Читать книгу Sanctuary in Chef Voleur - Mallory Kane - Страница 9

Chapter One

Hannah Martin’s heart leaped into her throat as she waved at Mr. Jones, their neighbor, whose house was a mile away from theirs. He was watering his window boxes as she drove past.

Billy Joe had told her to be friendly with the neighbors but not to talk to them. “If you say one word to anyone, you’ll never see Stephanie alive,” he’d told her more than a few times in the past twenty-four hours.

Her mom, Stephanie Clemens, had gone into liver failure from cirrhosis a couple of weeks ago and was receiving hemodialysis while waiting for a donor liver. Then two days ago, Hannah had overheard Billy Joe, her mother’s boyfriend, talking on his cell phone. He was arranging some kind of delivery to Tulsa, Oklahoma. And from his side of the conversation, it was obvious to Hannah that the goods were illegal and very valuable. It had to be drugs.

She’d confronted him and kicked him out of her mother’s house, saying if he showed back up, she’d go to the sheriff. He’d left.

Then, yesterday, when she’d returned from a short run to the drugstore, her mother was gone and Billy Joe was back. He’d abducted her mom and was holding her somewhere.

Hannah growled in frustration and desperation as she pulled into the driveway of her mother’s house. Popping the trunk lid, she grabbed one heavy case of beer, leaving the other case for a second trip.

“Billy Joe?” she called as she hooked her index finger around the handle of the screen door and then toed it open enough to catch it with her elbow. “Billy Joe? I’m back. My car’s battery died again. That’s why I took the Toyota.”

She set the beer on the kitchen counter and listened. Nothing. The house felt empty. Where was he? He was always waiting at the door to make sure she got back from the grocery store not one minute later than he’d told her to be—with his cigarettes and beer.

An ominous thought occurred to her. Had something happened to her mother? She went through the house, but as she’d known, it was empty. Billy Joe wasn’t there. Nearly panicked, she ran back outside. The setting sun reflected on the tin roof of the garage, but she thought she could see a light on inside it. Billy Joe never left a room without turning off the light, just like he never left the house without checking the locks three times. And woe to anyone who didn’t put a tool or a book or even a ballpoint pen back exactly where they got it, down to the millimeter. So if the lights were on in the garage, then Billy Joe was in there.

From the first moment her mother had let him move in a few months ago, he’d taken over the garage. He’d kept it locked and never let her or Hannah near it. His reasoning was because he was working on his prized vintage Mustang Cobra and the engine had to stay free of dust. He was as obsessive about his cars as everything else.

Hannah walked across the driveway to the garage, her shoulders stiff, her heart thudding so hard it physically hurt. Maybe her mother was in there? It wasn’t the first time she’d thought that, but she was genuinely afraid of Billy Joe. After all, he’d pushed and slapped her mother a couple of times.

She wasn’t sure what she thought—or hoped—to find when she looked through the glass panes of the side door, but she couldn’t continue to sit by and do nothing while her mother was missing. Luckily, she’d just had her dialysis and wouldn’t need it again until the end of the week. But Hannah didn’t trust Billy Joe to take care of her. So although her stomach was already churning with nausea and a painful headache was making her light-headed, she was determined to see the inside of the garage.

Then she heard Billy Joe’s voice. She nearly jumped out of her skin. In the first instant, she thought he was yelling at her. But by the time she’d heard three or four unintelligible words, she realized that his tone wasn’t angry, it was afraid. Then she heard another voice. It was low and menacing, and she didn’t recognize it.

With horrible visions swirling in her head of her mother dying while Billy Joe and some buddy of his drank beer, she approached the door cautiously. She slid sideways along the outside wall until she was close enough to see through the glass panes, her heart beating so loudly in her ears that she was positive the people inside could hear it.

When she peeked through the dusty glass panes, Billy Joe’s back was to her, so she couldn’t see his face. He was standing in front of his workbench, arms spread plaintively, talking in an oddly meek voice.

Her gaze slid to the man standing in front of him. He was twice the size of Billy Joe. Not quite as tall but much larger. He had on a dark, dull-colored T-shirt that fit his weightlifter’s torso and beefy biceps like a glove. On the back of his right wrist was a tattoo. It was red and heart-shaped with what looked like letters in the center. Hannah blinked and squinted. Did it say MOM? She thought so, although the O wasn’t exactly an O. It was a dark circle. Before she could focus on it, the man reached behind his back and pulled a gun. The fluorescent light glinted off the steel barrel. Hannah stared at it, her pulse hammering in her throat.

Billy Joe froze in place. His voice took on an edge of shrill panic and he stepped backward and turned his palms out. “Hey, man, watch out with that thing. It could go off.” He laughed nervously. “I swear! You know everything I know. I’d never cheat the boss. I ain’t that stupid.”

Hannah saw a quick smirk flash across the other man’s face and knew he was thinking the same thing she was. Billy Joe was pretty stupid.

“So what happened to the drugs and the money?” the man said, not raising his voice. “Because our customer says he was shorted, and the last payment you sent to Mr. Ficone was short, as well. Mr. Ficone depends on his distributors to pay him so he can pay his suppliers. Now his suppliers are expecting to be paid everything they’re owed when Mr. Ficone meets with them in three days. So you’ve got three days to get that money to him.”

“I don’t know what happened to them, man. I had to use a new courier because my regular guy got picked up for not paying child support. Maybe he took it. I swear it was all there when I sealed the envelope. Or, hey, it coulda been the girl. Hannah Martin. My girlfriend’s daughter. Smart-mouthed bitch.” Billy Joe was sweating, literally. “She’s always snooping around. She probably stole the money out of the envelope. That new guy coulda left it lying around.”

The man with the red tattoo looked bored and disgusted. “I don’t think Mr. Ficone’s going to be satisfied with somebody else must have done it. He doesn’t like people that can’t control their people. That delivery was short almost twenty grand.”

“Twenty? That’s im-impossible,” Billy Joe stammered.

Beneath the fear, Hannah heard something in his voice she’d heard before. Billy Joe was lying.

He took another step backward, toward the door. “I’m telling you, it had to be Hannah Martin. She’s as sneaky as a fox. She musta got into it. I wouldn’t be surprised. But I swear, when I sealed that envelope, it was all there. I counted it.”

Hannah felt a heavy dread settle onto her chest, making it hard for her to breathe. He was throwing her to the wolves. She’d known he was trouble the minute she’d first laid eyes on him, and she’d tried to tell her mother, but Stephanie had never been smart when it came to men.

The man with the red tattoo shook his head. “Money doesn’t disappear from a sealed envelope,” he said. “I’ve got better things to do than stand here and listen to you lie. Mr. Ficone needs his money and he needs the drugs that were missing from your last delivery to our customer in Tulsa.”

“But, man, I swear—”

“Shut up with your whining,” the man yelled. “Where’s the money?”

Hannah jumped at the man’s suddenly raised voice. She shrank back against the wall by the door, terrified. He was holding a very big gun and his voice told her he was sick of Billy Joe’s rambling excuses.

What if he shot him? Everything inside her screamed “no!” Billy Joe was the only person in the world who knew where her mother was. She wanted to burst into the garage and beg the man to make Billy Joe tell her where her mother was, but the man looked ruthless and he was already sick of Billy Joe’s whining. If she called attention to herself, he was liable to shoot her, too.

“All right, punk. Mr. Ficone has no use for you if you’re not going to talk about where the money and the drugs are. That’s all he wants.”

Hannah shifted until she could see through the door again. She saw the man lift the barrel of the gun slightly, aiming it at Billy Joe.

“What he doesn’t want is screwups like you working for him. He hates people who can’t control their women. He hates thieves and he sure as hell hates loose ends.”

“Listen. I’ll get the money back. I’ve got a plan,” Billy Joe said, his hands doubling into fists. “My girlfriend’s sick. Real sick. And I kidnapped her. I’ve got her hidden away.”

Hannah gasped. Where? Tell him where, she begged silently.

“I told Hannah she’ll never see her mom again if she doesn’t do what I tell her. She’ll give me back the money.”

The larger man frowned and brandished the huge gun. “You kidnapped your sick girlfriend? You’re a real piece of work.”

“Okay, listen, man.” Sweat was running down Billy Joe’s face and soaking the neck of his T-shirt. “Here’s the deal. The drugs are hidden in the Toyota. But that bitch Hannah took it to town. She’s got strict orders not to touch my damn car, but she took it anyway. Bet you can’t guess where I put ’em. The drugs.” Despite the gun pointed at him, Billy Joe’s voice took on the bragging tone he used when he was sure he’d done something brilliant. “They’re hidden in the trunk lining.”

The man rolled his eyes and raised his gun.

“No, wait,” Billy Joe begged. “I was trying something new. A better way to hide them for transport. I swear man, that’s all. As soon as I made sure it worked, I was going to ask to show it to Mr. Ficone.” Billy Joe took a nervous breath. “Or you. Maybe you’d want to see it first. You could take the credit for thinking it up if you want.”

The man with the tattoo flexed his fingers around the handle of the handgun.

“Okay, listen. Hannah will be back any minute. She’d better be.” He turned his hands palms out and continued babbling. “Wait till you see the car. It’s brilliant, the way I hid the drugs. It’s all fixed up, ready to go.”

Fear and desperation twisted Hannah’s heart. Billy Joe was off on his favorite subject. Cars. The moment when he might have revealed where her mother was had passed.

“It’s a blue Toyota. Oh, I said that already. Anyhow, I painted it and boosted the engine. Th-the passenger-side mirror is broken and there’s a crack in the windshield. It looks like any old family car on the outside, but under the hood is a screaming turbo-charged V-8. It’s perfect for transport.” Billy Joe had turned his body slightly to the right and was gesturing with his left hand to emphasize what he was saying, but Hannah saw him slowly reaching behind him to the waistband of his jeans.

“What about the money? I don’t buy that your new guy or the girl—Hannah?—stole it.”

“No, no. Listen. I swear. I’m giving you the real deal.” Billy Joe’s words tumbled over each other. “It’s Hannah. That bitch is the key.” He giggled. “The key. You’d better believe me. She’s the one you want.” He got his fingers wrapped around the handle of the gun that was stuck in his waistband and covered with his untucked shirt.

The man with the red tattoo stiffened and gripped his weapon tightly. “Don’t move, slimeball!” the big man shouted.

“Look, I swear on my mama’s life. Okay, so I kept those few drugs that are hid in the Toyota. But Hannah’s the one who took the money. Not me. Make her talk. She’s holding the key to everything,” Billy Joe stammered.

Then, as Hannah watched in horror, he pulled out the gun. No! Don’t! She covered her mouth with her hand to keep from screaming.

Billy Joe fired. The gun bucked in his hand and the bullet struck the garage wall at least three feet above the other man’s head.

Without changing his position or his expression, the big man’s finger squeezed the trigger. Billy Joe bucked once, then the back of his shirt blossomed with red, like ink in water. He made a strangled sound, then collapsed to the floor, right where he stood. The small gun he was holding dropped to the concrete with a metallic clatter.

Hannah tried to scream, but her voice was trapped behind her closed throat. The last thing she saw before she turned and ran toward Billy Joe’s car was the big man’s dark eyes on her and the gaping barrel of the gun pointed directly at her.

* * *

A LONG TIME later, Hannah wrapped her hands around the thick white mug, savoring its warmth. It was almost midnight—four hours since she’d watched a man shoot Billy Joe in the heart. In one sense it seemed as though it had happened to someone else. But then she would close her eyes and she was there, watching the blood spread across the back of his shirt like a rose blooming in fast-forward on a nature show.

He was dead. Billy Joe was dead, and the secret of where he’d taken her mother had died with him. A spasm of panic shot through her and her hand jerked, spilling the coffee. She grabbed a napkin from a chrome dispenser and laid it on top of the spilled liquid.

Ever since her mother had disappeared, Hannah had been imagining things. She knew her mother was not literally dead yet—not from her disease. But nightmarish images of where she was being held swirled continuously in Hannah’s mind.

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.