What She Doesn't Know (32 page)

The wind beneath her wings. She could fly. She stretched out her arms. Dive, dive, swan dive.

“Rita, stop!”

Christopher’s voice again from a long way away. Harsh, deep red waves pulsing at her. She swayed. She’d made him mad again. Or was Sira playing with her mind? She tilted forward, feeling momentum taking over. Arms wrapped around her waist. A sob tore from her throat. Sira was going to throw her over. She wanted to do it herself. She felt herself being dragged back, pulled against a hard body.

“God, Rita, what are you doing?”

Her head lolled back against Christopher’s shoulder. Wait, was it Christopher? His face looked distorted. The railing grew farther away, but she couldn’t trust her vision. Or the sense that filled her brain with Christopher’s after-shave. Or the feel of his arms around her.

She felt herself being tilted, felt weightless and floating again.

“What happened to her?” Another female voice. Breathless. Floating through the other senses. “She said she didn’t feel well, but I never thought…”

Everything went dark. Sun was gone! No, just a crack of light. She struggled to see more, to open her eyes. Salmon walls dancing around her again. Christopher’s face above her, making the nasty snake inside her go away.
 

“What did she eat? Did she drink anything?” His voice sounded garbled with a faint echo. Red lights pulsed to each word.

“Jus’ some coffee and a beignet, and I know they were fine, ‘cause I had ‘em, too.”

Too many voices. Rita couldn’t keep up with them, but the mention of coffee turned her stomach. She heard a groan and thought it came from her.

“Was anyone in here?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“
Could
someone have been in here?”

“I suppose. I was outside doing the windows, and then vacuuming downstairs. I didn’t see anyone in the house, but I wasn’t looking. What’s going on?”

Rita was glad she wasn’t expected to answer any questions. She wasn’t even sure she still had a tongue. She tried to move her mouth, but it felt big and fuzzy. She tried to grab their words, to make sense of them. Happy faces bounced in front of her. Bright yellow, happy, happy, happy.
 

“Damn it, I should have come back. You didn’t see anything suspicious?”

“No. Nothing. Chris, what is going on?”

Rita tried talking again. It took three tries. “Rose.” It came out all slurred, but at least it was a word.

“Who’s Rose?” Emmagee asked.

“I’m taking her to the hospital,” he said.

“No,” Rita managed, trying to grasp his arm. She didn’t want to leave this familiar place, or his arms. No moving, no car. His hands cradled her face, and she tried to make her vision clear.
 

“Rita, tell me what happened. Come on, baby. If you don’t, I’m taking you to the hospital. You’re scaring me.”

His words filled her with warmth and strength. “Sira.” She took a deep breath and felt as though her chest were expanding twenty-fold. What was happening to her senses? Everything seemed more potent, louder, brighter.
 

He was shaking her head. “Rita, come back. Sira what? What did she do? Was she here?”

“Who’s Sira?” Emmagee asked. “I feel so bad. I should have come up with her.”

Rita tried to sort through the questions. There was something important she needed to tell him. Sira. No, she’d already said that. What had happened to her! That’s what she had to tell him. What was the word Sira had used? “K-ket…keta…mmm...”

“She’s saying ketamine, I think. Is that what you’re trying to say, Rita? I know that stuff,” Emmagee said. “It’s been going round lately, along with ruffies. It’s a drug vets use to sedate large animals. Guys have been lacing women’s drinks with it, in bars usually. The woman starts to get sick, the guy escorts her out and that’s the last thing she remembers. Then the guy does whatever he wants to with her. The paper’s been warning women to watch their drinks at all times, and not to do snort. Scary stuff. No, don’t worry, it won’t hurt her. It’s sort of like PCP or angel dust. It distorts the senses and breaks down your will to resist. You can get someone to do whatever you want.”

Dread filled his chest at those words. “What do I do?”

“There was something…” She snapped her fingers. “Cranberry juice! The article said it draws the drug out of your system. I remember thinking I was going to start drinking Cape Cods from now on. I’ll run out and get some.”

“My keys are still down in the car, or maybe on the sidewalk. I pulled up and saw her on the roof and ran. I don’t know what I did with them.”

“I’ll find them. Be right back.”

He looked down at Rita and tried to swallow past the huge lump in his throat. His heart was still hammering. Her eyes were open, but they were unfocused and dilated. Her body was limp and her mouth slack. But she was all right.

“Come on, baby, stay with me.” God, what she’d done to him. “You’re all right, you hear me?” He brushed her thick hair from her forehead, letting his fingers remain against her skin. “If I could take it for you, I would. I wish I’d come back. I’m sorry.” He squeezed her tighter against him, and for the first time in a long time, he prayed.

He heard the front door open and close a few minutes later, then a sound in the kitchen. His body stiffened. If Sira had come back to finish her dirty work, he would kill her. He had his plan of attack ready when he heard footfalls on the steps.
 

“The roses!” Emmagee said, bursting into the room with a glass and bottle of cranberry juice. She poured a glass and handed it to him. While he lifted Rita’s head and helped her to drink, Emmagee said, “I didn’t even think about it when she said ‘rose.’
 
She meant the roses Henri brought by.”

“What are you talking about?” he said, his attention on Rita who was taking sips.

“Some gardener guy came by and gave Rita some roses, condolences for Brian’s death. Black roses. She knew him, so I didn’t think anything about it. But I don’t know how that would have gotten ketamine in her system.”

Rita nodded the slightest bit. “Henri?” he asked, and she nodded again. He had to have given it to her somehow. How was an old gardener involved in this? The janitor was young. Unless Henri was young, too, and in disguise. He tried to remember what he looked like. Unfortunately nothing specific came to mind. He was becoming convinced the two men were the same. He turned to Emmagee. “Did you say
black
roses?”

“Yeah. Rita thought they were some New Orleans mourning tradition.”

Black roses, like in the lobby. Black like death. But what did roses have to do with ketamine? “Go down and see where she put them. Don’t touch them.”

When she returned a few minutes later, she said, “I didn’t see them, only the empty vase.” She looked down at Rita. “When are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

He kept his eyes on Rita. “Come on, baby, keep drinking. This’ll make you feel better.” She responded to his coaxing. “Brian was into a role-playing game on the Internet. I think it got him killed.”

“Killed? I thought he jumped.”

He wasn’t going to get Emmagee involved, but he didn’t want her ignorant of the danger, either. “I can’t get into all the details. I’m not even sure of all the details. But someone pushed him from the roof.”

“This is getting weird.”

“You don’t know the half of it. I want you to stay away from here. I appreciate what you’ve been doing, but I don’t want you hurt. Take my car.”

Emmagee’s expression went from curious to somber. “This is serious, isn’t it?”

“Yeah. I can’t walk you down, so you’d better get going. Before it gets dark.”

She scooted off the bed but paused to look at her. “Take good care of her. That girl feels a lot for you.”

His arms involuntarily tightened around Rita. “Go on, and honk the horn twice once you’re inside the car and the doors are locked. Call me when you get home so I know you’re okay.”

“All right.”
 

She backed out of the room, and he heard her footsteps as she ran down the stairs. A second later, he heard two beeps and the sound of his car heading out. He focused on Rita again, giving her more juice. He glanced at the French doors, closed but not locked. How had Sira gotten in? Too many questions, and he wasn’t sure Rita would remember enough to help.

Without letting go of her, he maneuvered to the phone on the nightstand and called the emergency room. A nurse answered after the twentieth ring, yelling over noise and obvious chaos. “You can bring her in, but it’s going to be a while before anyone can see her,” she said after listening to his story. “But there isn’t much we can do unless she’s been physically assaulted.”

He looked her over. “No.” That’s not what this was about. “Can she overdose on this stuff?”

“Doubtful, but keep an eye on her.”

“What can I do in the meantime?” He didn’t want to take her down to any chaotic place to wait for hours anyway.
 

“Get her to drink as much cranberry juice as possible. Make sure someone stays with her at all times. If the effects don’t start to wear off in an hour, bring her in.”

He was sure that Sira had only intended to use enough to get Rita to jump from the roof. He scooted back against the headboard and cradled her.
 

“Come back to me, baby,” he whispered, stroking her hair. His chest ached as he watched her look around at imaginary scenery. “You’re going to be all right.” He closed his eyes for a moment and rested his forehead against hers. For the first time, he admitted he was afraid. And even worse, he had no idea how to deal with this faceless evil.
 

CHAPTER 21

It was an hour before Rita tried to talk again. She’d drank most of the juice, and her eyes were focusing better. He’d been trying to keep her calm by talking about the kittens, some of his trickier information retrieval jobs, his house, anything. Her mouth started working, though no sound came out at first. He tilted her chin up a bit so he could read her eyes better. She reached up for his face, though her hand was six inches too far to the left. He took it in his.

“Rita, you okay?”

She blinked, nodded. “I think so,” she said in a light, airy voice.

He smiled and felt his chest filling with something like helium. She looked small and frail, like a lost little girl. He squeezed her against him. “You’re going to be all right.” She was, but he wasn’t.

“No,” she said, looking very serious. “I’m going to be sick.”

“All right, come on.”

She shook her head again. “No, not you. Emmagee.”

Despite her unsteady voice, he couldn’t help but smile. “She’s gone. It’s just you and me.” He scooted off the bed and pulled her up with him.
 

“No,” she whined as they neared the bathroom.

“You must be feeling better if you’re embarrassed. Come on, tiger, do what you have to do. I’ll keep the lights dim, okay?”

She squeezed her eyes shut, but in the end let him lead her into the dark bathroom. He felt every heave of her body as his arms were wrapped around her waist. Then he washed her face, let her rinse her mouth out with Scope, and turned around to let her go to the bathroom. When she was finished, he locked the French doors and helped her back to bed. Looking utterly humiliated, she tried to fight him again when he tugged down her pants.

“I’ve already seen you naked,
cherie
. Besides, you’re going right under the covers. That’s my girl.” His instincts had told him to get back to the house, but he’d ignored them. He’d let himself care about her against his good sense, and she’d almost died.

Not his girl. He didn’t deserve her. Hadn’t he proven that again today?
 

But tonight…for a few more hours, she could be his. He wasn’t letting her out of his sight. He sat on top of the covers once she was tucked underneath with her back against a pile of pillows. He smoothed her damp hair from her face.

“You don’t know how beautiful you are,” he said, wondering how his mouth had gotten so loose. She rolled her eyes, but he ran his thumb across her lower lip and said, “No doubt about it.”

“I’m not…even beautiful…when I haven’t been drugged and gotten sick.”

He remembered thinking that, too. Somewhere along the way she’d become beautiful. But he wasn’t used to giving compliments, so he just tried to let her know with a pointed look instead of words.

“No one ever took care of me like this before.” Her voice was still too thready. “It must have been awful.”

“It wasn’t,” he said when he was really wondering why no one had ever taken care of her.

He leaned back against the headboard and pulled her close. She sighed and said in a slurred voice, “I’m not giving up on you, Chris. You try to make me believe you have no feelings, but the way you held me, I don’t believe that anymore. I’m in love with you, and I don’t care if you didn’t save your girlfriend, or if that boy died, or whatever other human things you did.” She settled against him and closed her eyes. “I just wanted you to know.”

Then she fell asleep.

Christopher thought he was imagining the sounds of laughter and music in the distance, until he remembered that the parades started early on Sunday. He rolled onto his back and looked over at Rita, who was also waking up. She blinked as though she was surprised to see him. Her brown waves were in disarray, her cheeks flushed with sleep.

“I had the weirdest dream last night…”
 

“It wasn’t a dream,” he said. “Wish it had been.”
 

“I was trying to pretend it was.” Her voice was still hoarse. She squeezed the pillow beneath her cheek.

“How are you feeling?”

“I’m not sure there’s a word to describe it.” She made a sort of growling sound. “That about covers it.”

He hadn’t wanted to upset her last night, but now he risked asking, “Do you remember anything about what happened?”

She took a shaky breath. “Not really. I can remember being scared. I knew something terrible was happening, but everything was distorted. I had no control over my own body, that was the worst part. I could only do what she asked me to. The rest comes in flashes. What happened?”