"Le Mascarade… It's the kind of place you don' wanna go, sugar. Unless you like leather and you're into S amp;M."
S amp;M. Bondage. Annie had been tied up. Savannah had been-
She clamped a hand over her mouth as her stomach heaved. She bent over, putting her head between her knees, and gagged as terrible images flashed behind her eyes. Blood. Pain. Screams. Delicate wrists straining against their bonds. Blood, so much blood. There was nothing in her stomach to come up, leaving her choking, coughing, as her body did its best to reject the possibilities that continued to bombard her.
Stephen Danjermond. District Attorney Danjermond. The golden boy. The favorite son. Destined for great things. What if he really was the killer?
And she was the only person who knew.
Laurel Chandler. The prosecutor who cried wolf.
No one would believe her. Not in a million years.
And he damn well knew it.
Cold sweat slicked over her face and her body, sour with the scent of fear. She dragged a hand across her forehead and into the damp tendrils of her bangs as she sat up and leaned heavily against the back of the seat. Funny, she thought, without the least trace of humor, she had actually been holding up pretty well in spite of everything. Savannah's death had devastated her heart, but mentally she had hung tough. Dr. Pritchard would have been proud. Until now. Stephen Danjermond had stood back and watched her fight, watched her hang on to her strength, then with no more effort than he would use to swat a fly, he stepped out of the shadows and knocked her legs completely out from under her.
"Right and strength don't always coincide."
Was that what this was all about? A contest between justice and the laws of nature? A game? "Does he want you to catch him, Laurel? Or does he want to show you he can't be caught?" Was this what he had been alluding to when he had spoken of the two of them working together?
Or was she imagining things?
He had made her uncomfortable from the moment they had first met, but that wasn't a crime. She'd been under a terrible strain lately, hadn't eaten, hadn't slept. As she sat there panting for breath in the stagnant heat, the sounds of traffic rumbled in the background like the murmur of a distant ocean, someone stepped out of Bentley's Small Engine Shop across the street and hollered for Sonny. An indigo bunting fluttered down from the branches of a magnolia tree to poke its tiny head in an abandoned McDonald's bag in hopeful search of crumbs.
Beautiful little bird, she mused, her thoughts breaking into desultory chunks. It was decorated with gaudy, bright colors-yellow-green, violet-blue, red-that made it look as if an artist had flung paint at it with verve and abandon. How could anything that pretty just happen along for her to see if she had just been confronted by a murderer?
"Then you haven't been paying attention, Laurel…"
"This killer is brilliant…"
"What do you think of sharks, Laurel?"
Sharks moved silently, swiftly, cutting through the deep water, disturbing nothing until they struck. When they killed, they killed brutally, efficiently, completely without mercy or remorse.
"Serial killers are the sharks of our society…"
Nerves trilled at the base of her neck. Memory stirred. The feel of a gaze in the dark. Eyes without a face. As her skin crawled and pebbled with goose bumps, she turned and looked out through the windshield at the courthouse. From a second-story window he looked down at her, knowing she saw him, knowing she could do nothing to stop him. She had no evidence he was a killer.
"You need evidence, Laurel…"
The matchbook was all she had that could link him in any way. There was no law against having a red book of matches. At any rate, he could throw them away, say he'd never had them. It would be her word against his. No question who would win that contest. Besides, she couldn't prove who had left the matches in her car. There was no doubt there would be many prints-her own, Savannah's, Jack's.
Jack's.
"The best suspect we have is your lover… Rest assured, I will have enough evidence to get a conviction. More than enough."
"Oh, God," she whispered, her throat nearly closing on the words. "He's building a case against Jack."
The notion hit her like a sledgehammer, literally knocking her back in her seat. No one would have better access to hard evidence than the real killer. No one would be more adept at building a case than Stephen Danjermond. The politically ambitious Stephen Danjermond.
The sense of dread and disgust seeped deep into her bones as she considered the implications. What better feather in his cap than successfully convicting a man for crimes that had terrorized South Louisiana for a year and a half? A sensational crime. A sensational trial. A defendant whose name was known across America as the Master of the Macabre.
The press would have a field day. Danjermond would be hailed as a hero. Lifted up on the shoulders of the people of Acadiana without their ever suspecting there was blood on his hands. The case could take him anywhere he wanted to go.
Unless someone stopped him.
He'd thrown the gauntlet at her feet. He had chosen her as his adversary, then turned his back on her and sauntered away as if he didn't have a care in the world, as if he knew she didn't have a chance in hell of besting him. He was bigger, stronger, his mental skills honed to a razor's edge. He was admired and adored. And she was the woman who cried wolf, small and weak, her credibility in tatters, her battle skills rusted and atrophied. The only line of defense between Stephen Danjermond and his future.
If it would have done any good, she would have broken down and cried.
There was enough food in the house to feed an army platoon for a week. The rich, spicy aromas of gumbo and étouffée blended with the milder scents of sundry casseroles with a cream of mushroom soup base and the sweet perfumes of fresh fruit pies and spice cakes. Offerings from neighbors and friends who knew it wouldn't assuage the grief, but brought it anyway to show that they cared.
As she set her purse aside on the hall table, Laurel wondered absently if anyone had taken gumbo or spice cake out to Beauvoir. She supposed someone had. Not these same, salt-of-the-earth folk who had come to comfort Mama Pearl or Caroline's eclectic group of friends, but the women from the Junior League and the Hospital Auxiliary. They would have gone out to deliver their deviled eggs and chicken salad with a thin dose of sympathy. Pained smiles and sugarcoated apologies. Poor Vivian, how terrible to lose a daughter (but at least it was the tacky one). Poor Vivian, you must be beside yourself (it was such a scandalous death). And Vivian would nod and dab at her tears while casting glances askance to see if Ridilia Montrose had put dark meat in her chicken salad.
"Laurel?"
It was all Laurel could do to keep from jumping out of her skin, her nerves were strung so tight. She had hoped to slip upstairs unnoticed. Irrational as the thought was, she was sure her suspicions were written all over her face, that anyone who glanced at her would know what she was thinking and shake their heads sadly over her mental state.
Trying to compose herself, she bent her head and fussed with her glasses as Caroline stepped out of the parlor and came toward her with hands outstretched. Laurel caught her aunt's fingertips and squeezed, but her gaze moved past Caroline to the tall, striking redhead in the dark yellow dress, who came only as far as the doorway.
"Laurel, this is Margaret Ascott," Caroline said, glancing between them. "Margaret is a friend of mine from Lafayette."
Margaret sent her a look of genuine sympathy from big dark eyes. "I'm so sorry about your sister, Laurel," she said in a low voice.
"Thank you," Laurel murmured, too distracted to care just what kind of friend Margaret could be. All she could think was that she envied Caroline her friend. She would have dearly loved to have someone she could spill her heart out to.
Caroline's brow furrowed in concern. "Darlin', you're as pale as milk. You must be exhausted. Come sit down."
She couldn't. There was no way she could sit down and pretend she didn't have knowledge of her sister's killer, nor could she tell them-or anyone-yet. No one would believe her, she thought, her heart thudding wildly. Caroline would say she was under too much stress. Others would point to Scott County and say this was just another wild conclusion of an unbalanced mind.