A Christmas Kiss (16 page)

"No. No, I don't think Wyatt's tastes ran to commitments of any kind with the opposite sex." He shrugged. "Just a passing observation."

"Who do you think he was meeting?"

Joey had a theory, but not a shred of proof. All he had was a gut reaction. "I think he was trying to take a payoff. I think someone from DeCarlo's family had gotten to him, and he was going to take a lot of money not to testify. We found out he had two one-way tickets booked to Paris. He wasn't planning on coming back."

"He had sold out." Cori spoke softly, tasting the words as if she couldn't decide on the flavor of them.

"We have no proof of that. It's a theory. My theory. Not the marshals' or anyone else's."

"And you thought maybe I'd been bought off, too, didn't you?"

Joey looked straight out the window, but his lips turned up slightly in a smile. "It crossed my mind.

Until I met you."

"And now?"

"Now I think you're a victim of someone playing a very deadly game."

Cori put her free hand on the handle of the door. Joey still held her left hand, and began unconsciously to massage it. It should have relaxed her, but instead she imagined his touch working slowly up her arm, moving closer to places that suddenly anticipated the pressure of his fingers. "Let's do this so we can get on the road," she said.

"Are you sure?"

The concern in his voice stopped her as she swung her feet to the ground. "I'm sure that this nightmare has to end. I'm not living, and it's not going to get any better until I take some action. Yes, I'm ready."

"Say as little as possible," Joey directed as he got out and locked the car. They went to the back door, and Joey pulled it open, unleashing a cloud of smoke and the reverberating noise of the jukebox.

Cori drew back involuntarily, pushed by a wall of noise. Joey looked at her. "Are you sure?"

"Absolutely." She walked through the door he held open.

She found herself at the edge of a room filled with men. In the darkness, only the stage was recognizable from her prior visit, the long strings of white lights endlessly winking. A few of the men had women with them, but most were alone or in groups. They watched the gyrations of the girl she recognized as Candy as she danced in an outfit made of fake leopard skin. The big bouncer materialized out of the smoke.

"At night there's a ten-dollar cover, each." He gave Joey a wolfish grin and offered a wink to Cori.

"Back so soon?"

Joey handed him a twenty, but kept a grip on it when the man tried to take it from his hand.

"Where's Danny?"

"I think he must be at church." The bouncer smirked.

"We'll wait."

The man walked away, and in a moment a young girl with tired eyes came up to them. "Danny's in his office." She turned around and led the way.

Cori was relieved to step inside the small room and close the door behind her and Joey. Danny Dupray sat at a desk, stacks of money in front of him.

"Make it fast, Tio. I've gotta make a deposit tonight."

"You know anything about a hit on this woman?" He nodded at Cori.

"I know she's an eyewitness against Ben DeCarlo. I'd say more than one party might want to see her dead." Danny counted out another stack of twenties.

"Benny Hovensky was killed this afternoon."

"Ah, too bad. Several of the girls will be sad to hear that."

"So you don't know anything about Benny?"

Danny looked up from his money, the overhead lights slicing down his nose. "You want to know who hired him or who hit him?"

Joey pulled his billfold from his pocket and put a stack of new twenties down on the desk. "Both."

"I don't have that information now." Danny reached for the money, riffled it with his thumb and added it to a stack on the desk. "I can get it. Or some of it." He looked down at the money. "Is there a place you can be reached?"

"She isn't safe in the city."

"That's a revelation." He looked up, his eyes flitting over Cori as if she were no more than another stick of furniture.

"We're going over to the bayous."

Danny's eyes snapped. "Does this place have a phone, or should I strap a message to an alligator's back and hope he delivers it before he eats you?"

"Funny, Dupray." Joey reached across the money and picked up a pen. He wrote a number on the back of a small card and handed it over. "You can get word to me here."

Danny tucked the card into his desk drawer.

"Keep that number safe," Joey warned.

"It'll go with me to the grave."

"If you roll over on me, Dupray, I'll see that you are permanently put out of your misery."

Danny stood up. "If you're done with your threats, I've got a business to run."

Joey motioned Cori out of her chair. "Stay in touch."

Danny saluted, but his eyes were hard.

Joey opened the door and Cori preceded him back into the music and the smoke. She focused on the place where the door had to be and walked straight toward it, aware that Joey was behind her, his broad frame protecting her from any threat.

Stepping out into the night, she expelled the breath she'd been holding. "He never even acknowledged me," she said.

"You're a part of a business transaction, Cori. Nothing more. Nothing less."

The fact was disturbing. Up until Antonio De Carlo's murder she had lived a safe, structured life where everything made sense. People operated within a prescribed set of rules. The Danny Duprays of the world were far removed, and never acknowledged as part of the circle of life.

"How long do you think it will be before he sells that phone number?" she asked.

"Oh, he'll make the call and then hold out until tomorrow."

"We'll be ready by then?"

"We'll have to be."

"It's not a lot farther now." Joey nodded at the sign for Breaux Bridge. The forty-mile stretch of raised interstate that gave access over the Atchafalaya Basin had ended. They were back on solid ground.

Cori felt as if her eyes had glazed over and dried. They burned with weariness, and she knew Joey had to be as tired. The drive had been long, the night dark, and anxieties weighed heavily on her.

She had not asked Joey for the details of his plan. He would tell her when he was ready, or he would not. She had left that in his hands. He had called his office and said he was headed to Texas to take her home. Then he had called his sister and told her he was going to New Iberia. There had been a whispered conversation, and Joey had ended with a soft, "I love you, sis."

Those words haunted Cori. Joey had put himself in danger to protect her. It was his job. He said that repeatedly. But if she had not come back to New Orleans, the danger might have been held at bay.

Except for the fact that someone had uncovered her identity. Someone who knew her past, and was using it to manipulate her.

Kit.

It all boiled down to that single fact. In the past hours she had begun to accept the fact that Kit was not the man she'd thought him to be. She had married an upright, honorable police detective who loved his job and cared about the city he protected. She had never known the dark side of Kit Wells.

She gritted her teeth and stared down the interstate illuminated by Joey's headlights. How deep did Kit's dark side go? Was he trapped in a situation he couldn't get out of, or had he deliberately set her up as a witness, promising to marry her and start a new life with her only to get her testimony? Two days ago the very thought of such a thing would have reduced her to tears. Her heart had been so wounded, so tender where Kit was involved, that the idea of such a betrayal would have devastated her. In a very short time she had toughened up considerably. She was not so much devastated as angry at the idea of having been played for such a fool. Angry at Kit—and at herself.

"Do you need anything? Cosmetics, that type of thing?"

Joey's question scattered her bitter thoughts. She glanced at him. "I have everything I need. But thanks for asking."

"I need a razor and a few things." He pulled into a small drugstore. "Will you stay in the car?"

"Yes." She smiled. "Word of honor."

He killed the engine and looked over at her. "With an attitude like that, you're going to make a great partner."

"You mean as long as I do exactly what you say?"

"You're a smart cookie." He chucked her chin. "Word of honor, remember."

She watched as he went into the store, a tall man with broad shoulders and lean hips. A man who was comfortable in his own skin. A skin he was all too willing to risk to protect hers.

He was back out in fifteen minutes with a shopping bag. At the pay telephone he stopped, slotted in a quarter and spoke for several moments. When he hung up, some of the anxiety was lifted from his face.

"Good news?" she asked when he got in the car.

"Very good. Aaron's home off the boat this week. He'll be waiting for us at Henderson. With his boat."

"I thought we were going to New Iberia?"

"Too hard to protect you there. This camp is perfect. The only way to get to it is by boat. And Aaron knows the way."

"How will they find us?" She was suddenly concerned that Kit would not be able to follow. She wanted to see him, but not for the original reason. She had plenty to say to him, and none of it was about how much she missed him. Whatever tender feelings she'd gone to New Orleans nursing, they'd been killed. The truth of Kit Wells and his machinations had destroyed any desires she'd clung to.

The man sliding into the car seat beside her was responsible for her changed emotions, though he'd done none of it deliberately. The truth had come to her slowly, by deed and example. How could she compare Kit to Joey and not see the differences? Right this moment Joey was creating a plan to save her life, at the risk of his own.

Her hand lifted an inch, wanting to touch his cheek, to thank him for his concern, his honor. She dropped it back into her lap and listened to what he was saying. Her life and his might depend on his words.

"We can't make the plan too easy or they'll know it's a setup. Don't worry, Cori. I'll leave plenty of clues."

She settled back into the darkness and tried to imagine the town around them as they passed through Breaux Bridge and headed for Henderson.

"We have to cross the levee." Joey gave that information just as the mountain of dirt loomed up in the night. The sports car seemed to soar straight up at a ninety-degree angle before it crested the top of the levee and came down the other side. The headlights illuminated a fairyland that could easily be inhabited by the darkest of creatures.

Cypress trees, huge old roots sunk deep, were surrounded by water. Their leafless branches clawed the starlit sky.

"Spanish moss." Cori identified the view caught by the headlights, an eerie landscape of stark trees growing in water, their branches hung with filigreed lace. She inhaled sharply. She had driven past swamps before, but this one stretched far beyond the car's lights. It was almost another dimension.

"Yes, Spanish moss." Joey sensed her sudden anxiety at the scene before her. The swamp could be a very intimidating place. In times past, many people had gotten lost in the turning canals and twisting bayous. Some had never found their way out. He focused on a lighter story, something to ease her mind.

"Some of the old stories say it's the beard from the Spaniards who passed through this area. The old legend goes that a Spanish conquistador fell in love with a girl of the swamps. He climbed a tree to catch sight of her, and he lost his balance and fell. His beard hung in the tree and became the first bit of Spanish moss."

"It's beautiful, in an eerie kind of way."

"I love the swamps." Joey blinked his lights twice and then killed them. The silence of the night surrounded them as quickly as if someone had thrown a spangled blanket over their heads.

"Let's explore." Joey got out and Cori met him at the front of the car. The water was a constant presence, a soft whispering against the shore.

"Is it ever dry?"

"The tide affects the water level, but it's never dry." There was amusement in his voice. "This is a world unto itself."

"You grew up here, didn't you?"

"Yes. This is my home. I hadn't realized how much I've missed it."

She could hear a love for the area in his voice. There was also the distant sound of a boat motor.

She knew without asking that their ride was on the way.

"How long do you think before they find us?"

"It'll take them a couple of days." He saw her shiver, and he put his arm around her, drawing her close. "I forgot how intimidating the water can be for someone who doesn't know it. I'm counting on that factor to work in our favor when we need it."

She could only hope that he was right. For the moment, she was content to shelter against him, a moment's respite from the events yet to unfold. A chain of actions that she had set in motion.

All too soon the small boat glided into view. The lean man steering cut the motor and slid against the shore. Joey held the bow steady as she climbed aboard, and then he pushed them back out into the water, stepping in without rocking the boat or getting his foot wet.

"What about alligators?" Cori asked. The sides of the boat were only inches from the water. One little lurch and she feared they'd take on water and sink. She glanced at the silent man who guided them.

He was dark-haired, his muscles pulling his jacket tight across his back. She'd caught only a glimpse of him, enough to know that he was dark and unflappable.

"They're very big, those alligators," he answered her.

She could hear the teasing in the man's voice. His accent was easy, like a gentle rain.

"Don't upset her, Aaron." There was no reprimand in Joey's voice. "Whatever you do, don't tell her about the gator that tipped over that boatload of tourists last spring."

"Ate them every one," Aaron pronounced with satisfaction. "They was fat, too. Big ole tourists. That was one hungry gator. And he's still out there, waiting for another chance."

"I'm delighted to be your sport, since it's too dark to fish," Cori said. "Just to let you know, I'm not afraid of alligators. I like reptiles."