Sabine slid into the booth across from the detective, her heart racing because of the task at hand and the appearance of the man who was going to perform it. He was so young, so rugged, so manly. Sabine had no idea what she’d been expecting, maybe some gray-haired man wearing a Sherlock Holmes hat…but that was ridiculous. Still, she’d only worked with a private detective once before and the chain-smoking, mid-fifties burnout hadn’t even remotely resembled the gorgeous man across from her.
She took a deep breath, hoping to slow her racing pulse, and pushed a folder across the table, praying that her hands didn’t shake. “Mr. Villeneuve, I know Raissa gave you some information about my family, but this is everything I have. Twenty years of research.”
He reached for the folder and flipped through the sparse set of papers Sabine had given him. “Not a lot to show for twenty years.” He looked over at her. “That must be very disappointing.”
“You have no idea.”
Beau studied her for a moment, a contemplative expression on his face. Then his expression shifted back to business mode, and whatever it was that Sabine had thought he was going to say was apparently pushed back. “So tell me what you do know,” he said. “I like to hear the story firsthand if I can. It gives me a better feel for the situation and sometimes opens up avenues of investigation that might not have been explored.”
Sabine laughed. “If you can find an avenue I haven’t explored, then you’re the best detective in the world, Mr. Villeneuve.”
“Call me Beau.”
“Okay, Beau. I guess I’ll start at the beginning, what I was told of it anyway. I was only six months old when my parents had a fatal car accident.”
“You weren’t in the car?” Beau asked.
“I was in the car. Some folks around here called it a miracle, and I suppose it was, but apparently they were riding with the windows down and I was thrown clean when the car rolled. The fireman who worked the scene probably wouldn’t have found me at all, except they’d brought their dog with them. He set up a howl, and they found me perched in a clump of marsh weeds, not a scratch on me.”
“Wow! That’s incredible.”
Sabine nodded. “The police did a search to locate the closest relative, trying to find someone to care for me until the state could decide what to do. They came up blank on my father. His name didn’t appear in records anywhere except for a driver’s license that had been issued a little over six months before. They finally got lucky with my mother and came up with my greataunt in Mudbug.”
“And she took you in?”
“Yes. Aunt Margaret was a nurse. She never married and, to hear the talk, never even dated much. All I know is she took me in. Gave me a home, food, clothes…took care of me.”
Beau nodded. “And your mother? What did your aunt have to say about her?”
Sabine frowned. “Not much. She didn’t really know my mother or her parents that well. Apparently they were from the dirt-poor branch of the family that lived deep in the bayou—in huts, really. All Aunt Meg knew was that my mother’s parents had died young, probably when she was a teenager, and she didn’t know of any other children at all.”
“Was there any other family?”
“Not that Aunt Meg was aware of.” Sabine frowned, recalling her recent conversation in Dr. Breaux’s office.
“What’s wrong?”
“Well, my whole life Aunt Meg always said she had no other living relatives, but I just found out this week that was a lie.”
Beau leaned forward and stared at her. “Why would she lie?”
Sabine shrugged. “Since my aunt passed away years ago, I can only guess it’s because the relative she failed to mention was her nephew, a loser of monumental proportions. Harold is in jail right now for an assortment of charges, attempted murder being two of them, and who knows what else the cops will find now that they’re looking.”
“Then it’s just as well you weren’t obligated to exchange Christmas cards or anything.”
Sabine smiled.
“I need to tell you up front that I journal all my cases from start to finish, but I promise any documentation I acquire or create will always remain confidential. Writing things down helps me reach logical conclusions, and I tend to remember things more easily if I write them longhand.”
“Do most detectives work like that?” Sabine asked.
“I can’t speak for other detectives, really. I started keeping journals when I was a kid. The habit just stuck, I guess.” He looked down at the table and fiddled with a packet of sugar.
Sabine, sensing he was somewhat embarrassed, continued. “Well, that’s basically it in a nutshell.” She reached for the gold heart-shaped locket that was always around her neck. “This locket belonged to my mother. That information in that folder and this piece of jewelry are all I really know about them.”
Beau looked back up at her. “And a drawing from beyond.”
Sabine nodded. “Raissa’s very talented. I’m fortunate to know her.”
Beau narrowed his eyes at her. “Do you really buy into all that psychic stuff?”
Sabine laughed. “She didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
“Raissa’s my mentor. I own the psychic shop across the street.”
Beau hopped into his vehicle and stared at Sabine as she unlocked the front door of her shop. Read ’em and Reap. Good God Almighty! He’d stepped into the middle of a nut parade. And the worst part was, against his own better judgment, he’d picked up a banner and agreed to march. No doubt about it—he was going to make a colossal fool of himself over a beautiful woman who walked like a ballet dancer. Maybe he needed to reconsider his vow of bachelorhood and settle down with a nice accountant or something. Women like Sabine LeVeche could only get him into trouble.
Sabine turned before entering the shop and gave him a wave and a smile. Beau waved back and started his truck, hoping the drive back to the city would clear his head and help him make sense of the mess he’d just gotten himself into. Not one psychic but two. And he had actually agreed to embark on a search for dead people with his biggest lead supposedly coming from the dead people themselves. For a man who was more than a skeptic, it was an irony he wasn’t quite ready to fathom.
As he drove out of town and onto the highway to New Orleans, he pulled Raissa’s drawing out of the envelope and took another look. He knew he’d seen that face somewhere before, but not exactly that face and not in person. For the life of him, that’s all he could remember. Given the sheer number of photos he’d viewed when he was an FBI agent, God only knew when he’d seen a picture that resembled the man in the drawing. Hell, there was nothing to say he’d even seen it while working at the FBI. Raissa had claimed she thought the man looked familiar, too, so for all he knew it could have been a likeness in a local newspaper.
But for some reason, that didn’t feel right.
He took another glance at the drawing and frowned. Somewhere buried in the depths of his mind was the answer. He slipped the drawing back into the folder and concentrated on the road ahead of him. As soon as he got back to his apartment, he would pull out his journals from his FBI years. Maybe something in them would spark his memory. Beyond the basics of background searching, the drawing was his best lead for now.
Unless, of course, Raissa or Sabine could call up more spirits to give them an address.