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  Mrs. Cabanis was already reaching for the phone, but she hesitated. “Oh, I wondered if you were the one. My husband told me why you’re visiting New Orleans.” She frowned sympathetically. “I’m sorry about your sister.”

  “Thank you. About Mr. Fornier—”

  “You don’t think there’s any connection between his daughter and what happened to your sister, do you?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

  “Well, you don’t want to bother him.”

  “Why not?”

  “He might be handsome as the devil, but he’s also angry…and dangerous.”

  “What makes you think so?”

  “I saw him on TV, too.” She brought the phone to her ear and started to dial the car rental place. “Bothering him would be like baiting that alligator you’re so afraid of.”

  * * *

  Jasmine thought it might be smart to pay the New Orleans police a visit the next morning. She wanted to tell them her sister had been abducted sixteen years ago and that Kimberly’s kidnapper might’ve brought her to Louisiana. She also wanted to ask about their cold cases. Maybe they were working on something that would provide a connection between the man who’d sent Kimberly’s bracelet and an incident in New Orleans.

  The station on Loyola was farther from the hotel than the car rental place, so Jasmine picked up the compact car Mrs. Cabanis had reserved, then stopped by the homicide division on her way out of town. But her visit didn’t go as well as she’d hoped. Huff had quit the department and moved away only a few months after Fornier went to prison. And because there was no indication that the man who’d sent that package had committed a crime here, the other detectives weren’t particularly interested in talking to her.

  The two detectives who did take a few minutes to chat assured her that there’d been no stranger abductions in recent months and that they couldn’t remember any cases, cold or otherwise, similar to Kimberly’s. They promised to ask around and contact her if they found anything of potential value, but as she was leaving, one suggested, for the third time, that she get in touch with the Cleveland police and turn over the evidence in her possession. When she finally admitted she wasn’t willing to do that, he shrugged and said, “You either want police help or you don’t.” Then they both walked away, and Jasmine was fairly sure they wouldn’t trouble themselves further. They didn’t care about a cold case in Cleveland. Her sister’s disappearance wasn’t their problem.

  But if the bearded man was indeed living in New Orleans, and the note she’d received meant anything at all, that could easily change.

  Her cell phone rang as she got into her rental car. “Hello?”

  “Jaz? How’s it going?”

  It was Sheridan. “Fine, I guess,” she said.

  “You find anything yet?”

  Jasmine frowned as she put on her seat belt and started the car. “Not really.”

  “So what are you going to do?”

  She turned down the radio when “Silent Night,” sung by Natalie Cole and her father, blasted through the speakers. “Keep looking.”

  “You won’t stay in New Orleans for Christmas, will you?”

  For a moment, Jasmine longed to fly back to Sacramento and pretend her sister had never been abducted. She’d built a good life in the West. It felt as though she was making a difference in the lives of other victims, she had close friends, a home. She didn’t need to risk unraveling all the progress she’d made.

  But she couldn’t ignore that bracelet, couldn’t forget her sister. Her only hope of peace was through finding the bearded man. And then…

  She didn’t want to consider what she might do then. She kept having visions of pulling a gun as Fornier had done.

  “I think I’ll stay,” she said.

  “But you don’t know a soul there. Who will you spend Christmas Day with?”

  Jasmine wondered about all the holidays Kimberly had spent away from home. Somewhere. At the mercy of a dangerous man. Or in a cold grave. What’d her life been like? Had it lasted longer than eight years? “This is more important to me than anything else.”

  After checking the directions she’d printed out at the hotel, she turned onto South Broad, which quickly became Perdido Street. Then she made a quick right on South White. She had to find I-10 West, which she’d take for seventy-seven miles toward Lafayette. “I want to bring my sister home for Christmas.” Even if it was only Kimberly’s body or the knowledge of where she’d gone and what had happened to her.

  The following pause was filled with sadness. “I wish I could be there with you.”

  “You already have your plane ticket to Wyoming. Your little sister’s bringing her fiancé for the family to meet. You’ve got to go.”

  “But I hate what you’re going through, especially at Christmas. That makes it so much worse.”

  “Would you be doing anything different if you’d received some note or trinket from the man who shot Jazon?” she asked, referring to the incident that’d sent Sheridan to the victims’ support group where they’d met each other and Skye.

  Sheridan’s voice dropped. “No. I’d give anything for the chance to go back and make things right. Or as right as I can.”

  “Then you understand.”

  “That’s why I’m worried. I understand too well. I’m going to cancel my trip home and come there instead,” Sheridan announced in an abrupt reversal. “Do you have a rental car? Can you pick me up from the airport on the twenty-fourth?”

  “Sheridan, stop,” Jasmine said with a laugh. “Your sister will be heartbroken. Go meet her new man. Enjoy your family. I may not even be in New Orleans on the twenty-fourth.”

  “What does that mean? Are you going to your father’s?”

  Jasmine winced at the hope in her friend’s response. Sheridan constantly tried to talk Jasmine into pulling her family back together, couldn’t stand the thought of everything that’d been left unspoken and unforgiven between them. But that was because Sheridan didn’t understand that they were better off this way. Although Sheridan had her own pain to deal with, that pain didn’t involve her family. They could rally around her and help her forget; Jasmine’s parents only made her remember. “No, I’m going to Mamou.”

  “Where?”

  “The Cajun music capital of the world.”

  “Sounds like a metropolis.”

  Jasmine smiled at the sarcasm. “Compared to some of the nearby towns, it is.”

  “At least it’s not hurricane season right now.”

  “See? There you go, looking on the bright side.”

  “Have you heard from Skye?”

  “Not today, but I talked to her when my plane landed the night before last. I called to let you both know I arrived safely.”

  “She mentioned it. She also told me she wants you home for Christmas.”

  “She knows I have to do this. And she has David. She’ll be fine.”

  “Do I have your hotel number?”

  “You have my cell.”

  “Just in case.”

  “I don’t have it with me. But you can get it online if you need it.” Jasmine reached I-10 West as she gave her friend the name of the hotel.

  “Thanks. I’ll be on a plane to Wyoming tomorrow, but I’ll call you when I get in.”

  “Sounds good. Have a nice Christmas.”

  “This sucks,” she said and hung up.

  Jasmine recalled her brief conversation with the detectives at the NOPD and, for now, had to agree with the sentiment. She was basically on her own. Like she’d been at seventeen, when she’d started rambling around the country. Only this time she wasn’t running from the past—she was racing toward it.

  CHAPTER 4

  The town of Mamou made real the kinds of places Jasmine had imagined when she read novels set in the South. Built on relatively flat land in a traditional grid, it was small and, judging by appearances, the buildings hadn’t changed by more than a coat of paint in the past forty or fifty
years.

  According to the Web site Jasmine had accessed the night before, there were only about 1600 homes here. Half were owner-occupied, the other half renter. Not too many of the ones she saw from the road looked impressive, but she hadn’t expected mansions. The median rent in this town was $218 a month—a figure she could scarcely believe. You couldn’t even rent a doghouse for that amount in California.

  “Wow,” she muttered, dropping her speed to match the posted limit. Mamou wasn’t much like Cleveland, where she’d grown up—and yet a nostalgic similarity existed between the wooden frame homes and her old neighborhood. The simplicity of the early-twentieth-century architecture evoked childhood memories of weekends spent at her grandparents’ house, before they passed on. That throwback to American roots was notably absent in her adopted state, where most cities seemed prosperous, shiny and new.

  Slowing even more, she turned into the first gas station she came across.

  Before she could unbuckle her seat belt, a man close to her own age walked out of the garage. She rolled down her window to ask about Romain Fornier, but the way the attendant ducked his head and mumbled when he spoke made him seem a bit odd. That encounter reminded her of another statistic she’d read online: At last count, Mamou had 152 people in mental hospitals, a significantly higher number than the state average.

  She wondered if this man had been recently released. “Excuse me?” she said, hoping he’d clarify what he wanted.

  He motioned to the gas pumps but didn’t speak again. Evidently, he was planning to help her and needed some direction.

  She hadn’t expected any assistance. In most parts of the country, full service had become a casualty of cost savings nearly two decades before.

  Getting out, she told him to fill up the tank with regular, then wandered through the snack shop attached to the garage, where she selected a bottle of juice and a doughnut and brought them to the register. She wanted to talk to someone about Romain Fornier, but she could tell that this man wasn’t a good option and already had her eye on the fiftyish woman behind the counter.

  “Hello.” Jasmine smiled as she set down her items.

  Dressed in jeans, a turtleneck sweater and an oversize coat—the inside of the store wasn’t much warmer than the forty-degree weather outside—the clerk barely glanced at her. “Hi.”

  “Nice town you have here.”

  “That’ll be $1.85. Plus the gas.”

  Jasmine handed her fifty bucks. “How long have you lived in the area?”

  “Most my life,” the woman responded, but her attention was on the till and making change.

  “It’s nice to have someone pump my gas.”

  The woman’s eyes darted to the window. The man Jasmine had encountered earlier was now checking her oil. “Lonnie does what he can.”

  Jasmine wasn’t sure, but she thought she saw some resemblance between this woman and the man outside. “Are you two related?”

  “I’m his mama—all he’s got in this life and likely all he’ll ever have.”

  She sounded weary, overwhelmed and, for the first time, Jasmine noticed the dust that covered so many products on the shelves. “You own the place?”

  “Since his daddy died last year. Now it’s just the two of us.”

  Guilt about being so caught up in her own troubles made Jasmine realize how single-minded she’d been the past few days. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  The woman gave her a tired smile. “So am I. Half the time when he was alive, I wanted to kick him out. He was always going off fishing and leaving me with the station and the store. But at least I had him, you know? At least he came home to me.” She gauged the progress of her son, who’d finished with the oil and was washing Jasmine’s windshield. “And Lonnie did better when his daddy was alive.”

  Jasmine thought of her own father. She’d been so busy shielding herself from the pain of their relationship she’d seen him only once in four years. “It’s that way for some kids.”

  “Not you, though, huh?”

  Jasmine instantly regretted divulging so much of her personal history. “My father’s still living. I’m just not close to him.”

  “Don’t waste the time you got left, beb. That’s the best advice I can offer.”

  Jasmine didn’t want any advice. She was managing, wasn’t she? She’d gotten off drugs, made something of her life. That was progress.

  After accepting her change, she turned to go. She didn’t feel comfortable asking this woman about Fornier; although they were strangers, they’d revealed too much about themselves in their brief exchange. There were other people in town, she told herself. But Lonnie’s mother was finally interested enough to stop her with the question Jasmine had been expecting from the beginning.

  “Where ya from?”

  “California.”

  “You come to see Fred’s Lounge?”

  “No, I’m not a tourist. I’m looking for someone.”

  “Here?”

  “I don’t know if he’s still around, but he was born and raised in Mamou.”

  “Who we talkin’ about?”

  Jasmine’s reluctance to push her own agenda burned away beneath the hot glare of opportunity. “Romain Fornier.”

  Her eyes narrowed, the tentative connection they’d established already at risk. “What you want with him?”

  “I’m hoping he can help me.”

  “Help you what?”

  “My sister went missing sixteen years ago.” A lump rose in Jasmine’s throat. After almost two decades, the hurt and loss still surfaced at unexpected moments. She swallowed hard and attempted to continue. “She was only eight.”

  The deep groves in the woman’s face indicated that she’d lived a hard life. Money had probably been scarce even when her husband was alive. But there was genuine kindness in her, despite her apparent loyalty to Fornier. “I’m sorry.”

  Jasmine blinked back the tears that threatened. “It’s fine. I—I don’t know why I’m crying like this.”

  She came around the counter. “You’re cryin’ ’cause you care, beb. Ain’t no stoppin’ that. But you don’t want to bother T-Bone. He’s been to hell and back, fuh shore.”

  “T-Bone?”

  “That’s what we call him. Used to be T-Boy, which is an old Cajun tradition, but when he was eight, he got in a fight with a bully who was three years older and took a good lickin’. His mamère was a superstitious old lady who told him to bury a steak and his black eye would heal, so he took his papa’s T-bone off the grill and did exactly that—and got another whippin’.” Her laugh settled into a wistful smile. “Ever since, he’s been T-Bone. He used to be a good boy, the best. But now…it’s better to leave him alone.”

  “I’m not trying to hurt him.”

  “How could you hurt him? He’s lost everything he cares about. He’s not the same person anymore. He’s so en colère—angry, you understand?—he works real hard to keep his distance from everyone. There’s no need to make him the misère.”

  Between her accent and the French words, this woman’s English was difficult to follow, but misère obviously meant miserable or something close. “So he lives here?” She felt sudden hope, despite her new friend’s warning.

  “No, he lives near Portsville, out on the bayou.”

  “How far away is that?”

  “’Bout five hours southeast, down near Grand Isle and Leeville, give or take twenty minutes. Mais, like I said, I think it’d be a waste of your time to drive down there. He barely speaks to his own kin.”

  Somehow, Jasmine didn’t quite believe that Romain was as unfriendly to his relatives as this woman said. If the local gas station owner knew him well enough to tell a story about his childhood, the community was a close one and chances were good he maintained some ties to it. “I’m willing to do whatever it takes,” she said.

  Lonnie had finished with the car. He stepped inside, grinning like an eager dog after fetching a stick, and his mother put a hand on his sho
ulder to give him the approval he craved. “Thanks, Lonnie,” she said gently. “Some things should be left as they are,” she told Jasmine.

  “This isn’t one of them.” Her tears had dried—gone as quickly as they’d come. Now she felt only a fierce determination. “Fornier might be able to help me catch a killer.”

  The woman’s eyebrows knitted. “He’s already shot one. What more can he do?”

  “Stop another.”

  “How?”

  “By providing information.”

  The woman’s lips pursed stubbornly. “I’d rather he didn’t get involved. I don’t want him to go back to prison.”

  Jasmine spread out her hands, palms up. “If anyone gets in trouble, it’ll be me. I have to stop the man who kidnapped my sister.”

  The woman reached up to smooth the hair on the back of her son’s head, as if he were ten years old. Mentally, he probably was. “It’s always the innocent who suffer,” she said. Then she sighed. “I can’t give you an address. T-Bone doesn’t have one. From what I hear, he lives alone in the swamp somewheres, without mail service or utilities.”

  Jasmine’s heart sank. “How will I find him?”

  “Portsville’s very small, beb. If you go there, someone will take you to him. And when you see him, tell him Ya-Ya Collins sent you. That might help.” She frowned. “Then again, it might not.”

  “Thank you,” Jasmine said and meant it.

  “Good luck findin’ your sister.”

  Jasmine nodded, got back in her car and turned around. It seemed she was going into the swamps, after all.

  Now to avoid the alligators…

  * * *

  The headstones were a bad omen.

  After passing several waterside towns with docks that disappeared into an inky morass, which grew inkier as night fell, Jasmine entered Portsville. It was located on Bayou Lafourche at nearly the southernmost tip of Louisiana. The cemetery was right there beside the road, but it was unlike any she’d ever seen. The aboveground tombs, all painted white, glowed eerily in a foot of water—the same marshy water that lapped gently at the telephone poles running parallel to the highway.

  She wondered how people down here weathered each new hurricane, each storm. It’d take a certain stubbornness to hold out, people who loved this land more than she’d ever loved a particular location. She’d always felt a bit restless. There was no mystery as to the reason, of course, but she was envious of the devotion required to fight for existence in such a place. To say, “This is my home and I’m staying put.”