Wild Man's Curse (Wilds of the Bayou #1) (24 page)

CHAPTER 29

Before he’d made his call, Lang had taped up her mouth again, so Ceelie kicked over a bucket in the corner of the tin shed, hoping to make enough noise that Gentry would hear it. Why the hell had Lang called Gentry instead of the sheriff’s department?

Dumb question, Celestine.
Because he could. Because it would hurt his brother. Because it would make sure Gentry was stuck right in the middle.

Once she’d had a moment to think, however, she realized it was better this way. Gentry would hear the directions firsthand. Would have more time to think about them. Would, she hoped, recognize them as a sign.

She just had to pray Gentry was as smart as she thought he was. Otherwise, it would be either Plan B—the ax or knife—or Plan Last-Resort: matches.

“Time to go, sugar-puss.” Lang hefted her up by one arm and shoved her toward the door of the shed. She gauged it was late afternoon, the sky a clear blue and the air thick as molasses from the humidity. The ability to see the setting sun helped her gauge direction; nothing in this landscape looked familiar, however, even as it all looked familiar. It was South Louisiana and that’s as near as she could pinpoint.

Still, even the hot day with its hot wind felt good against her overexposed skin, after the furnace of the tin shed.

Once he’d gotten her wedged into the bow of the boat, Lang pulled a worn map out of a small wooden storage area under his seat and studied it, tracing over it with a long, dirty finger. At the sound of an approaching motor, he froze, and Ceelie’s heart sped up. They were deep against the bank, hidden behind the overhanging limbs of a tree, and the boat that passed them was moving fast. No way they’d been seen.

Lang turned to look at her, and she didn’t like the calculating expression. “An ugly beat-up hag in the boat might draw attention this time of day, so . . .” He opened the bin under his seat again and dragged out a worn blue tarp. “I think you need a blanket.”

Ceelie squirmed and kicked at him when he walked toward her, almost sending him over the side of the boat. She did not want to be wrapped in a blue plastic shroud.

“You want me to tape your ankles together? You want me to tape you to the fuckin’
boat
?”

He’d do it, too, Ceelie had no doubt. She willed her limbs to go still as he flapped the folds out of the blue tarp and let it settle over her, cutting off her view. As he tucked it around her body, she kept her head raised so that when he finished, she’d have fresh air and some space in front of her face. Otherwise, claustrophobia would be paying her a quick visit.

Once her initial panic subsided, Ceelie realized there were a lot of small holes in the tarp, which had definitely seen better days. Not big enough for her to see anything, but at least enough to breathe.

Once again, she considered flipping herself out of the boat, but again, she decided against it. Lang still might shoot her, and this time he was using his motor rather than trying to move silently. Everyone would think Lang was gator-hunting—the blue tarps were ubiquitous among the hunters, who used ice or cold water and tarps to keep the skin and meat of their big reptilian victims cool until they could reach the buyer.

Unless a boat got close enough for her to risk exposing her feet and legs. It would be risky, though, because unless they were caught, Lang would follow through on his threat to tape her ankles together. She didn’t want that.

Having her out of sight and himself on high alert, Lang no longer talked. He navigated the boat at a slow, steady pace, not drawing attention.

At some point, Ceelie drifted off to sleep and then startled awake, disoriented at the darkness around her, thinking Lang had covered her with something heavier, or buried her.

The boat still rocked gently, though, so he hadn’t moved her. The motor was no longer running, and she could hear splashes around her, and the swirl of water around an oar or pole. Night must have fallen, which increased Lang’s chances of getting into the cabin unseen. It all depended on what the response had been to the phone call. She hoped Gentry would ride in like a knight on a white horse—or a black oversized pickup—and save her.

Until now, she’d never seen herself as a damsel in distress, however, and she didn’t plan to start. The only thing she could rely on for certain was her belief that she was smarter than Langston Broussard and that, in the end, she’d find a time to make her move. She’d either succeed, or she would fail. If she failed, she would die. She was at peace with that.

She hadn’t been a successful person by any measure the world would take. Not by a long shot. But she had carried herself with dignity. She’d stayed true to herself, for the most part. And although her Tante Eva would never know, in her death she’d helped Ceelie learn what was important in life: not record deals, but home. A sense of place. A sense of history and where you came from. Maybe even a chance to love someone and be loved in return.

A thump and splash jerked her out of her reverie, which had started to sound way too defeated. She hadn’t lost yet. And her unexpected nap had sharpened her mind.

The air that hit her face when Lang yanked off the tarp sent a wash of cool relief over her skin, even though it was probably at least eighty.

He pulled her from the boat, waiting until she got her land legs underneath her, then prodded her up a bank and into the dark woods. Roots and branches grabbed at her ankles and caught on her boots, almost sending her sprawling.

Lang wrapped a hand around her throat and jerked her toward him. “You make a sound, even a stick breaking under your feet, and you’re dead, coins or no coins.” Lang’s soft whisper hit her ear from less than an inch away. “You understand?”

Ceelie gave him a sharp nod and squinted in the dim light to see where she was going. The day had been clear and so was the night, dark enough for there to be a full canopy of stars and moonlight to give some visibility.

Lang, walking close behind her with the shotgun in the crook of his arm and both pistols stuck in the waistband of his jeans, put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her to a stop. Ceelie looked up and around, a wash of excitement rising in her chest as she recognized the wooded area north of the cabin on Whiskey Bayou, opposite the clearing where Gentry had spent the night in his truck.

She squinted through the trees, hoping to see a light or an outline of a patrol boat. No way to see the back of the cabin from here to determine if there was a sheriff’s vehicle there.

Lang propped the shotgun against a tree trunk and turned her to face him, hands on her shoulders. “Not that I don’t trust you, bitch, but I don’t trust you. I can’t have you making noise. So time for you to take a nap; I’ll see you later.”

Ceelie was still struggling to understand when she saw the fist coming toward her face again. Exploding pain. Black.

Rain splashed on her face. When did it start raining, and why was she outside?

Ceelie struggled to open her eyes. Her head had been stuffed full of cotton. Cotton filled with nails projecting outward.

“About damned time, sweetheart. We have business to tend to.”

Ceelie rolled to her side and gagged. Would’ve thrown up if there’d been anything in her system to lose. She lay back and fought the nausea. He’d really hurt her this time.

Lang was still running his mouth, but she couldn’t absorb his chatter because something else finally registered. She was inside the cabin.
Her
cabin. She was lying on her own bed. Still bound, but the tape had been pulled off her mouth, and—she wiggled a foot—her ankles remained free.

“C’mon, sit up. Drink something.” Lang grasped her by the shoulders and helped her to a seated position. He had a bottle of water—Walmart brand, from her own fridge—and placed it against her raw lips. She took a couple of quick gulps, then promptly threw it up.

She steeled herself for another blow, but he simply helped her sit upright again. “Drink one sip and see if you can keep it down. When you can, I’ll give you the rest.”

“Okay.” She took the water into her mouth, swallowed it, waited for the nausea to pass. After some rolls and growls, her stomach settled. “More?”

“Can you hold the bottle?”

“Think . . . so.” Talking was hard. Thinking was hard. She just wanted to sleep, but didn’t have time to baby a concussion.

Lang fitted the small water bottle between her hands, and she was able to drink by lifting both arms.

She looked around the cabin and saw nothing out of place . . . “Oh my God, who is that?” A man wearing the light-blue shirt and navy pants of a sheriff’s deputy lay on the floor in front of the dining table, his ankles taped and his arms pulled behind him. A length of duct tape had been slapped over his mouth. He lay on his side, eyes closed. His right leg was soaked in blood; his pistol was still in his holster.

“That is Deputy G. Baker, according to his shirt. He had the shit luck to be guarding the cabin.”

“You shot him?” Ceelie wanted to go to the deputy and see if he was alive, but wasn’t sure she could stand. Not yet anyway. When she stood up, she’d have to make it count.

“Of course not, stupid. Guns are too noisy. I stabbed him.”

Of course he did, because Lang Broussard was an amoral, out-of-control junkie who thought himself the cleverest man on earth. What a lethal combination of traits.

Ceelie breathed a quiet sigh of relief when Deputy Baker opened his eyes and looked straight at her. They were bright-blue eyes. Kind eyes. His gaze shifted to Lang and he shook his head slightly. She answered with a hint of a nod. Playing possum.

“Okay, sweet Celestine. It’s time.” Lang hovered over her. “You either tell me where the coins are, or make plans to join your Tante Eva in the great hereafter of hell.”

Ceelie took a deep breath, trying to lessen the pounding headache that had set up a steady rhythm in her right temple. It would serve the stupid son of a bitch right if she stroked out and left him here with an injured deputy, a dead hostage, and no coins.

“They’re somewhere on the underside of the subflooring. I don’t know exactly where, but there’s a loose floorboard in front of the table by the front window. That’s where I’d start if I were looking.”

“If you’re lying to me, you know what’s coming, bitch. Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.” Ceelie had had time to think, over the past day and a half. If she’d lived her whole life in this place, didn’t have a bank account, didn’t trust outsiders in general, and considered this treasure a three-generation family curse—but not enough of a curse to get rid of it—where would she hide it?

Her memories of Tante Eva were wrapped in childhood and teen drama, but she remembered enough to know that the woman was practical about keeping things repaired, about being ready for emergencies. So if Eva had recognized the value of these coins, and Ceelie thought she had, she’d put them somewhere she could easily reach in an emergency but also a place that would be hard for a stranger to find.

There was nowhere else for the coins to be hidden—if they existed at all. It was a big
if
. Since the deputy was here, the matches had to come off her list of options. But she’d spotted the rusty old ax that had killed LeRoy Breaux, and it was singing to her.

CHAPTER 30

Gentry sat in his truck in the hospital parking lot, listening to the radio chatter from his own agency, the sheriff’s office, and the state police. He’d passed on his bombshell from Lang, first to Warren, and then directly to Sheriff Knight.

“You think he’s serious?” Knight had asked. “And does he think I’m a fucking miracle worker with that ‘sweet deal’ crap?”

Gentry had no idea, and told the sheriff so. “Sir, he’s so far gone from when we were actually brothers, it’s like I don’t know him anymore. I don’t know what he’s capable of.”

After leaving Jena looking like a miserable, beaten Irish setter in the bosom of her dysfunctional family, Gentry had returned to his truck, unsettled. The more he thought about the rendezvous point Lang had suggested, the more he agreed with Jena.

He passed his theory on to the sheriff and to Warren.

They were hesitant. “You really think Lang would accept a meeting spot Ms. Savoie suggested?” the sheriff asked. “It doesn’t seem likely.”

Finally, they agreed to split the manhunt between the area near Tomas Assaud’s house and the stretch from their current location to the Savoie cabin.

“And you’re still off duty,” Warren reminded him before hanging up.

Gentry huffed in frustration as he punched in Paul Billiot’s number. “Where are you?”

“At home,” he said. “Lieutenant made me take a few hours off just after he kicked you out. Been following on the radio.”

Gentry shared his and Jena’s theory. “I’d bet anything they’re either already at Whiskey Bayou or on their way.”

Paul hesitated a moment. “You at home? Let’s talk.”

They agreed to meet at the Jiffy Stop in twenty minutes.

When Gentry pulled into the lot fifteen minutes later, Paul’s truck already sat in the shadows nearest the road, backed in and pointed toward the highway.

Not only did Paul have seniority but Gentry respected the man, so he climbed out and went to the other agent’s turf. Gentry’s dark-green uniform shirt and pants, which he’d pulled out of the dryer, were rumpled and looked as if Hoss had been napping on them; Paul could’ve just walked out of a dry-cleaning store. His truck was a lot neater than Gentry’s too. Instead of a rat’s nest of cords and cables, everything was organized and excess cordage bound with twist ties; the cables to his radios and equipment were all the same color. OCD much?

“Does Ceelie know where the coins are?” Paul wasn’t one for small talk, which was fine. Time was running out; Gentry could feel it. “What can she tell Lang?”

“I don’t think she even knew the coins existed, but Lang never has known when to shut up. He might very well have talked enough for her to bluff him and get him back to the cabin.” She might think being in her own house would shift some advantage her way.

If Gentry was reading things right.

Paul gave a curt nod and looked at his radio transmitter. Setting it back in its cradle, he pulled out his cell phone instead. “Don’t want everybody hearing this.” He punched a speed-dial number and put the phone on speaker just as Warren Doucet answered.

“Gentry’s been sharing his theory with me, and I think he’s right,” Paul said. “We want to stake out the cabin.”

Warren cursed under his breath, and the next voice they heard was the sheriff’s.

“How sure are you about this, Broussard? Billiot?” Knight sounded like he’d been sucking on lemons again.

“I’ve gotta be honest—I’m not sure,” Gentry said. “It’s a hunch, but it’s a strong hunch.”

“Hold on a minute.”

They sat in silence while, in the background, radios and motors and voices echoed the organized chaos of a remobilizing manhunt. Around the Jiffy Stop, business was light, and no one seemed to find it interesting that two LDWF vehicles sat at the edge of the parking lot. Most people thought of the department’s enforcement agents in terms of writing citations for hunting, fishing, and water-safety violations, and that did make up the bulk of their jobs. But working in the rural corners of the parish, they were often the ones who walked into one situation only to blow open something much bigger.

There were lots of places out here for criminals to hide, and those were the places wildlife agents patrolled.

Warren came back on the line. “The sheriff has been unable to reach his man who was in charge of watching the cabin, a Sergeant Baker. Where are you guys?”

After a couple more minutes of talk, they agreed that Gentry and Paul would proceed to the cabin since they were less than five minutes away. They’d report if there was anything suspicious. Meanwhile, the sheriff would get a couple of units on their way from Houma. They’d go ahead and fan out the units in Cocodrie as planned, in case Gentry was wrong.

“Let’s take both trucks,” Paul told him after they ended the call. “We don’t know what we’ll be facing and it gives us more options.”

Gentry nodded and moved back to his own vehicle. He checked his sidearm, his shotgun, and his rifle, making sure all were loaded and on the seat beside him. Who knew what they’d be walking into?

Paul followed him to the cabin turnoff, and Gentry flicked off his lights just before making the turn. Behind him, Paul did the same. It had gone without saying that they’d drive in black. Because agents worked so many night shifts out in the marshes trying to catch illegal hunters and fishermen, most had become adept at navigating in the dark. Good night vision was a job requirement.

As soon as Gentry cleared the trees overhanging the drive, he spotted a white TPSO patrol car parked far to the left. They’d figured if Lang came back here, he’d come by boat, but parking in the open had been risky. It proved no one really expected Lang to come back to the scene of his original crime.

Gentry stopped behind the patrol car, and Paul stopped beside it and exited his vehicle, holding his shotgun. He closed his truck door, but not enough to make a noise, and walked to the open door of Gentry’s truck. “I’m going to take a quiet look-see. Call the lieutenant and tell him the deputy’s car is here.”

Paul was not as heavy-footed as Gentry, so he could move more quietly. Otherwise, Gentry would’ve insisted on going first. This was
his
brother,
his
woman . . . Not that he’d ever tell Ceelie he’d begun to think of her that way. Hell, he hoped he’d get the
chance
to tell her, and she could call him all the sexist-pig names she wanted.

He phoned Warren with the information on the deputy’s car and got out. Something felt wrong, and it took a moment for him to realize what it was. There were lights on in the cabin—not the overhead lights, but a candle or maybe a lantern, barely visible from the outside through the curtains. Had Paul noticed?

As he approached the back side of the porch, a sound came to him from inside, some kind of rhythmic tapping.

“State officers! Open the door!” Upon hearing Paul’s shout, Gentry took off at a run, gun drawn. From inside the cabin, he heard the distinctive click of a shotgun being racked. He rounded the corner to the front porch just as a shot rang out and Paul flew backward, landing in the bayou with a splash. Gentry halted at the corner. Light poured out as the cabin door opened, but the only sound came from the water. Gentry gave the bayou a quick glance, and saw Paul swimming his way to the shore farther down the bank. He moved awkwardly, which told Gentry he’d been hit, but not a serious-enough shot to immobilize him. He’d been lucky; Lang had shot through the door, and solid cypress would slow down even a shotgun slug.

Gentry flattened himself against the front wall of the cabin, hidden in the shadows, and waited. He didn’t want to slip up and shoot inside the structure without knowing where people were. He might hit Ceelie or the sergeant; he had to assume they were in there and incapacitated.

Lang was not a patient man. Eventually, his brother wouldn’t be able to stop himself from coming outside to see if he’d hit his target.

It took less than thirty seconds for Gentry to be proven right. Lang stuck his head out, looked left and right, and then walked onto the porch holding the shotgun. He hadn’t seen his brother.

Lang’s condition shocked Gentry. The brief span of time he’d seen him outside Eva Savoie’s cabin, on the day of the murder, Lang had been wearing an oversized hoodie. Shirtless, every rib protruded from his shrunken chest. Mosquito bites had brought out pink splotches on his pale arms and chest. Unshaven and jittery, he looked every bit the junkie he was. Even given the circumstances, a degree of pity broke through Gentry’s rage. What a damn mess he’d made of his life.

“Hey, Lang.” With his gun drawn and steady, he stepped out of the shadows. “You’ve gotten in way over your head this time.”

Lang swerved and raised his shotgun—or Jena’s, in this case. As soon as he moved, Gentry took a quick sidestep in case he fired on instinct. Gentry’s .45 was a solid weapon and he was a good shot, but a shotgun had more power.

“I thought you’d be halfway to Cocodrie by now.” Lang’s voice shook, then he seemed to gather himself. Instead of running back inside the cabin and slamming the door, which is what Gentry would’ve done, he began to back up, toward the far end of the porch.

“Where you going, Lang?” Gentry took another step toward him, and another. “We need to end this. Nobody has to get hurt.” Except so many already had.

“Back off, Gentry.”

“You know I can’t do that.” They continued to talk softly, moving in tandem until the open door to the cabin lay just to Gentry’s left. He didn’t dare take his eyes off Lang to look inside, which would give his brother a moment’s advantage. He refused to step inside and lock Lang out, hoping Paul would catch him. He didn’t know Paul’s condition or if he even still had his weapons.

This had to end. Here. Now. However it ended.

Lang dropped his right hand to his side with the shotgun pointed toward the ground. “I’m going to back out of here before all your buddies arrive—I think I hear them. They’re your brothers now, right? Not me. Not me for a long time.”

Damn it, the deputies were coming in with sirens.

“You’ll always be my brother, Lang. It’s too late to run, and it’ll be easier on you if you put down the gun and let me take you in.”

Lang laughed, high and frantic. The hand he used to brush the hair away from his face shook badly, and his eyes had a crazy gleam in them. “That’s not happenin’, little brother. I got my boat right here. I’m gonna jump in it, and then I’m gonna be gone. Your little bitch is inside; you’ll get to be her hero, although you probably won’t want her now. I gave her one of those makeovers, like on TV, and it didn’t turn out too good.”

Gentry felt the dead calm of his training sink into his bones like a douse of cold water. “Don’t think I won’t shoot you, Lang. Don’t think I won’t shoot you
again
.”

“You won’t do it.” Lang turned and tossed the shotgun off the porch, and it clattered into what Gentry had to assume was his boat. Lang held up his arms. “I’m not armed. It wouldn’t be a case of self-defense this time, bro. Just you, being a murderer.”

He took another step back and was a foot from the edge of the porch. Gentry didn’t want to shoot him, but one more step and he would. He adjusted his pistol for a kill shot, trying to remember not his brother but Eva Savoie. Tommy Mason’s wife and son. Jena. Ceelie. Especially Ceelie. “Damn it, Lang, last chance to walk away from this. Don’t make me shoot you.”

“Nobody’s makin’ you do nothing, Brother.” Lang took another step back, but before Gentry could squeeze the trigger, a blast from behind him sent Gentry rolling to the porch in a defensive move.

Lang disappeared with a midair pinwheel, a spray of blood from the center of his chest, and a splash.

“Law enforcement! Drop your weapon!” Gentry quickly pivoted and aimed. In the center of the porch, illuminated by the light coming from the cabin door, stood a woman with short, uneven hair, half a muddy, bloody blouse, and wild blue eyes. Silver duct tape covered her mouth; the face behind the tape was barely recognizable. But Gentry knew her. God, how well he knew her.

In her hands, despite wrists bound with more tape, she held out a .45, still ready to fire, on the edge of breaking. She didn’t seem to see Gentry, or anything else. What had that SOB done to her?

“Ceelie.” Gentry kept his voice even, but only because he’d been trained to do so. He wanted to cry. Hell, he
was
crying, unless hot rain had started falling just on his face. “Baby, it’s me. It’s Gentry. You can drop the gun now. It’s over. You’re safe.” He laid his weapon on the porch and got up slowly, with his hands at his sides and open so she could see them.

For a second she stared at him without a spark of recognition, the gun pointed at him. Then her arms began to shake, and she dropped the pistol. It landed on the wooden porch with a solid thud.

Gentry closed the space between them in two long strides, scooping Ceelie up and taking her back inside the cabin. She shook violently. He laid her on the bed, pulled out his knife, and cut the tape on her wrists. “I’m going to the kitchen to get something to take the tape off your face, okay?”

She blinked at him and turned her head. He followed her gaze to a deputy lying on the floor. He blinked a couple of times, so he was conscious, but he’d lost a lot of blood. Gentry went over and freed the man’s arms and legs. “Are you Sergeant Baker?” The officer nodded.

“Gentry Broussard, LDWF. Your guys are already on the way. I’ll call an ambulance.” For both of them.

Paul, with a shoulder wound, arrived just ahead of three teams of TPSO deputies—probably the first three of many. Gentry filled him in quickly and let Paul do the rest of the communicating. Gentry rummaged in the kitchen until he found a bottle of olive oil and took it to the back corner, where Paul had been keeping everyone away from Ceelie while they awaited the EMTs.

Gentry sat on the bed next to her; she flinched and turned her head away slightly, as if steeling herself to be hit. She’d been hit a lot, and by closed fists. There were a few glass cuts on her face similar to Jena’s, but the worst of Ceelie’s injuries had come at the fists of his brother. He hoped the SOB drowned, and that Ceelie didn’t ever feel a moment of guilt for shooting him. He’d make sure of it.