[Bayou Gavotte 03.0] Heart of Constantine (5 page)

“No, I’m freezing.” She didn’t need protection against Constantine Dufray, but saying so wouldn’t encourage Lavonia to give her a quick checkup, here and now. “I’m not really afraid of him. He was actually quite considerate.” When he wasn’t trying to scare her away or kissing the hell out of her.

If anything, she was afraid
for
him. His life had been a series of catastrophes for the past two years, and yet he’d encouraged her to offer him up to the hostile world on a platter. Why? It would mean total ruin of his already disastrous career. Suspected murder might be titillating, vigilante brutality might seem justified, but rape? Nobody but pervs would go for that.

It hit her then: He didn’t care about his career.
You’re dead
, the reporter had said, and Constantine had agreed. The reporter had meant career-dead, but had Constantine meant…
dead
dead?

It made sense. Several months ago, he had appeared to attempt suicide, although afterward he’d told the media it was just a joke. Today, his aura had clearly revealed his emotional anguish, a ghastly mixture of bitterness, anger, and pain. He expected betrayal. How would it be to live like that? Maybe he really did want to die.

She couldn’t let him. “I will not throw him to the jackals,” she said. “It’s too late for that anyway, even if I wanted to, which I don’t. They believe I’m sleeping with him.”

“Only because you said you were.” Because she’d kissed him, too, but she hadn’t mentioned that to Lavonia. She still didn’t know what to think of it herself.

Oh,
God
, what a kiss. She’d never felt hunger like that before, never been so enmeshed in another’s aura. Never
participated
like that, never felt such a sensation of enjoying and being enjoyed.

If he was so eager to get rid of her, why kiss her like that? Any woman with enough breath to run would hurry back for more. As for the image of their naked bodies writhing together that had surged into her head just before she drove away…

“What got into you?” Lavonia said. “It’s one thing to like his music, but you’re acting like a silly little fan-girl.”

“So because I’m a fan, I shouldn’t help him?” Marguerite huddled inside the throw. “He needed rescuing from that jerk of a reporter. I had no choice.”

Lavonia rolled her eyes. “Maybe the rumors about his telepathic abilities are true. Maybe he planted that idea in your head. Tantric sex, my foot!”

“It was a great idea, and the credit is all mine.” It was also completely uncharacteristic; she’d pretty much given up on sex ages ago, both thinking and doing.

On the other hand, if she thought about having sex with Constantine, she might finally warm up to the idea.

“I’ve always wondered if the rumors were true,” Marguerite said. “It’s one of the reasons I came to Bayou Gavotte—because I wanted to see him in person. Not that I expected
meeting him to prove anything, but because, in a way, I owe him.”

“Owe him? For what?”

Marguerite heaved a sigh. Lavonia probably wouldn’t go for this either. “You know the story of how he supposedly sent telepathic messages to a corrupt cop, scaring him into killing himself?”

“Yes, I know the story. That cop was a jerk who deserved to die, but I don’t know whether I believe Constantine had anything to do with it.”

“I don’t know either. But—and don’t tell anyone this, please—that cop was my uncle, and he wasn’t just a corrupt, violent police officer. He was also a pedophile. Don’t tell me how I know—it’s a long story—but I was afraid he would get to my little sister. So if Constantine did cause his death, then he saved my sister, and I owe him.”

Lavonia huffed. “Even if the story is true, Constantine did it for vengeance. It had nothing to do with saving your sister.”

“Not directly, but it prevented my uncle from hurting anyone else, and I can’t help but be grateful.”

“
That’s
why you made a fool of yourself this morning?”

Oh, hell, she didn’t know. Her mind was such a muddle.

Fortunately, Lavonia didn’t need an answer. “Did they get pictures of you together? You’ll be all over the tabloids.”

Marguerite hunched a shoulder, while her stomach tied itself into knots like the ones on the Celtic cup. “I’ll survive. It’ll only be for a couple of days, and then some new gossip will take over. Anyway, people do scandalous stuff in Bayou Gavotte all the time. That’s another reason I moved here—because for the most part, it’s an easygoing town.”

“Next you’ll be saying it’s your civic duty. That you’re contributing to the twisted reputation of Bayou Gavotte.”

Marguerite cut off a laugh. “Too bad there’s nothing twisted about tantric sex. Now, listen. If they find out I came straight to you, you have to tell them it was for the calendar.” Lavonia was designing a witches’ calendar, and Marguerite helped with the illustrations.

“At seven on a Saturday morning?”

Marguerite waved the objection away. “I’m just glad you were awake.”

“I have a meeting with Eaton Wilson this morning.” Lavonia took two mugs out of the cupboard. “He wants to measure brain activity while people are having visions. He says they need to learn to induce visions by meditating in a sacred space before they can reproduce them in the lab. I think he wants someone to bounce ideas off who won’t act like he’s a nutcase.”

“Kind of you.” Eaton was borderline crazy, but so was Lavonia. In fact, much of Bayou Gavotte was on the cutting edge of weird, but the university community had to walk a fine line, in touch as it was with the ordinary scientific world. Marguerite added cream to her coffee. “If any reporters find out I was here, just tell them I rushed over first thing because I knew you’d be with Eaton all day.”

“I’d better not be stuck with Eaton all day,” Lavonia said dourly. “I do have a life.”

Marguerite grinned. “You have plans with Bon-Bon?”

Lavonia visibly suppressed an answering grin with the mention of Al Bonnard, the handsome professor she was dating. “Don’t change the subject.”

Marguerite blew out a breath. “I will do my best to find out who did this to me, but methodically and in private, with no suspicion falling on Constantine.”

“Unless he did it.”

“Right,” Marguerite said, and then the caffeine finally hit her brain. “But I don’t see how he could have. I don’t even remember the end of the concert, so I must have been drugged at the back of the crowd while he was at the front, singing.”

“He could have paid someone to do it, just like he paid someone to poison his wife.”

Marguerite threw up her hands. “Right, he beckoned to one of his roadies and said, ‘Drug some random chick and drag her on top of the mound. I want to do an unconscious woman tonight.’ Even if he were that perverted, he’s definitely not that stupid. I tell you, I know he didn’t do it.”

Lavonia fumed silently, which meant she was gathering ammunition. Marguerite breathed in the warmth of coffee and life. “Mmm. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, but you’re taking an unscientific approach,” Lavonia said. “If you’re too attached to your hypothesis, you’ll interpret the results to support what you already believe.”

Marguerite nodded and took a bracing swallow of coffee. “You’re perfectly correct, but you’re doing exactly the same thing, and you know it. Please do me this favor, Lavonia. Either you examine me, or no one does. It’s that simple.”

Lavonia threw up her hands and motioned Marguerite into the bedroom. “When was the last time you had sex?”

“Well over a year ago, and you know that, too.”

Ten minutes later, Lavonia had her conclusion. “No. It’s unlikely you were raped. No residue, no bruising or chafing, no sign of forced entry or trauma to your cervix.”

Marguerite let out a long breath and sat up. “That’s a relief.”

“Still, it’s not proof positive. If you would let me send a sample to the lab—”

“No,” Marguerite said.

“This doesn’t prove he didn’t drug you or have you drugged, and it doesn’t prove he didn’t intend to rape you. Or murder you.
Sacrifice
you.” Lavonia’s nostrils flared. “Are you
listening
, Marguerite?”

“It was almost dawn,” Marguerite said. “If he wanted to kill me, he had plenty of opportunity during the night. In fact, maybe it was Constantine’s presence on the mounds that stopped whoever really did want to light that fire from doing whatever… he had planned.”

Lavonia pounced on the catch in Marguerite’s voice. “You
are
scared.”

“Of course I’m scared, but not of Constantine!” Not really.

Her friend glowered. “What happened to all the paraphernalia you described? I suppose, in your dippy fan-girl state of mind, you let him take it away.”

“He didn’t have a vehicle with him,” Marguerite said. “It’s in my car.”

The dense warmth of a Louisiana summer morning greeted them outdoors. Marguerite shed the throw and sipped her coffee, and the shaking subsided to the merest quiver in her gut. Lavonia gave the strange loot a once-over. “The cup looks vaguely familiar, but for all I know, they sell
them at Walmart. The bowl, not at all.” She took out the bird mask, stroking the shining copper and the feathers. The beads winked in the sunshine. “It’s beautiful, but sort of scary. Look at that cruel curved beak! Where have I seen one like this? At the mound museum?”

“It may have been modeled on an artifact on display there,” Marguerite said. “There’s also a book with paintings of what they think the original masks looked like, but no reconstructions, as far as I know.”

Lavonia laid the mask in the trunk. “You said something about a knife. Where is it?”

“It wasn’t there.” Marguerite described the imprint on the chamois as she shut the trunk.

Lavonia huffed. “Constantine must have hidden it because it would incriminate him. I bet there’s a cover of
Rolling Stone
where he’s brandishing that very knife. Why aren’t you terrified?”

Marguerite hesitated.
Because he kissed me?
That wouldn’t cut it with Lavonia; it would only make matters worse.
Because he seems headed toward self-destruction, and I can’t bear that?
Lavonia would reply that if Constantine’s guilt was destroying him, it was exactly what he deserved.

“That’s it.” Lavonia swiveled and made for the house again. “I’m calling the cops.”

“I’ll deny everything you say.” Marguerite hurried after her, slopping coffee onto the paving stones.

“Why?” Lavonia cried. “Even if Constantine didn’t do it, someone did.”

“Right, so I want to find out where all the paraphernalia came from, especially the mask. I thought you might have some ideas.”

Lavonia put her hands on her hips. “The only idea in my mind at the moment is that you barely escaped grave danger, and now you’re putting yourself right back in.”

“It might be someone at Hellebore U,” Marguerite persisted. “At least half the people at that concert were students. Quite a few profs were there.”

“Sure, but you should leave the investigation to the cops.”

Must she be so stubborn? “Also, there’s another reason I don’t want anyone else involved.”

“And what might that be?”

Again, Marguerite hesitated. For obvious reasons, she couldn’t mention Zeb. If she did, Lavonia would go straight to his father, Al Bonnard. Zeb would feel betrayed, and any hope of getting information from him would be gone.

“There’s nothing, is there? Stop trying to stall me.” Lavonia marched indoors.

“I’m not stalling.” Marguerite followed her and shut the door, trying to sort things out in her mind. If some lunatic really had planned a rape or human sacrifice, how had Nathan found out? If it was just a setup to discredit Constantine, had they seriously expected Marguerite to back up their ugly story? Regardless, what did Zeb have to do with it all?

Meanwhile, Lavonia’s expression would make a cactus wither. She wouldn’t just let this go. She picked up her phone.

“We’ll both look ridiculous if you call the cops,” Marguerite said. “There really is something else, but I’ll look even more ridiculous if I mention it to anyone except you.” She’d
been meaning to anyway. Maybe. “But you have to promise not to tell anyone.”

“That depends on what it is,” Lavonia said.

“And you’re not allowed to put my dreams in your journal.”

Lavonia’s eyes widened, her nostrils flared, and she put down the phone. “You’ve had another prophetic dream?” Such dreams were one of Lavonia’s favorite areas of study, and finding people with verifiable prophetic dreams wasn’t easy.

Marguerite grimaced. Being bombarded by auras was plenty bad enough, and she sure didn’t want this dream to come true. “I didn’t think dreaming Pauline would kill herself was prophetic, because she had tried it before. Although I believed she was recovering, underneath I was afraid for her, so it came out in my dreams. But then she
did
die.”

“And now you believe the dreams were genuinely prophetic?”

“I hope they weren’t. I’m having new nightmares, but in these I’m the one who’s going to die.”

Lavonia plumped herself down on the couch. Tears welled in her eyes. “I don’t want you to have
that
kind of prophetic dream!” Then, furiously: “Wasn’t tonight warning enough?”

“In the dream, I don’t get stabbed on top of a mound.” Marguerite sat next to her. The cat jumped onto Marguerite’s lap, waving its tail in her face and purring. She caressed it while deciding what to say; no need to describe the terror her dream evoked. “I get run over by a van. But the cops won’t take me seriously if I tell them about it. Even
I
don’t take myself seriously. I’m sure it’s only a jumble of stuff my subconscious is churning through.”

Lavonia put an arm around Marguerite. “Just because you dreamed it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. We always have the power to change our fate.” She glowered at Marguerite. “All right, I won’t go to the cops just yet. Let’s have breakfast, and then I have to run and meet Eaton. We’ll get together later and try to figure this thing out.”

Marguerite drove first to the supermarket. Lawless, the little black-and-white sheepdog mix who had belonged to Pauline, would be all right a while longer because he had a doggy door, but she had run out of dog food—and people food, too. Pauline had been a difficult roommate, but she’d done most of the shopping and cooking. She hadn’t been such a great cook, but her aura had so plainly said she needed to control whatever she could that Marguerite had acquiesced.