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She could be lying in a bed or on a pallet on a cold floor, her breathing labored, her paper-thin skin turning more and more sallow as the time since her last dialysis treatment grew longer. Without the life-giving procedure, the toxins that her diseased liver couldn’t metabolize would kill her within days, if Billy Joe hadn’t killed her already.
Her once-beautiful mother, still young at forty-two, was an alcoholic. She’d been as good a mother as she could be, given her addiction, while the liquor had systematically destroyed her liver. By the time Hannah was sixteen, she had become her mom’s caregiver.
Right now, sitting in the bright diner with the mug of hot coffee in her hands, she couldn’t even remember how she’d gotten into Billy Joe’s car, peeled out of the driveway or gotten on the interstate. Her only thought had been to run as if the hounds of hell were behind her. All she remembered was that desperate need to stay alive so she could find her mother.
A few minutes ago, four hours and almost two hundred miles later, she’d been forced to stop because she was about out of gas. She took a swallow of hot, strong coffee. What was she going to do? Go back to Dowdie, Texas, where Sheriff Harlan King was already suspicious of her and her mother? He’d been called twice in the past few months, once by neighbors and once by Hannah herself, complaining about her mom’s and Billy Joe’s screaming fights. Two years ago, he’d nearly busted her mom for possession of marijuana.
She thought about what he and his deputies would find this time. Her brain too easily conjured up a picture of Billy Joe, lying in a puddle of his own blood on the floor of the garage, her mother, missing with no explanation, Hannah herself gone, with brand-new tire skid marks on the concrete driveway, and who knew what kind of evidence of illegal drugs in the garage, on Billy Joe’s body, even in her mom’s house.
She couldn’t go back.
The sheriff would never believe her. He’d arrest her and send her to prison and one day they’d find her mother’s body in a ditch or a remote cabin or an abandoned car, and people in Dowdie would talk about Hannah Martin, who’d killed her mother and her mother’s boyfriend, and how quiet and friendly she’d always seemed.
It was a catch-22. If she went back, all the sheriff’s emphasis would be on her, and they probably wouldn’t find her mother until it was too late. But if she didn’t go back, then it might be days before anyone knew her mother was missing. Either way, she was terrified that her mom’s fate was sealed.
She put her palms over her eyes, blocking out the restaurant’s harsh fluorescent lights. She’d spent the past twenty-four hours begging Billy Joe to bring her mother back home. She’d sworn on her mother’s life and her own that she wouldn’t tell a soul, that she would do anything, anything he wanted her to, if he would only bring her mother back home so Hannah could take care of her.
But Billy Joe had been cold and cruel. He’d pushed her up against the wall of her bedroom and told her in explicit detail what he would do to her if she didn’t shut up.
At that moment, Hannah had begun to devise a plan to follow Billy Joe to where he was holding her mother. But now, Billy Joe was dead.
Hannah’s eyes burned and her insides felt more hollow and scorched than they’d ever felt before. Her mother was her only family, and she had no way to find her. Pressing her hand to her chest, Hannah felt the loneliness and grief like a palpable thing.
She picked up the mug and drained the last drops of coffee, then slid out of the booth and went to the cash register. A girl with straight black hair and black eye shadow that didn’t mask the purplish skin under her eyes gave Hannah a hard look along with her change. “You want a place to sleep for a couple hours?” she asked.
Hannah shook her head.
“No charge. There ain’t a lot of traffic tonight. I’ll give you the room closest to here. You don’t have to worry about anybody bothering you.”
“Thanks,” Hannah said, “but I’ve got to get to—” Where? For the first time, she realized she had no idea where she was going. Or where she was. “Where am— I mean, what town is this?”
The girl frowned. “Really? You don’t know? Girl, you need some rest. You’re about ten miles from Shreveport.”
“Louisiana?” Hannah said.
The girl angled her head. “Yeah.... You sure you don’t want to sleep awhile?” She paused for a second, studying Hannah. “You can park your car in the back. Nobody’ll see it back there.”
Hannah shook her head as she took her change. “Thanks,” she said, giving the girl a tired smile. “That’s awfully nice of you, but I’d better get going.”
“Where you headed?”
Hannah stopped at the door and looked out at the interstate that ran past the truck stop, then back at the girl. She’d driven east, but she had no idea where she was going or what she was going to do when she got there. She had to have a plan before she went back to Dowdie. Otherwise all she’d accomplish would be to get herself arrested.
Shreveport, Louisiana. She wasn’t quite sure where in the state Shreveport was, but there was one place in Louisiana she did know. Chef Voleur, on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain.
She recalled a photo her mother had given her a long time ago. It was a picture of two young women, arm in arm, laughing. Her mother had always talked about Chef Voleur and her best friend. We loved that place, Kathleen and me. That whole area around Lake Pontchartrain, from New Orleans to the north shore, is a magical place. She stayed, and I wish I had. Living there was like living in a movie.
She made a vague gesture toward the road. “This is I-20, right?”
The girl nodded.
“I’m going to a town called Chef Voleur,” she said. “To visit a friend of my mother’s.”
“You know you’re going to get there around three o’clock in the morning, right?” the girl said dubiously.
Hannah waved a hand. “My mom’s friend won’t care.”
Hannah prayed that her mother was right about the place being magical. Maybe things would be better there. They certainly couldn’t get much worse. Could they?
As she walked back to Billy Joe’s car, Hannah scanned the nearly empty parking lot, looking for the large maroon sedan that must have belonged to the man with the red tattoo, but she didn’t see any sign of it.
Chapter Two
Just like the girl at the truck stop had predicted, Hannah wound up in Metairie at 3:00 a.m., unable to hold her eyes open any longer. She found a small, seedy motel that she figured wouldn’t push the limit of her credit card, checked in and managed to sleep a little—in fits and starts, interrupted by nightmares of finding her mother just as she was breathing her last breath, or worse, leading the killer to her.
Around eight, she got up, showered and dressed, then sat down on the bed and dumped the contents of her purse. Like her mother, Hannah carried everything essential, valuable or meaningful in her purse. And like her mother, she wasn’t sentimental, so most of the bag’s contents were practical, except for two items. One was a photo her mother had given her years ago. The second was a sealed envelope.
Hannah picked up the envelope. With the traumatic events of the past couple of days, Hannah had totally forgotten about it. Looking at the words scrawled across the front made her want to break down and cry, but she didn’t have time for that. So she carefully placed the envelope back in her purse and picked up her wallet.
She pulled the fragile, dog-eared photo out of a hidden pocket. It had to be thirty years old and was of her mother and Kathleen Griffin, her best friend. On the back it read, “Kath and me at her house.” In a different hand was written “sisters forever,” and an address in Chef Voleur, Louisiana.
Hannah looked up the address and took note of the directions. She was about to head out when her cell phone rang.
When she looked at the display, her heart skipped a beat. It was the Dowdie, Texas, sheriff’s office. Hannah’s already queasy stomach did a nauseating flip, the result of too little sleep, too much coffee and the image of Billy Joe’s blood in her head.
She stared at the display, not moving, until the phone stopped ringing, then she dropped the phone back into her purse. There was no doubt in her mind why they were calling. They’d found Billy Joe’s body. But how could she talk to them? What would she say? How would she explain to the authorities why she had run away to South Louisiana after witnessing a murder if she couldn’t explain it to herself?
It took her about half an hour to drive to the address written on the back of the photo. It was across the street from a pizza place. With the photo in her hand she walked up to the building, hope clogging her throat.
A small voice deep inside her asked why she thought that talking to her mother’s old friend would help her find and rescue her mother back in Texas.
She had no idea. Except that her only other choice was to trust Sheriff King to believe her, and she’d been taught at her mother’s knee that authorities couldn’t be trusted. Sheriffs. Police. Lawyers. They were the people who took children away from their mothers and placed them in foster care. They threatened sick people with prison for using marijuana to relieve the debilitating nausea associated with cancer and other diseases.
* * *
SHE KNOCKED ON the heavy wood door, then realized immediately that her tentative rapping probably couldn’t be heard by anyone inside. So she rapped a second time, harder.
For a long moment that probably spanned no more than eight or ten seconds, she stood there listening and heard nothing. As she lifted her hand to rap again, she heard soft thuds on the other side of the door, as if someone was walking on a hardwood floor in socks or barefoot.
Standing stiffly, not quite ready to believe that she’d actually found her mother’s best friend, Kathleen, she waited for the door to open.
When it did, it was not a pretty, dark-haired woman with even, striking features and a beautiful smile who stood there. It was a man. He was tall and lean and he had the same even, striking features but they were distorted in a scowl. And he had a cell phone to his ear.
After a brief, dismissive glance at her, he scanned the hallway behind her. Once he’d assured himself that she was the only one there, he said, “Hang on a minute,” into the phone. “I’ve got to deal with somebody at the door.” His tone was irritated and impatient.
Private investigator MacEllis Griffin kept his expression neutral as he eyed the young woman from the top of her streaked blond hair to the toes of her clunky sandals.
“What is it?” he growled. She stood there looking at him with all the apprehension of a kid called to the principal’s office. Only she was no kid and he was no schoolteacher.
She could have been a kid. Her hair was pulled back into a single messy braid that looked like she’d slept in it. The skinny jeans were slightly loose on her slender frame and the shirt looked more slept in than her hair.
“Hmm? Oh, nope. It’s pretty slow here,” Mack said into the phone as he tried to guess her age. Twenty-five? Twenty-six? Under twenty-five? Hard to tell. She had that heart-shaped face that always looked young. But faint blue circles under her eyes that matched the color of her jeans told him she was much older than her hair or clothes might indicate. She opened her mouth but he held up a finger. “Buono’s working a missing person case,” he said. “A seventeen-year-old. Probably ran away with her boyfriend.”
“Well, get to the office and do something useful,” Dawson Delancey, his boss, replied. “You could file your past three months’ expenses if you’re bored.”
Mack didn’t take his eyes off the young woman as he laughed. “I’ll never be that bored,” he said. “In fact, I might be real interested in something real soon.” He smiled when the woman’s gaze dropped from his and her cheeks turned pink.
“In what?” Dawson asked. “Was that the mailman delivering your latest issue of Playboy?”
“Right. He just got here from 2002,” Mack responded. “Nope. Looks like I’m about to be hit up for Girl Scout cookies or a donation to a religious cause. I’d better go.”
“I hope it’s the donation. You don’t need the cookies,” Dawson said.
“Bite me,” Mack said conversationally. “You’re the one getting fat on your wife’s Italian cooking.”
“You’re just jealous. Juliana and I will be back in Biloxi in a few days. I’ll give you a call when we know for sure.”
“Okay. Later. ’Bye.”
As Mack hung up the phone, the young woman met his gaze and gave him a sad, self-conscious smile. The smile didn’t reach her eyes and the only thing it accomplished was to make her look older and sadder.
A familiar sinking feeling gnawed at his stomach. He knew that smile. He’d never met this woman before, but he knew her type way too well. Standing there with that sadness in her eyes, that furrow between her brows. She was the embodiment of a lot of things he’d worked very hard to forget. She was exactly the type of person—the type of woman—he’d spent his adult life avoiding.
He upped his scowl by about a hundred watts and aimed it directly at her. With any luck, she’d turn and run. Her type was easily intimidated.
But her gaze didn’t waver. She lifted her chin and to his surprise, he recognized a staunch determination in her green eyes, along with a spark of stubbornness. Interesting. But the small furrow between her brows didn’t smooth out and the corners of her mouth were still pinched and tight.
He put his hand on the doorknob, preparing to close the door and get back to his coffee. “Can I help you?” he asked grudgingly.
“I’m looking for Kathleen Griffin,” she said quietly.
The name hit him like a blow to the solar plexus. “Who?” he said, an automatic response designed to give him a second to think. But his brain seemed suddenly to be caught in a loop. Kathleen Griffin, Kathleen. Kathleen.
“K-Kathleen Griffin. The mailbox said Griffin.” She gestured vaguely toward the front door.
It had been twenty years since his mother had died. This young woman wouldn’t have been more than five or six at the time. Why would she be looking for his mother? “What’s this about?”
“It’s...personal,” she said, glancing behind him into his foyer.
“I doubt that,” he said flatly. “Go peddle whatever you’re selling somewhere else. Kathleen Griffin doesn’t live here.” He started to close the door, but she held out a small, dog-eared photo. The paper was old and faded, but one of the two women in the picture looked familiar.
“Please,” she said. Her hand was trembling, making the paper flutter.
“What’s that?” he asked, knowing he was going to regret having asked that question. He held the door in its half-shut position.
The young woman’s throat quivered as she swallowed. “It’s a picture of my mother and Kathleen Griffin,” she said, lifting her chin. “I really need to see her. It’s a—” she bit her lower lip briefly and her gaze faltered “—it’s a matter of life and death.”
He gave a short laugh, but cut it off when she winced. “Life and death,” he said dubiously. “Who are you?”
“Hannah Martin,” she responded. “My mother is Stephanie Clemens.”
She waited, watching him. But he didn’t recognize the name. He gave a quick shake of his head, took a small step backward and started to close the door.
“You’re her son, aren’t you?”
Her words sent his stomach diving straight down to his toes. He shook his head, not in denial—in resignation. She had him and he knew it. He also knew that if he didn’t do whatever he had to do in order to get rid of her this minute, he was going to regret it for a long time. “I’m sorry, but Kathleen Griffin is dead. So...” He put his hand on the door, preparing to close it.
“Oh. Oh, no,” Hannah Martin said, her eyes filling with tears and her face losing its color. “I’m so sorry—” she started, but at that instant, her phone rang. She jerked at the sound, then reached into her purse and pulled it out.
As Mack watched, she looked at the screen as if she was afraid it might reach out and bite her. When she checked the display, her face lost what little color it had. She made a quiet sound, like a small animal cornered by a hungry predator. Her fingers tightened on the phone until the knuckles turned white, and all the time, the phone kept ringing, a loud, strident peal.
Whoever was on the other end of that call frightened her. In fact, she looked as if she’d seen a ghost. When the ringing finally stopped, Hannah dropped the phone back into her purse as if it were made of molten lava.
Mack had missed his best opportunity. He should have closed the door as soon as her phone rang. It was the perfect opportunity to escape. But he hadn’t taken it. He wasn’t sure why.
“I’m sorry about your mother,” she said in a trembling voice. “I don’t know what I was thinking, coming here. I apologize for bothering you.” She closed her eyes briefly.
She’d let him off the hook. He took a step backward, preparing to close the door, because of course, she was about to turn and walk away.
But she didn’t move. Her ghostly white face took on a faint greenish hue. She swayed like a slender tree in a punishing wind. Then she fainted.
Mack dived, catching her in time to keep her head from hitting the floor. She was fairly short, compared to his six-foot-one-inch height and he’d already noticed that she wasn’t a lightweight. Her body was compact and firm. Lowering her gently to the floor, he grabbed a pillow off the couch and placed it under her head, making the decision to leave her on the floor rather than try to move her to the couch or a bed.
By the time he’d gotten the pillow under her head, she’d woken up. He recalled a paramedic telling him once that if someone passed out and woke up immediately, they were probably in no immediate danger.
Her face still had that greenish hue, although surprisingly, it didn’t detract from its loveliness. He retrieved the photo she’d dropped when she’d passed out. He looked at the two young women—girls, really. They were both pretty and pleasant-faced. They were laughing at whoever was taking the picture, and behind them, Mack recognized the furniture. Most of it was still here. He knew one of the girls. It was his mother. He smiled sadly, seeing how young and happy and innocent she looked.
He’d never seen the other girl before, but the young woman lying just outside his door bore a strong resemblance to her. He turned the photo over. On the back was written “Kath and me at her house” in an unfamiliar hand. The other handwriting he knew. It was his mother’s flowery script. She’d written “sisters forever” and his address.
Hannah stirred and tried to sit up. “What happened?” she asked, looking around in confusion.
“You fainted,” he said.
She stared at him. “No, I didn’t,” she said, frowning at him suspiciously. “I never faint. Did you do something—?” But then her hand went to her head. “I feel dizzy.”
“Just sit there a minute. I’ll get you some water,” he said grudgingly. He rose and drew her a glass of tap water. When he handed her the glass, she drank about half of it.
Then she shook her head as if trying to shake off a haze. “I guess I must have fainted.”
“I guess,” he said, a faint wryness in his voice.
She rose onto her haunches and stood, then grabbed on to his forearm for a second, to steady herself. “I never faint,” she said again.
Mack smiled. “So I’ve heard,” he said, thinking she was stubborn. He assessed her. Her color was still not good. “Do you want to sit down?” he asked, then felt irritated at himself for asking. Hell, she’d stood up on her own. So it was the perfect time for her to leave. And again, he’d missed his chance. And right there was one of the primary reasons why he didn’t get involved with her type. She was obviously on some personal mission that would consume her life until she accomplished it. A certain clue—she’d driven all night without stopping except to get coffee and gasoline.
“Thanks,” she said, and turned and headed, a little unsteadily, for the small dining table. He followed her.
She started to sit, then looked around.
