Fifteen
“Sahara! Sahara! Where are you?”
Sahara curled up into the tiniest ball beneath the bed and closed her eyes, thinking if she couldn’t see Katarina, then Katarina could not see her. Then she heard a slap, and her mama’s high-pitched voice.
“I don’t know where she is, ma’am. I swear I don’t,” Billie said.
Katarina’s voice was strident and angry. “You find her now, or I’ll punish her myself and neither one of you will like that. The Garden Club ladies will be here in just over an hour, and we still need to do the child’s hair and change her clothes.”
“Yes, ma’am. I know, ma’am. I’ll find her, I promise,” Billie said.
Sahara was sad now, wishing she hadn’t hidden. She’d gotten Mama into trouble.
Billie sat down on the side of the bed, wiped her eyes and took a tissue from her pocket and blew her nose.
“You can come out now,” Billie said.
Sahara crawled out from under the bed, her eyes welling with tears.
“I’m sorry, Mama. I didn’t mean to get you in trouble.”
Billie lifted Sahara into her lap and gave her a brief hug.
“You go tell Katarina that you were outside in the garden and didn’t hear her calling. Tell her you’re sorry.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Sahara said, and left their bedroom with her steps dragging.
But she was soon running, her little footsteps echoing throughout the house.
Katarina heard her and came out of her bedroom with an angry look on her face.
“I’m sorry, Katarina! I didn’t hear you calling. I was in the garden.”
Katarina sighed. Children were such a burden sometimes.
“It’s okay, child. I thought you were hiding.”
“Oh no, ma’am. I would never do that,” Sahara said, and then smiled.
Katarina looked down into the beautiful little face before her and imagined she saw herself in those perfect features.
“Well, then,” she said. “We need to hurry. You’re going to sit beside me during Garden Club as a reminder to the members to vote you in as Little Miss Rosebud. Come Mardi Gras, you will be riding with me in the Garden Club float. Isn’t that exciting?”
“Yes, ma’am, exciting,” Sahara said.
* * *
Bubba was running out of ways to get rid of Sahara without revealing his identity. If he managed to get inside the house, he would have to deal with the bodyguard, which was out of the question. And while he had been using bombs earlier, he had no intention of blowing up the mansion. Poison hadn’t worked. Deadly snakes didn’t work. Hiring a hit man was a bust. Every time he changed his modus operandi and failed, it was a cautionary warning to them of impending dangers.
He was walking past a mirror in his house when he paused, intently eyeing his reflection. He didn’t look like a murderer. He didn’t feel like one, either. What he felt was cheated. He hadn’t started out intending to hurt others to get what he wanted, but in war, collateral damage was inevitable.
He leaned closer. He had his mother’s eyes and coloring, and he’d also inherited from her an ingrained hate for the Travis family as a whole, which was why he had no problem ending their time on earth. They’d lived in opulence long enough. It was his turn to share in the wealth, and there was only one more person standing in his way.
He made a quick trip to the supermarket and was back home in less than an hour, carrying the sacks up to his third-floor apartment.
When he reached the third-floor landing, he stomped loudly, certain that the lady who lived across the hall from him would open her door to see who was making noise in the hall.
And just as he expected, she did.
“What’s going on out here?” she cried.
“Oh, I’m sorry, Mrs. Lively. I didn’t mean to disturb you,” he said.
The old woman frowned. “Well, since it’s you, it’s fine. For a minute I thought it might be some kind of burglar, kicking in the doors to rob good folks like us.”
“No, ma’am, just me. I’m really sorry. Oh, by the way! Did you hear the news about Sahara Travis?” he asked.
She frowned. “Hear what? That they found her daddy dead? Yes, everyone heard that.”
“No, not that. I just heard on the news as I was driving home that she had been killed. She was the last of that family—now they’re all gone. Sure is a shame.”
“Oh my Lord!” the woman cried. “I hadn’t heard. What a tragedy. So beautiful and so young,” she said, and shut the door in his face.
He grinned. Mrs. Lively was the building’s gossip, and she had a reputation for spreading even a hint of a rumor the second she heard one. She loved being the center of a good story, and so Bubba knew she was on her way to share this tidbit with anyone who would listen. She would have it on Facebook to all of her family all over the United States, and he knew that because he saw her posts to them regularly. If he was lucky, she’d also text her daughter who had a big following on social media as a stylist to the rich and famous on the East Coast, and the rest would take care of itself. The story would blow up before anyone thought to verify it because that was how social media worked these days. If he was lucky, Sahara would come out of hiding just to prove she was still alive, and he would get one clear shot at her and change the rumor to a truth.
He put the groceries away, took time to eat some lunch and send a couple of texts to make sure all was going as planned, then changed into old jeans and a lightweight T-shirt, tennis shoes in case he had to run, and headed out the door, this time taking care to be quiet.
He drove back to the street where the old house was located, then drove another half block and parked. He got out and began walking, as if out for a stroll, and when he got to the old three-story house, he stopped to stare at it, as if he was a prospective buyer casually walking around the house. He slipped back into the unlocked window when the coast was clear, and this time ran all the way up to the attic.
The fact that the house was hot as hell now was not lost upon him. So the ghosts didn’t hang out here in the daytime, or if they did, they were lying low. He got down on his knees and quickly reassembled the rifle, loaded it, checked the scope and then stood up to look out the dormer.
As he’d hoped, locals were already beginning to gather at the front gates to the Travis estate because the old gossip would have told her local friends first. They were taking pictures on their phones and likely posting them back to Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, innocently furthering the lie that he’d told. There were a couple of empty wooden boxes in a corner that he hadn’t seen from the time before, so he pulled one of them up to the window and sat down to wait.
Soon, sweat was pouring out of his hairline and down his face. His clothes were stuck to his body, and he wished another thunderstorm would come through and cool off the city. But he refocused his thoughts on the task at hand.
The longer he waited, the larger the crowd grew, and the more pleased he became. When the cops showed up and then left without dispersing the crowd, he laughed.
“By God, this just might work.”
* * *
While Brendan was confident the police would be pursuing the info he’d sent them, he wasn’t going to quit now. Carson had given him some very interesting information, and it would either play out in their favor or not.
The good news was that Shelly and the kids were getting well, and Carson hadn’t caught whatever it was they’d all had. Concerned that Carson would get caught hacking into something that would get him in trouble, Brendan ended his brother’s participation with a thank-you, the promise of a steak dinner and a bottle of his favorite wine next time he saw him.
He glanced up from the desk to check on Sahara. She was still sleeping. At least it was helping pass the time, but as he watched, she whimpered, then rolled off her belly and curled up onto her side, her knees drawn up as far as they would go.
Frowning, he got up and pulled the afghan off the end of his bed and covered her with it. He didn’t think she was cold, but the weight of covers could be a reassuring feeling to someone who was afraid. He wished so much for the freedom to just lie down beside her and wrap her up in his arms, but they needed to find a killer worse than she needed the end to a bad dream. He leaned down, brushed a kiss across her forehead and went back to work.
Carson had given him the address of where Leopold Travis’s body was found—an abandoned house in the middle of the Ninth Ward. There were many buildings like it that were rotting and in disrepair because of Hurricane Katrina, but he had a strong suspicion that the building of the murder scene was special for some reason. In no way was he going to buy someone kidnapping Leopold from his own home, taking him to what amounted to an abandoned house in the middle of a dead zone and then randomly killing him there.
So he logged in to a site he often used and began to research the owners of that particular property through county records. What he hadn’t figured on was the actual age of New Orleans and how many records were attached to a single property. But he could contain his search to within a certain span of years. After he found the names, he began researching census records to see if those owners had heirs with birthdays that would fall within the timeline of the payoffs they’d found.
It was a tedious task. He got up a couple of times to go to the bathroom and to stretch his legs, and like Sahara, he felt confined because his job was to stick with her and she wasn’t going anywhere.
When he heard a soft knock at the door, he got up. It was Billie. She saw Sahara asleep and motioned for him to come out in the hall so they could talk.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“There’s a crowd of people gathering outside the gate.”
He scowled. “Again? What the hell for? Is the media there, too?”
“I can’t tell. I didn’t even know they were there until one of them buzzed to be let in, and I didn’t recognize the name. I looked out to see if he was still there after I’d refused, and that’s when I saw them all. I’d guess there’s at least fifty or more.”
“Damn it,” Brendan said. “Call the police.”
She took off down the hall.
Brendan went back into the bedroom and then looked out the window in disgust.
“Hell’s fire,” he muttered. “What now?”
He watched until he heard sirens, and then saw a half-dozen cruisers pull up and police getting out to disperse the crowd. He watched the cops moving toward the gates, then walking aimlessly through the crowd for a few minutes before a couple went back to their cruisers.
Within minutes, the house phone rang. He picked up. “Hello?”
“Brendan, it’s me. The police just called. The crowd is putting up some kind of memorial. There are flowers and candles and stuffed toys all along the fence,” Billie said.
“For Katarina and Leopold? Why now?”
“No,” Billie corrected him. “They think Sahara was killed today.”
“Well, hell, why would they think—” And then it hit him. “I continue to marvel at the depths to which this person will go.”
“What do you mean?” Billie asked.
“How much do you want to bet that our killer started this rumor, knowing it would escalate to this? The national news will report it. The crowd outside will grow larger, and the makeshift memorial larger and a bigger freaking mess...unless Sahara, herself, shows up to prove she’s alive. And when she does, there’ll be a sniper somewhere waiting for a kill shot. One shot is all it takes if he’s good.”
Billie gasped and then started to cry. “Why won’t this madness end? What are we going to do?”
“Don’t worry, Billie. This guy thinks he’s smart, but he’s clearly desperate and hasn’t thought this through. In a world where social media reigns, why would anyone ever need to go outside? Hell, she could probably do a live Skype call and that would be all it takes to squash this rumor. But we’ll go a step further just to prove it’s legit. I’m going to wake up our Sleeping Beauty and have her make another call to her friends at the local television stations. A live, on-the-spot interview inside the mansion will do it and added verification from the media who saw her.”
“Oh, Brendan, that’s brilliant! Yes, that should work,” she said. “If I need to do anything, just let me know.”
“Will do, and thanks,” he said, and hung up.
Sahara was sitting on the side of the bed when he turned around.
“So Sleeping Beauty woke up and without the kiss from her prince. What’s going on?” she asked.
“I can fix that,” he said, then sat down beside her and took her into his arms. The kiss he gave her was soft and searching and ended far too soon.
She groaned softly when he pulled away.
“I’m sorry, baby, but you heard what I said. There is a large crowd gathering at the gates, and the beginnings of a makeshift memorial. Flowers, candles, teddy bears...you know the drill. If this catches on, it’s going to take the physical sight of you to end it. But if you go outside, you’ll become a sitting duck.”
She stood abruptly, anger in every feature on her face.
“Oh my God! This is never going to end! So this is why you mentioned the television station to Billie.”
“What do you think?” he asked.
“I think if they’ve heard the rumor, too, they’ll be all over getting the scoop directly from the source. Yes, I’ll call, but I don’t remember the freaking number. I have to go back downstairs to—”
“Wait,” Brendan said, and handed her his phone. “Google it.”
“Oh. Right,” she said. Within minutes she was, once again, speaking to the station manager who was in shock that he was hearing her voice.
“I can’t believe I’m speaking to you. We just heard this a few minutes ago and have been trying to get verification from the police department, but no one’s called back,” he said.
“If you’ll send your crew over here again and put me on the air live, you’ll have yourself another scoop and hopefully end this before it gets too far.”
“Oh...it’s already ridiculous. That’s why we’ve heard about it. Someone came into the station talking about an unsubstantiated story spreading all over social media that the killer finally took you out. Since no one has seen sight of you since the day you arrived in New Orleans, the viewing public bought it.”
Sahara groaned. This was the nightmare that kept on giving.
“So when can you come?”
“As soon as we can round up the crew.”
“You better ask for a police presence or you won’t get through the crowd,” she said.
“Yes, yes, we’ll be there soon.”
She handed the phone back to McQueen and then ran into the bathroom to look at herself.
“I have bed hair, no makeup on, and look at what I’m wearing! And I have to be on air in less than an hour.”
“I like that sleepy-eyed bedroom look myself,” he said, and then grinned when she glared at him. “Want me to go get Lucy?”
“If I went on air looking like this, they wouldn’t believe it was me, so yes, please. I’ll need all the help I can get to be ready before the film crew arrives.”
She heard Brendan cross the hall and knock, then a murmur of voices. She grabbed a hairbrush from the bathroom and walked back into the room, trying to tame the curls, as Lucy came hurrying into the bedroom with purpose in every step.
“Sahara! I don’t like this. The only strangers who have been in this house so far are the TV crew. What if the killer is one of them? He’d have seen the whole setup of the house once. What if he’s the one who started this lie, knowing it would give him the chance to come back in again? What if this might be the time he makes his move?”
Sahara’s heart skipped as she looked at McQueen, suddenly doubting their decision.
Brendan was staring at Lucy. This was the most he’d heard her say since they’d been introduced. It was also the first time he’d heard her express concern for Sahara’s welfare since that day in the hospital when she’d arrived bloody and in tatters. Still...she had made a good point.
Then he heard the tremble in Sahara’s voice.
“Brendan, what do you think? Should I not let them in? We could do just a brief word at the door, couldn’t we?”
He shook his head. “I don’t like that idea. That leaves you open the moment you show your face.”
She looked at Lucy, and then at Brendan, back and forth, back and forth.
He could tell she was wavering, and then she took a quick breath and blurted her decision.
“We’re doing this inside as Brendan suggested. He’s in charge of keeping me safe.”
Brendan exhaled slowly. “And I still will,” he said.
Lucy shrugged. “That’s fine. I just felt I had to say my piece. You do your makeup while I take care of your hair. I think we should put it up, don’t you? It’ll save having to style it too much. And you can wear one of the dresses we brought. Anything but black, though. That’s too reminiscent of a funeral, which is the opposite message we’re trying to achieve here.”
And just like that the tense moment had passed and Sahara appeared to pull herself together, going willingly into the bathroom with Lucy.
Brendan wanted to hug her. He wanted to tell her that he would not let her down. That he would die before he’d let anyone touch her. Instead, he pointed to the table where he’d been working.
“I’ll just be over here,” he said to no one in particular, and sat down because his legs were suddenly shaking. All he could think was Please, God, help me keep her safe.
* * *
A long hour passed as the crowd grew larger and larger. When Bubba saw a van from a local television station coming up the street, he frowned. Here was where it got tricky. If she came to the door for a few words, he was gold. But if they went inside to get a full interview, once again this was wasted effort.
The van passed through the crowd toward the gates, and two police cruisers stopped and got out for crowd control to let the van pass through.
When the van drove up to the house, he saw the crew get out and head toward the door.
He opened the window and stood all the way up.
He recognized the reporter—an anchorman who did the six o’clock news on that station. If he had to, he would shoot through him to get to Sahara Travis.
He took aim. Now the front door was in the crosshairs. Perfect.
The door began to open.
“Hold it, hold it, hold it,” he muttered, then to his horror, the door swung all the way inward with only a fleeting glimpse of the housekeeper as the whole crew filed inside.
A wave of disappointment swept through him, followed by growing frustration. He’d known it would be a long shot, but it could have worked.
“Just fuck it,” he said, then dropped back into the shadows and closed the window.
He sat down and quietly disassembled the rifle, repacked it in the case and made his way out of the house, then back to his car while frustration slowly turned to rage.
The air-conditioning in the car was on high as he drove through the city, then headed out into the countryside, wondering what his life might be like if he just turned his back on all of this now and kept driving. Right now, they didn’t even know where to look. They couldn’t prove anything. They couldn’t pin anything on him.
He drove all the way to Baton Rouge, stopping at a little restaurant he used to go to with his mother. It was barely the dinner hour, but close enough.
He ordered a bowl of gumbo and, for an entrée, blackened shrimp and grits. The food was tasteless, but it didn’t matter. It was the ritual of remembering his past that he’d come for.
He stayed only long enough to finish, then left a dollar tip when he paid, like his mama always had. Not because she was cheap, but because they never had enough. He left before he could see the angry look on the waiter’s face.
He started driving around the city, remembering when he’d lived here, the school he’d gone to, the park he’d played in. Remembering everything.
* * *
Billie was upset and trying to hide it as she welcomed the film crew back into the mansion.
“Good afternoon, gentlemen. Miss Travis is in the formal living room. This way, please.” She led them back to the white room, where, days earlier, Sahara had received Katarina’s friends.
She saw Sahara sitting in icy silence with McQueen only feet away and then left them to it.
“Stop there,” Brendan said, as the news crew froze. “One at a time, please,” he said shortly, and again patted down every member of the crew, including the anchorman, searching duffel bags with sound equipment and any place a weapon could be stored, before letting them into the room.
For the crew, it was their second time to be searched here, and it brought home the seriousness of Sahara’s situation in an unexpected way.
Sahara sat without speaking, letting Brendan do his job and making no apologies for the reason.
Last time she’d worn white to match the room, but this time she was wearing a navy blue minidress with three-quarter-length sleeves and a plunging neckline. Her dark hair appeared to have been carelessly yet perfectly piled up on top of her head, leaving tantalizing wisps dangling around her face and neck. She was limited on dress shoes, but in deference to the tender skin on her foot, she had chosen the same sandals she’d worn before.
Lucy was absent at her employer’s request. Sahara was adamant that the fewer people the killer could connect to her, the safer they would be. Since she wasn’t needed, Lucy escaped to the kitchen to stay with Billie.
Buzz Jordan was the six o’clock news anchor and would be the one with the lead-in. Despite the heat, he was wearing a pale gray summer-weight suit, a pink shirt and a maroon-colored necktie. He was a confident thirtysomething man who knew he was good-looking but managed to carry it off without seeming cocky.
“Okay, Miss Travis, we’re just about ready. I’ll do the voice-over, the camera will cut to the date on my cell phone to verify this isn’t a prerecorded clip, and then the camera will cut to you. You will say what you need to say, and then I’ll thank you, do a wrap-up, and we’ll be out of here.”
She glanced at McQueen. He had the curtains drawn, the crew thoroughly vetted, and stood just out of the shot with his hand on his gun. The quick nod he gave her was the cue she was waiting for, and she gave the anchorman a thumbs-up.
He had his earpiece on. The voice in his ear began the countdown.
“In five, four, three, two and...you’re live!”
Buzz Jordan turned to the camera. “We are here with breaking news to quell a rumor that has gone viral on both local and national news, thanks to social media. The rumor involves Hollywood megastar Sahara Travis’s death, and the claim made that she was murdered today. Efforts to stop the rumor have been unsuccessful, partly because she has been forced to stay in hiding, since her life is still in danger. To prove this is not a stunt, or a prerecorded clip, I’m showing you the current date and time on my cell phone.”
The camera did a close-up as Buzz Jordan kept talking.
“Miss Travis is here with us now to make a statement that will end these foolish rumors once and for all, and stop the memorials gathering all over the country. Miss Travis, what would you like to say to the millions of viewers who are watching this live?”
The camera cut to Sahara as she looked straight into the lens.
“I think I was as shocked as you all were to hear that I was dead. As you can see, that is anything but the truth. I was so touched to see the crowds outside my family home, and to learn of the mementos being left at the gates. My fans mean the world to me. I take pride in my work and would never want to let you down. It is touching to know that you really care.
“So, as you can see, I am alive and well, and putting this rumor to rest for good.”
Then her expression changed. Brendan saw a muscle jerk at the side of her jaw, and when her hands doubled up into fists, his heart skipped a beat. What the hell was she about to do?
“Now I have another message,” she said, and slowly stood. “It’s for the gutless coward who murdered my parents...the same asshole who’s been trying to kill me.”
The whole crew gasped, as did McQueen.
She stared straight into the camera. “Look at me, you slimy little weasel. If you want me dead, you’re going to have to come into my world to do it. Every attack you’ve made has been behind my back, or in the dark. You’ve killed two elderly people, an innocent young woman, an airport mechanic, and got your own hired gun killed—all because you’re afraid to face me. That says coward to me, and I’m not afraid of cowards. If you want me, you know where I am. Come and get me.”
Brendan strode over to where Buzz was standing. “Cut the feed now,” he snapped.
Buzz nodded at the cameraman, and the live feed ended.
Brendan turned around and stared at Sahara as if she was a stranger. He had not seen that coming, and now it was too late to take it back.
“What the hell did you just do?” he asked.
She lifted her chin and wouldn’t answer in front of the crew.
Brendan hustled them out of the house, then ran back to where she was waiting.
She was standing in the doorway.
“Why?” he asked, then took her in his arms and held her.
“Because I’m sick of this, and I want it over. I set the trap. Now it’s your job to figure out a way to make him think I will be unprotected.”
“Damn it, Travis,” he said, then tilted her chin up and kissed her.