“Uh-huh. And Gabe was starving to death because he wasn’t feeding. I’m not saying that drinking whiskey on an empty stomach was smart, and I’m not saying that Margaud wouldn’t have slept with Gabe, or that she didn’t spike his liquor with something even stronger. I’m not saying that Gabe isn’t an idiot, because he is. What I am saying is that you didn’t get the full story. Your daughter is”—I pulled a Cajun saying out of the air—“the pole around which this johnboat twirls.”
“You say my Shauna causing trouble?”
“Yep. First off, it sounds like she also has postpartum depression. And that’s on top of you raising her to think she could get anything she wanted out of life just on her looks.” Lucky started to object. “Don’t. I met her. I knew girls like her, growing up. I recognized the signs the first time I met her, and that was before the depression set in. You let Shauna wrap you around her little finger her whole life. You need to see all your people for who they really are. Shauna, Gabe, and Margaud too. And then you need to stop being flighty, emotional, and volatile, and be a leader. Don’t tell me you can’t just because you’re a male witch. That excuse might have worked when you were fourteen and full of testosterone, but it stops working today. Right this minute.”
I set the shotgun on the counter and let Lucky go. He didn’t lunge for the gun, which kept him alive; Eli had a vamp-killer in one hand and his .380 in the other, aimed through the glass butcher counter. At this range, he could have hit Lucky—and a gorgeous ham—with his eyes closed.
He said, “You done come to dis town and you try teach me lesson?”
“Somebody needs to. Lucky, this town is this close”—I held my thumb and index finger a quarter inch apart—“to going up in flames or turning into a bloodbath. Or both.”
“Okay. I hear dat.” He squinted at me. “You too young to be my gran’-mère, but you sound just like her.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” The rest of the convocation went much more smoothly.
? ? ?
The shop door closed behind us. Eli said mildly, “Grandmaw?”
“Boy?”
“Yeah, ’bout that.” He scowled. “Coonass,” he said, evaluating and passing judgment.
“Agreed.”
“But . . . Grandmaw?”
“Cherokee chick,” I corrected.
“Badass, motorcycle-mama, deadly Cherokee chick,” he amended.
I nodded contemplatively, taking in everything about the small town as we walked, including the still-unused heavy equipment parked in the streets around the main intersection. “Badass, gun-toting, loyal, former military, take-no-prisoners-and-leave-no-one-behind”—I paused, thinking about Eli’s milk-and-coffee skin tone and his possible ethnic background—“caramel candy man.”
“Sylvia says my skin is sweet as sugar,” he agreed, looking relaxed as a tourist, but his eyes taking in everything, glancing at me, making sure I saw what he did. The unused equipment didn’t have state or county license tags. Some private company had gotten a contract to repave the city streets, and then, for reasons unknown but probably having to do with bloodsuckers, the workers had disappeared. “She likes to lick me aaaall over.” His twitch of a smile was half-teasing, half–evil swagger.
“Ick. TMI. Boy talk. Not what I needed to hear. If I weren’t so badass I’d stick my fingers in my ears.”
He laughed. Finished with the questions, insults, clarifications, and bragging rights, Eli slipped his sunglasses on against the glare. The day was heating up in what South Louisianans called fall weather: mid-nineties, dead air, with a blistering sun. Even with my healing abilities I had taken to wearing sunscreen. Sunburn was unpleasant, and it might be a while before I could shift into Beast and heal the minor hurts. “The only good thing we got out of our chat with Lucky was lunch plans.” He shook his head as we sauntered toward the Catholic church on the far corner. Eli went on, “I ate until I was stuffed at breakfast, and I’m already hungry just from smelling Boudreaux’s.”
“I think it’s a spell. A make people hungry spell.”
Eli’s stomach growled softly in reply.
“See?”
The Catholic church hadn’t changed since my last visit. The bell tower was the tallest building in the town, built of thick brick walls that shadowed its tarnished, patinated bell, the openings high landing and nesting places for pigeons. The church itself was cross-shaped, brick and mortar. Brick fencing encased the expanse of close-cut lawn. The ornate bronze crosses in the niches of the fence had tarnished and leaked various shades of verdigris down the brick, like the stains of ancient tears. The top of the wall, with its pointed cross iron spikes, made the whole place look like a fortress of religion instead of a church.