At Johnson Bayou, the houses visible from the highway became more numerous, but most looked empty. All had plywood covering their windows. People were either socked inside or gone. Just past Crystal Beach, the highway jogged back toward the Gulf.
Mori watched the looming clouds with worry. It was only 1:00 p.m. but looked more like dusk. When they finally reached Gilchrist and the bridge spanning Rollover Pass, Mori saw she’d been right. A few hardy souls had rebuilt, but not many.
She drove slowly along the coastal highway, gasping each time a wave sent water rushing up the narrow shoreline and onto the road.
“Damn.” Kell shifted in his seat and looked to the right. “Big one coming in. Hold on to the wheel.”
This time the water came ashore with enough force that it still had energy to spend as it washed over the road. The SUV tires left the asphalt, and gritting her teeth, Mori steered into the turn as it swept them sideways.
They ended up with the SUV’s nose on the left shoulder of the highway, but since they were the only fools on the road, no damage had been done. She backed the SUV into position and moved forward again, driving slowly, holding her breath at each rush of water that crossed the highway around their tires.
A half hour later, they reached the eastern end of the peninsula and turned north, running from the weather now instead of crossing through it.
“That was hairy. Nice job.”
Mori glanced at Kell, who looked as relieved as she felt. “I hoped you were getting some sleep.” Last night hadn’t been exactly restful for either of them.
“And miss that? I just didn’t want to distract you. Want me to drive a while?” She must have looked skeptical. “C’mon, let me drive. It won’t make my back any worse. Might even help me relax.”
She nodded and pulled off to buy gas and change drivers. Once the power got knocked out, they’d have to rely on whatever gas they had, so it made sense to top off the tank as often as was practical. Plus, they still had long stretches of isolated roads to cover before reaching I-10 and what she hoped would be a faster drive into Central Louisiana.
Once they’d settled back into the drive and were able to go faster, Mori’s thoughts returned to Michael. “Tell me what you meant earlier about Michael being a sociopath. Do you mean that literally, or do you just mean he’s screwed up in general?”
Kell glanced at her, then back at the road. “I meant it literally. Remember the old Charles Manson case? Jim Jones and the Kool-Aid?”
Mori laughed at the idea of Michael having revival meetings and passing out doses of poison or collecting a tribe of naive groupies. “I don’t see the connection.”
Kell turned up the wiper speed as another round of heavy rain set in, and remained silent for a couple of minutes, squinting as he struggled to see the edges of the highway.
“He has the classic signs you look for in a sociopathic personality,” he finally said, settling back as the rain slacked and lifting his fingers off the steering wheel as he talked. “First, he can be really charming and engaging, right?”
Mori thought back to the meeting between Michael and his business associate that night at River Oaks, and then of his banter with his secretary. “When he wants to be, definitely. There’s something about him that makes you want to believe him and like him.”
“Right,” Kell said. “Two, he’s good-looking, and sociopaths are usually people that others find attractive. Third, he’ll do anything to get what he wants, without hesitation. Fourth, he doesn’t have regrets. He doesn’t regret that bombing, or branding you, or getting Adam killed.
“I realized that when I was talking to him at the office.” He snorted. “You know, before it all went to hell and back. I think he honestly believes himself to be in the right and justified in whatever he does to get what he wants.”
Mori closed her eyes and settled back against the headrest. “Me, in other words.”
“Sure, he wants you, but not just you for yourself. He isn’t obsessed with Mori Chastaine the woman. He’s obsessed with the person who can help him get what he wants — not the chance to save the Dires, but to win, to be the hero of the Dires. In his mind, anything he does to you, or anyone around you, is justified.”
Mori thought about Michael’s presence as she was growing up, waiting patiently for his promised mate to reach maturity, and the violent direction he’d taken when he realized she wasn’t willing to meet him on his terms. If he’d only wanted to save the Dires, as an alpha should, he wouldn’t have objected to her offer of artificial insemination. He’d still be fulfilling his role as alpha. He could marry his human partner. The children would be theirs to raise together, in whatever way they agreed. That was how a true alpha should behave. It’s how Gus Chastaine would have behaved.
“I can’t believe I never realized this.” She turned to look at Kell. “He’s not being an alpha at all. He’s just…nuts.”
“Exactly. All along, we’ve been thinking about him in the wrong way.” Kell shook his head. “I knew the colonel’s plan wasn’t going to work. He offered to let Benedict walk away from this whole mess without criminal charges. Benedict didn’t even consider accepting. A sane man — even a sane criminal — would have jumped at that offer, unless he cared more about winning than living or unless he thought he was invincible.”
Invincible. That was Michael’s thinking, in a nutshell. But the biggest question remained: How the hell were they going to stop him?
CHAPTER 31
The eastbound I-10 had been almost deserted from Beaumont, across western Louisiana, and into Lafayette. There, Kell left the interstate and began winding his way south again toward Jeanerette.
Then the roadblocks began. Time after time, at parish line after parish line, Kell rolled down the window and, shouting to be heard over the rain that was coming in steady squalls now less than an hour apart, lied to another member of the Louisiana State Police about why he was traveling into the storm zone instead of evacuating.
Though she didn’t say it aloud, Kell knew Mori would be happier if they’d stopped at a hotel in Lafayette or New Iberia, or even Jeanerette itself. Her shoulders had settled into a tense, rigid posture, and he wasn’t sure she realized that, for the past hour, she’d been holding onto the door handle as if it were a lifeline.
But his gut told him Cote Blanche was where he needed to go, logic be damned. Yeah, it was closer to the coast. It was more isolated. They had no way to get help. If the cabin got wrecked, they could be literally dead in the water.
Maybe the old cabin lured him because he knew it so well, the way he knew the road from Lafayette down to Jeanerette, his muscle memory keeping him on course in the dark as he steered through the twists and turns of narrow roads.
Maybe it was because when you got in trouble, or when you got hurt, or you weren’t sure where else to go, you went to whatever place your heart considered home. And no matter how long he lived in Houston and how much he loved it, the bayou was home.
When they got to Jeanerette, he stopped long enough to buy more gas and call his cousin Trey to make sure he was still willing to grant this boneheaded favor.
He answered on the first ring, and his voice was tight. “This is a big storm, Kell, a slow-moving Cat Three. You sure you don’t want to stay here with us? We’re stocked up and riding it out.”
Kell heard Trey’s kids in the background, laughing and shrieking like all kids did in close quarters, and felt a stab of guilt at dragging him away in this kind of weather. But he couldn’t let go of the call of Cote Blanche. In the backseat, Gator, who’d slept through most of the drive, smelled home. He’d begun pacing and whining as soon as they hit Iberia Parish.
“I really need to get out there. Just let me borrow one of your boats. There’s no point in you going down there and risking getting stuck.”
“Well…” Trey hesitated, and Kell knew it had been the right offer. It made Kell feel better, too. Trey needed to be home with his family. “OK. Drive straight to th
e landing, and I’ll have the boat ready. The quicker you get where you’re going, the better.”
Once out of town, Kell wound his way toward the small bayou that ran along the back of Trey’s property. It fed into a byzantine network of lakes and bayous that eventually led to Cote Blanche Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. They wouldn’t be going quite that far.
He skirted the road around Trey’s home and drove to the boathouse and dock. A light shone through the window, and as he stopped the SUV, Kell could see movement inside.
He turned to Mori, who’d been mostly silent since they hit the state line. If he had to define her mood, he’d use the word thoughtful. She had seemed truly surprised at the idea that Michael Benedict might be mentally ill instead of just a bully alpha wolf. Kell was no expert, but he figured mental illness didn’t play favorites with species. They all had their bullies and their evil, and even their sociopaths.
“You ready to meet the family?” He took her hand and squeezed it. “We’re almost there. We’ll get to the cabin, dry off, and eat some of the best nonperishable food this side of heaven.”
There it was — the light he’d been missing in her eyes. And the smile.
“Well, how can I pass up that offer?” She opened the door and gasped as a gust of wind blew rain in her face. “Hey, that feels pretty good.”
She stood in the rain outside the SUV, tilting her chin up to the dark sky and scrubbing off any traces of dried blood that remained. The minor shrapnel wounds to her face and neck had already healed.
At the smell of fresh air and damp earth, Gator scrambled between the seats and took an excited lick along the side of Kell’s face before leaping into the rain with Mori.
Kell stifled a groan as he heaved himself out of the vehicle, carefully shifting his weight to a standing position and waiting until the spasms settled. His back muscles were tighter than a well-tuned guitar string. A good thing in a guitar, but not so good in a person who needed to steer a boat through two hours of bayou in the dark, never mind the hurricane.
He followed Mori’s lead and let the rain wash off as much grime and blood as possible. There was nothing to be done about his hand or the jaguarundi scratches that still trailed down his left cheek.
Which Trey noticed right away, observant Kellison that he was.
“What got ahold of you, man?” He pulled Kell into a bear hug before introducing himself to Mori.
She kind of looked like a drowned rat, but an awfully sexy one. Trey noticed that, too, if the nod and lift of his eyebrows behind Mori’s back were any indication. He might be married, but he wasn’t blind.
Trey was the nickname for Dwight Eisenhower Kellison III, named after their grandfather, who’d seen fit to name all his sons after dead presidents. The family resemblance could be seen in the blue-green eyes and dark hair. Trey was skinny, though — always had been.
But he’d never been afraid of work, and he’d been busy. The larger of the two boats bumping against the slips had been stocked. Kell spotted two or three gas cans, lanterns in sealed plastic bags to keep them dry, a couple of coolers strapped shut with duct tape, a stack of blue tarps, and two large boxes wrapped in plastic that, if Kell had to guess, probably contained food.
Trey helped them unload the SUV, taking the duffel, Mori’s backpack, and the supplies she and Robin had packed and stashing those on the boat as well. It was a big load.
“You got plywood at the cabin?” Trey handed Kell the keys. “Got all the tools you need?”
Kell nodded. “I’ll shore everything up as soon as it’s daylight.” And while thank-yous were as awkward as apologies, it had to be said. “Thanks for all this. Not just for the boat, but for not asking questions.”
“No problem.” Trey looked at him with the Kellison eyes, and Kell tried to remember why he’d wanted to leave here so badly in the first place. “That’s what we do, you know?”
Yeah, that’s what they did. They were simple people who worked hard, earned an honest living, and didn’t give a fuck about politics or position or being the biggest, baddest Ranger on the block. Somewhere, Kell had gotten lost.
He nodded, not trusting himself to keep from blubbering like a girl, especially when the only girl in the boathouse was watching.
“Should Gator stay here?” Mori walked up beside him and touched his arm. “I’m afraid if he gets off the boat on the trip down, we won’t be able to find him again.”
Gator had sniffed his way around the boathouse and had finally come to rest next to Kell. Man, he hated to leave his dog. But Mori was right. A long, dark ride through a turbulent bayou was no place for him.
“The kids’ll love to have him,” Trey said, pulling a leash from a hook on the wall and attaching it to Gator’s collar. The Catahoula danced around like it was walk time. “The cat will have to live with it. Take care of the boat, man — and yourself.”
Kell watched them leave, then turned to Mori. “You ready for another travel adventure?”
She hopped on the boat, strapped on one of the Day-Glo orange life jackets, and handed the other to him. “Let’s do it.”
Kell said a prayer of thanks for Trey as he navigated the Belle Teche out of its slip and into the bayou. The water was choppy, and the rain came in at a slant, but the boat had a sturdy portable cover on it, and he was able to steer from the back in relative dryness.
He flipped on the two spotlights attached to the front of the boat and made his way down a stretch of water he’d crossed hundreds, if not thousands, of times, beginning when he was a kid. Traveling by water was a way of life around here, and it felt natural, even in the storm.
The lights had trouble cutting through the rain that kept coming down in sheets, so he barely saw a downed log in the water in time to throttle back and ease around it. Close call.
Mori had been perched on one of the boxes of supplies, but now she was making her way to Kell. “How about I hang in the front and keep a lookout for stuff that’s fallen in the water?” She had to shout for him to hear her. “I’ll signal if you need to change course.”
Good idea, but she was going to be drenched. “Cover up with one of the tarps.”
She nodded and grabbed a folded tarp on her way to the prow, almost losing her balance as she left the flimsy sanctuary of the canvas cover.
Mori wedged herself into a stable spot at the front and tried to unfold the tarp, but a gust of wind caught it and blew it away. When she looked back at Kell with a shrug and a laugh, a surge of joy raced through him. He had no right to feel such joy. They were in a blinding rainstorm, in a dark bayou, on the run from a murderous shape-shifter, and if his new back injury didn’t end his career, the broken fingers probably would.
But watching Mori’s wet hair whipping around her head like the serpents of Medusa as she hung over the front of the boat, her face alive and excited to be living in the moment, he felt an inexplicable happiness. He didn’t know what the future held for them — too many obstacles still remained. But she made him happy. For now, that was enough.
Between Mori’s hand signals, Kell’s knowledge of every bend of the bayou, and her willingness to hang over the side of the boat, using a pole to move the flotons and shifting water lilies aside, they finally rounded the bend to the cabin on Cote Blanche Bayou just before midnight — assuming Kell’s watch was as waterproof as it claimed.
They arrived at the cabin during a lull in the weather. Only a light rain fell as they silently unloaded the boat and set all the supplies at the end of the short dock. Once the boat was empty, Kell took down the poles that held the canvas cover, unhooked the spotlights from the prow, and handed the lights and their battery packs to Mori before levering himself back up to the dock. He wanted to prevent those poles from becoming projectiles when the real storm arrived, and they needed the battery-powered spotlights to get settled.
“I’ll secure the boat against the side of the cabin in the morning, but it’ll be OK out here tonight.” He gritted his teeth as he squatted to t
ether the boat securely to the dock, and gritted them more when he stood up. Damn, but he hoped that first aid kit had some kind of sports cream in it and that his industrial-sized bottle of ibuprofen had stayed dry.
Another squall line moved in as Kell set up one light on the dock and the other on the cabin’s porch. After unlocking the door, he started up a couple of fluorescent lanterns to light the interior.
In sync, they worked through the wind and rain to move the supplies into the cabin, and Kell breathed a sigh of relief when they finally shut the door behind them.
Mori had stopped just inside, dripping on the little braided rug he kept as a doormat. He tried to read her expression as she looked around, but couldn’t.
“I know it isn’t much.” He tried to imagine it as she might see it and ended up somewhere between rustic and primitive. “We used it as a weekend fishing camp when I was a kid. I don’t think it was ever meant as a place to actually live — at least not until I sold my parents’ place in Jeanerette and began staying out here.”
What had he been thinking? There was no electricity. The water was iffy. There were no people within thirty miles, even in good weather. And this wasn’t good weather.
She grinned at him. “I think it’s cool. It’s just…you.” She waved her hands around, looking for the right words. “It’s not pretentious or trying to be something it’s not. It’s…Jack Kellison, if he were a cabin.”
Uh-huh. Well, Jack Kellison the non-cabin was tired and wet. His back hurt like nails had been driven into it, and his left hand throbbed and was so swollen it probably weighed about twenty pounds.
He lifted it and studied the black, misshapen fingers and the puncture wounds from Benedict’s teeth.
“Hey.” Mori’s voice was soft as she walked toward him. “Let’s dry off and put on clothes that aren’t soaked full of bayou rain, and then I’ll take care of that. You have a first aid kit?”
Omega Force 01- Storm Force Page 24
