Big Evan listened in silence and when I was done, he turned piercing eyes on me and said, “And do you want to tell me why I wasn’t informed?”
“Because you’d have run off and gotten in the way and made a stink and caused trouble and scattered your scent all over the hotel room and brought in the cops, who have little to do with, and no control over, vamps. Molly went off with vamps, Evan. And I have contacts with vamps. The cops don’t. You don’t.” I let that sink in for a while and said, “I have a question for you. If Molly told you she was coming to New Orleans to see me, and then didn’t come see me, can you make a guess why?”
“She was kidnapped,” he growled.
I didn’t let myself react, because it seemed a likely possibility. Even if Molly had left the hotel under her own power, it hadn’t been by free will, and it didn’t mean that she had been making her own decisions, and didn’t mean she was still missing by her own choice. With only a slight hesitation to mark my thoughts, I said, “Molly came here for a reason. She expected you to come to me, just like you did, so that, if she got in trouble, I could keep her family safe until I found her. She also wanted you here for whatever reason—and no, I don’t know what it might be,” I said as he started to interrupt. “Molly had to want my help, Evan. And she had to be in trouble or she would have told us all the truth and called me and told you and none of this would be happening.”
And Molly hadn’t trusted anyone with her reasons for coming to New Orleans. Not her husband. Not me. Molly was in deep trouble. I didn’t say that aloud, but Evan must have realized it because he swore, “Son of a witch on a switch.”
“Pretty much.” With Molly gone from her hotel room, and not checking in with any of us, things had gone bad. Maybe real bad.
? ? ?
There was little for me to do on any of my cases, and so when our confab was over, I did what all good vamp hunters do when nothing is happening. I lay down. I didn’t expect to sleep, but figured things might come to me if I put my feet up and closed my eyes and let my mind wander, let things percolate and steep and find unconscious connections. Fortunately, it was also nap time for the Trueblood children and I got in three long hours of uninterrupted, blissful rest, some of it probably snoring, despite my worry.
? ? ?
I woke when Angelina opened my door and stood there, one hand holding the knob, her body dangling from it, her feet pivoting as she swung back and forth and around. She had a doll under her other arm, and I recognized Ka Navista, the Cherokee Indian doll I had given her. Ka had black hair in a braid and yellow eyes like mine, and a wardrobe sewn for her of traditional Cherokee clothes. Ka originally had black eyes, but Molly admitted later that Angie had complained that the doll wasn’t “right,” so Molly had painted them to match mine. “Hey, Angie Baby,” I said.
“Hey, Aunt Jane. Uncle Alex Kid says he has something for you and to wake you up, biscause it’s important. Be-cause it is important,” she corrected herself. Angie was growing up and had been trying to break herself of baby talk the last time I had seen her; still was, it seemed.
“Okay.” I rolled off the mattress and checked the time as I tucked my phone into my jeans pocket. It was two hours before dusk. Plenty of time. “Let’s see what Uncle Kid has to say.”
Angie lifted her arms to me and I picked her up, adjusting her on a hip so that Ka wasn’t squished. I slid my feet into slippers, but the floor wasn’t as chilled as it had been. The promised warm front was fully in, and rain pattered outside. I went to the kitchen, where I could smell tea steeping. I poured a mugful, getting a whiff of a spice-flavored tea left over from the holiday season. I added sugar and a dollop of Cool Whip and carried the mug to the living room. I set Angie on the couch and bent over Alex. “Got something?”
The Kid tapped a tablet, bringing up a still shot from the video feed of Bliss and Rachael getting into the black cab limo. He pointed to the driver. “His name is Alonzo Nubbins. He owns a car service that caters to vamps and their dinners. The night of the party, he was driving himself because a driver called in sick. He wasn’t willing to give me any more info on the phone, so you might want to pay him a visit.” He pointed to one of the unknowns in the car. “I’m pretty sure she’s a chick and that she has long, straight red hair because it matches the shade of Rachael’s hair in this light.”
I leaned in. Molly’s a redhead. She might have straightened her hair. And then I realized how stupid that was. Molly was not tied in to my case. The timeline was impossible. I was reaching for straws. I was starting to panic about my best friend.
The Kid said, “The other one looks like a dude, with a nose ring.”