Cry Wolf

Chapter Twenty-One

Laurel slipped from the bed at dawn and dressed silently in the soft light that filtered through the French doors and lace curtains. For a long while she stood by the balcony door and just studied him, as an artist might study a subject before putting brush to canvas, taking in everything about the man, the mood. The light seemed the color and consistency of fine sand, golden and grainy, and it didn't quite penetrate the shadows of the graceful four-poster. Jack lay sprawled on his belly, taking up most of the bed, his face buried in the crook of his arm. His bronzed back was a sculpture of lean, rippling muscle. The sheet, a drift of white, covered only a section of thigh and hips. One leg was bent at the knee, thigh and calf strong, masculine, dusted with rough, dark hair.

Laurel memorized the way he looked in that moment, this first morning after she'd fallen in love with him. It didn't seem any wiser today than it had in the night. She had no idea where these feelings would lead, but she wouldn't deny to herself that she felt them. She'd lied to herself enough in her lifetime. She had, however, refrained from telling Jack, knowing without being told that he wouldn't want to hear it.

Her heart squeezed painfully at the thought, but she pushed the pain away. She would let things take their natural course. The feelings were too new, too sensitive to be trod upon by something as heavy as practicality or an awkward morning-after scene.

She touched two fingers to her kiss-swollen lips and wondered how she had gotten in so deep so fast with a man like Jack Boudreaux. They were opposites in many ways, too alike in others. An unlikely match drawn together by pain, bound by something neither of them would speak of-love.

It had to have been love in his touch during the long, sultry night. The tenderness, the poignancy, the sweetness, the desperation-in her logical, analytical mind, those components added up to more than mere lust, she was sure. Just as she was sure Jack would never acknowledge it and she would never speak the word. Not now. Not when he was so certain he didn't deserve anything good. She wouldn't try to bind him to her with words and guilt. He had enough guilt of his own.

Unbidden, thoughts came of the wife and child he had lost, and she ached for him so, she nearly cried out. She knew about loss, and she knew about blame. She thought of the unloved, battered boy he had been, and the frightened, emotionally neglected little girl in her wanted to reach out and gather him close. And she knew if Jack had suspected any of what she was thinking, he would have done his damnedest to chase her away. He hoarded his pain like a miser, stored it deep inside, and shared it with no one. It stayed stronger that way, more potent, more punishing. She knew.

God, why him? Why did she have to go and fall in love with a man like Jack at a time like this, when all she really wanted to do was get her feet back under her and get her life back on track-any track?

No answer came to her as dawn broke over the bayou in ribbons of soft color. No answer but her heartbeat.

In the frame of the open French door a small dark spider was carefully spinning a web of hair-fine silk that glistened in the new light with crystal beads of morning dew. Laurel watched for a moment, thinking of her own attempt to build a new life. She had come home to heal, to start over, and she felt as if she were as fragile, as vulnerable as that newly spun web. She looked for toe holds and tried to weave back together all that had been torn asunder inside her, but the slightest outside force would tear it all apart again, and once again she would be left with nothing.

Her gaze shifted to Jack, who was still asleep-or pretending to be-and she felt that tenuous foundation tremble beneath her. With a heavy, tender heart, she tiptoed out of the room and left the house.

As he heard the hollow echo of the front door closing, Jack turned over slowly and stared up at the morning shadows on the ceiling. He wanted to love her. His heart ached for it so, it nearly took his breath. It surprised him after all this time, after all the hard lessons, that he could still be vulnerable. He should have been able to steel himself against it. He should have known enough to turn her away last night. But he had wanted so badly just to hold her, just to take some comfort in her sweetness.

He had wanted her from the first. Desire he understood. It was simple, basic, elemental. But this… this was something he could never be trusted with again. And because he knew that, he had somehow believed he would never be tempted. Now he felt like a fool, betrayed by his own heart, and he kicked himself mercilessly for it. Stupid, selfish bastard… He couldn't allow himself to fall in love with Laurel Chandler. She deserved far better than him.

And maybe, a lost, lonely part of him thought as the pain of those self-inflicted blows burst through him, maybe after all the penance he had done, he deserved to be left in peace.

Laurel went up to her room via the courtyard and balcony, not wanting to alert anyone else in the house that she was only just returning. Preoccupied with turbulent thoughts of Jack and the night they had spent together, she took a long, warm shower, then dressed for the day in a pair of black walking shorts and a loose white polo shirt. She assessed her looks in the mirror above the walnut commode, seeing a woman with troubled eyes and damp, dark hair combed loosely back.

There should have been some external sign of the changes made inside her during the last few days-the strength she had regained fighting for her new friends, the humility that remained after her pompous ideas concerning Savannah 's life had been shattered, the uncertainty in her heart about her own future.

With a sigh she dropped her gaze to the small china tray on the commode where she had left the little pile of oddities she'd come across recently. The gaudy earring no one would lay claim to, the matchbook from Le Mascarade she had found in her car, the necklace that had come in the plain white envelope. At a glance they seemed unrelated, harmless, but something about the way they had simply appeared made her uneasy. Looks could be deceiving. An earring with no mate. A matchbook with a name that conjured images of people in disguise. A necklace. There was no thread to tie the items to one another other than the mystery of their origin.

She lifted the necklace, draping the flimsy chain over her index finger. The little butterfly wobbled and danced in a bar of light that slanted through the door. It was probably Savannah 's, she told herself again. She'd left it somewhere with a lover. She was notoriously careless with her things. The man had sent it… in an envelope with no address. No. It had to have been left in the car. Unless the Bayou Breaux post office was employing psychics, blank envelopes didn't get delivered.

The obvious solution was to simply ask Savannah herself. Forgetting the hour, Laurel marched down the balcony to her sister's room and let herself in.

The bed was empty. The sheets were tangled. The same abandoned clothes littered the chairs and floor. The same sense of stillness as had been there the night before hung, damp and musty in the air.

The memory of that stillness hit Laurel like a wall. It had seemed so surreal, she had almost convinced herself it had been a dream, but here it was again with panic hard on its heels. Savannah hadn't slept in this bed. When was the last time anyone in the house had seen her? She had returned the Acura sometime Tuesday night or Wednesday morning-How did anyone know that? The car had been in the drive Wednesday morning, but no one had actually seen Savannah that day.

"Murders?" "… four now in the past eighteen months… women of questionable reputation… found strangled out in the swamp…"

"Oh, God," Laurel whispered as tears swam in her eyes and crowded her throat till it ached.

She clutched the little necklace in her fist and bit down hard on a knuckle as wild, terrible, conflicting images roared around in her head like debris caught up in a tornado wind. Savannah lying dead someplace. Savannah locked in combat with Annie Gerrard, her eyes glazed with blood lust. T-Grace screaming on the gallery at Frenchie's. Vivian relating the tale of the vandal at St. Joseph 's Rest Home. "Blood will tell." Blood. Blood from wounds. Bloodred-the color of the matchbook from Le Mascarade. Savannah's face blank as she tossed it on the table. "I use a lighter…" Savannah, finally pushed over that mental edge after all these years because of that son of a bitch Ross Leighton. Savannah, used by men, by Conroy Cooper, by Jimmy Lee Baldwin, who liked his women bound…

All of it whirled around and around in Laurel's mind like fractured bits of glass in a kaleidoscope, every picture uglier than the one before it, every possibility too terrible to be true. And over it all came the harsh voice of logic, scolding her for her foolishness, for her lack of faith, for her lack of evidence. All she really knew was that her sister wasn't home, and no one in the family had seen her since Tuesday. The only logical thing was to go looking for her.

She seized on the notion with a rush of relief and resolve. Don't fall apart, do something. Get results. Solve the mystery.

Focused, all the tension drawn into a tight ball of energy that lodged in her chest, she left the room and went to her own to get shoes and her purse. She would leave the back way, she thought as she trotted down the steps to the courtyard. No use alarming Aunt Caroline or Mama Pearl. She would find Savannah, and everything would be all right.

Mama Pearl was up already, shuffling out onto the gallery with a cup of coffee and the latest Redbook. She caught sight of Laurel the instant her sneaker touched ground at the foot of the stairs.

"Chile, what you doin' up dis hour?" she demanded, her brow furrowing under the weight of her worry.

Laurel pasted on a smile and stepped toward the back gate. "Lots to do, Mama Pearl."

The old woman snorted her disgust for modern femininity and tossed her magazine down on the table. "You come eat breakfast, you. You so little, the crows gonna carry you 'way."

"Maybe later!" Laurel called, waving, picking up the pace as she turned for the back gate.

She thought she could still hear Mama Pearl grumbling when she was halfway to L'Amour. It might have been her stomach, but she doubted it; it had gotten too used to being empty. Out of habit, she dug an antacid tablet out of her pocketbook and chewed it like candy.

She had left Jack to avoid the awkwardness of morning-after talk. What had passed between them during the night had gone far beyond words and into a realm of unfamiliar territory. But this was safe ground. She wanted to ask his opinion, tap his knowledge. It was like business, really. And friendship. She wanted his support, she admitted as Huey bounded between a pair of crepe myrtle trees and bore down on her with his tongue lolling out the side of his mouth and a gleam in his mismatched eyes.

The hound crashed into her, knocking her into the front door with a thud. As she called him a dozen names that defamed his character and his lineage, he pounced at her feet, yipping playfully, snapping at her shoelaces. He whirled around and leaped off the front step, running in crazy circles with his tail tucked, clearly overjoyed to see her. Laurel scowled at him as he dropped to the ground at the foot of the step and rolled over on his back, inviting her to scratch his blue-speckled belly.

"Goofy dog," she muttered, giving in and bending over to pat him. "Don't you know when you're being snubbed?"

"Love is blind," Jack said sardonically, swinging the door open behind her.

He was in the same rumpled jeans. No shirt. He hadn't shaved. A mug of coffee steamed in his hand. As Laurel stood, she could see that the brew was as black as night. She breathed in its rich aroma and tried to will her heartbeat to steady. He didn't look pleased to see her. The man who had held her and loved her through the night was gone, replaced by the Jack she would rather not have known, the brooding, angry man.

"If you've got some milk to cut that motor oil you're drinking, I could use a cup myself."

He studied her for a minute, as if trying to decipher her motives, then shrugged and walked into the house, leaving her to follow as she would. Laurel trailed after him down a long hall, catching glimpses of rooms that had stood unused for decades. Water-stained wallpaper. Moth-eaten draperies. Furnishings covered with dust cloths, and dust cloths thick with their namesake.

It was as if no one lived here, and the thought gave her an odd feeling of unease. Certainly Jack, The New York Times best-selling author, could afford to have the place renovated. But she didn't ask why he hadn't, because she had a feeling she knew. Penance. Punishment. L'Amour was his own personal purgatory. The idea tugged at her heart, but she didn't go to him as she longed to. His indifference to her presence set the ground rules for the morning-no clinging, no pledges.

He led her into a kitchen that, unlike the rest of the house, was immaculate. The red of the walls had faded to the color of tomato soup, but they were clean and free of cobwebs. The refrigerator was new. Cupboards and gray tile countertops had been cleaned and polished. The only sign of food was a rope of entwined garlic bulbs and one of red peppers that hung on either side of the window above the sink, but it was a place where food could be prepared without threat of ptomaine.

He pulled a mug down from the cupboard and filled it for her from the old enamel pot on the stove. Laurel helped herself to the milk-a perfect excuse to snoop. Eleven bottles of Jax, a quart of milk, a jar of bread-and-butter pickles, and three casseroles, each bearing a different name penned on a strip of masking tape like offerings for a church potluck supper. Lady friends taking care of him, no doubt. The thought brought a mix of jealousy and amusement.

She leaned back against the counter, stirring her coffee. "Have you seen Savannah since the other morning when she left in such a huff?"

"No. Why?"

"I haven't, either. Nor has Aunt Caroline or Mama Pearl." She fiddled with her spoon as the nerves in her stomach quivered. She fixed her gaze on Jack's belly button and the dark hair that curled around it. "I'm a little concerned."

He shrugged. "She's with a lover."

"Maybe. Probably. It's just that…" She trailed off as the suspicions and theories tried to surface. She wished she could share it all with him, but he wasn't in a sharing mood, and faced with the stony expression he was wearing, she couldn't bring herself to tell him any of it. She felt alone; the one thing she had come to him to avoid. "… with all that's been going on, I'd feel better knowing for certain."

"So what do you want from me, sugar?" he asked bluntly. "You know for a fact she's not in my bed."

"Why are you doing this?" she demanded, setting her cup aside on the counter. She halved the distance between them, hands jammed on her hips.

"What?"

"Being such a bastard."

Jack arched a brow and grinned sharply. "It's what I do best, angel."

"Oh, stop it!" she snapped. "It's too early in the morning for this kind of bullshit." She dared another step toward him, peering up at him in narrow-eyed speculation. "What did you think, Jack? That I was coming over here to ask you to marry me?" she said sarcastically. "Well, I'm not. You can relax. Your martyrdom is safe. All I want is a little help. A straight answer or two would be nice."

He scowled at her as the martyrdom barb hit and stuck dead center. Giving in to the need to escape her scrutiny, he abandoned his coffee and sauntered across the room to pull a beer from the fridge.

"What do you want me to say?" he asked, twisting off the top with a quick motion of his wrist. "That I know who was screwing your sister last night? I don't. If I were to hazard a guess as to the possible candidates, I could just as well hand you a phone book."

"Oh, fine," Laurel bit back. She stalked him across the room like a tiger. Fury bubbled up inside her, and she wished to God she were big enough and strong enough to pound the snot out of Jack Boudreaux. He deserved it, and it would have gone a long way to appease her own wounded pride. "You're a big help, Jack."

"I told you, sugar, I don' get involved."

"What a crock," she challenged, toe to toe with him now, leaning up toward him with her chin out and fire in her eyes. She might have been uncertain treading the uneven ground of their suddenly formed relationship, but she knew what to do in an argument. "You're dabbling around the edges everywhere, Jack-with Frenchie's, with the Delahoussayes, with Baldwin, with me. You're just too big a coward to do more than get your feet wet."

"Coward?" He gaped at her, at the sound of the word. He described himself in many ways, few of them flattering, but "coward" was not on the list.

Laurel pressed on, shooting blind, fighting on instinct. Her skills were rusty, and she had never been good at keeping her heart out of a fight, anyway. It tumbled into the fray now, tender and brimming with new emotion. The words were out of her mouth before she could even try to rope them back. "Every time it starts looking like you might have a chance at something good, you turn tail and run behind that I-don't-give-a-damn facade."

"A chance at something good?" Jack said, his gaze sharp on hers, his heart clenching in his chest. "Like what? Like us?"

She bit her tongue on the answer, but it flashed in her eyes just the same. Jack swore under his breath and turned away from her. Struggling for casual indifference, he shook a cigarette out from a pack lying on the counter and dangled it from his lip. "Mon Dieu, a couple' a good rolls in the sack and suddenly-"

"Don't!" Laurel snapped. She held a finger up in warning and pressed her lips together hard to keep them from trembling. "Don't you dare." She gulped down a knot of tears and struggled to snatch a breath that didn't rattle and catch in her throat. "I didn't come here to have this fight," she said tightly. "I came here because I thought you might be able to help me, because I thought we were friends."

Jack blew out a huff of air and shook his head. "I can't help anybody."

Laurel tugged her composure tight around herself. Damned if she'd let him make her cry. "Yeah? Well, forgive me for asking you to breach the asshole code of conduct," she sneered. "I'll just go ask Jimmy Lee Baldwin flat out if he had my sister tied to his bed the past two nights. I'll just go knock on every goddamn door in the parish until I find her!" She held up a hand as if to ward off an offer that was not forthcoming. "Thanks anyway, Jack," she said bitterly, "but I don't need you after all."

He watched her storm out of the kitchen and down the hall, a frown tugging at his mouth, a lead weight sinking in his chest. "That's what I've been tellin' you all along, angel," he muttered, then he turned and went in search of matches.

Coop stared into his underwear drawer, frowning at the array of serviceable cotton Jockey shorts and boxers and the little silk things Savannah had bought him. He lifted out a white silk G-string, dangling it from his finger, shaking his head. He'd felt stupid as hell wearing it, too big and too old and too set in his ways. But as he dropped it in the wastebasket beside the dresser, he felt a little twinge of regret, just the same.

She wouldn't be back this time. The fight to end all fights had been fought. It was over, once and for all.

Too bad, he thought as he stared out the window. He had loved her. If only she had been able to take that love for what it was worth and find happiness. Of course, that restless, insatiable quality had been one of the things to draw him to her in the first place. So needy, so desperate to assuage that need, so utterly, pitiably incapable of filling that gaping hole within her heart.

He sighed as his mind idly drew character sketches of Savannah, and his gaze fell through the window, taking in the details of the setting. The bayou was a strip of bottle green beyond the yard, and beyond the banks lay the tangled wilderness of the Atchafalaya. Wild and sultry, like Savannah, unpredictable and deceivingly delicate, fragility in the guise of unforgiving toughness.

He thought he ought to write the image down, but he couldn't work up the ambition to go and get his notebook. Instead, he let the lines fade away and tended to his packing. Five pairs of shorts, five pairs of socks, the tie bar Astor had given him the Christmas before she forgot his name.

Astor. God, how different she had been from Savannah. She had always worn her fragility like a beautiful orchid corsage, as if it were the badge of a true lady, a sign of breeding. Her toughness had been inside, a stoic strength that had borne her through the stages of her decline with dignity. She would have disapproved of Savannah-silently, politely, with a tip of her head and a cluck of her tongue. But he imagined Astor would have forgiven Savannah her sins. He wasn't so sure the same could be said for his case. He had made his wife a pledge, after all.

The doorbell intruded on his musings, and Coop abandoned the closet and his shirt selections to answer it, never expecting to find Laurel Chandler standing on the stoop.

"Mr. Cooper, I'm Laurel Chandler," she said, all business, no seductive smile, no gleam of carnal fire in the eyes behind the oversize, mannish spectacles.

"Yes, of course," he said. Remembering his manners, he stepped back from the door. "Would you care to come in?"

"I'll be blunt, Mr. Cooper," Laurel said, making no move to enter the house. "I'm looking for my sister."

Coop sighed heavily, wearily, feeling his age and the weight of his infidelity bearing down on his broad shoulders. "Yes. Do come in, Miz Chandler, please. I'm afraid I'm in a bit of a hurry, but we can talk as I pack."

Determined to dislike him, Laurel stepped past him and into the entry hall of a lovely old home that held family heirlooms and an ageless sense of loneliness with equal grace. Everything was in its place and polished to a shine, with no one here to see it. A grandfather clock ticked the seconds away at the foot of the stairs, marking time to the end of a family. Cooper and his wife had no children. When they were gone, so would be the memories the family had made in this house over the generations.

She cast a hard glance at Conroy Cooper. Behind the lenses of his gold-rimmed glasses, he met her gaze with the bluest, warmest, saddest eyes she had ever seen, and he smiled, wistfully, regretfully. It wasn't difficult to see what had attracted her sister. He was a big, strong, athletic man, even at an age that had to be near sixty. His face had probably taken young ladies' breath in his hey-day. A strong jaw and a boyish grin. Now it was a map etched with lines of stress and living. No less handsome; more interesting. He stood there in rumpled chinos with one leg cocked, his head tipped on one side. A gray T-shirt with a faded Tulane logo spanned his shoulders and hung free of his pants.

"I am certain you are well aware of my relationship with your sister," he drawled, that smooth, wonderful voice rolling out of him, rolling over Laurel like sunwarmed caramel. She steeled herself against its effects. "And you think less of me for it."

"You're an adulterer, Mr. Cooper. What am I supposed to think of you?"

"That perhaps I loved Savannah as best I could while trying to keep a promise to a woman who no longer remembers me or anything of the life we once had together."

Laurel pressed her lips together and looked down at her shoes, dodging the steady blue gaze.

"Savannah once told me you thought in absolutes," he said. "Right or wrong. Guilty or not guilty. Life isn't quite so black and white as you would like for it to be, Laurel. Nothing is as absolute in reality as it is in our minds in our youth."

"Loved," Laurel repeated, seizing on the thought to fend off any pangs of contrition his words may have inspired. She raised her head and looked at him sharply again. "You said loved. Past tense."

"Yes. It's over." He ran a hand back through his blond hair, glancing at the clock as it ticked away another few seconds. "I don't mean to be rude, but I have to be in N'Awlins this afternoon. If you'll excuse my back, I'll lead the way."

As she followed him into his bedroom, a feeling of something like déjà vu stole over her. The furnishings were big and masculine. The smell of leather and shoe polish underscored the faint woodsy tang of aftershave. Like Daddy's room back home before Vivian had dismantled it and given it over to Ross.

A duffel bag sat open on the white counterpane on the bed, giving her a peek of white cotton and polished wingtips. Cooper went to the closet and selected three shirts, which he hung neatly in a black garment bag on the closet door.

"She wanted to go with me on this trip," he said. "Of course, I had to tell her no. She knew very well the boundaries of our relationship. If you think she took the news well, I should point out to you that I used to have a collection of fine antique shaving mugs left to me by my grandfather. I kept them in that cabinet next to the bathroom door."

The curio cabinet stood, an empty frame with no glass in its sides and no antique shaving mugs within. All signs of the destruction had been vacuumed away, but Laurel could very easily picture her sister hurling mugs at Cooper's head. She had that kind of rage in her, that kind of violence.

Fingers of tension curled around her stomach and squeezed.

"When did this argument take place?" she asked, turning to face Cooper once again.

He hung a pearl gray suit in the garment bag and smoothed the sleeves. "Tuesday. Why?"

"Because I haven't seen her since Tuesday morning."

He pulled another suit from the closet and added it to the bag, frowning as his mind rushed to plot out scenarios. "Then she's probably gone on to N'Awlins. I wouldn't put it past her to think she could disrupt my stay."

"She didn't have a car."

"She may have caught a ride with a friend." His mouth compressed into a tight line as he zipped the bag shut. "Or another man. You might check with the Maison de Ville. She likes to stay in the cottages there."

"Yes," Laurel murmured. "I know."

They had stayed there the spring before their father died. A family outing, one of the few she remembered happily. She could still hear Vivian going on about how movie stars sometimes stayed there. She could still see the thick-walled cottages and the courtyard, could still hear the noise and smell the ripe smells of New Orleans as she had perceived them then, through the senses of a child.

Cooper pulled the garment bag down from the closet door, folded and latched it securely. Laurel watched his hands. They were thick and strong with square-cut nails. The hands of a farmer or a carpenter, not a writer. A gold band, burnished with age, circled the third finger of his left hand.

"How is your wife?"

His head came up sharply, eyes shining with interest and surprise as he studied her. He swung the bag onto the bed beside the duffel.

Laurel picked at her ravaged thumbnail absently, uncomfortable with the topic and his scrutiny. "I heard about the incident at St. Joseph's. I'm sorry."

Coop nodded slowly, finding it interesting that Laurel would apologize for the actions of her sister. They were two sides of the same coin-one light, one dark; one driven by angst to acts of justice, one to strange fits of passion. Laurel subdued everything feminine about herself; Savannah flaunted and magnified. Laurel held everything within; Savannah knew no boundaries and no control.

"She's doing well enough," he said. "One of the few saving graces of her illness is that she forgets unpleasantness almost as quickly as it happens. It's the rest of us who have to go on with bad memories lingering like the smell of smoke."

The past was gone, but its taint was stubborn and pervasive. An apt analogy, Laurel thought as she left the house.

She slid behind the wheel of her car and just sat there for a moment, her mind trying to go in eight directions at once. Cooper thought Savannah had gone to New Orleans. It didn't feel right. Savannah had always treated a trip to New Orleans as an event, something to fuss over and pack and repack for. She would have told Aunt Caroline, promised to bring back something outrageous for Mama Pearl just to hear the old woman huff and puff. She wouldn't have slipped away like a thief in the night, regardless of who she had gone with.

She would call the Maison de Ville, just to be sure, but there were other possibilities, and one of them was Jimmy Lee Baldwin.

Jimmy Lee stretched out across his rumpled bed and groaned. He felt near death with exhaustion. He smelled of rank, ripe sweat with an undertone of liquor and an overtone of sex. Without question, he needed a long shower before his lunch meeting with his deacons. Deacons. Christ, the saps would go nuts over that title.

"You're fucking brilliant, Jimmy Lee," he snickered, staring up at the creaking old ceiling fan as it strained to stir the stale air. "You're a Grade A-mazing, God damntastic genius."

It was the sign of a man who would go far. When things turned sour, he found a way to sweeten the deal. The taping at the Texaco station hadn't turned out the way he had planned, but ultimately it was going to be to his advantage. He would make sure of it.

The brainstorm had come in the middle of a wild, hard fuck. In a way, he had a whore to thank, ironic as that seemed. The answer to his troubles was what she had begged from him-mercy, sympathy. He would play on the sympathies of his followers. He didn't believe in giving sympathy himself. Go for the throat. Look out for Number One. Those were his mottoes. But the American people had traditionally loved an underdog. He would get a few key puppets whipped into a frenzy for his flagging cause, they would rally the troops, and he'd be back on track in nothing flat.

He smiled a wicked smile as he pictured it. The looks on their gullible, stupid faces as he poured his heart out to them about the plight of his ministry and his campaign to end sin. His cause was being sabotaged by Satan in the guise of Jack Boudreaux. He was being thwarted and made to look a fool at every turn, and he just didn't know if he had the heart to go on alone. Perhaps if one or two good men would be willing to shoulder some of his burden by filling the role of deacon… Their eyes would go wide, and their faces would shine with imagined grace.

The timing was perfect. Discovery of a mutilated female in their own backyards tended to turn people's thoughts to God and to vengeance. They would want a leader and a scapegoat, and Jimmy Lee intended to give them both.

He sat up just enough to snag the paperback off his nightstand and fell back across the lumpy mattress, thumbing through the pages.

Blood ran in rivulets, pearling and tumbling in the knife's wake. She tried to scream, but the sound vibrated only in her mind. Her throat was raw. Silk filled her mouth, like a stopper in a bottle, and the tie of the gag pulled her lips back in a macabre smile…

"Twisted stuff, Jack my man." He chuckled as he folded down the corner on the page.

This was all playing right into his hands. He fantasized about all the possibilities as he stripped and showered in the grungy, mildew-coated shower stall. Jack Boudreaux would get pinned for the murders. Jimmy Lee would be a hero. Free publicity. Fan mail. The faithful would come out of the woodwork and follow him anywhere, do anything for him. What a perfectly wonderful dream.

He was a happy and satisfied man as he dressed. He even hummed a few bars of an old gospel tune as he polished off the knot in his tie and stood back to critique his look in the mirror above the bathroom sink.

His tawny hair was slicked back, his cheeks perfectly tan and clean-shaven. He flashed a smile, euphoric as always with the dental wonders he had invested in. He looked, quite simply, perfect. The shirt and tie were neat, but the knot was just slightly loose and askew. The suit was sufficiently limp with just enough wrinkles to make him look a little downtrodden. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, letting his shoulders sag and the muscles of his face droop into a worried frown. For a crowning touch, he mussed his hair a little in front, flicking a few strands loose to tumble across his forehead.

The deacons wouldn't know what hit them.

Someone banged on the screen door, and Jimmy Lee let whoever it was wait a few seconds, setting the mood. It was probably one of his chosen come to check on him. He had sounded despondent when he'd called them this morning. He shambled out of the bathroom, head hanging low, hands dangling by his sides.

Laurel Chandler stared in at him through the screen. She didn't look the least bit sympathetic. She looked like trouble.

"Miz Chandler," he said, pushing the door open. "What a surprise to see you here."

"Yes, I suppose you'd be less surprised to see my sister," Laurel said. She stepped across the threshold, staying as far away from Baldwin as she could, never turning her back to him for a second. From the corners of her eyes, she did a quick reconnaissance of the shabby bungalow, her gaze lingering a second on the old bed with its scrollwork iron headboard and footboard.

Jimmy Lee let the door bang shut. His face carefully blank, his gaze steady on the woman who looked up at him with undisguised contempt, he pushed back the sides of his suit coat and planted his hands at his waist. "Just what is that supposed to mean?"

"Exactly what you think it means."

"You're suggesting I have a relationship with your sister?"

"No. I'm saying you have sex and play bondage games with my sister."

His reaction was something that artlessly combined incredulous laughter and choking astonishment. Jaw hanging slack, head wagging, he staggered back a step, as if her words had struck him physically and dazed him. "Miz Chandler, that's simply outrageous! I am a man of God-"

"I know exactly what you are, Mr. Baldwin."

"I think not."

"Are you calling my sister a liar?" she challenged, planting her hands on her slim hips.

Jimmy Lee bit his tongue and assessed the situation. Back in his youth, when he'd hustled small-time for pocket money, he had prided himself on being able to read a mark in nothing flat. What he saw behind the glasses, in the depths of Laurel Chandler's deep blue eyes, behind the temper and the intelligence, was a hint of vulnerability. Maybe she didn't approve of Savannah's freewheeling sex life. Maybe she was every bit as prim as she appeared to be. Maybe she didn't quite trust Savannah's sanity.

He sighed dramatically and slipped his hands into his trouser pockets, forcing his shoulders down. Letting her hang for a minute, he turned away from her-not so far that she couldn't see him furrow his brow and frown, as if in contemplation.

"'Liar' is a harsh word. I think your sister is a very troubled woman. I don't deny she's come to me. I've tried to counsel her."

"I'll bet you have."

Her whole body vibrating with temper, Laurel took a slow turn around the room. When she came to the foot of the unmade bed, she stopped and curled her fingers over the curving bow of the foot rail. It was bumpy with layers of old paint, rough in spots where the rust was coming through. She gave it a yank, testing for sturdiness, and shot a look at Baldwin over her shoulder.

"Psychiatrists still favor using a couch for their sessions. I guess you decided to take it a few steps further."

She gave the bed another shake, but turned her back to it the instant her imagination began to picture Savannah there with her wrists bound.

Annie Gerrard had been bound by her wrists too.

She settled her right hand on her pocketbook and pressed the pocketbook against her hip, imagining that she could feel the outline of her Lady Smith through the glove-soft leather.

"Do you know what I think of men who have to tie women up in order to feel superior to them?" she asked, giving Baldwin the same look that had cracked more than one defendant's story. "I think they're spineless, twisted, despicable scum."

A muscle ticked in Jimmy Lee's cheek. In his pockets he balled his hands into fists. His temper strained with the need to use them. "I told you, I've never had anything to do with your sister sexually. Only the Lord can decipher what might go on in a mind like Savannah's. I don't doubt but that she's capable of saying-of doing-anything at all. But I'm telling you, as God is my witness, I have never laid a hand on her."

"God is a very convenient witness," Laurel said dryly. "Difficult to cross-examine."

Baldwin's tawny brows scaled his forehead. He all but raised a finger and declared her a blasphemer. "You would doubt the Lord?" he gasped, incredulous.

The act was lost on Laurel. "I would doubt you," she said. "I came here to ask if you've seen Savannah in the last couple of days, but I can see I'm wasting my time waiting for a straight answer. Perhaps Sheriff Kenner will have better luck."

She hadn't taken three steps past him when his hand snaked out and caught her by the shoulder. Laurel twisted around, chopping at his arm as she had been taught in self-defense class, breaking his hold. He glared at her, but made no move to touch her again.

"I haven't seen your sister," he said, struggling to maintain a facade of calm. "That's God's honest truth. No need to drag the sheriff out here."

Laurel took another step back toward the door and inched her hand into her purse. Her heart was thumping. Her palms were sweating. She hoped to hell she would be able to hang on to the gun if the need arose.

"Why don't you want him out here? Skeletons in your closet, Reverend?"

"Scandal is deadly in my position," he said, following her retreat toward the door. "Even though I've done nothing wrong, people tend to believe where there's smoke, there's fire."

"They're usually right."

"Not in this case."

"Save your breath, Baldwin," she sneered. "You couldn't win me over if you turned water into wine right before my very eyes. You're a charlatan and a fraud, and if I didn't have better things to do with my time, I'd make certain the whole damn world found out about it."

She could ruin him. The thought hit Jimmy Lee like a brick in the belly. His stomach twisted into a knot. His shot at wealth and glory could be dead in the water. No one would believe her sister, but people would at least pause to listen to Laurel Chandler. They might dismiss what she said after, since she had a reputation for crying wolf, but the damage would be done.

The press would focus on him. Despite the pains he had always taken to disguise himself, some whore would recognize him on the news and sell a juicy story to the Enquirer. Christ, he wished he'd never set eyes on a Chandler woman in his life. Bitches and whores, both of them. He wanted to choke the life out of this one, the pompous little do-gooder.

As the picture flashed like a strobe in his brain, his hold on his temper broke with a snap. He opened his jaws in a snarl that was made only more eerie by the white of his too-perfect caps. A red haze filmed across his eyes, and he lunged toward her, growling, "You little bitch."

Heart catapulting into her throat, Laurel stumbled backward to give herself room. Staying just out of Baldwin's reach, she jerked the Lady Smith from her purse and held it chest-high, with both hands wrapped around the grip.

Jimmy Lee's eyes bugged out at the sight of the gun. "Jesus Fucking Christ!"

"Amen, Revver," Jack drawled.

Adrenaline was searing his veins. He wanted nothing more than to throw the door open, tackle Baldwin, and pound the life out of him for whatever he had done to spook Laurel, but he held the machismo in firm check. Laurel and her purse pistol had the situation under control. Sort of. Her hands were trembling badly.

With deliberately, deceptively lazy movements, Jack drew open the screen door and propped himself up against the jamb.

"And if you think she can't use it, you better think again, Jimmy Lee," he said. "She'll shoot your balls off and feed 'em to stray dogs."

Jimmy Lee glared at him with a look of pure, unadulterated hate. "I didn't ask you in, Boudreaux."

Jack arched a brow in amusement. "Oh, yeah? Well, you gonna do somethin' 'bout that, Jimmy Lee? Ms. Smith amp; Wesson might have somethin' to say 'bout that."

"Isn't that just like you-hiding behind a woman," Baldwin sneered. He raised an impotent finger in warning. "You take my word for it, Boudreaux. You won't be able to hide much longer."

He had a card up the sleeve of that cheap suit. Jack could tell by the gleam in his eyes. He couldn't imagine what it was, but he couldn't imagine that he'd give a damn, either. He blinked wide in mock fear and splayed a hand across his heart.

"Did you hear that, Miz Chandler? Why I do believe the good reverend just threatened me." With the same casual grace, Jack reached out and gently pushed her hands and the gun down so the barrel pointed at the floor. "Sugar, mebbe you could wait outside for me. I think Reverend Baldwin and I need to clear up this little misunderstanding."

Laurel looked up at him, more curious as to why he had shown up than what he was going to do to Jimmy Lee Baldwin. She probably should have stood her ground or made him leave with her. After all, assault was against the law, and she was sworn to uphold the law. But she glanced over at Baldwin and felt a surge of something primal and angry, and for once turned her back on rules and regulations. She didn't like the things Baldwin had intimated about Savannah-even if she knew deep down they may well have been true.

She slipped the Lady Smith back into her pocketbook and without a word turned and left the bungalow.

Jack settled his hands at the waist of his jeans and waited for the echo of the screen door slamming to fade away before he turned fully toward Jimmy Lee. Jimmy Lee, who believed the best defense was a good offense, snatched up the mostly empty bottle of E amp;J brandy off the three-legged coffee table and brandished it like a big glass club.

"Get the hell out of my house, Boudreaux."

"Not before we have us a little chat." Jack circled Baldwin slowly, moving in on him by imperceptible degrees. He didn't appear threatening. He scuffed his boots along on the gritty linoleum, his head down, as if he had nothing better to do than count the cigarette burns in the floor. "Now, Jimmy Lee, I don' know what you did to make Miz Chandler pull her little peashooter on you, but it had to be somethin' bad-her being such a law-abiding sort and all."

"I didn't do shit to her," Jimmy Lee snapped, turning, turning, to keep Boudreaux in front of him. His fingers flexed on the neck of the brandy bottle. "She's unbalanced. She was in an asylum, you know. She's nuts, just like her sister."

Jack shook his head in grave disappointment, still shuffling along, still turning, still moving in a little at a time. "You're impugning the character of a fine, upstanding woman, Jimmy Lee. Even I have to take exception to that."

Jimmy Lee made another quarter turn, wondering dimly at the way the floor seemed to dip beneath his feet. "I don't give a rat's ass what you take exception to, you coonass piece of shit."

Jack suddenly moved toward him, and Jimmy Lee swung the heavy, unwieldy brandy bottle. He did so with gusto, imagining the mess it would make of the Cajun's head, but he missed badly, throwing himself off balance in the process.

Jack ducked the blow easily. Quick and graceful as a cat, he stepped around Baldwin, caught hold of the preacher's free arm, twisted it up high behind him, and ran him face-first into the rough plaster wall. The bottle fell to the floor and shattered in tinkling shards, the last of the brandy soaking into Baldwin's wingtips.

"I told you once to leave Laurel Chandler alone," Jack growled, his mouth a scant inch from Baldwin's ear. "You shouldn't make me tell you twice, Jimmy Lee. Me, I don' have that kind of patience."

Jimmy Lee tried to suck in a watery breath. His face was mashed against the nubby plaster, and he was sure he'd chipped at least three of his precious caps. While the blood pounded in his head and spittle bubbled between his ruined teeth and down his quivering chin, he damned Jack Boudreaux to hell and plotted a hundred ways to torment him once they were both there.

"I mean it, Jimmy Lee," Jack snarled, jerking his arm up a little higher and wringing a whimper out of him. "If you give her another moment's trouble, I'll rip your dick off and use it for crawfish bait."

He gave one last little push, then stepped back and dusted his palms off on his thighs as Baldwin stood, still facing the wall, doubled over, clutching his arm.

"Hope I don' see you 'round, Jimmy Lee."

Jimmy Lee spat on the floor, a big gob of blood and saliva flecked with fragments of porcelain. "God damn you to hell, Boudreaux!" he yelled around the thumb that was feeling gingerly for the sorry condition of his caps.

Jack waved him off and walked out and away from the bungalow.

"I don't want to know one thing about it," Laurel said as she came toward him from the base of a huge old magnolia tree. "If I don't know anything, I can't be called to testify."

"He'll live," Jack said sardonically. They walked toward the vehicles they had left on the scrubby lawn beside Baldwin's beat-up Ford. Huey sat behind the wheel of Jack's Jeep, ears up like a pair of black triangles, mismatched eyes bright. Jack shot Laurel a sideways glance. "You okay?"

Laurel gave him a look. "What are you doing here, Jack? Two hours ago you weren't even willing to give me a straight answer, let alone ride to my rescue."

He scowled blackly, caught in a trap of his own making. He should have stayed the hell out of it, but as he sat at his desk, smoking the first pack of Marlboros he had allowed himself in two years, trying to conjure up a violent muse, he hadn't been able to get the image out of his head-Laurel charging at Baldwin with the courage of a lion and the stature of a kitten. Baldwin was a con man, but that didn't mean he wasn't capable of worse, and try as he might to convince himself otherwise, Jack couldn't just stand back and let her take a chance like that alone.

"I followed you," he admitted grudgingly. "I don' want to get involved, but I don' want to see you get hurt, either. I've got enough on my conscience."

Too late for that, Laurel thought, biting her lip. He had hurt her in little ways already. He would break her heart if she gave him the chance, and damn her for a fool, some part of her wanted to give him that chance. Knowing everything she knew about him. Even after everything they had said in his kitchen. She couldn't think of his tenderness in the night, of the vulnerability that lay inside that tough, alley-cat facade, and not want to give him that chance.

"Why, Mr. Boudreaux," she said sardonically, gazing up at him with phony, wide-eyed amazement, "you'd better watch yourself. One might deduce from a statement such as that one that you actually feel concern for my well-being. That could be hazardous to your image as a bastard."

"Quit bein' such a smart-ass," he growled, his expression thunderous. "I didn't like the idea of you comin' out here alone. Ol' Jimmy Lee, he might not be as harmless as he seems, you know."

"He might not be harmless at all," Laurel muttered, turning her gaze back toward the shabby little bungalow.

Reverend Baldwin was into kinky sex and bondage, and he had an ugly temper. He also had a near-perfect cover. Who would ever suspect a preacher of murder?

"Murder." The word made her shudder inside. She had come here looking for her sister, and now she was thinking of murder. She wouldn't begin to allow the two subjects near each other in her mind. In any regard.

"Well, whatever your reasons, thank you for coming."

They seemed beyond the formality of thanks, and it hung awkwardly between them. Laurel pushed her glasses up on her nose and shuffled toward her car. Jack shrugged it off and curled his fingers around the door handle of the Jeep.

"Where you goin' lookin' for trouble next, angel?" he asked, calling himself a fool for caring.

"To the sheriff," she said, already steeling herself for the experience. "I think he and I need to have a little chat. Want to come?"

It was a silly offer. She had no business feeling disappointed when he turned her down, but she didn't want to break the fragile thread of communication between them. Foolish. Even as she chastised herself, her fingers snuck into her purse and came out with the red matchbook. She offered it to him, simply to feel his fingertips brush against hers.

"Would you happen to know anything about this place?"

Jack's expression froze as he stared down at the elaborate black mask and the neat script title. "Where'd you get this?"

Laurel shrugged, her mouth going dry as his tension was telegraphed to her. "I found it. I think Savannah left it in my car, but she wouldn't admit it was hers. Why? What kind of place is it?"

"It's the kind of place you don' wanna go, sugar," he said grimly, handing it back to her. "Unless you like leather and you're into S amp;M."