Fat Tuesday(99)

While debating what to do, Basile asked them if the fish were biting.

So they weren't lawmen. Or was Basile tricking her into thinking they weren't?

She took another clandestine peek. The men were barely distinguishable in the pale light, but there was nothing in their rough appearance to distinguish them as law enforcement officers, nor were there any official insignias on their boat.

In English, the spokesman of the group told Burke that they weren't on a fishing expedition."We're looking for someone. A priest."

"Just any ol' priest or one in particular?" Basile kept his tone light, but Remy knew the friendliness was counterfeit.

"This priest, Father Gregory, we think maybe he was in trouble.

Who knows?" She detected the Gallic shrug behind the Cajun's words.

"If he has enemies, we don't want any trouble from them."

"What made you think he might have enemies?"

Basile listened to the man's tale without comment. When he finished, Basile said, "Lost in the swamp? Poor fool. In any event, nobody's been by this way since I got here several days ago."

The three men in the boat held a whispered consultation, then the spokesman thanked Burke, bade him good night, and they pushed off.

Turning the boat around, they started back the way they'd come.

Remy considered charging through the door and calling out to them but decided against it. What about them had frightened Father Gregory more than the perils of the swamp? He must have had a compelling reason not to trust them.

Or had he feared only that they would turn him over to the authorities?

She stood up and ran toward the door, but Basile was there to block her."You can scream and they'll come back," he said in a low, urgent voice, "but you have no guarantee that they won't hurt you."

"What guarantee do I have that you won't?"

"Have I so far?"

She couldn't see his eyes, but she felt their intensity, and she knew he was right. Her safety was reduced to choosing the devil she knew.

Sensing her decision, he crossed the room and extinguished the lantern, plunging the shack into total darkness."Just in case they're around the bend watching," he said.

"What do you think happened to Father Gregory after he sneaked away from the wedding?" she whispered.

"God knows. But at least I know he made it that far."

Gregory had resigned himself to dying soon.

He wouldn't receive the death penalty for the role he'd played in the kidnapping, but he wouldn't last long in prison. Guys like him were prey, and they were outnumbered by predators. In a cell block, his life span might be a couple of months. But after even that amount of time, death would be a welcome release.

He cowered in the backseat of the unmarked police car, his heart tripping crazily. But, surprisingly, they weren't heading toward the Vieux Carre station."Are you taking me uptown?" The arresting officers ignored him and continued their conversation about their upcoming Mardi Gras party plans.

When they passed police headquarters without even slowing down, Gregory's terror went into overdrive."Where are you taking me?"

The man in the passenger seat turned to him."Will you shut up?

We're trying to talk here."

"Are you guys feds?" They laughed and the driver said, "Yeah, that's us. Feds."

Disliking the sound of their snickers, Gregory began to whimper.

"I was forced to be an accomplice. Basile, he's meaner than hell. He threatened to kill me if I didn't help him. I didn't even know what he was going to do. I ... I didn't know anything about the kidnapping until it was a done deal."

Since his avowals of innocence didn't seem to faze them, he took another tack."My daddy's rich. If you take me to his house, he'll pay you a lot of money, no questions asked. Just tell him what you want, and you'll get it. He's wealthy, I swear."

"We know all about you, Gregory," said the one in the passenger seat "Now shut the f*ck up, or I'm liable to get mad."

Gregory swallowed his next earnest entreaty and began to cry qui officers, and all doubt of that was removed when they drove into the underground parking garage of an office building. At this time of night, the garage was empty save for only a few other cars.

A parking garage had been the setting for countless movie murders, and those grisly scenes kaleidoscoped through his mind. He figured that this was where they would have him face the concrete wall and shoot him in the back of the head. His faceless body would be discovered tomorrow morning by an office clerk arriving early for work.

"Please," he blubbered, recoiling against the seat when they opened the car's rear doors."Please don't."

But the man he'd mistaken for a cop reached into the backseat, grabbed him by the front of his shirt and hauled him out. He sank to his knees and began to beg for his life, but they pulled him to his feet and prodded him toward the elevator.

Okay, so they weren't going to shoot him in the parking garage.

Probably didn't want to get blood on their clothes. They were going to take him up to the roof of the building and throw him off, making his execution look like a suicide. For being an accomplice in a kid napping, Gregory James had gone over the edge. Literally.

However, before reaching the roof, the elevator stopped on another floor. When he was dragged from the cubicle, Gregory was surprised to find himself in a carpeted corridor, lined on either side by mahogany doors. At the end of the austere hallway was a set of double doors bearing an engraved plaque.