Chapter
13
Nowell followed Clarice into his
apartment, then closed and locked the door. She hadn’t felt this
giddy, hadn’t known this mixture of excitement and uncertainty in
nearly forty years. Not since the first time she and Jonathan had
made love. She’d been twenty-three then and living in Memphis,
working at a dress shop, learning her trade. On a rainy Tuesday a
young soldier, home on a month’s leave, came into the shop looking
for a birthday gift for his mother. They had taken one look at each
other and it had been love at first sight. Jonathan had been
handsome, dashing, ardent. He’d simply swept her off her feet.
Within two weeks of their first meeting, they were engaged. And the
night he put the ring on her finger, he made love to her for the
first time. Those had been the happiest days of her life. Three
short weeks. Five months and a hundred love letters later, Jonathan
had been killed in Vietnam.
Nowell slipped his arms around Clarice
and drew her back up against his chest. While nuzzling her neck, he
whispered, “I love you, Clarice. I love you more than life
itself.”
She turned slowly, the warmth of his
embrace, the tenderness in his expression enveloping her in a
loving cocoon. His adoring gaze told her more than the words he had
spoken what his true feelings were. She never should have doubted
him. But she’d been confused since the first day Nowell Landers
walked into her life. He’d just shown up one day at Belle Rose and
asked to see her.
“I don’t mean to disturb you, ma’am,”
he’d said. “I’m Nowell Landers, and I was a friend of Jonathan
Lenz. We were in the same outfit in Nam. I—I was with him when he
died.”
She hadn’t been as instantly attracted
to another man since Jonathan, so was it any wonder that she kept
finding similarities in the two men? Same height and similar
builds, although Nowell was heavier, broader, probably the results
of aging. Same piercing dark eyes. But there were differences, too.
Enough so that she could usually differentiate between the two. Yet
sometimes, when Nowell and she were alone together, like now, her
heart longed for them to be the same man. Of course, that wasn’t
possible, was it? Jonathan was dead.
“I don’t like that sad look on your
face.” Nowell rubbed his index finger across the frown lines on her
forehead.
“Sorry, I was just thinking about…It
doesn’t matter.” Standing on tiptoe, she kissed him. Sweet and
fleeting, just a brush of lips against lips.
“You were thinking about Jonathan,
weren’t you?”
Clarice grabbed Nowell’s hand. “Don’t
be jealous. I loved Jonathan dearly, but he’s been gone a long,
long time.”
“You still love him,” Nowell
said.
“I …yes. But I love you, too. And I
never thought I’d ever love again.”
“It’s all right, honey.” He cupped her
face with his big hands. “I don’t mind if you love both of us. Your
heart’s big enough for that.”
“How kind you are. How understanding.”
She tugged on his hand. “I thought you brought me back here to your
apartment after our dinner date so that you could ravish
me.”
He smiled. “I want to make love to you.
But only if it’s what you want, too.”
“It’s what I want,” she told him. “More
than anything.”
Nowell scooped her up into his arms.
Sighing with delight, she draped her arm around his neck and laid
her head on his shoulder. He carried her through the small living
room and into the bedroom, then placed her in the center of the
bed, on the brown quilted spread.
“I haven’t been with anyone in years,”
she told him. “Not since…”
“No one?” he asked. “No one since
Jonathan?”
“No one…until you.”
“God, Clarice.”
She was both surprised and yet deeply
touched by the tears in Nowell’s eyes. Crying seemed so out of
character for the big burly man. Opening her arms in welcome, she
said, “Make love to me.”
His gentleness mixed with passion,
showing her by heated romantic words and nerve-tingling caresses
that she was precious to him. “Precious beyond words,” he said as
he removed her beige silk blouse and unlatched the front hook of
her bra.
Shouldn’t I
feel the least bit embarrassed? she wondered.
Shouldn’t I worry that he will be disappointed when he sees my thin
sixty-year-old body? But she felt neither embarrassment nor worry
as Nowell slowly, tenderly removed her clothes, caressing her,
kissing her, praising her each step of the way. When she was
completely naked, he rose up and off the bed and quickly divested
himself of his own clothing. Clarice watched with fascination as he
stripped down to bare skin. He was big, thick chested, and very
hairy. His chest hair was almost white and the rest was mixed with
gray. She studied him, admiring his raw masculinity. And another
comparison came to mind. He looked like Jonathan there, too.
Although her experience was limited, she knew enough about men to
know they weren’t all equally endowed.
“You keep staring at me that way,
honey, and I won’t be able to wait. And I want to wait. I want to
take a long time with you.”
Clarice swallowed. Her nerves sang a
high-pitched melody of great expectations.
Nowell came down over her, bracing his
weight so that he didn’t crush her. His lips moved over her face,
down her throat and stopped to pay homage to her small breasts, her
taut nipples. She quivered, the sensation an unbearably painful
pleasure. While he acquainted himself with every inch of her body,
every curve, every indentation, she caressed him—his shoulders, his
hairy chest, his large biceps, his stomach, his penis. When she
circled him, he drew in a deep breath, but made no move to stop her
when she began pumping him. Odd how familiar everything was, the
taste of him, the feel of him, the sound of his heavy breathing.
Making love must be like riding a
bicycle, she thought, you
never forget how to do it.
With intimate lunges, Nowell’s tongue
explored between her open thighs. When he laved the kernel of
sensitive flesh between her feminine folds, Clarice’s hips bucked
upward to meet his mouth. And then before she realized what was
happening, she climaxed. While shudders of release racked her body,
Nowell tested her readiness and found her moist from her orgasm. He
lifted her hips and entered her, slowly, carefully, inch by inch
embedding himself deeper inside her. When he’d taken her fully, she
wrapped her legs around his hips and participated passionately as
he thrust and retreated. Within a couple of minutes, he came, his
roar of completion like that of a jungle animal.
“God, Ricie, I love you.” He eased off
her, sliding down beside her on the bed.
Although she was in a state of shock,
she didn’t protest when he pulled her close and held her. She lay
there, her heart beating wildly, her mind filled with chaotic,
incomprehensible thoughts. He had called her Ricie, but apparently
wasn’t aware that he had. Jonathan had called her Ricie. No one
else. Only Jonathan. There was a logical explanation for why he’d
used Jonathan’s pet name for her. There had to be. But she couldn’t
imagine what that explanation might be. She couldn’t believe that
Jonathan would have shared something so personal, so intimate with
anyone else, not even a comrade in arms. But what other explanation
could there be? Unless… Oh, Clarice, you
mustn’t do this to yourself. Stop thinking crazy thoughts. Accept
Nowell for who he is and be grateful that you’ve found love again.
Don’t ask for the impossible.
Tired, dirty, and feeling slightly
waterlogged after drinking God only knew how many cups of coffee,
Jolie dropped her head onto the old desk in the basement of the
sheriff’s department and groaned loudly.
“Okay, I give up,” she said. “We’ve
gone over every inch of this basement, looked through every damn
file cabinet, every shelf, every drawer, in every nook and cranny.
There are no Belle Rose massacre files.”
Theron cocked his chair backward, up on
two legs, stretched his arms, entwined his fingers, and cupped the
back of his head. “Either someone took them, probably years ago, or
someone destroyed them. It really doesn’t matter. Either way, we’re
screwed. Without those files—”
“Don’t say it.” Jolie lifted her head
just enough so that she could look at Theron. “There has to be
another way to get the case reopened. Just the fact that the files
are missing should prove something.”
“Prove what?” he asked. “Prove
incompetence? Files get misplaced all the time. We have no proof
that they were destroyed or taken. All we have is my gut
instinct.”
“Then we’ll just have to find another
way to gather evidence. Find Sheriff Bendall, if he’s still alive.
Talk to his deputies. It’s only been twenty years ago. Most of them
probably still live around here. And there’s always the CIB report.
The agent who came to Sumarville to investigate had to have filed a
report. We need to find out his name and where he lives
now.”
“I’m too tired to think about it
tonight.” Theron checked his wristwatch. “Damn, it’s nearly eleven
o’clock.” He scooted back his chair and stood. “Come on. Let’s go
home. We can come back tomorrow and straighten up this mess. After
a good night’s sleep, we’ll plot our new strategy.”
Jolie rose to her feet, arched her
back, and groaned. “I’m not used to sitting that long. My neck,
shoulders, and back are sore.”
As they headed for the stairs, Theron
clamped his hand on Jolie’s shoulder. “Take a long soak in the tub
before you go to bed. Then sleep until I phone you in the morning.
Bright and early tomorrow, I’m going to make some calls and also
talk to Ike to see if I can find out the whereabouts of everyone
involved in the investigation. As soon as I have something to go
on, I’ll call you.”
“Sounds like a plan to
me.”
Upstairs they said good night to the
deputies on the evening shift, then headed outside to their cars.
Just as Jolie unlocked and opened the driver’s side door of her
Escalade, Theron called to her.
“You realize that Ike was right about
it taking somebody with money and power to pull Larry Newman’s
strings, don’t you? The same holds true for whoever saw to it that
those records disappeared. And since we have no way of knowing if
those files have been missing for years or only for
months—”
“What are you trying to
say?”
“If the files were misplaced in the past few months or even the
past few years, then I’d say either Roscoe Wells or Max Devereaux
is the man behind the scenes.”
“And if they were misplaced twenty
years ago?” She held her breath, knowing the answer, but needing to
hear Theron say it.
“Then it would be either Roscoe or…” he
hesitated a split second, “or Louis Royale.”
She released the breath she’d been
holding, suddenly feeling like a deflated balloon. “Why would
Daddy… Oh , my God. To protect Georgette.”
“Or Georgette’s son.”
Georgette lay awake in her bed. Alone
and afraid. She’d never been afraid when Louis was with her. He
always kept the demons at bay. Nothing would ever be the same
without him. He had known her so well, understood her completely,
and loved her unconditionally. Now that Louis was gone, Max would
try his best to take care of her. But her son didn’t know the woman
she’d once been, so he couldn’t truly understand her well enough to
help her fight the monsters that lived inside her.
The room lay in shadows. The
night-light in the corner didn’t banish enough of the darkness. She
reached out and flipped on the bedside lamp. A creamy glow
illuminated the room. Georgette slipped out of bed, grabbed her
thin silk robe from the chaise longue, and went to the French doors
that opened out onto the upstairs balcony at the front of the
house.
As a young girl she had dreamed of
living in a house like this, with servants to wait on her, and more
money than she could spend in a lifetime. While she earned her
living by giving her body to any man with the right price, she had
kept her heart untouched. And dreamed of the day her prince would
come. Philip Devereaux had been her prince. One of her customers
for several years, using her services whenever he visited New
Orleans, Philip had fallen in love with her. She had given Philip a
little piece of her heart when he married her and took her with him
to live in Sumarville. His home had been nice, better than anything
she’d ever known, but it was nothing in comparison to Belle
Rose.
The first time she saw Louis Royale,
she knew that he was unlike any man she’d ever known. And the first
time he touched her, she had felt that she was destined to be his
in a way she had never belonged to another man. She had given her
whole heart to Louis, loving him more than she’d ever thought
possible. And he had loved her, with his body and his heart and
even with his very soul.
But I had no
soul to give you, did I, my love? Georgette whispered
the words as she opened the French doors and walked out onto the
balcony. Once you’ve killed, once you’ve
taken another person’s life, you lose your
soul.