Dead on the Delta

Ten



I sit in the strained silence for ten long minutes, determined not to be the first one to break it. We’re nearly to the gate when Hitch speaks. “I read your file today. The entire thing. It took twenty minutes.”

“Glad it didn’t suck up too much time.”

“You haven’t been promoted once in five years. Isn’t that unusual in your line of work?”

He knows damned well my job is reserved for the newest FCC recruits, a way to pay their dues for a year or so before they’re advanced to cushier jobs at the ports or the camps or the occasional research facility. If the person in question has a college degree and any kind of medical training, it’s a no-brainer they’ll be on the fast track to ruling a research facility.

The U.S. government isn’t the only employer for the immune. There are other countries running investigative operations in the Delta, each wanting to be the first to unlock the secrets of the creatures who’ve hidden among us for thousands of years. I’ve been approached by representatives from France and Brazil, but I told them both no thanks. I don’t want to rule the world or even a research facility. I just want to scoop shit in peace and go home to a cold beer or four.

But Hitch will never understand. He works even harder than he plays. He’s driven, in the way that makes people captains of industry or Peace Prize winners or eventually eats them alive and leaves them drooling in a corner.

“It would be unusual,” I say. “If I’d applied for a promotion.”

“And you’ve been passed over for two pay increases. Because of habitual lateness? If I was reading between the lines correctly?”

“You probably were.” I shrug. “I make enough money.”

I make more than twenty average D’Ville residents combined, but you’d never know it from the way I live. I don’t need the excess. I grew up with an entire floor of a house to myself and unlimited charging privileges. I know firsthand that money doesn’t buy happiness. Or safety.

Speaking of safety …

“Do you want to put your suit on before we go through?” I ask, as Hitch brakes in front of the gate.

“Nope.” He hits the button on the dash, the automobile portion of the boundary tilts upwards, and we drive through the iron mesh at the mandated five miles per hour. The mesh slithers across the hood and over our heads, scratching like a hundred tiny fingernails. “I’m assuming we’re going right.”

“Right for about a mile. I’ll tell you when to stop.”

He nods. “So what happened to all the ambition?”

“It became more environmentally friendly.”

“Like your bike?”

There’s the smart-ass. I’d known it was coming. It’s almost a relief to hear the derision in his tone. The pleasant neutrality was hurtfully impersonal.

“Let’s talk about you,” I say, shifting in my seat, giving him my full attention. “Do you have a death wish? Or has the FBI developed some kind of vaccine I don’t know about because—”

“No death wish, no vaccine. I don’t plan on getting out of the car.”

“You don’t plan on getting out of the car?” I’d considered that he wouldn’t have to, but assumed he’d at least want to be prepared.

“Nope.” It’s his turn to shrug. “This is your mess, you should clean it up. It’ll be dark by the time we get there and I’d rather check out the Breeze house during the day when I can see something. I’ll come back suited up tomorrow.”

“So why’d we waste time going back for your suit?”

“I didn’t want an innocent man risking his life,” he says, giving no sign that he realizes the “innocent man” is my man or that he cares one way or the other. “And I needed my guns.”

“How are you going to shoot someone from inside the car?”

He sighs. “I think we both know there’s not going to be anyone there to shoot.”

“We do?”

“If this woman had friends they either untied her and got the hell out of town, or left her there and got the hell out of town. They’re going to know they’ve been discovered and react accordingly.”

“Right. Because Breeze heads always react the way they should.” My eye roll is so intense my head gets involved. “Are you the same man who spent a year in the ER? Because I know you’ve seen your share of—”

“No, I’m not,” he says, his words shutting me down as thoroughly as he knew they would. “I’m a different person, and I’d appreciate it if you’d respect that.”

“The way you’ve respected my differences?”

“I wouldn’t call being a drunk and lousy at your job respect-worthy differences.”

My jaw clenches, but I manage a soft laugh. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know what I read, what I see.” He casts a look exquisite in its disdain toward my side of the car.

It’s all I can do not to run my hand through my hair, straighten my stained tank top, do something to make myself less repugnant. Instead, I search the road ahead, breathing in and out through my nose, fighting not to say things I’ll regret.

“Pull over. Park at the end of the gravel.” I point to a stretch of dry land that reaches further into the water than most. I should be able to see the Breeze house from …

Yep. There it is, floating among the gnarled branches, gray clapboard sides nearly black in the fading light, tiny windows as flat and empty as fairy eyes.

“That’s it?” he asks. I nod. “I don’t see—”

“We won’t be able to see her from here. I pulled her around to a dry patch on the other side.” I’m pretty sure that’s where I put her. I pray so, anyway.

As I grab my flashlight from my bag, I honestly do pray for the first time in a long time, sending out a promise to suck less at everything if God will help me find this woman and let her be okay. Or as okay as when I found her.

“Guess you’d better get going,” Hitch says. “Unless you’ve got something you’d like to share with the class.”

I take a deep breath. “No, nothing to share. I just guess I’d rather be a drunk than a condescending a*shole.”

Hitch smiles, a stiff curve of his lips I can barely make out in the near dark. “I’d rather be a condescending a*shole.”

“Clearly.” I hit my seat belt and reach for the door, but pause to check for fairies.

None have dared get close to the iron-plated car, but the rest of the dusky bayou is aglow with orbs swooping through the air, their reflections dancing in the still water beneath. It’s beautiful, like a house fire or a tornado writhing in the sky. There are times when you can’t help appreciating something, no matter how deadly it is.

I pause a second too long, and Hitch lets out a frustrated sigh.

“If you really think you’re in danger, you can have one of my guns. I have two.”

I turn, surprised to see the handle of his semi-automatic hovering near my face. “Am I supposed to be carrying an FBI weapon?”

“I don’t care.”

“I thought you were a big rule follower these days.”

“Sometimes. Sometimes not.” The gun inches closer. “If it will make you feel safer to have a gun, take it. I know you know how to use it.”

It’s not much of an opening, but I could try to make this lead into a chat about how much of what we know about each other we’re going to admit to in our new, shared workplace. But I can’t muster the gumption. Hitch is sending me out into the bayou alone. He isn’t even going to suit up so he’ll be ready in the unlikely event I need backup. He doesn’t care if I live or die. He volunteered to come out here solely to spare the life of a stranger.

If that isn’t confirmation that he’d just as soon forget he ever knew my name, I don’t know what is.

“Thanks.” I take the gun, but keep my eyes lowered. I don’t want him to see that he’s hurt me. Again. “If the fairies get too close, turn on the lights up top.” I gesture toward the control on the dashboard. “They don’t like the white and blue.” Police lights are no longer red. Red attracts fairies.

“Got it. Good luck.”

I don’t bother to respond. For all the sincerity in that “good luck,” he might as well have told me to go f*ck myself. I slam out the door and head toward the bayou, realizing I neglected to fetch my waders from my trailer only seconds before I reach the water’s edge.

Christ on a cracker. How could I have forgotten? People are creatures of habit and today’s been anything but routine, but I spent most of my early twenties thriving in a stressful, rapidly shifting reality. When I want to excel, I do. And I honestly want to excel right now. I want to find this woman and help dismantle the chain of Breeze houses around Donaldsonville. I want to assist Cane and the FBI in finding Grace’s murderer, and make my town a safe place again.

But despite my good intentions, I’m failing. And Hitch is watching. The knowledge makes me tuck my borrowed gun into the back of my waistband, flick on my flashlight, and keep going.

I step into the water, wincing as the gritty, oily bayou soaks through my thin cotton pants. I’ve barely made it five feet when something slithers against my leg, churning through the water with a muscular thrust of its long, thick body. I freeze, heart racing, tongue pressing against the roof of my mouth as I fight the urge to scream. Even when the snake is gone, gliding away, tracing elegant S-shapes in the water, the need to turn and race back to the shore is almost more than I can handle.

“Crap,” I hiss, shaking one hand at my side in a vain attempt to release some of the adrenaline coursing through my system.

I’m immune to fairy bite, not snakebite. There’s a reason I wear thick, rubber waders and search the ground very f*cking carefully before I reach my hand near a place that could hide a snake. This is insane. I should go back to the car, see if Cane has a pair of waders in his trunk. I could even ask Hitch to loan me his suit. If he isn’t going to wear it, I might as well. It’d be pretty damned hard for a snake to bite through iron.

Now a gator, on the other hand …

Panic dumps into my bloodstream. The black water with its dancing fairy lights isn’t pretty anymore. It’s deadly, filled with things I have good reason to fear. This isn’t groundless anxiety; it’s my body’s attempt at self-preservation.

I turn, but stop before I take a step toward the shore. It’s still light enough for me to see that Hitch’s head is tilted down, as if he’s reading something in his lap. He isn’t even watching. If I go back to the car I might get the comfort of his suit, but I’ll also get more of the “Annabelle is a loser “ show.

I don’t like that show. I don’t like Hitch much, either. Unfortunately, growing to loathe him isn’t making it any easier to be in his company. The only remedy for the nasty way he makes me feel is to get rid of him, to make sure he has no reason to be here.

Hand strangling my flashlight, I wade forward, one foot after another, until the water reaches my waist and begins to recede, inch by merciful inch. By the time I reach the low limb where I busted my head earlier in the day, the bayou barely tickles the tops of my thighs. A few more feet and I slog—dripping, pants clinging to my skin—onto dry land.

Several fairies prowl the air beneath the trees, but they give me a wide berth, flitting on to other hunting grounds as I draw near. At this point I’ve been sweating onto my clothes for nearly eight hours. No matter how non-stinky Marcy insists I am, the Fey are obviously catching my scent. They’re so averse to contact that I’m alone in the glow-free shadows by the time I reach the place where I tied up my Breeze-head friend.

Or where I thought I tied her up.

Shit. The ground where I left her is empty. I stalk forward, tennis shoes squishing, sweeping my flashlight back and forth, eyes straining as I search for some sign of where she’s gone. But there’s nothing. Nothing.

Shit, shit, shit.

I follow the gentle slope of the land downhill, thinking maybe she’s rolled somewhere nearby. Like into the water … where she’s drowned or been eaten by gators or sucked dry by fairies or something equally horrible. My head spins with all the possibilities, my gut certain I’m going to find a body floating in the shallows. A body I’ll have to drag back to the police car, a gruesome trophy to my shame. I’ll have to live with her blood on my hands for the rest of my life, I’ll probably do jail time, I’ll—

“Ohthankgod.” My breath rushes out, half sigh of relief, half hysterical laugh, as I pluck the twisted scrap of leather from the ground. The belt! She untied herself and got away!

Not usually something I’d celebrate, but I know Cane’s right: far better for her to escape than be found dead. I stuff the cheap accessory down the front of my pants, and draw Hitch’s gun from the back. Juggling my flashlight, I remove the safety, and load the chamber with a quick snap of the slide back and forth, glad Hitch gave me the semi-automatic. He has a revolver, as well, but I prefer the added heft of the semi. It makes me feel … safer.

My finger hovers over the trigger, not touching, but ready to squeeze—light and steady—if the need arises. Unlike some people, I’m not certain my former captive has the sense to get out of town. She could still be close by, sniffing Breeze, picking at her scabs, lying in wait for round two of our own personal WWE smackdown. It pays to be prepared. I don’t want to shoot her, but I will if I have to.

No sooner has the thought pinged through my mind when something much harder—a meaty fist backed by some major muscle—crashes against the side of my head.

My entire body clenches as I fall, including the finger lingering above the trigger. A shot goes wild into the trees. My flashlight falls to the ground and my gun nearly joins it, but at the last minute I curl my finger, hanging on to the trigger guard as my hip and shoulder hit the ground. I make the most of my small good fortune, spinning the gun back into position as I roll onto my back, aiming at where I guess my attacker will be standing. I twitch my arm back and forth, but find … nothing. Nothing at all. The air is quiet but for the rasping of my desperate breath.

Here I am, the heavy breather. Come and get me.

I swallow, blink, fight for a clear thought. Tree limbs dance a creepy mambo against the dark-blue sky and my head pounds out an accompanying rhythm. I scramble into a crouched position, low to the ground. I can’t stand up; I can barely sit. The world spins and tilts like every carnival ride that ever made me puke when I was a kid.

I turn, searching the shadows, trying not to tip over. Halfway around my circle, my right wrist cramps and the gun wavers, but I prop it up with my left, squinting for a flash of skin, the shine of an open eye, the slightest sign of the man who hit me. It has to be a man. I don’t know many women who can pack a punch like that. My head feels like it’s about to explode; my eyes pulse with their own unhealthy heartbeats. Everything is blurry, but I can see well enough to know that there’s no one, not even—

Sudden warmth at my neck, and rough fingertips tease over my racing pulse.

I throw an elbow into a mass of flesh and dive back to the ground. I hit the earth and roll as a howling sound fills the air, making me flinch and scream. The gun fires again—though I can’t remember squeezing the trigger—and a bullet bolts into the sky. Blue and white lights pulse through the night, helping my brain make sense of the howling. It’s the siren on the police car. Hitch must have heard the gunshot.

Now, if only he can get suited up in time. Even the gun in my hand doesn’t make me feel safe. That gut I jabbed was ridiculously immense, a brick wall of an abdomen belonging to someone large enough to wring my neck with a single hand. Someone who also has the agility to move scary fast. He’s gone again, the space where he stood is empty and …

No. Not empty. The light sweeps through the trees, casting racing, writhing shadows everywhere. Everywhere, but for a patch of pitch black at forty-five degrees. A shadow. A man’s shadow … with no man attached.

What the …

The flashlight a few feet away snaps off of its own accord. A second later, the gun flies from my hand, and a man’s voice growls in the darkness. “Where is it? We know you have it.” He’s close, close enough to touch, more than close enough to see. My eyes flick up and down, back and forth, desperate to find what my brain assures them they should. “Where is it!”

“Wha-wha-wha—”

“Where did you hide it?”

“Annabelle! Annabelle, answer me!” Hitch’s yell booms through the night, louder for the sudden absence of the sirens, sounding closer than the door of the police car. I hear a splash and then another. He’s in the water; he’s coming for me.

“I’m over here! In the trees!” Now it will be two against one.

My attacker must have had the same realization and decided he doesn’t care for the odds. The leaves crunch and whisper as he hurries away. He has a soft tread for a big person and is distancing himself quickly, fleeing the scene of the crime.

Crime. Has there been a crime? Assault is certainly against the law, but how do you press charges against someone you can’t see? I don’t know. I don’t want to think about the impossibility of what just happened. I just want out of here.

I snatch Hitch’s gun from the ground, decide I can buy another flashlight, and make a run for it. My eyes search the darkness as I crash into the bayou, aiming my body toward Hitch’s splashes, wondering how I’m going to explain to him—or anyone else—that I was attacked by an invisible man.