Bayou Blue

by Raquel Byrnes

  I heard paper rustling in the background, and then Salem was back. “I dumped your brother’s phone and cross-referenced the numbers he called in the past month with the numbers you copied from Dauby’s chalkboard.”

  I forgot about that. The phone numbers next to the phone on Dauby’s wall. I’d written them down and given them to Reyna when I asked her to investigate Randy. “Did any of them show up on both?”

  “Yeah, actually, one of the numbers does.”

  “What number.”

  “Look, Riley, Reyna doesn’t like to give information over the phone. She’s gotten burned before.”

  “Please, Salem, just tell me.” I sounded desperate and Verona looked up at me with a frown on her face. “I don’t have a lot of time it seems.”

  He hesitated then sighed. “The number on both Dauby’s chalkboard and Randy’s phone records is a number to an office at Tulane University. It belongs to a graduate student, a TA.”

  “Teaching assistant?” I bit my lip, thinking. “Tulane?”

  “Yeah, but there’s more.” Salem whispered, and I wondered if Reyna was in the room. I didn’t want him to risk his job. “The TA, her family lives in La Foudre.”

  “You…what?” I motioned for Verona, writing in the air with my fingers. She hopped up, grabbed a pen and paper and tossed them to me. “She lives here?”

  “Well, I called the university and talked to the teacher she taught for. I told him I was her brother, and he asked how she was doing. Apparently she dropped out of school a few months ago.”

  “So she might be here, with her family?”

  “Worth a look,” Salem said. “You going?”

  “Yeah, I’m going. You have her family’s address?” He told me and I wrote it down, tapping the paper for Verona to look. She shook her head. “What’s her name?”

  “Uh, Lockhart, Susan Lockhart.”

  I thought about Bradley’s warning, that someone close was watching and wondered what this girl had to do with everything. “Thanks Salem, I owe you one.”

  “Yeah, well, be safe, Riley,” he intoned, and was gone.

  “Verona, do you know this Lockhart family?”

  “No,” Verona eyed the address. “That zip code, it’s not La Foudre. Well, not exactly.”

  “What do you mean?” I found my phone’s map application and navigated to the directions page of the website. “Salem said it was.”

  “Well, it’s part of an unincorporated area just outside the parish. There are lots of families living out there. La Foudre is almost five thousand people, Red, but all the outlying areas have more. I don’t know everyone.”

  My navigation program couldn’t map out the route. It couldn’t find the address. “It’s not on here.”

  “Well, you’re not looking up an official address, probably. I mean, folks out there have dirt roads leading to their houses named after their dead dogs and stuff. It’s not the city, Red. You’re talking off-the-grid bayou country out there.”

  Frustrated, I tossed my phone on the bed and wiped my face with both hands. “How am I supposed to find this person, then? She might be a key part of this.”

  Verona brushed the crumbs of bread from her mouth and smiled. “You need someone who grew up here; someone who knows every twist and turn of roads and waterways.”

  I shook my head quickly.

  “No. I can’t get him involved in this. I’ve already ruined his career.” I held up the newspaper photo. “Booted, Verona, I got him booted from the investigation.”

  But Verona nodded with a smile. “You need Jake.”

  27

  Verona called the station and found out that Jake was away on a call across town.

  I slumped in my chair, feeling deflated and beat.

  “You can always go over there.”

  “What? No, I can’t.”

  “Sure you can. This concerns him, too. If this girl is spreading lies about you and him then he’ll want to know.” She grabbed my coat and held it up. “Besides, it’s not far from the Roustabout, you can find it.”

  “The hotel where Randy stayed?” I thought about Carl’s welcome and the bullet riddled rental car and made a face. “I’m not sure—”

  “What kind of reporter are you, Red?” She folded her arms. “You afraid of a little confrontation?”

  I looked over her shoulder at the broken window and the waves of rain blowing across the road. “Not confrontation, drowning.”

  “Yeah, well, we better get goin’, then.” She yanked my hood over my head.

  “We?”

  She pulled on her jacket, held the keys out, and smiled. “I need my truck with this storm coming and telling you how to get there will take too long.”

  “Thanks, Verona,” I said, surprised at the level of relief that flooded over me. “Really, thanks.”

  “Yeah, well,” she gave me a little push towards the door. “You seem to grow on people.”

  We drove against the wind, the wipers of the truck going full speed without making much of a difference. I squinted at the windshield, wondering how Verona could navigate the road without crashing.

  “Are we almost there?”

  “Just about.” She pulled off the road onto a dirt path that bounced and banged us along for almost a mile.

  Up ahead, a chain link fence crossed our path and I sucked my breath in.

  We were at Grossman’s, the chemical plant, or what was left of it.

  She got out, pushed the gate open, and hopped back in, grumbling about getting wet again.

  Taking the road slowly, navigating the broken branches and windblown debris, she took us past the broken structure. Fractured and listing columns flanked the burnt-out hulk of the main building. Black soot streamed down the façade, the rain smearing the remains of that terrible night into the mud and puddles. To the right of the building, near the bay doors, sat a pile of rubble and twisted debris; the mess that Jake pulled me out of. I could still remember the smell of smoke and the pain licking at my skin as he ran with me in his arms through the rain.

  “I shouldn’t be here,” I whispered.

  Verona looked at me with frown. “Why not?”

  “Because it’s wrong. I would only hurt people by coming here.”

  It’s the reason I hadn’t come here before. To come to the place where my brother’s actions caused so much pain would feel like I was intruding on their grief.

  Her look wasn’t exasperation, it was sympathy. “You lost someone here, too. You got a right.”

  Verona drove us up to the guard gate, and I saw Jake’s squad car parked a few yards away. I saw a light, just inside the gaping hole in the front of the building, a flashlight beam slashing slowly back and forth in the dark.

  “There he is,” Verona said and drove to the building. When she stopped, she checked her watch and frowned. “Mind if you catch a ride back with Jake? I got Dash coming over to help me put the board over the windows. With the hurricane warning issued I have to get the storm shutters on, fill up my water bottles…all that jazz.”

  I smiled at her. “He’s handsome.”

  “That he is, Red.” And she smiled back.

  I thanked Verona for the ride and climbed out of her truck, running with my hood pulled down as the frigid rain slapped my face with big, sharp drops. The sound of the rain on the metal building was deafening, like a million metal bearings on a car’s hood.

  I ran towards the flashlight beam and stopped when I was just inside the building.

  Jake must have moved because I couldn’t see him.

  Standing in the maw of the scorched room, I took in the charred sides in the wan light from outside. The smell of chemical, the smell of smoke, it all hit me hard, and I staggered a little from the force of the memories that rushed over me.

  The heat and panic. The flames so bright it seared the vision from my eyes like a glance at the sun. Pain and sorrow. I thought of Randy, and I remembered him that night. Not like my dream, but how it had been, and
I gasped at the realization that he had pushed me. Ran at me, with his face pulled tight with terror, and his arms flailing for me to run. He pushed me and I flew out of the blast range, but he hadn’t.

  If I’d acted on my hunch, sooner…come out here as soon as I suspected, instead of trying to reason out of my worries, then maybe…

  I put my hand to my mouth, overwhelming sorrow and loss crushing the sob from my throat. “Randy…what were you doing here?”

  Noise around the corner, the beam of light pushing along the floor, pulled me back from my thoughts and I saw Jake walking along the inside wall.

  “Jake.”

  Jake looked up at me, his face showing frustration.

  “What are you doing here, Riley?” He took my elbow, and propelled us back outside into the rain.

  “Jake,” I shouted over the rain and wind, and tried to pull my hood back. “What is the matter?”

  His mouth was set in a thin line. “You can’t be here. Especially now, Riley.” He opened the squad’s passenger door and slipped me inside in one move. Shutting the door, he ran around the nose of the car and got in the driver’s seat.

  “Not exactly the greeting I envisioned.” I crossed my arms, teeth chattering. “Nice to see you, too.”

  Jake tossed his hat on the dash, wiped his wet face and turned on the car. He looked at me and shook his head. A crooked smile pulled at his mouth.

  “You look like you’re about to shiver right off that seat,” he said as he turned the heater on.

  Cool air blew, and I groaned and shifted away from the vent. I frowned at him, hurt that my presence at the plant would be so wrong that he had to drag me out of there the second I set foot in it. “Is my being here that terrible?”

  “You don’t understand, Riley.” He reached out and pointed the vents in my direction. The now heated air felt wonderful. “I just got a call from the FBI field office in New Orleans. They asked me to re-secure the plant’s grounds. Apparently, they’re coming out here to run some more tests…I don’t know, but you can’t be here.”

  “And certainly not with you,” I whispered.

  “Especially not with me.” Jake looked at me, a worried expression on his face. “Why did you come out here in this weather, Riley?”

  I stared at the plant through the rivulets of water running down the window. A wave of guilt and sadness flooded through me. I flashed on Randy’s terrified face in my dream and something inside me shifted. I had seen Randy that night, I was almost sure of it, wasn’t I?

  Then again, being back here, remembering the pain and the fear, maybe I was reaching for meaning where there was none. I pulled in a shaky breath, blew it out slowly, and turned to face Jake’s concern.

  “I–I wanted to tell you about something, but it’s not important, now.”

  He ran the back of finger down my cheek. “Being here must be hard for you. Is this the first time since you came to stop Randy?”

  I nodded, a tear sliding down my cheek. “I dream about him,” I said and caught Jake’s sorrowful look. “I think…”

  I didn’t know if what I remembered about Randy was real or just a desperate hope, so I didn’t tell Jake.

  “It’ll get better.” Jake pulled a ringlet near my temple, let it bounce back up, and tugged it gently again.

  I shook my head, not sure I believed it. “It hasn’t for you.” My words, whispered, still made Jake tense. Looking up at his face, I searched it for something, some sort of hope.

  “I think you and I both need to do some praying,” he murmured. “I think we both have some forgiving to do.”

  I didn’t understand. “Who would I have to forgive?”

  He smiled sadly. “Yourself, Riley.” He took my hand. “The Lord offers unbridled forgiveness, offers it to us through His mercy, but we have to take it.” He held my gaze. “Failing Jason…” He took a breath, cleared his throat, struggling to keep control.

  I saw this strong man felt the same fear and floundering faith that I did, and my heart turned towards him.

  “I spent these years punishing myself for wrecking his family, not believing that I deserved happiness of my own because of it, but now…I see hope when I look at you, Riley. I don’t want to turn from that. Not anymore.”

  Staring into his dark eyes, to the earnest feeling there, I hoped with all my heart that somehow we could be together. “I – I love you, Jake. No matter what happens, know that one true thing.”

  He took in a deep breath, slow, like he’d been holding back something powerful, and brought my hand to his mouth. Relief flooded his face, relief and quiet joy. Jake’s kiss, his lips soft and heated, sent a ribbon of emotion through me.

  I wondered how, in the midst of all of this, we might manage to keep our hearts from breaking.

  Jake gave a crooked grin, making me smile back. “Well, I was on my way to V’s to tell you something before all this.”

  “What is it?”

  He hesitated for second, and then, “The guy who attacked you at the Lightning Bug, he’s at the hospital.”

  My hand flew to my throat, to the bruises there, and I struggled to breathe. Panic ripped up my chest and my eyes went to the windows. “He’s here?”

  Jake tugged on my arm gently so I would scoot closer to him. He slipped his arm around my waist, pulling me near. “Don’t worry, Riley,” he soothed. “He’s pretty torn up. Someone nearly hacked him to bits with a piece of mirror.”

  I looked up, stunned. “I got him?”

  “Enough times to make him pass out and crash in a ravine. He has scratches and bruises on him, too.”

  “Is he, will he get out?” I struggled to keep from shaking.

  “No, Riley. He messed with the wrong lady.”

  “Did you arrest him?”

  “The Staties did after they found out he was there.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Well, I couldn’t really be there in an official capacity.”

  I remembered the newspaper article and froze. Stammering, I didn’t know how to apologize for decimating someone’s career. “Oh, Jake, you…and the investigation…booted—”

  “Slow down,” Jake said through a crooked smile. “You didn’t do this.”

  “But that newspaper article,” I wiped at my tears angrily. “It was full of lies.”

  Jake chuckled softly. “Well, we did dance, Riley, and I was investigating Dauby’s murder in connection with your brother’s death.”

  “I know, but I’m not using my ‘wiles’ to derail your investigation.” I sniffed, still smarting from the article’s depiction of me as a conniving temptress.

  “You are quite distracting, Riley,” Jake said softly in my ear. “But I don’t think you know how much.”

  I leaned my head back against his shoulder, listened to his breathing, and bit back tears. “What is going on, Jake? How did they get all that information about you and me and the investigation? Who took that picture?”

  Jake ran his hand along the length of my hair, smoothing it. He took in another breath and let it go in a sigh against my temple. “We’re upsetting someone out there, that’s for sure, but it’s not who you think. The guy who attacked you, what he said to me, you’re in more danger than you know, Riley, way more.”

  Looking up at him I sniffled confused. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean,” Jake said, and the worry in his voice sent my heart racing. “That this is way bigger than we thought. It’s huge.”

  I set my jaw against the fear welling in me. “Well if that’s the case, then I need to talk to this Lockhart person right away.”

  “Who?”

  I told Jake about my conversation with Salem and what I’d learned about Susan Lockhart and her connection to Randy.

  “And you want to track this girl down in this weather, Riley? There’s no telling if she’s even at her parents’ house.”

  “I have to try, Jake.” I nodded out the window, at the trees twisting in the torrent outside. �
�I can’t know this and not act on it.”

  “Nope.” Jake shook his head, a stubborn jut to his chin as he said it. “No way.”

  “She could shed some light on what’s happening, Jake.”

  “C'est trop dangereux,” He took my hand. “It’s too dangerous, Riley.”

  “To go and talk to a young girl?” I squinted at him. “After fighting off some mystery attacker at Dauby’s house?”

  “Too dangerous for you to do this, Riley.” He must have seen irritated look on my face because his expression softened. “Not that you couldn’t probably take her in a fist fight…”

  I smiled a little. “I have to follow this lead, Jake. Especially knowing what this guy in the hospital just told you.”

  Jake sank back in his cruiser’s seat. “This guy, this guy who tried to kill you,” his jaw tightened under his skin. “He told me that he worked for Grossman Chemicals, and that they were tipped off by a young woman who called them with information about your investigation into Randy and the plant disaster. Whatever they think you know, they’re desperate to keep it quiet.”

  I looked at him bewildered. “What do they think I know?”

  “Something worth hurting you. But that’s all he would tell me.”

  “I can’t believe you got him to talk at all.” I looked at him askance.

  “I can be convincing when I want to be,” Jake intoned and that steel in his voice sent worry through me.

  How far would he go to help me? Did I want to know?

  “That’s what I got from Bradley at the paper. Davis is using tips from the same person, I think. A woman with a southern accent who contacts them and feeds them information about what’s going on out here. Susan Lockhart could be this woman. She fits the profile.”

  “That’s half the population of La Foudre, Riley. Heck, it could be Verona by that description.”

  I didn’t tell him how I thought it could also be Citrine.

  “I can’t find the person on my own,” I said tightly, feeling helpless. “I know you’re busy with the people here and the trouble the weather is causing—”

  “It’s not about being busy. I’m never too busy to help you, Riley,” he said. “We’ve been issued a hurricane warning. Erin will make landfall in a couple of days. We can’t go around in the swamps in this weather.”