.
The cuckoo clock announced two o’clock. Tara burst into action. Having set up a rotating schedule with her sisters for visiting Grandmere, her time would be at three. She selected the freshest plants she’d picked and lit the burner. Her back ached as she concentrated on mixing just the right amount of ingredients in the glass flask. Sweat glued her shirt to her back. At last, the potion was ready to place on the burner. Very carefully, Tara put the flask atop the burner and adjusted the open flame. Her chant came as a whisper, then grew louder as bubbles burst forth in the potion.
She lowered the heat and continued to chant. This part of the process was critical. Every word had to be said with confidence. Each bubble of the boil had to be gentle so as not to burn, yet forceful enough to blend all the ingredients.
Finally the potion was complete. Using pot holders, Tara poured the mixture through a colander, gathering the liquid in a small glass vial. She straightened and twisted the dropper-top on tightly.
“A healing potion?”
Tara jumped and turned.
CoCo stood in the doorway, her arms crossed over her chest.
Shoving the vial into her pocket, Tara shrugged. “How’d you know?”
CoCo laughed. “I trained for more years than you, Boo. Do you think I wouldn’t recognize the chant?” She moved across the room and looked at the damp solids in the colander.
Leave it to her sister to remind her that she was Grandmere’s second choice in training a replacement. “But I thought once you were a Christian you forgot all this stuff.”
“Becoming a Christian didn’t erase my memory, Tara, only my sins.”
Whatever. “Well, I guess I’d better be getting up to the hospital. You know how Alyssa will gripe if I’m late.”
CoCo laid a gentle hand on Tara’s shoulder. “You know your sins can be erased, as well, right?”
A lump the size of a lily pad filled her throat. Tara swallowed, pushing it back down. “I’m fine.”
CoCo’s eyes were soft. “Deep inside, you know I’m telling you the truth. I’ve never lied to you, nor will I start now.”
The words wouldn’t come, nor would the sarcasm she relied on so often when someone pressed her back against a wall.
“That potion isn’t the answer.” CoCo gestured around the room. “None of this is. But there is a definite answer. Positive. Full of hope and life. Promises.”
Tara’s eyes stung. The fumes from the burner must be getting to her.
CoCo enclosed her in a hug, then tightened the embrace. “God loves you, Tara. He’s waiting for you to accept Him and His free gift.”
Tara jerked away from her sister and pawed at her eyes. “Don’t try to fill my head with that nonsense. You’ve already brainwashed Grandmere and look where that’s gotten her.”
“Oh, Boo, you can’t think that.”
“Then explain to me how your precious God can let this happen to her. She bought into the whole Jesus tale. What has that gotten her?”
CoCo took a step toward her. “Eternal salvation, that’s what accepting Jesus has gotten her.” She reached for Tara, only for Tara to take another step backward. “We can’t always understand why things happen, but we need to accept that God’s master plan is what’s best for us. You can have the peace and salvation, too.”
Why did she even bother to stand and listen to such nonsense? “No, thank you. I deal with the cold hard truth. I can see potions working, touch the plant life I work with, feel the earth under my nails. What can you feel with your God?”
“The wind blowing. The clouds rumbling.”
“That’s nature, not God.”
“He created it all, Boo.”
“Yeah, well, he can create me gone. I’m heading to the hospital.” Tara grabbed her keys and shoved her feet into the clogs by the door. “Lock up for me, will ya?”
She made it into her Mustang and down the driveway before her tears spilled. What was wrong with her? Crying because her sister had become delusional? No, it couldn’t be something so silly.
Bubba.
That’s what had gotten her emotions all out of whack. Him accusing her, casting shadows on her voodoo abilities. Making her feel less confident. It was all his fault.
She whipped into the hospital parking lot and stomped inside. After checking her watch and noticing she had a few minutes until she could see Grandmere, Tara slipped three doors down and stuck her head in Tanty’s room. There was no one with her. Tara crept inside, withdrawing the vial from her pocket as she looked around.
She administered four drops of the potion to Tanty, planted a kiss on her cheek, and then exited the room just as the doctor rounded the corner of the hall. She made a beeline for him. “Doctor?”
He stopped, squinting. Probably trying to place her. “Yes?”
“I’m Tara LeBlanc, Marie LeBlanc’s granddaughter.”
“Oh. Yes. How can I help you? I’m afraid there’s no change in your grandmother’s condition.”
Big surprise. “Has the sheriff contacted you in regards to running tests on my grandmother and his aunt, Tanty Shaw, to look for a particular, undefined substance?”
His brows furrowed. “No. But it’d be hard to test for something undefined. Why would we do such a thing? Exhaustive bloodwork on both patients has turned up nothing out of the ordinary.”
“You wouldn’t know unless you looked for it, right?”
“I’m not following, young lady.”
Tara swallowed back an exasperated sigh. “If you could be told to look for something in particular, even if it was unidentified, could you find it?”
The doctor shoved his glasses back to the bridge of his nose. “Perhaps. Although we’d have to know at least a partial component.”
“Such as chemical traces of paraldehyde?” a deep voice asked.
Tara spun to face the sheriff. Her back stiffened. “It’s not nice to eavesdrop.”
He ignored her and continued to address the doctor. “Could you run tests on the patients and see if there are any traces of paraldehyde?”
The doctor rubbed knuckles over his chin. “We could. But why?”
“I want that test run on my grandmother.” Tara shoved her way between the doctor and the sheriff. “Immediately.”
Bubba continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “Would paraldehyde show up in any of the tests you’ve already run?”
Tara bit back the sharp retort she had ready to blast at the sheriff. She wanted to hear the doctor’s reply more than she wanted to get back at Bubba.
“No. The tests we’ve run wouldn’t have detected any paraldehyde. We’d have to order a special test.”
“I want that test on my grandmother.” Tara raised her voice. Both men shifted their focus to her.
Finally.
“I want you to administer the test to my grandmother.”
“Well—” the doctor began.
“No. I’m her next of kin and am requesting the test. No, I’m ordering the test.” She popped her hands on her hips. “Do I need to sign a permission form or something?”
; “I suppose I can order the test, but I don’t see much point in it.”
Tara rose to her full height. “I don’t care what you see, Doctor. I want that test given to my grandmother. Now.”
The doctor’s face flushed, and his glasses slid to the bump on his nose. “I’ll draw up the paperwork now.”
“Merci.”
The doctor turned and strode down the hall to the nurses’ station. Game, set and match to the little people. Victory made her lips curve into a smile.
“What’re you trying to prove?”
“I’m trying to prove my grandmother was poisoned by whomever visited her that morning.” Tara jabbed a finger in his direction. “And you should have Tanty tested for it, as well.”
“There’s no evidence of my aunt having been poisoned. Your grandmother, either, for that matter.”
She let out a groan that could only be described as coming straight from her gut. Flames shot from her eyes, and she flipped her hair over her shoulder. “Aside from them both just falling into a coma for no reason, that para-hyde stuff being found in Grandmere’s cup and them both involved in voodoo, you mean?” She rubbed her hands over the sides of her jeans. “Come on, man, open your eyes.”
He had to admit when all the circumstantial evidence was laid out like that, it pointed to there being someone behind the women’s illnesses. But circumstantial evidence wasn’t enough. He needed more. The law required it.
“Look, if your grandmother’s test comes back positive for traces of paraldehyde, then I’ll have Aunt Tanty tested.”
“And waste precious time?” The muscles in her jaw jumped.
His tolerance held. Barely. Like he wasn’t doing all he could to figure out what was wrong with his aunt, why she was still in a coma. “Look, that’s really none of your concern.”
She pressed her lips together as if holding in her opinion. Wouldn’t that be a first?
“Look, I know you’re only trying to help because you care about my aunt, but I have to treat her case and your grandmother’s as totally different. There’s nothing to imply foul play in my aunt’s case.”
Again her jaw muscles twitched.
