Love and Glory: The Coltrane Saga, Book 3 (12 page)

“So good…” she cried. “Oh, Travis, you are one big man, and you fill me up, and I must have you always.”

Then she stopped talking and threw her head back farther. Her teeth sank into her lower lip, but she could not suppress the loud cry of joy as she climaxed against him. A few more quick thrusts, and he released himself, sighing contentedly, but still wishing foggily that it was Kitty he held.

“Again,” Molina cried suddenly, pushing herself up and down. “We do it again and again. I never get enough of you.”

Travis swore under his breath as he gently lifted her up and off of him. “Not this day, lady. I’ve got to check in with the bosses and see if there’s any word on when we’ll be going home. There might even be work for me to do.”

Seeing her eyes flash red, he playfully squeezed her breast and murmured appeasingly, “Tonight I won’t let that devil, rum, get hold of me. I’ll make it good for you all night long.”

Suddenly she leaped from the bed, her hair flying wildly about her face. “You take me for a
jeunesse?
Or a
bousin?”
She screamed, stalking about the room and waving her arms. “I do not even have the reward of a
jeunesse
or a
bousin,
for you give me no money.”

“You never asked for money.” Travis felt his own ire rising, and he sat up to fasten his pants. She had deftly undone them in her eagerness. It was time, he figured, to leave, for he had seen her mad.

“I do not ask for money because I do not want money.” She was shrieking. “I want to be your
placée.
Is that asking too much? At first I lie. I tell you I have been with men before, so you will think me smart in the ways of pleasing you, but you say yourself you know the truth, that I was virgin when you took me. You make me
placée!
You do not talk of leaving Haiti and returning to America!”

Travis tugged at his beard.
Placée.
What the hell was she talking about? Reaching for his boots, he decided not to hang around. “We’ll talk later, Molina. I’ve got to be going.”

She ran across the floor and threw herself at him, catching him off balance and knocking him backward across the bed. He stared up at her, stunned, as she shrieked, “No! We talk now. I already talk with
houngan.
I talk with
mambo.
Both say they talk with
hounsi,
and I become your
placée.
They say
wanga
power not working because you strong man. You not of our kind. You too strong.
Hounsi
will fix.”

Travis had no idea what she was talking about, but there was something in her tone that made him realize he was in big trouble. Gently, he asked, “Molina, you know that I don’t know what all those words you are using mean. Now calm down and explain.” He tried to push her away, but she pressed down harder on his chest. He did not want to use force, so he just lay there and looked up at her in puzzled misery.

“You need
placée.
All men need
placée.
I deserve, because you were first man. I be good to you.” She pushed back her black hair, which had tumbled across her forehead, and he saw the play of a smile on her lips. “You will like Molina. I give you many fine sons.”

Travis muttered a quick “Uh-oh!” He caught her off guard, and shoved her quickly to one side. He leaped from the bed. “If you’re talking about what I think you’re talking about, you better understand something, Molina.” He backed away, spreading his hands and hoping he sounded sympathetic. “Now, I never promised you anything except a good time in bed, and we had that. If that word
placée
means wife, I’m sorry you got the wrong idea, because I happen to have a wife at home that I love very much, and a son, and I’m going back there.”

She had stopped listening at the word “wife.” Eyes narrowed to slits, she moved on her hands and knees, crouching on the bed as though to spring at him like an angry panther. Her lips parted, and her teeth even looked like fangs, long and deadly. “You have
placée!”
She hissed accusingly. “You never tell Molina. You make fool of Molina.”

Travis had had enough. He snatched his hat from a nail on the wall. “I never had to tell you a goddamn thing, Molina. You knew what you were doing. I never forced you.”

He turned to leave, and that was when she sprang, leaping up from the bed to throw herself upon his back, arms going around him, hands and nails reaching for his face. He felt the flesh tear as he struggled to get her off of him, but she was digging in, clawing, screaming, and he turned around and around, trying to loosen her hold.

He felt a nail catch the corner of his eye and rip downward, and then he understood that it was time to forget she was a woman. Hell, he wasn’t going to let her keep on till she blinded him. He threw himself backward against the wall, and the impact caused her to let go. She fell to the floor. Towering above her, blood streaming from his eye and mouth, he yelled, “Woman, are you crazy? If you were a man, I’d—”

“I am not man! I am woman!” Tears ran down her cheeks, but rage made her tremble as she lay looking up at him with a venomous glare. “You will not go home. You will stay here. Molina will be your
placée. Hounsi
will make it so. You will see.”

“That’s all I’m listening to, Molina, and it’s over for us. I’m sorry if you got the wrong idea about things.” He hurried from the hut into the torrential rain, heedless of the soaking he was getting. All he wanted was to escape from the sound of her shrieks.

He hurried down the muddy street, breaking into a run. He needed a drink, but he was damned if he would let whiskey or rum or anything else make him get involved with another woman. He would serve out his time on this infernal island and then he would head for home, where he would try to piece his life together, with or without Kitty. There was still John.

He finally reached the small hotel in Port-au-Prince that was serving a headquarters for the committee, and where he had a room. It wasn’t much but it beat that hut of Molina’s.

Suddenly Travis realized he did not like himself very much. Since arriving in Haiti, it seemed he had been steadily turning into a bum. It was time for a change. A bath, a shave, some decent food, and hot coffee, then to bed to sleep for the rest of the day and on into the night. Tomorrow he would feel like pulling himself together once again.

“Coltrane, you look like hell.”

The voice came from a corner of the shadowy lobby. Travis turned quickly to see Eldon Harcourt rising from a chair to walk toward him, one eyebrow raised as his gaze raked Travis’ appearance. “You look worse up close, man. Those are some nasty scratches. Better have them taken care of. Have you been messing with an island girl? I should have told you about them. They’re dangerous.”

Travis did not know Eldon very well, only that he was an aide to one of the politicians on the committee. Eldon had seemed friendly enough, but Travis had not been looking for friends.

“Eldon, how would you know so much about the women here?” Travis asked, not sarcastically but out of sheer curiosity. “This is your first trip here, isn’t it? Yet you really do seem to know a lot about Haiti.”

Eldon smiled. “I do. And you’re right. It is my first trip here, but you see, my grandfather was involved in slave trading, and he lived here for many years. He brought my grandmother here from England, and my father was born here. They moved to America while my father was still a young boy. My grandmother was always frightened of voodoo, and I can remember Grandfather telling how she nagged him constantly to get her off of this evil island.”

“Voodoo!” Travis shook his head in disgust. “Those infernal drums they beat at night. They are like children playing a game. I find it ridiculous.”

Eldon frowned. “Don’t make light of it, Coltrane. At least not while we are here.”

“You believe in all that superstitious nonsense? Then I should introduce you to the native girl who damn near blinded me a short while ago. She was screaming names like
hounsi
and
houngan
and
wanga
power, and she did this to me because I wouldn’t make her my
placée,
whatever the hell that is.” He pointed to his face angrily. “The two of you might get along.”

Travis did not miss the shift in Eldon’s expression to one of sudden fright. “You
do
believe in that mumbo jumbo, don’t you? And something I just said scared you. I’d like to know what.”

Eldon glanced around, saw that no one else was in the lobby, and placed a hand on Travis’ shoulder. He whispered, “Come with me to my room. I’ve some whiskey we can wash those scratches with, and you’re going to need a drink when I finish telling you just what that girl was talking about.” He sucked in his lower lip, face paling. “I hope it’s not what I think it is.”

Travis stood his ground. “Look, I appreciate your concern, but I just want to go to bed and forget the whole damn thing.”

“No!”

He all but screamed the word, and Travis sobered. Eldon was no blabbering native. He was an American, by God, like himself, and something was frightening him.

Travis allowed himself to be led up the stairs and to Eldon’s room. Eldon went to the rickety wooden dresser and grabbed the bottle of whiskey and a cloth. “Here, put this on your face and wash off that blood. I’ll find some cups.”

Travis winced as the alcohol touched his flesh. Looking in a cracked mirror, he cursed at the sight of his face. She had worked him over, all right, and he was lucky he still had his eyeball. He tilted the bottle to his lips and took a long, burning swallow.

“Sit down.” Eldon motioned to the only chair in the room. He perched on the side of the sagging cot and sighed “Tell me the whole story, everything she said. No, wait.” His eyes widened. “First I want to know if you raped her.”

“Raped her?” Travis hooted. “I’ve never raped a woman in my life!”

“All right, all right.” Eldon waved his arms. “You did
do
it, though, didn’t you?”

“If you mean did I take her to bed and make love to her, yes, I did. I was drunk, and she was all over me. Maybe I shouldn’t have, but my whole damn life is a series of ‘shouldn’t haves.’ I can’t worry about every one.” He took another long swallow from the bottle.

“Was she…” Eldon lowered his voice to a whisper. “Was she a virgin?”

Travis nodded, and Eldon cried, “Oh, God, no,” and slapped his hands over his head, twisting his body from side to side.

Travis had had enough. “Goddamn it, man, will you get on with what you were so all-fired anxious to tell me? I’m getting a little tired.”

Once more, Eldon held up his hands. “All right, but first tell me all the things she said to you about
houngans
and
wanga
power. Tell me all the words she used that you don’t understand.”

By the time Travis finished talking, Eldon looked about to faint. It was difficult to make out his words. “You…you are in big trouble, Coltrane. If I were you, I’d get out of Haiti as quickly as possible. Forget the committee, your job, everything. Just get
out
of here.”

Travis calmly pulled a cheroot from his shirt pocket, saw that it was wet and soggy, then tossed it into a nearby spittoon. Spying one on Eldon’s dresser, he got up and took it without asking. After lighting up and watching the smoke spiral, he faced the man and said in a low voice, “All right, I want to know exactly what you are talking about, Harcourt, and spit it out fast.”

Eldon took a deep breath and then began talking in a great rush, as though if he did not get it all out quickly, he would not be able to tell it all. “You took a virgin. A young girl. She accused you of looking upon her as a
jeunesse,
what we call a mistress. You say she also accused you of not treating her as respectably as a
bousin,
a prostitute. So you were not paying her for the use of her body?”

“No, I wasn’t,” Travis drew on the cheroot, talking with his teeth clenched around it. “She never asked for money. She just wanted me to make love to her. I obliged. End of bargain.”

“No,” Eldon shook his head with dread finality. “The beginning of big trouble. She never wanted to be a
jeunesse
or a
bousin.
She wanted to be your
placée,
which is a common-law wife. She probably doesn’t have a family, or she would have had them demand that you make her your lawful wife, called a
pas placée.

“When she mentioned
houngan,
she was talking about a voodoo priest. A
mambo
is a voodoo priestess, a woman. They make things happen. They have the power. And speaking of power, when she said
‘wanga
power,’ she used a concoction to try to make you love her.”

Travis’ eyebrows shot up. “What kind of concoction?”

“Probably food with her nail and hair clippings mixed in, I imagine.”

Travis fought the impulse to gag. Damn, what had he gotten himself into? He bit down hard on the cheroot. “Go on. What else has the wench done to me?”

“It’s not what she
has
done,” Eldon said, eyes wide. “It is what she is
going
to do to you. She spoke of
hounsi.
That is the spouse of the god. She has obviously been to the
houngan
and the
mambo
of her village, and they are going to use voodoo to make you want her, to make you stay here, in Haiti, and make a respectable woman of her since you took her virginity.”

“Eldon, I don’t know who’s crazier, you or Molina. Now, maybe you believed your grandfather’s fairy tales. That’s nice. I can’t remember having a grandfather and I’ve often wished I had. It must be nice to hear stories. But that is all they are. Stories.”