[Bayou Gavotte 03.0] Heart of Constantine (9 page)

“Say what?” Leopard grimaced at Constantine. “Shit, man, I told you we should have done him.”

Constantine showed nothing but mild interest. “He didn’t literally kill her, I assume. Indirectly, though?”

“Maybe, but it was his fault, the stupid jerk.” Zeb took a deep breath. “He hit on my mother, and she told him where to go, but I guess you know what he’s like. Once he gets an idea in his big, fat, stupid head, he never lets go. He kept pestering and pestering her, trying to get her to run away with him. Anyway, they were at the same conference in New Orleans. She got a ride home with him, and their car went off the road. It hit a tree, and my mom died, and that bastard only got a few bruises.”

“He’s the one who should have died,” said Leopard.

Grateful, Zeb nodded. “I freaked out, and I wanted to kill him, and I tried, too.” He shrugged. “I was, like, only twelve. I didn’t stand a chance. Now, though, I might be able to do some damage.” He shoveled a mouthful of egg and potato. “I’m going to be in such deep shit over this. And
for running up and down the mounds,” he added glumly, spreading strawberry jam on his toast.

“Training for the Classic?” Constantine’s eyes were almost sympathetic. “I ran it a couple of times.”

“Cool,” Zeb said, surprised.

“Running’s a good way to burn off rage,” Constantine said.

Bullshit. What was this, a frigging therapy session? The only alternative to rage was the Zone. If he folded his aura, rage couldn’t get at him—not his own rage, not anyone else’s. If he folded it tightly enough,
nothing
could get at him. He stayed in the Zone most of the time, because once there, he could avoid thinking—about his father and his dead mother, about decisions, about life and death—and just do what had to be done.

But his aura wasn’t doing what he wanted, so he let resentment take hold again. People usually got that just fine. “Better than anger management classes, that’s for sure. Lutsky says I should go through forgiveness therapy so I won’t hate him anymore. Not that my dad gives a flying fuck about Lutsky or Myra and the stupid mounds, but he plays all the standard hypocrisy games like everyone else, so he’ll make me go.”

“Lutsky kills your mom and then gripes at your dad ’cause you don’t like him?” Leopard rocked with laughter. He shuffled toward the coffee urn to the gentle reggae beat, dreads bobbing.

Zeb decided Lep was okay. “Well, it wasn’t
his
fault, of course. It was just an unfortunate
accident
. And
everyone
was in love with my mother because she was a vampire.” Not that he usually let this information slip, but the underworld
knew all about vampires, so it didn’t matter. “You know what people are like with vampires. Can’t help themselves, although with a little discipline and self-control, it’s not that big a deal.”

He was getting off track. He was probably even trying, deep down, to impress Leopard and Constantine, which was mortifying. “What with Dr. Wilson worshipping her and a zillion other assholes wanting to sleep with her, who could blame poor,
poor
Dr. Lutsky for going off the deep end? And he was so
devastated
afterward. So terribly
sorry
. What a
tragedy
. Shit!” He banged his fist furiously against the palm of his other hand.

“Jesus, a freaking soap opera,” Constantine said. “You had four witnesses this morning that Lutsky attacked you first. If none of the others support you, feel free to call on me, for what it’s worth.”

“Um, thanks.” This would have been an incredibly cool offer under any other circumstances, but Zeb knew all about bargaining with the devil. “Lavonia will probably stick up for me, but it won’t do any good. My dad will just say I need to learn self-control.” He stood. “Well, thanks for breakfast. And for the guitar. I gotta go face the music.”

“Sure, Zeb,” Constantine said. “But first, why did you take the knife?”

“Knife?” Zeb’s voice cracked.

Constantine didn’t want to feel sympathy for the kid. He would far prefer last night’s instinctive dislike, but to some extent, that had dissipated. His spirit guide said it had
something to do with the kid mattering, but, as usual, it made no sense.

Regardless, he needed information. “Who are you protecting, Zeb?”

Silence.

“Somebody drugged a woman and left her on the mound.”

More silence. A shrug.

“He may have raped her.”

“No.” Zeb shook his head rapidly and then went still again.

“You know he didn’t rape her?” Silence again. “You don’t think he did? You just hope he didn’t? Which is it?” More silence; a stubborn kid. “It looked like he was planning to sacrifice her. Why wouldn’t he make use of her first?”

Zeb went green, but shook his head again. “Look, is Mar—is she okay?”

Ah. So Zeb did know Marguerite, and Marguerite knew Zeb, and she’d kept that to herself on purpose. Didn’t want him to question the kid. Again, the suspicion surfaced that she knew more than she would let on. That her motives weren’t what they seemed.

Inside his head, the spirit guide bristled with annoyance. Before it started making a nuisance of itself, Constantine acknowledged what Marguerite’s behavior more likely meant: that she just didn’t want him to hurt Zeb. “Marguerite seemed fine when I last saw her, driving away from the mounds. That doesn’t mean she wasn’t raped. It doesn’t mean she’s not in danger now. If she’s a target, it’s your responsibility to protect her, not the man who’s threatening her.”

“She’s not a target,” Zeb choked out. “He likes—I mean,
everybody
likes her.”

Ignoring Zeb’s slip of the tongue, Constantine said, “You know and like Marguerite, and you know who did this, and yet you’re protecting him.” Pause. “Why would you want to protect someone like that?”

Silence again.

“You don’t feel any sense of responsibility here? Not concerned about Marguerite? Not about some other girl getting kidnapped, maybe mutilated or murdered?” Pause. “No shame in you at all?”

Zeb flushed darkly under his tan but maintained his silence.

Constantine leaned back. “Okay, so we’ve established that you’re too much of a lowlife to go for guilt, so how about bribery? Would front-row tickets do it? Backstage passes for you and all your scummy friends? Your pick of the groupies?” He watched chagrin cross Zeb’s face, chased and replaced by fury. “Not enough, evidently. How about cold, hard cash?”

Zeb clenched both his fists and his teeth.

“No.” Insulted, was he?

“Threats, then. I’m a dangerous man to cross.” Constantine resisted the temptation to demonstrate immediately what he meant. Instead, he just said, “I can make your life hell.”

Zeb’s voice and eyes were bleak. “My life is already hell.”

“I can make it worse,” Constantine said, and then wished he hadn’t. The kid’s shrug wasn’t one of bravado, or even of indifference.

Desperation. How familiar.

A chicken stalked past the window. It fluttered awkwardly onto the fountain and glared at Constantine with an unfriendly red eye.

A
chicken
?

“Whoa,” Leopard said, opening his laptop. “This is serious business, kid. You don’t want Constantine pissed off at you. Better give him the answers. Way too much of the bad shit you hear about him is true.”

“Thank you,” Zeb said. “I appreciate your advice. It’s very kind of you to warn me.” He turned to Constantine. “Fuck off.”

The fool had no idea who he was dealing with. Constantine leaned forward, hands clasped. “Zeb, I don’t want to hurt you,” he said, meaning it but preparing himself all the same.

He’d always done what he had to, and this was no different. Marguerite didn’t know any better and couldn’t possibly be expected to understand. As for the bird in its many forms, all annoying, it could go to hell and wait for him there. “I don’t want to hurt you,” he repeated, “but I will.”

The kid didn’t respond, so Constantine released a brief twinge of pain. Nothing much, just enough to show him.

Zeb’s eyes widened, but he showed no other sign that he’d felt the pain. “You can still fuck off.” He stood. “I thought you
protected
innocent people.”

Stupid, pigheaded kid. Outside, a whole host of birds were making a god-awful clamor. It sounded a lot like cheering.

“Which reminds me,” Lep said into the charged silence that followed, “looks like someone got to that perv before
you, bro.” He clicked a few keys. “Some young guy beat the crap out of him in a bar the other day.”

If Constantine hadn’t been frowning at Zeb, trying to figure him out, he wouldn’t have seen that betraying flicker. “You’re that guy.”

Zeb jutted his chin in response. “He’s been hitting on a friend of mine. She’s only fourteen.”

Constantine blew out a long, slow sigh. Why couldn’t that aggravating bird have given him this useful info earlier? But that was always its way—incomprehensible commands or veiled hints. “Go away, Zeb. I’ll give you a while to think about it. Don’t kid yourself—you
will
give me the information I need. You’d be a lot smarter to do it before someone else gets hurt.”

Zeb went out, leaving the guitar behind. The chicken dropped from the fountain and out of sight. Good riddance.

Then it reappeared inside his head, clucking madly.

Lep eyed Constantine over the laptop screen. “That was unusually merciful of you. What’s going on?”

“Shut up!” Constantine shook his head violently. “Get the hell out!”

“Who are you telling to shut up? I’m a dangerous man, too.” He slid off his stool, let fly a few playful punches, danced away, and then leapt onto Constantine from behind.

“It’s this frigging bird,” Constantine said with a grunt. He stood and shoved his arms apart, sending Leopard and the stool flying. “Flapping around in my head like some manic chicken, talking absolute bullshit.” He thudded his forehead with the heel of his hand and retrieved the fallen stool.

“Sure you don’t mean chicken shit, bro?” Lep chuckled and went over to the espresso machine. “Glad I’m not a fucking Indian, stuck with a spirit guide. Enough shit going through my head without birds crapping in there, too.”

“The bird says,” grumbled Constantine, “I should stop being an asshole.”

“No doubt about that.” Lep tamped coffee into the portafilter.

“That hurting this kid will backfire on me. That’s supposed to be news? I know how karma works.”

Lep grunted, positioning the shot glasses.

“It says this kid is a gift from the gods,” Constantine said.

Lep glanced at him. “Say what?”

“It says I might be able to redeem myself by way of this kid.”

“Redemption.” Leopard’s voice was contemplative; espresso dripped slowly into the shot glasses. “We could all use some of that.”

Constantine rested his head in his hands, listening to the coffee and the comforting hiss of milk being steamed. The spirit guide also said Marguerite was a treasure from the heavens, but he wasn’t about to admit he’d even heard that one. Sure, it sounded good, but what was he supposed to do with her? Say he got up his nerve and slept with her. Even if, by some miracle, that didn’t turn out to be a catastrophe, his Enemy was still out there. What if Marguerite got hurt through association with him? Why couldn’t the bird tell him something useful about his Enemy instead?

On that issue, it was utterly silent.

Now that the bird had spoken its mind, it was taking its sweet time pecking its way across the patio and out of his head.

Lep set a double espresso on the table before Constantine and returned to his laptop. “Your bird might be right. I don’t know what’s going on with the kid, but he looks exactly like you used to: glowering over a cup of coffee before you did something.”

“Great. So what’s my role here? Mentor? Moral preceptor? I don’t think so.” Constantine noticed himself glowering and downed some espresso.

“You know what I think?” asked Leopard innocently.

They’d been over this countless times. “Your solution to everything is not the same as mine.”

“Life is simple when you don’t have a chicken messing with your mind, saying ‘Do this, don’t do that.’ Maybe if you got laid now and then, you’d be able to think straight.”

A bird cackled from some distant height. Not a chicken, though. Small mercies.

“Nathan Bone says you’re making it with a hot babe. That news actually woke me up for a moment or two. Tantric sex, no less.” He eyed Constantine and sighed. “I had hopes that for once it might be true.”

“Shut up, Lep. I need to protect the girl, not destroy her.” He paused. “I need you to do me a favor. Two favors.”

“Sure, as long as you do yourself a favor, too, and start thinking seriously about getting laid.”

“Believe me, I’m thinking about it way too much.” He shook his head. “See what you can find out about Zeb—where he lives, some history on his parents, who he hangs
out with. Also, get me whatever you can on a prof at Hellebore named Eaton Wilson.”

“Will do.” Lep’s cell phone chimed, and he read the display. “It’s Jabez. He’s at the babe’s place. Says you sent him there to scope the place out.”

Constantine’s heartbeat ramped up. “What’s wrong?”