KILLING ME SOFTLY

by Jenna Mills

  Then he was gone.

  Even before she looked down at the damp napkin and saw the handwriting, she knew what the neatly printed words said.

  Be careful. She's a reporter. Renee Fox. True Crime.

  On a wave of frustration she looked toward the tables and saw the trio. Gabe sat with his arm around Val's shoulders, and though she leaned into him, the intimate pose looked strained.

  There was nothing strained about Cain. He sat with his long legs stretched out, rolling a tumbler between his hands as he watched her. The second their eyes met, he lifted his empty glass to her.

  He still enjoyed playing every bit as much as she did.

  The realization should not have scraped like the blade of a dull razor, but deep inside she bled anyway. People talked about life going on as though it was a good thing, a panacea for every ache and pain and bruise. But no one ever talked about the corollary, when life going on was a betrayal, the desecration of the hopes and promises that were all she had left.

  But that was ridiculous, and she knew it. She was the one who'd come back to this town. She was the one trying to reclaim a life everyone else thought was over. She was the one who would not allow herself to believe in, to trust, the fractured hopes and dreams that grew more vivid with every second she spent in Cain Robichaud's presence.

  She watched him lounging there, the way his big body dwarfed the club chair, and felt the draw clear down to her bones. Refusing to concede the match, she did the only thing she could.

  She dropped the napkin and accepted his challenge.

  "How many guesses do I get?"

  "Guesses?" Gabe watched his cousin walk toward the leggy brunette. "For what?"

  Val didn't know whether to laugh or cry. After the tension of the night before, she'd been surprised when Gabe suggested they spend the evening at the casino. His voice had been warm, almost flirtatious as he'd encouraged her to buy a new dress, something pretty. Something special.

  She'd done just that, gone to her favorite boutique and let them deck her out in sequins. When Gabe had seen her, she'd felt as jittery as a sixteen-year-old on her first date with the starting quarterback, a completely ridiculous response considering she and Gabe had been lovers for years. It's not that he didn't excite her anymore. He did. But there was very little about him she didn't know, and vice versa. And though she loved the familiarity, she hated the way it tended to dull the excitement.

  At the casino they found Cain waiting and she'd realized Gabe had not asked her out to pop the question she was longing to hear. And yet he'd mentioned a surprise, and his eyes had smoldered as he'd reached into his sport coat.

  Cain had picked that moment to laugh softly, then roll to his feet and stroll toward the woman. And for some reason Gabe was riveted on the sight of the two of them squaring off in the middle of the casino.

  "My surprise," Val said, careful to keep the uncertainty from her voice. In a move designed to look casual, she trailed her index finger along the rim of her wineglass. "You know what being left in the dark does to me."

  More than anything, she hoped the words didn't sound as desperate as she felt. Sometimes she hated how clingy she'd become and tried to pull back, to let the Fates take care of things. Gabe loved her. She knew that.

  But then she'd see the secrets in his eyes, feel the tension in his touch, and the blades of panic would nick all over again. Savannah had assured her that if she would just focus on her relationship with Gabe, everything else would work itself out. But sometimes it was hard not to worry. If she lost Gabe—

  Slowly, as though coming out of a trance, he turned to look at her. The transformation was immediate, from brooding watcher to charming companion in less than two seconds. "I'm sorry, hon," he said, and the warmth in his eyes went a long way toward chasing away her doubts. "Just trying to see how much trouble Cain's getting himself into this time."

  Val glanced toward the brunette. "Who is she?"

  "That producer I was telling you about."

  Val took in the way Cain stood deep into the woman's personal space, watching her as if she was a piece of filet mignon and he was famished. "I thought you said he wanted her gone."

  Gabe laughed. "My cousin doesn't know what he wants."

  "Doesn't look that way to me," Val said, bringing her wineglass to her face. She sipped. "Looks to me like he knows exactly what he wants."

  Gabe practically growled. "That's what I'm afraid of."

  "Pretty," Val commented, practically feeling the heat from where she sat. "I can see—"

  "Shh," Gabe said, stunning her, and before she could even turn to look at him, he was pulling her closer and holding her hand in his. "I didn't invite you here to watch Cain."

  The jolt, the long-forgotten rush, was immediate. "No?" She smiled up at him. "Then why did you?"

  With his free hand he reached into the inside pocket of his sport coat and pulled out a small bundle. "I stopped by the travel agent this afternoon."

  Val stared down at the brochures he spread across the small table, hardly able to believe what she was seeing—or hearing. He'd been so distracted lately, barely listening when she talked, barely there when they made love. "I thought you said you were too busy to get away."

  He drew her hand to his mouth and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. "I am."

  "But—"

  "I won't be forever. And when the air clears, I'm taking you away from here, just like you've been suggesting for weeks. Anywhere you want to go. Aruba, Antigua, Barbados…"

  That schoolgirl feeling grew stronger, giddier, and as she looked into his eyes and saw the contrition glowing there, she realized how skilled she'd become at torturing herself. There'd been no need to cry when he left that morning, before the sun had risen. No reason to curl into a ball and wonder how she would survive if she lost him. No reason to run into the bathroom and do something she'd sworn she would never do.

  "Gabe," she whispered, looking up at him. "I'm sorry."

  He took her face in his hands, making her feel small and delicate and fragile, even though she was none of those things. "You have nothing to be sorry for. I'm the one who's been a horse's ass."

  "I'm sorry for doubting you. Doubting us."

  "Don't—" he started to say, but then abruptly turned from her and stared off toward the cashier's cage.

  Val followed his gaze, expecting to see Cain and that woman, but found no one she recognized. "What is it?"

  "Nothing, I just…" He brought his fingers to his temple and pressed hard. "I thought I saw the new A.D.A."

  Val frowned, realizing what he'd been hiding from her all evening. "Headache?" she asked, reaching for her purse. The migraines had been plaguing him for years, since shortly before Savannah went missing.

  He nodded. "Must not have been her, though."

  Her. Val shook off the grab of panic, reminded herself that Gabe worked with a lot of women. But he always came home to her.

  "Here you go," she said, handing him two prescription tablets from the little box she always carried for him, all the while refusing to dwell on the other pills she'd handled that day, the little beige ones she'd flushed down the toilet.

  She'd stood in the bathroom for a long time, under the accusing glare of the fluorescent lights, staring in the mirror but barely recognizing the woman staring back at her. It certainly wasn't the international ballet star she'd dreamed of as a shy young girl. But life had a way of changing people, shaping them. Loss and fear and desperation could harden even the softest places into lethal edges. She couldn't lose Gabe, no matter how high the cost. He was her everything. Without him—

  Without him didn't bear considering.

  "Thanks." He threw them back with whiskey. Then he stood. "Be right back."

  Then he walked toward the cashier's cage.

  "Want to play?"

  Renee lifted a hand and twirled a long strand of dark hair around her index finger, a hauntingly familiar gesture that fired Cain's blood and slayed what re
mained of his moral compass. "Depends upon who I'm playing with."

  He watched her standing there in her killer little black dress, the way her glossy hair played with her shoulders and the slinky fabric draped over her curves, just like he'd watched her weaving magic on poor Jean Paul. The fool hadn't stood a chance.

  "Is that how you do your job?" he asked, enjoying the way her eyes darkened. "Is that how you do your—" he plucked two stems of red wine from a passing waitress and handed her one "—what did you call it?" He let a beat of silence build. "Research?"

  She brought the glass to her mouth, rubbed the rim against her bottom lip. "If that's what it takes."

  Cain wasn't quite sure how he stayed standing, how he kept himself from grabbing her shoulders and pulling her to him—grabbing her shoulders and shoving her away. He wanted to do both. He wanted—

  That was the problem. He wanted. For eighteen months he'd been living in a self-imposed exile, giving himself to his photography the way he'd once given himself to police work, and to Savannah. After he'd lost both, photography had been all that kept him going. Sometimes he'd stayed gone for days, weeks even, alone in the swamp, the marsh, along the bayous, staking out sunrises the way he'd once staked out crack houses, craving sunsets the way he'd always, always craved Savannah.

  In the weeks and months since then, he'd felt nothing. Not rage for all he'd lost, not desire to fill the empty spots deep inside of him. He'd gone from day to day, using his lens to stay on the periphery of life.

  But now here was this woman, this reporter despite what she called herself, who wanted nothing more than to tear his life to shreds. He should be moving hell and high water to stop her, but all he could think about was how she'd feel underneath him, soft and warm and naked—how she'd tasted just that afternoon, when she'd kissed him like there was no tomorrow.

  Wintergreen, for crissakes. Wintergreen.

  "You're good," he told her, reminding himself that the coincidences really weren't that surprising after all. "You've obviously had a lot of practice." Renee had known Savannah. They grew up together. Lots of childhood friends shared quirks like favorite candies. "I especially liked your move this afternoon."

  Renee lowered the wineglass, but her lips remained parted, and the slight flare to her eyes told him that she was remembering, too.

  "You surprised me," he said. And that wasn't easy to do. "Is that why you're in the Big Easy? To follow me?"

  Her smile was immediate. Too immediate. "I had a few leads I wanted to follow up on."

  "And did you find anything?"

  "Nothing you don't already know."

  He sipped his wine. "Tell me anyway."

  For a second he thought she was going to dodge his request, but then she lifted her hand and once again began twirling a strand of hair. "I'd much rather you tell me something. What went really down between you and Adrian Trahan? Why did you hate Savannah's brother so much?"

  "Who says I did?"

  "It's common knowledge," she shot back. "You two were constantly seen arguing. Just days before his death someone overheard you threaten him if he didn't start cooperating."

  Cain lifted an eyebrow, surprised by how much she'd learned in such a short time. Someone had a loose tongue, he realized. Someone had forgotten the lessons of the past.

  Instinctively he scanned the semidarkened gaming room, much as he'd been doing since the moment he arrived. It would be easy to attribute the hum in his blood to Renee, but Cain had never been one to take the easy way. Instinct wouldn't let him. The swarm of gamblers looked innocuous, the press of the elderly and the impoverished, those who had no business trading hard-earned money—or social security checks—for the lure of chance … or the hunger of the Russian Mafia.

  "There's a difference between knowledge and rumor." And the bridge between the two was illusion. During his days on the force, he'd worked hard to make people believe what he wanted them to believe, see what he'd wanted them to see. And it had worked. Not even his sister, Saura, had realized the truth. "If your intent is to uncover all my dirty secrets, you're going to have to dig harder."

  "He was dating your sister," Renee pointed out.

  This time Cain laughed. "I'm not sure which one of them wanted to piss me off more." Older by eleven months, Saura once thrived on doing the exact opposite of what was expected. She'd taken rebellion to new heights … until the day a bullet had killed two for the price of one.

  Cain lifted the glass to his mouth. "Is that all you've got?"

  She released the strand of hair, let it fall against her cheek. "You really think I'm going to lay all my cards on the table for you to analyze?"

  "Analysis isn't what I have in mind." He wasn't sure what he expected when he stepped closer, but it wasn't for her to go deadly still, to stare beyond him as though he'd neither spoken nor moved. Intrigued, he supped his hand between her arm and her waist and let it settle against her lower back. "Maybe I just want to help."

  The sharp intake of air felt better than it should have. So did the shock coloring her eyes. Since the moment he'd caught her trespassing by the cottage, she'd been in control, remote almost, untouchable, as though she had some preordained right to do whatever she wanted, ask whatever she wanted, all else be damned. The only falter had been at the racetrack, when she'd thrown herself at him and pretended to kiss him—

  Pretended, like hell.

  There'd been nothing pretend about the way she'd greedily slanted her mouth against his.

  To see her here, now, like this, rattled and unsteady, finally responding to his nearness, his touch, told him she wasn't as immune to him as she wanted him to think.

  "Just relax," he murmured, loving the feel of her, the smell of her. "Just let it happen."

  "My God." Her voice was low, hoarse. "That's him!"

  Cain blinked and the scene changed, shattered. Renee wasn't mesmerized with desire. She was frozen in horror. And he knew.

  "Who, honey?" he asked anyway. "Who do you see?"

  Her eyes met his. "The man from the racetrack. The one who tried to shoot you."

  "Does he know you've seen him?"

  She shook her head. "I don't think so. He's just beyond the poker tables. He's on his mobile phone."

  "Good girl." Slowly, he slid his hands up her back and tangled them in her hair. "Just follow my lead," he said, and dipped his face toward hers. Their mouths met and opened, slanted against each other. Deepening the kiss, he moved with her, walked her toward the slots as he scanned the casino—and saw the lanky man standing where she'd described, with the phone to his face.

  Betrayal ran like ice through his blood.

  Fighting the darkness, he urged Renee to safety and pulled back, took her face in his hands. "Get Gabe," he instructed. "Tell him what's going on."

  "But—"

  "Just do it," he said with a quick kiss to her forehead. Then he turned and went after the man he'd once trusted with his life.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  "You said there would be more time."

  The softly spoken words lured Gabe closer. She stood with her back to him and a mobile phone to her ear, adjacent to a statue of the god Dionysius just beyond the entrance to the gaming room. A long leather jacket concealed much of her body, but he could tell her shoulders were rigid.

  "I know," she said. "I'm trying."

  Gabe told himself to turn and walk away, go back to Val. Evangeline Marceau was none of his concern. The district attorney's request to show her the ropes did not extend beyond the courthouse.

  "Okay." Her voice was a little harder. A lot more resigned. "I understand," she said. "I—"

  There wasn't time to move. She glanced over her shoulder so suddenly that Gabe didn't have a snowball's chance south of New Orleans of bluffing.

  So he grinned.

  "—have to go," Evangeline said, never stripping her gaze from Gabe's. She flipped the phone shut and slid it into the small purse hanging from her shoulder. "Gabe."

  The wa
y she said his name, low and throaty and more like an accusation than a greeting, socked him somewhere near the gut. She looked pale, he noted, a sweep of hair falling against eyes uncomfortably dark. It was a look he'd seen countless times before, from scared witnesses and distraught victims.

  It was not a look he'd anticipated seeing form the cool, refined, confident A.D.A. he'd met earlier in the day.

  "Are you okay?" The question shot out of him before he could pull it back.

  Her mouth tumbled open for a brief heartbeat before she clamped it shut. "Of course."

  But that was a lie, and he was pretty sure they both knew it. If he didn't know better, he'd swear she looked ready to bolt. "Look," he said, stepping closer and lowering his voice, "if something's wrong—"

  If someone is trying to hurt you—

  "Nothing's wrong." She smiled, widely and brilliantly, and his breath damn near jammed in his throat. But his attorney's instincts did not relax. At least he told himself they were his attorney's instincts.

  The instincts of the man had no relevance with this woman.

  "Just … stuff," she said breezily, and he could literally see the smoke screen forming, right before his eyes. Something was wrong. That he knew for a fact. He knew spooked when he saw it, and Evangeline was textbook.

  He also knew he had no business pressing her further, despite the shady possibilities that automatically surged through him. One thing about being a prosecutor in a city like New Orleans.

  Worst-case scenario became a way of life.

  "If you're sure—" he started to say, and if possible, her smile widened.

  "Are you here alone?" She put a hand to his arm. "I'd love to see if everything I've heard about—"

  "Gabe!"

  They twisted around simultaneously to see Renee Fox racing from the gaming area.

  Val shoved at the fire exit and burst into the alley.

  "Wait!" Renee darted through the door before it closed and absorbed the bite of the wind, felt the chill penetrate the leather of her jacket and soak into her blood.